Immoralism, Homosexual Unhealth, and
Scripture
A
Response to Peterson and Hedlund’s
“Heterosexism, Homosexual Health, and the Church”
Part II: Science: Causation and
Psychopathology, Promiscuity, Pedophilia, and Sexually Transmitted Disease
by
Robert A. J. Gagnon, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of New Testament,
Pittsburgh Theological Seminary
gagnon@pts.edu
© 2005
Robert A. J. Gagnon
I.
Introduction
This portion of my response to Peterson
and Hedlund’s Critique of my work corresponds to their
Part 1 on science, specifically pp. 1-6 where they concentrate their
critique of my work. A general presentation of the results below is given
in my Part 1.
II. The
Association between Homosexuality and Psychopathology
•
an endemic dearth of long-term, monogamous relationships (further
rejection by members of the same sex)
•
an inability to procreate with one's same-sex partner
•
an obsessive centering on self that may occur when sexual
intercourse can be obtained without having to learn how to relate to a
sexual “other” and when erotic attraction is directed toward the very
physique and traits that one shares in common with another
•
the dismal association of same-sex intercourse with debilitating,
sometimes terminal, sexually-transmitted diseases
•
shame and guilt over one's abnormal and unnatural sexual preference
(a realization that stems from visible evidence of same-sex
discomplementarity or the inability to relate properly to the opposite
sex, not from “internalized homophobia”)
No one can pretend to know all the
causes for the current health crisis and pinpoint the exact percentage
of “blame” on each cause. Nevertheless, the bottom-line statistics speak
for themselves. (The Bible and Homosexual Practice, 475-76)
III. The Dearth of
Lifelong, Monogamous Homosexual Relationships
A. Peterson and Hedlund’s
carelessness in reconstructing my argument. Peterson and Hedlund,
under the heading “3. Sexual promiscuity” (pp. 2-5 of Part 1 of their
critique) are so careless in representing my position that they begin by
splicing material from my book where I suggest factors for “higher rates
of depression and suicides attempts” (pp. 475-76) into a discussion of
factors that I raise for “The Dearth of Lifelong, Monogamous Homosexual
Relationships” (pp. 453-60). They also confusedly state that I “repeatedly
characterize homosexuals as afflicted with a rampant sexual promiscuity
due to ‘an endemic dearth of long-term monogamous relationship’” (p.
2, emphasis added; the quote is from p. 476 of my book). I do not
characterize the disproportionately high rates of sex partners on the part
of male homosexuals—a better description than “homosexuals as afflicted
with a rampant sexual promiscuity”—as “due to” a dearth of long-term
monogamous relationships (surely a tautological point!). Obviously the latter is a result, not a
cause, of the former. As we shall see (and as pointed out in my book), the
cause has to do with basic biological differences between men and women,
here specifically the greater problem that men have with maintaining
monogamy, a problem that is exacerbated in an all-male sexual union.
Their attempt to refute the research
that I cite on pp. 453-60 boils down to two extraordinarily weak pieces of
evidence.
B. Why their citation of Terry Stein
doesn’t prove what they think it does. Peterson and Hedlund cite a
paragraph by Terry Stein from Kaplan and Sadock’s Comprehensive
Textbook of Psychiatry (eds. B. J. Sadock and V. A. Sadock; 7th ed.;
Lippencott Williams & Wilkins, 2000), p. 1624 (Stein is the author of the
entry on homosexuality):
The majority of gay
men and lesbians report being in a committed romantic relationship with
surveys indicating that 45 to 80% of lesbians and 40 to 60% of gay men
are currently in such relationships. From 8 to 14% of lesbian couples
and from 18 to 25% of gay male couples report that they have lived
together for more than 10 years. In contrast to stereotypes of gay men
and lesbians, they clearly form and maintain intimate same-sex
relationships.
Now what does this paragraph tell us?
