A friend writes that the fall of Dr. George Rekers, while certainly calling his pseudoscience into question, doesn’t refute his arguments. I suppose he’s right. It’s an ad hominem argument, the kind I hate when they come from the other side. NARTH responded simply: He doesn’t exist anymore.
http://www.narth.com/docs/rekers.html
… but his memory lingers on in their home page
response:
NARTH has accepted Dr. Rekers’ resignation and would hope that the legal process will sufficiently clarify the questions that have arisen in this unfortunate situation. We express our sincere sympathy to all individuals, regardless of their perspective, who have been injured by these events. We also wish to reiterate our traditional position that these personal controversies do not change the scientific data, nor do they detract from the important work of NARTH. NARTH continues to support scientific research, and to value client autonomy, client self-determination and client diversity.
There’s a subtle point here. NARTH believes that it is under attack because:
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homosexual activists want to suppress NARTH’s scientific evidence
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homosexual activists don’t value client autonomy, self-determination, and diversity
I don’t think that they want to suppress NARTH’s science because it disagrees with their own. I think they want to argue with it on its merits. Maybe I should retract that last sentence as a guess about what others think and speak for myself. I want to argue their evidence on its merits because it’s not even good "bad science." And I really doubt that homosexual activists are opposed to "autonomy, self-determination, and diversity." It’s what they are fighting
for. Their fight with NARTH has, in my opinion, other roots. They are opposed to NARTH because NARTH is an anti-gay organization fighting against the Civil Rights of homosexual people and basing it on something they call science. Rekers wasn’t testifying about "autonomy, self-determination, and diversity," he was testifying that all homosexuals would be unfit parents of either adopted or foster children. Rekers’ treatise that has been now scrubbed from the NARTH web site was entitled
Review Of Research On Homosexual Parenting, Adoption, And Foster Parenting. It reiterated the argument that homosexuality is a disease, a pathology, a sickness. That’s what homosexuals are fighting against.
NARTH’s scientific arguments reduce down to a short list. Arguments against promiscuity, arguments that there’s more psychopathology in gay people than heterosexual people, arguments that homosexuals might be more attracted to younger people than heterosexual people ergo might be more likely to abuse their foster or adopted children, and a variety of arguments that hypothesize that gender identity is learned from same-sex parents [eg James Dobson’s idea that fathers and sons should shower together]. First, their numbers are jury rigged and much of what they say has no numbers because there aren’t any. But more to the point, it’s very likely that anything in these differences that might be true would be the result of there having been no place in society for healthy or "normal" development for homosexual kids. And as for "learned" gender identity, one in four American children is being raised in a single parent home already. They seem to be "gendering" just fine. Like this example, NARTH’s science is kind of silly.
NARTH and Dr. Rekers are really proposing that society and children are better served if homosexuality is either eliminated or considered a mental illness [or a sin] – that acknowledging its presence would corrupt society for the rest of us. Certainly, that proposal is not true for the society of the 4-7% of the population that is homosexual. Is that "better" for the remainder of society? The trajectory of history says "no." While there seem to be trends in most societies towards some kind of homogeneity, and recurrent attempts to engage government in preserving some kind of homogeneity, the results suggest that this is not our best thinking. That’s why, at least in this country, we aspire to the idea that all of us are "created equal."
Being gay, being black or asian or latino or amerindian, being a woman, being unconnected with a mainstream religion – all of these things remain harder in this country than being what’s left – a white, heterosexual, christian male of european extraction. As someone who has mostly grown up being in this latter group, I haven’t found life to be altogether that easy myself. But I’m completely sure after almost seventy years on the planet that making life harder for others wouldn’t have made life any easier or better for me.
On February 1, 2010 the American Academy of Pediatrics reaffirmed its position first set forth in a Technical Report published in its official peer reviewed publication Pediatrics, Vol. 109, No. 2, February, 2002, pp. 341-344. In this report the AAP reported on a comprehensive review of all studies of children raised by gay or lesbian parents, as well as the parenting skills, attitudes and values of gay and lesbian parents, particularly those that compared these results with similar measures of children raised by nongay parents. This report found no significant differences in parenting skills, attitudes and values between gay and nongay parents, found no significant differences between personality measures, self-esteem measuresbehavioral difficulties or academic success between children raised by 1 or more gay or lesbian parents and children raised by nongay parents. There was no documented difference between the percentages of selfidentification as hetero or homosexual by adult children of gay/lesbian parents versus adult children of nongay parents. In summary, the report concludes that “the weight of the evidence gathered during several decades using diverse samples and methodologies is persuasive in demonstrating that there is no systematic difference between gay and nongay parents in emotional health, parenting skills and attitudes toward parenting. No data have pointed to any risk to children as a result of having grown up in a family with one or more gay parents.” This is but one in a long line of academically sound and peer reviewed reports reaching the same conclusions. What is often touted as “scholarly” research by folks such as Rekers typically turns out to be supported by footnoting to the author’s other works, e.g., Rekers’ MO, or to organizations formed by the authors to advance the specific anti-gay agenda.
Thanks for that. It’s from the real people [the American Academy of Pediatrics] rather than the made up one Rekers and his friends created [the American College of Pediatricians]…