Year: 2010

Martin Ssempa wants to dialogue on his blog. He has been blogging the past few days and wants some company, even inviting Pam’s House Blend to join in.

I posted a couple of brief comments neither of which has been approved as yet. One of the comments requested that Rev. Ssempa post a link to a copy of the bill. Then his readers can evaluate the accuracy of this statement:

A lot has been spoken about the death penalty creating hysteria among some of you that we propose to run around and round up anyone who practices sodomy. No such thing..The death penalty is specifically proposed in cases of aggravated defilement which is the equivalent of statutory rape of minor or a handicapped person against their wish. I do not support or will not support any bill which seeks the death penalty for homosexuals.

I wonder why Rev. Ssempa allowed this video to be posted to his website with a man calling for the death penalty for homosexuals. At about 2 minutes, a man is featured who calls for Mosaic law to be upheld. Given what the Anti-Homosexuality Bill actually says and the demonstrations he organizes, it is understandable to me that GLBT people fear for their lives in Uganda.

Avaaz.org is hosting a petition opposing Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Bill. The first installment of signatures was delivered earlier today to the Speaker of the Parliament, Edward Sekandi. From Afrik.com:

The anti-gay bill was tabled in parliament by member of parliament David Bahati in October 2009. Since then a lot has been debated about the harshness of punishments in the bill.

The petition was today morning presented to the speaker of Uganda parliament Edward Sekandi by four people who said were representing Aids service providers, human rights activists, spiritual mentors and councilors.

Rev. Canon Gideon Byamugisha, the first Anglican church priest in Uganda to declare that he was living with HIV-AIDs in late 1980, led the group that presented the bill to the speaker in parliament.

Byamigisha told the press in Kampala that the speaker welcomed their petition and promised to send it to the committee working on the bill. He said that Sekandi told them that it is now too late to withdraw the bill because it is already in the hands of parliamentarians.

Last week, a British ex-gay group, Core Issues, hosted an ex-gay conference in Belfast, NI. One of the people involved with Core Issues is Paul Miller, a psychiatrist who was identified in 2008 by NI member of parliament Iris Robinson as a psychiatrist who works with gays to help them go straight.

Now Dr. Miller is facing more scrutiny due to a complaint from journalist who posed as a client and then wrote about the therapy experiences with Miller. The General Medical Council is hearing the complaints. The Independent article is here and Dr. Miller’s work is referenced as “David” in the article and conducts the therapy over Skype.

My intent is not to reflect on Miller’s problems. He is a devotee of Richard Cohen and the UK representative of NARTH. As such his methods and views are predictable. What I want to point out is that the website Core Issues has a link to the Sexual Identity Therapy Framework. I have asked them to remove the link and they have not answered my requests. I want to make it public that the SIT Framework contradicts the rest of the website and is not there by the permission of Dr. Yarhouse or me.

Given the links to NARTH and involvement of Miller, it is hard to understand links to the other resources including ours. Andrew Marin’s book is featured prominently as is Yarhouse’s Institute for the Study of Sexual Identity. In the SIT Framework, we specifically mention Richard Cohen’s book, Coming Out Straight as an approach which is inconsistent with the framework. Explaining a client’s experience as being a reparative drive is something we discourage as well.

There are two broad paradigms in sexual identity ministry – change and congruence. The change paradigm sees homosexuality as a treatable disorder and encourages the use of therapy and religion to change orientation. The congruence paradigm takes no strong position on what causes homosexuality. Change is not the objective but congruent living with a chosen value position. The website Core-Issues is a collection of references and resources which include both models. They certainly are free to put anything on a website which is public domain but I am also free to point out that the SIT Framework is within the congruence paradigm and inconsistent with most of what was described in the Independent article as well as what seems to be the focus of the Core-Issues organization.

After March Madness – which I am looking forward to – the month of the Days will be here. April 15 (or 12th if you listen to the PSA on the website) is set as the Day of Truth with April 16 being the Day of Silence. The boycotters will also be pursuing their mischief. This week, the Illinois Family Institute sent out an email asking for supporters to find out if their local school would be taking part in the Day of Silence. Soon after, Exodus sent out an email promoting the Day of Truth.