1. Let’s consider the source. Stein is a
known homosexual activist for homosexual causes who has served as a
Director of the AIDS Education Project at Michigan State University, Chair
of the American Psychiatric Association’s Committee on Gay, Lesbian, and
Bisexual Issues, Associate Editor of the Journal of Gay and Lesbian
Psychotherapy, and President of the Association of Gay and Lesbian
Psychiatrists. Could he have any biases and selectivity in his
presentation and interpretation of data?
2. Note the problems with what the first
sentence claims. The questionable statistics (what are the studies and how
representative were the surveys?) show an extraordinarily high
imprecision, “45 to 80% of lesbians” and “40 to 60% of gay men,” for what
amounts to be nothing more than a self-reported claim to a “committed
relationship,” whatever that means. There is no information provided in
the citation as to whether the relationship is “open” to outside partners
(a not uncommon phenomenon particularly among male homosexual unions). Nor
is there any information about the rate of infidelity in non-open
relationships.
For example, consider a 2003 study
entitled “Relationship Innovation in Male Couples,” presented at the 2003
American Sociological Association conference by Dr. Barry Adam, a
professor of sociology at the University of Windsor and homosexual
activist. Adam interviewed 70 homosexual men in Ontario who were part of
60 couples and found that only 25% reported being monogamous; and most of
the latter were in a relationship of less than three years duration (note
that being in a relationship of at least a year was a qualification for
being in the study). According to Adams, “One of the reasons I think
younger men tend to start with the vision of monogamy is because they are
coming with a heterosexual script in their head and are applying it to
relationships with men. What they don’t see is that the gay community has
their own order and own ways that seem to work better” (http://www.washblade.com/2003/8-22/news/national/nonmonog.cfm).
3. Furthermore, Stein’s very next
sentence undermines any assumption that these relationships are, as a
rule, long-term, let alone lifelong. Stein states, in effect, that nine
out of ten lesbians and eight out of ten homosexual men have been unable
to achieve even a ten-year relationship, let alone a twenty, thirty,
forty, or fifty-year sexually intimate relationship.
4. In the final sentence of the quote
Stein adds: “They (viz., homosexual persons) clearly form and maintain
intimate same-sex relationships.” But whoever questioned whether
homosexual persons were able to do that? Certainly not I. What we don’t
see here is any evidence that long-term (to say nothing of twenty years,
and forget lifetime) and monogamous homosexual unions are anything
but an exception to a consistent rule.
C. Their failed attempt at refuting
the research cited in my book. The second attempt by Peterson and
Hedlund to refute the research that I cite on pp. 453-60 about “the dearth
of lifelong, monogamous relationships” has to do with the research that I
cite regarding the high numbers of sex partners for homosexual males. They
claim that these cited studies “are either out-dated (pre-1973), have
small samples, are from studies of patients with AIDS, are from the gay
Advocate magazine, or are from some of the most sexually
promiscuous population centers in the world.”
There are serious distortions of the
data in this statement.
1. Peterson and Hedlund selectively omit
mention of the fact that I cite a 1997 study of 2,583 homosexually active
men in Australia who are 50 years or older, produced by researchers from
Macquarie University (discussed on p. 455 of my book). Only 15% of the men
reported having fewer than eleven sex partners to date, while on the other
end of the spectrum 15% had over 1000 sex partners. A whopping 82% had
over 50 partners and nearly 50% had over 100.
2. The 1992 National Health and Social
Life Survey (discussed on pp. 453-54 of my book) conducted mostly by
researchers from the University of Chicago (Laumann et al.) had a
relatively small sample size of homosexual men but at least it was a
random sample and not just a survey of “the most sexually promiscuous
population centers in the world.” It indicated that over a five year
period homosexual men had 4-5 times the number of sex partners that
heterosexual men had.
3. A 1994 Dutch study of 156
“close-coupled” male homosexual relationships found that by the sixth year
of the relationship the number of outside sex partners averaged eleven
(discussed on p. 456 of my book). Two 1984 American studies that I cite
also found that non-monogamous behavior was the norm for nine out of ten
homosexual couples.
