The second researcher in less than a week has confirmed that the religious-right American Family Association and its allies lied about research regarding sexual orientation.
Earlier today, Truth Wins Out reported that Francis Collins, Ph.D, of the Human Genome Project has again repudiated falsehoods being spread about his research by ex-gay activist Greg Quinlan and the American Family Association. We also pointed out that a recent article by Kathleen Gilbert, published by the American Family Association and LifeSiteNews, appeared to have falsely reported the results of a British paper by professor Michael King.
In a followup story, Box Turtle Bulletin today said it checked the original British paper and found little resemblance between it and the claims of AFA and LSN. The Bulletin asked King for his reaction. King replied:
LifeSiteNews and OneNewsNow have misinterpreted our review. Evidence from around the world identifies the main stressors leading to mental distress in gay and lesbian people as discrimination, prejudice, bullying in schools and colleges, and the consequent need for many LGB people to keep their homosexual identity secret, even from their families.
Our review did not examine links between mental disorder and homosexual “behaviour” or “lifestyle”. Our work reviewed studies of the mental health of lesbian, gay and bisexual people, and sadly, those studies showed that it is people (not behaviour) that are discriminated against, and not least by religious groups and organisations.
Discrimination on the grounds of sexuality is even more devastating than other forms of discrimination such as racism, as it reaches right into families and leaves no refuge for its victims.
Box Turtle Bulletin adds:
To throw more confusion into the mix, Gilbert tossed in a discredited 2007 study by Nazi-apologist Paul Cameron which supposedly demonstrated that “that the lifespan of a homosexual is on average 24 years shorter than that of a heterosexual.” She also used Cameron’ study to claim that discrimination hat nothing to do with it, saying that, “Homosexuals in the United States and Denmark – the latter of which is acknowledged to be highly tolerant of homosexuality – both die on average in their early 50′, or in their 40′ if AIDS is the cause of death.”
We have already examined glaring flaws in Cameron’ study, as has Danish epidemiologist Morton Frisch who described his study as “humorous example of agenda-driven, pseudo-scientific gobbledygook.” Cameron’ false claims of presenting this “study” before the Eastern Psychological Association earned him an official condemnation from EPA president Phile Hineline in April 2007.
Exodus International seems eager for such misinformation to continue to confuse the ex-gay movement and its allied churches and political groups: Since April 2007, the organization has declined to publicly warn the antigay and ex-gay movements about the lies, nor has the organization challenged AFA, LSN, NARTH, or Quinlan to correct themselves.