In response to the boycott and the Day of Truth, I will again support the Golden Rule Pledge. For more on that, go on over to the Golden Rule Pledge site.  And consider joining the Facebook group supporting the GRP.

Also, this week, fellow Crosswalk.com blogger, John Shore posted on the GRP. His initial reaction to the GRP was not positive and his readers are giving me some tips.

Writing in defense of unnamed NARTH leaders, Julie Hamilton recently said on the NARTH (National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality) website:

NARTH will continue its mission as a scientific organization despite the propaganda, and the research will continue to speak for itself.

However, then just across the page, one encounters a “NARTH Research Report” titled, Health Risks: Fisting and other Homosexual Practices. NARTH authors Michelle Cretella and Philip Sutton suggest that gay advocacy group GLSEN is currently teaching high school kids that fisting is safe practice. However, the authors fail to say that the incidents provoking their article happened 9 and 10 years ago. The NARTH article begins by framing the concern over those incidents as being in “recent weeks” but the incidents are old news. I am no fan of GLSEN’s conferences or reading list, but why use old news as a hook?

Furthermore, the article is a clear effort to associate risky practices with gays in a way similar to that being used now by Martin Ssempa in Uganda. However, the title and tone of the article overlooks an important fact – some heterosexuals also engage in those practices. In fact, if you go on Amazon.com and look up the practices referenced in this article, you will find how-to books written for straights (actually just take my word for it). Would a scientific organization claiming to provide science on sexuality overlook such things?

Now after a brief selective review of opinion and some studies, the authors determine that all things gay are harmful and lead to dysfunction. The studies don’t actually say that but most studies do find that homosexuals as a group report more psychiatric problems than straights and that there are risks associated with some sexual practices. However, the scientific train goes off the track with the conclusion.

Conclusion: An adolescent’s desire to prevent or cease experiencing serious medical, psychological, and relational health risks is sufficient reason for him or her to seek and receive competent psychological care to minimize or resolve the desires, behaviors and lifestyles associated with such increased risks.

Translation: If you experience same-sex attraction, better get some reparative therapy quick so you can avoid all the nastiness.

A scientific organization would then offer research the benefit of reparative therapy for mental health outcomes. The claim in the conclusion above is that changing orientation will allow you to avoid the problems NARTH finds with being gay. However, the problem with the claim is that those studies have not been done. To evaluate Cretella and Sutton’s conclusion, one would want to assess the mental health of ex-gays and gays and see who has the best outcomes.* Or one would expect to see large gains in mental health outcomes as the result of the therapy NARTH proposes. Where are the studies?

An author Cretella and Sutton quote is David Fergusson. Last year, Fergusson had this to say about a similar NARTH review of homosexuality and health risks:

While the NARTH statement provides a comprehensive and accurate analysis of the linkages between sexual orientation and mental health, the paper falls far short of demonstrating that homosexuality should be classified as a psychiatric disorder that may be resolved by appropriate therapy. To demonstrate this thesis requires an in depth understanding of the biological and social pathways that explain the linkages between homosexual orientation and mental health. At present we lack that understanding. Furthermore it is potentially misleading to treat what may be a correlate of mental disorder as though it were a disorder in its own right.

Fergusson also told me that studies designed to demonstrate positive changes in mental health via reparative therapy have not been done. In other words, there are no guarantees that changing orientation, if it could be accomplished in the manner suggested by Cretella and Sutton, would alter the mental health differences currently observed between gay and straight groups.

Julie Harren-Hamilton says the scientific research will speak for itself. However, just across the page, we have two authors providing a conclusion without adequate research. Apparently, on the NARTH website, the research needs a little help to speak in advance.

*There was a study which found better mental health outcomes among a sample of gays than an Exodus sample but this has not been replicated to my knowledge. Nottebaum, L. J., Schaeffer, K. W., Rood, J., & Leffler, D. (2000). Sexual orientation—A comparison study. Manuscript submitted for publication. (Available from Kim Schaeffer, Department of Psychology, Point Loma Nazarene University, 3900 Lomaland Drive, San Diego, CA 92106).

Another study of some relevance is the study of Exodus participants from Jones and Yarhouse. They found that their entire group of participants experienced enhanced mental health over the study period. Inconvenient for the NARTH claim is that the entire sample, whether gay or ex-gay, experienced improved health from Time 1 to Time 6.