4. Peterson and Hedlund debunk mention
of The Advocate surveys (pp. 455-56) even though these surveys
report slightly better figures than the other studies I cite. If anything,
the results of these surveys were skewed in favor of, not to the
detriment of, a homosexual agenda. The reason why is evident. Here
homosexual readers with an obvious vested interest in putting the best
face on homosexual practices self-select. They know to what political ends
the surveys will be used. Moreover, The Advocate is the largest
homosexual magazine in America. It reaches the homosexual “mainstream” and
not just the gay bar scene. Despite these factors, the surveys report that
nearly 60% of the male homosexual respondents, whose average age was a
mere 38 years old, had already had thirty or more sex partners. In
the past year alone, two-thirds had more than one sex partner and the
large majority of these had five or more. About half had
engaged in three-way sex in the last five years, a quarter group sex (four
or more). Also interesting here is that lesbian respondents come off
looking much better than their male counterparts as regards number of sex
partners (though worse as regards the longevity of the relationship).
In fact, Peterson and Hedlund
conveniently fail to mention that all the studies mentioned in my book
that report on both male and female homosexual behavior, from the Bell and
Weinberg study of the San Francisco Bay area in 1970 to studies in the
1990s, indicate that lesbian women do far better than homosexual males in
keeping down the numbers of sex partners (with rates approximating those
of heterosexual males, not heterosexual females). It is hard to attribute
this primarily to societal “homophobia” since both male and female
homosexuals face societal opposition.
D. Fundamental biological differences
between male and female sexuality. Peterson and Hedlund refuse to
acknowledge the obvious; namely, that male sexuality is far more given to
non-monogamous behavior than female sexuality. This is a cross-cultural
phenomenon. A recent study of over 16,000 persons around the globe, first
world and third world, industrial and tribal societies, concluded that,
on average, men want more sex partners than women do and are far more
willing to have sex with persons whom they have known for only a short
time. Cf. David P. Schmitt et al., “Universal sex differences in
the desire for sexual variety: Tests from 52 nations, 6 continents, and 13
islands,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
85 (2003): 85-104. It is studies like this one
that rightly generate the wry observation, “What would we do without
experts?” Of course, men and women are significantly different as
regards sexual arousal patterns. Of course, when two men are paired
in a sexual relationship they typically act like men—without a restraining
female influence. Women on average manufacture only about
one-seventh the amount of the sex-hormone testosterone each day that men
do. It
doesn’t take a scientist to figure out what kind of effect that is
going to have on male sexuality. Male sexuality is simply more given to
visual stimulation and genital focus than is female sexuality, which
partly explains why pornography is such a booming industry among males but
much less so among females.
Evolutionary
psychologists have replicated studies over and over again that demonstrate
that men are far more inclined to consider having sex with persons that
they know only marginally well than are women. See: David M. Buss,
The Evolution of Desire: Strategies of Human Mating (New York:
Basic Books, 1994); and, for a textbook, Linda Mealey, Sex Differences:
Development and Evolutionary Strategies (San Diego: Academic Press,
2000). For example, Mealy summarizes sex differences in mating strategies
across species, noting that “males are typically more sexually available
than females,” “males are typically more easily aroused than females,” and
“males are typically more likely to seek multiple sexual partners than are
females.” In The Bible and Homosexual Practice (p. 460) I have a
long footnote on Donald Symons’ The Evolution of Human Sexuality
(Oxford University Press, 1979). Symons argues that homosexual males do
not exhibit different tendencies in sexual behavior than heterosexual
males. The problem, rather, is that male homosexual relationships simply
lack the restraints imposed by female partnership (pp. 292-300). Putting
two males together in a sexual union is not a recipe for
lifelong, or even long-term, monogamy.
One could cite further research but it
suffices to cite the conclusions of J. Michael Bailey (cited above), at
the time chair of the department of psychology at Northwestern University,
in his chapter on “Gay Masculinity” in The Man Who Would Be Queen:
As noted above, Bailey would make a
similar observation of couple of years later in The Man Who Would Be
Queen, minus of course the negative assessment of this reality about
the nature of male sexuality. His chapter on “Gay Masculinity” contends
that homosexual males, as regards sexual stimulation patterns, remain very
much . . . well, male. Like heterosexual men and in contrast to women
generally, homosexual men show a greater interest in casual sex, manifest
a higher response to visual sexual stimuli (hence, more likely to seek out
pornography), invest greater significance in a prospective partner’s
physical attractiveness, show a stronger preference for younger partners,
and are less driven to have and raise children. Pair a man with another
man and what do you get? Very little of the balancing effect that comes
from pairing a man with a woman.
E.
Respectable male homosexual opposition to monogamy. Even respectable
male homosexual activists have long been making the point that the
principle of monogamy is too stifling. For example, Andrew Sullivan, a
senior editor at The New Republic and a well-known columnist (and a
homosexual man), wrote in his book Virtually Normal: An Argument about
Homosexuality (Random House, 1996):
There is more likely to be greater
understanding of the need for extramarital outlets between two men than
between a man and a woman; and again, the lack of children gives gay
couples greater freedom. . . . Marriage should be made available to
everyone. . . . But within this model, there is plenty of scope for
cultural difference. There is something baleful about the attempt of some
gay conservatives to educate homosexuals and lesbians into an uncritical
acceptance of a stifling model of heterosexual normality. (pp. 200-204)
Building Closets or Opening Doors
(Polyamory), Hyatt: Imperial
Ballroom 3, Fran Mayes. Have we who know the freedom of coming out to live
without fear or shame created our own MCC closets? The stories of some of
us who love and/or partner with more than one other person will be
presented as told to me for my dissertation “Polyamory and Holy Union in
UFMCC”. Chosen families in light of the Bible, a theology of sexuality,
history, and worldwide practice.
Our Gay Gaze: Using Your Eyes in Whole
New Ways to Get What You Want,
Hyatt: Imperial Ballroom 7, Dave Nimmons. From glances to gaydar,
lingering stares to winks, gay men have made eye contact an art form, with
its own power, language, rituals, and conventions. . . . Whether you’re
cruising for sex, intimacy, or spirit, this experiential, intimate session
will open your eyes about how to use your gaze to get what you most need.
You won’t ever see gay men the same way again.
Requiem for a Bitchy Queen: An inquiry
to a new ethical archetype,
Hyatt: Imperial Ballroom 8, Dave Nimmons. The tart-tongued, trash-talkin’
Bitchy Queen, equal parts camp and competition, is as much a part of gay
male socializing as brunch. . . . An intimate, provocative, personal
encounter with the she-bitch within. Funeral attire optional.
F. The structural link between
monogamy and binary sexual differentiation. Peterson and Hedlund
shouldn’t be surprised that a monogamy principle is threatened by societal
affirmation of homosexual unions. For this principle of restricting a
sexual relationship to two persons at a time is predicated on a structural
consideration of human physical makeup that Peterson and Hedlund want us
to ignore: the twoness or binary character of the sexes. Because there are
essentially two and only two sexes, the presence of a male and female in a
sexual relationship is both necessary and sufficient for reconstituting a
sexual whole, so far as the number of persons in the union is concerned. A
third party is neither needed nor desirable. Jesus recognized the
significance of sexual duality for marital monogamy and indissolubility
when he cited Genesis 1:27 and 2:24 back-to-back as normative and
prescriptive for human sexual behavior: “For this reason,” namely,
because God “made them male and female,” “a man . . . will be
joined to his woman/wife and the two will become one flesh.” He
implicitly extended the logic of the twoness of the sexes that had always
been incumbent on women (polyandry was unknown) to men as well, closing a
loophole that Moses had granted due to human (chiefly male) “hardness of
heart” for sexual relationships involving more than two persons. And he
did so by appeal to “the beginning of creation” (Mark 10:5-8 par. Matt
19:4-5, 8). A society that maintains an other-sex sexual prerequisite may
overlook or ignore the implications of two sexes for multiple-partner
unions, as did ancient Israel and nineteenth-century Mormonism. However,
it is difficult to see how a society can long maintain a strong monogamy
standard apart from grasping its implications. This is particularly the
case as regards modern Western society where patrilineal concerns have
receded in significance.
If society repeals a male-female
prerequisite, there no longer remains any logical or nature-based reason
for society to withhold approval from multiple-partner sexual unions,
whether fashioned in the mold of traditional polygyny or in a form
characterized by greater egalitarianism and/or bisexuality. The major
counterarguments to this assertion do not hold up. For instance, if
someone argues that a person can truly love only one other person at a
time, another can counter that parents have no difficulty loving all their
children equally intensely and fully. Why should being in a sexual union
with two or more persons be any different, especially since advocates of
homosexual unions make their case from claims to love and commitment and
resist any restrictions on what they perceive to be nonexploitative sexual
behavior? If someone contends that multiple-partner unions are not a
necessity of sexual life in the way that same-sex partnerships are for
homosexually oriented persons, another can respond that there are surely
at least as many people (especially men) who experience dissatisfaction
with monogamy that is as intense, and as “hard-wired,” as any
dissatisfaction with other-sex partners experienced by homosexual persons.
Finally, if someone makes the point that multiple-partner unions are less
stable configurations than monogamous unions, another could retort that
homosexual unions on the whole have shown themselves to be even less
stable and characterized by
more partners lifetime than traditional polygamous arrangements. In the
end, only an insistence on the male-female dimension of sexuality enables
a consistent stance against various “plural” unions.
The existence of “intersexed”
(hermaphroditic) persons does not significantly undermine the binary model
of sexual relations, since the former phenomenon involves overlapping
features of the two existing sexes, not distinct features of a third sex.
Moreover, extreme sexual ambiguity is very rare, encompassing only a tiny
fraction of 1% of the general population. Usually an allegedly intersexed
person has a genital abnormality that does not significantly straddle the
sexes; for example, females with a large clitoris or small vagina, or
males with a small penis or one that does not allow a direct urinary
stream. The category of the “intersexed” no more justifies an elimination
of a binary model for human sexuality than some fuzziness around the edges
of defining “close blood relations” and “children” justifies the
elimination of standards against incest and pedophilia. Of course, too,
homosexual persons who seek to discard a binary model for sexual relations
do not claim, for the most part, to be other than male or female. Thus
they, at least, remain logically and naturally bound to a binary model for
mate selection.
G. The problem with female
homosexuality. We have seen some of the evidence for a
disproportionately high rate of non-monogamous behavior in male homosexual
activity. What about female homosexuality? Are there any special problems
associated with lesbian relationships? While homosexual females, for their
part, do not experience anything near the number of sex partners lifetime
or rate of sexually transmitted disease averaged by homosexual males, they
are not without their own special problems. Studies to date suggest that
female homosexual unions are of even shorter-term duration than male
homosexual unions. For example,
a 2004 study of divorce rates for same-sex registered partnerships in
Sweden from 1995 to 2002 indicates that female homosexual couples were
twice as likely to divorce as male homosexual couples (see also the
discussion in the
Institute for Marriage and Public Policy). Even the quote that
Peterson and Hedlund give from Stein, cited above in III.B., indicates that lesbian
unions are twice as likely to dissolve before reaching the ten-year mark
as even male homosexual unions.
Moreover, relative to both heterosexual
females and homosexual males, homosexual females experience a higher level
of some psychiatric disorders such as major depression and substance
abuse. Stanton Jones and Mark Yarhouse compare the “National Lesbian Care
Survey” by J. Bradford et al. (Journal of Consulting and Clinical
Psychology 62 [1994]: 228-42) and the work of L. Robins et al. (Psychiatric
Disorders in America [Free Press, 1991]) to show that lesbian women
show a threefold increase in the incidence of serious personal distress
as compared to heterosexual women (Homosexuality: The Use of Scientific
Research in the Moral Debate [Intervarsity, 2000], 104-105). An
important 2001 Dutch study of “Same-Sex Sexual Behavior and Psychiatric
Disorders” (Archives of General Psychiatry 58.1: 85-91) showed that
homosexual females were significantly more likely to experience mood
disorders (49%) such as major depression (44%) than were homosexual males
(39%/29%; compare rates for heterosexual females [24%/20%] and
heterosexual males [13%/11%]).
How do we explain these two special
problems associated with lesbian relationships, shorter-term relationships
and higher levels of mood disorders such as major depression? An
explanation that takes into consideration basic biological/psychological
differences between men and women probably provides the answer—consistent
with the fact noted above that mood disorders and anxiety disorders are
also twice as high among heterosexual women as among heterosexual men. On
average women tend to expect significantly more of a sexually intimate
relationship than do men in terms of communication and relational
responsibilities (does anyone not know this?) and thus place greater
demands on a partner to meet personal needs. John Gray has made a bundle
of money on this common recognition of a male-female difference in his
aptly titled book, Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus: A Practical
Guide for Improving Communication and Getting What You Want in Your
Relationships (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1993). To have two women
with this higher needs index in a sexual relationship puts additional
strains on the relationship, which probably contributes markedly to more
problems and breakups that then impact mental health.
H. Conclusion. The different
problems experienced by male homosexual unions and female homosexual
unions provide ample testimony of the significance of male-female
differences and hence of the healthy balancing effect of a male-female
pairing on the excesses of each sex. In a sexual bond between persons of
the same sex the extremes of one’s sex are not moderated and gaps are not
filled. It is this reality that contributes in a significant way to the
disproportionately high rate of problems associated with homosexual
practice, at significantly different rates for male homosexual
relationships and female homosexual relationships. Only those who choose
to be blind to sexual realities can deny this obvious point.
I. The demagoguery of the left.
Instead of acknowledging the obvious, Peterson and Hedlund take a page
from a demagogic piece by David Balch of Brite Divinity School and accuse
me of language that inflames people to violence against homosexual persons
(pp. 4-5). I have already responded at length to Balch’s ludicrous claims
at my website (go to
http://www.robgagnon.net/articles/homoBalchFalseWitness.pdf/). Balch
draws together a pastiche of quotations out of context from various parts
of a 500-page book and utterly ignores the numerous exhortations made in
the book to loving homosexual persons and not responding in hate. For
example: the reference to “depraved sexuality” on p. 244 is an accepted
translation of the term koitai in Rom 13:13, a rubric that for Paul
clearly included homosexual practice (cf. Romans 1:24-27; arsenokoitai,
“men who lie with males,” in 1 Cor 6:9). References to “self-debasing
conduct” on p. 263 and to “self-degradation” and Paul’s “visceral
response” on p. 269 are, in context, precise characterizations of Paul’s
own description of homosexual practice in Romans 1:24-27 as stimulated by
self-“dishonoring” or self-“degrading” desires and as “indecent conduct.”
The reference to “heinous” is on p. 311 where I note that for Philo of
Alexandria, as undoubtedly for Paul, “the first and most heinous stage of
feminization [of the passive male sexual partner] occurred in the act of
sexual penetration.” This too is true. Have Peterson and Hedlund ever read
Philo? Do
they want to make the absurd argument that Philo did not regard such
behavior as heinous? The reference to “particularly revolting sin” again
occurs in a statement that refers to Paul’s views on the matter: “It seems
clear that Paul regarded homoerotic actions as particularly revolting sin
that should be avoided.” This is obviously an accurate interpretation of
Paul’s remarks in Romans 1:24-27. The comparisons with incest, adultery, and even
bestiality are all made both in Scripture and in early Jewish literature
(as I noted, bestiality is considered worse even than same-sex
intercourse). Does Balch, or Peterson and Hedlund, want to argue that the
historical facts are otherwise? And, again, my exhortations to love and
not to hate are repeated throughout the book but are conveniently ignored
by these critics in order to present a slanderous portrait that serves
their ideological agenda. The ends apparently justify the means for such
critics. For example (boldface added):
I deplore
attempts to demean the humanity of homosexuals.
. . . The person beset with homosexual temptation should evoke our
concern, sympathy, help, and understanding, not our scorn or enmity.
Even more, such a person should kindle a feeling of solidarity in the
hearts of all Christians, since we all struggle to properly manage our
erotic passions. . . . Thus a reasoned denunciation of homosexual
behavior . . . is not, and should not be construed as, a
denunciation of those victimized by homosexual urges, since the aim
is to rescue the true self created in God’s image for a full life. (pp.
31-32)
[As the parable of the Good Samaritan in
Luke 10:28-35 indicates] Christians should treat the homosexual as a
friend to be converted over to the path of life, not as an enemy to be
consigned to the path of death. . . . The church can and should
recapture Jesus’ zeal for all the “lost” and “sick” of society, including
those engaged in homosexual practice. Concretely, this means visiting
their homes, eating with them, speaking and acting out of love rather than
hate, communicating the good news about God’s rule, throwing a party when
they repent and return home, and then reintegrating them fully into
communities of faith. (pp. 227-28)
Far from being an unloving act, a
sensitive refusal to condone homosexual conduct is the responsible and
loving thing to do. . . . To simply assert that God loves us and forgives
us as we are, without holding out the necessity and hope of a life
conformed to the will of God, is to deny “God’s power to do for us what we
cannot do for ourselves. . . .” The church must not shirk its duty to
effect the costly work of reconciliation that liberates persons from
bondage to a sinful self. . . . The church should reject the notion
that the only alternatives are to affirm homosexual behavior or to hate
and harass homosexuals. Rather, the church must affirm a third option:
to love the homosexual by humbly providing the needed support, comfort,
and guidance to encourage the homosexual not to surrender to homosexual
passions. (pp. 484-85)
With regard to church, practicing,
self-affirming homosexuals should be treated as any other persons engaged
in persistent, unrepentant acts of immoral sexual behavior. They should
be loved and ministered to; the church of God must struggle along with
them and share in the groanings of the Spirit. They should also be called
to a higher standard of behavior. . . . The final word on the
subject of homosexuality is and should always be: love God and love the
homosexual “neighbor.” The homosexual and lesbian are not the church’s
enemy but people in need of the church’s support for restoring to
wholeness their broken sexuality through compassion, prayer, humility, and
groaning together for the redemption of our bodies. . . . To denounce
same-sex intercourse and then stop short of actively and sacrificially
reaching out in love and concern to homosexuals is to have as truncated a
gospel as those who mistake God’s love for “accepting people as they are”
and who avoid talk of the gospel’s transformative power. It is to forget
the costly and self-sacrifician work of God in our own lives, past and
ongoing.
The policy stances that the church
must take toward same-sex intercourse do not diminish the believer’s call
to love the individual homosexual. Indeed, a keener understanding of the
theological, social, and physical consequences of same-sex intercourse can
potentially perform the salutary task of helping our “love abound
still more and more in knowledge. . . (Phil 1:9-11). An ill-informed love
can be just as destructive as hatred. It is not enough to want to love. .
. . At the same time, it is not enough to know what is right. Knowledge
can “puff up” or “inflate” the ego. It can become a weapon for exalting
oneself over others in a smug attitude of moral superiority. It can turn
into a tool for “depersonalizing” others. Love must be wedded with
knowledge, faith must express itself in love. . . .
This book has been aimed at
showing that affirming same-sex intercourse is not an act of love, however
well meaning the intent. That road leads to death: physically,
morally, and spiritually. Promoting the homosexual “rights” agenda is an
awful and harmful waste of the church’s energies and resources. What
does constitute an act of love is befriending the homosexual while
withholding approval of homosexual behavior, working in the true
interests of the homosexual despite one’s personal repugnance for same-sex
intercourse, pursuing in love the homosexual while bearing the abuse that
will inevitably come with opposing homosexual practice. It is the harder
road to travel. It is too hard for many people to live within that holy
tension. Yet it is the road that leads to life and true reconciliation; it
is the calling of the church in the world. (pp. 489-93)
Apparently Peterson and Hedlund, like
Balch, commend violence against promiscuous persons, adulterous persons,
and incestuous persons. Rather than speak out against violence to such
persons, they merely try to disassociate homosexual males from such
groups. Or perhaps Balch, Peterson, and Hedlund think that no forms of
behavior should any longer be considered really sinful, because to do so
would inspire violence against persons who commit such behavior. My book
repeats over and over again the importance of showing compassion to
persons engaged in homosexual behavior, just as we should show compassion
to any persons engaged in any form of sinful behavior,
sexual or otherwise. In this I try to take the approach of Jesus who, for
example, in the case of the adulterous woman forgave her but also urged
her to “go and sin no longer” lest (by inference) “something worse befall
you,” i.e., the eternal judgment of God (compare John 8:11 with 5:14).
Only persons such as Peterson, Hedlund, and Balch, persons determined to
misrepresent my work to others, could ignore this important facet of my
argument. In other words, their misrepresentation appears to be willful
and deliberate. Lacking the capacity to mount substantive arguments, they
resort to malicious ad hominem attacks.
IV. The Problem of Pedophilia
Peterson and Hedlund claim that I
misrepresent the evidence as regards the disproportionate rates of
homosexual pedophilia (“The problem of pedophilia,” pp. 1-2).
Unfortunately, they do not bother to refute the evidence that I put
forward. Instead,
Peterson and Hedlund repeatedly talk past the evidence that I provide.
(Note: Consistent with European usage and some American usage I used the
term pedophilia to refer to sex between adults on the one hand and
prepubescent and/or adolescent children on the other.)
A. Cautions. At the outset, let
me make clear that I do not argue that the majority of homosexual persons
are pedophiles or promote publicly the acceptance of pedophilia. Rather,
as I say in my first book:
A second negative effect of
societal endorsement of homosexuality has to do with the problem of
pedophilia and its role in “recruiting” homosexuals into the fold. There
can be little doubt that affirmation of a same-sex lifestyle will increase
the incidence of pedophilic activity, regardless of society's attempt to
distinguish the two. The greater the latitude given to sexual expression,
the more likelihood there will be of people crossing the line into illicit
conduct. Indeed, a substantial body of literature emanating from the
homosexual community entertains the morality of adult-adolescent sex. The
gay community as a whole has not vigorously and swiftly rejected this
development. Indeed, homosexual groups in other countries have been at
the forefront of efforts to lower the age for sexual consent.
Although the majority of
homosexuals are not pedophiles and do not publicly promote pedophilia, the
incidence of same-sex pedophilic behavior is disproportionately high. . .
.
I also doubt that lowering barriers to
pedophilia constitutes the most important negative side-effect associated
with the endorsement of homosexual practice (although I could be wrong in
thinking this). Note, as just one example, my remark on p. 480: “A third
negative effect arising from affirmation of homosexuality, perhaps far
more dangerous than that of pedophilia, is greater permissiveness as
regards sexual promiscuity.” Nevertheless, the ramifications of homosexual
endorsement for the issue of pedophilia are a significant problem and need
to be mentioned. I give it significantly more attention in this article
not because it is significantly more important than other concerns
addressed herein but rather because I give it so little attention in my
book (half a page each on pp. 479-80) that there is now a need for more
documentation of my points.
B. Pro-pedophilic literature coming
from homosexual circles. As the block quotation above states, a
significant body of literature coming from homosexual and bisexual
activists entertains the morality of adult-adolescent or even
adult-prepubescent sex. One can start as early as Alfred Kinsey, a known
bi-/homosexual sex researcher in the 1940s and 1950s who worked vigorously
to present homosexuality to society as a normal and acceptable variant of
human sexuality. As Dr. Judith Reisman puts it in her heavily documented
critique of Kinsey’s work, Kinsey, Crime and Consequences (go to
http://www.drjudithreisman.com/chapter7.pdf for an online copy of ch.
7), Kinsey’s
Sexual Behavior in the Human Male
included 23 chapters of supposedly scientific data and analysis. Perhaps
the most baleful was Chapter 5, “Early Sexual Growth and Activity,” where
Kinsey claimed to show that the tiniest of infants have the “capacity” for
orgasm. He contended that his data confirmed that sexual activity is
natural to the human “animal” from birth, and that human children are
therefore unharmed by sexual activity even from birth. (p. 132)
Furthermore, according to Reisman,
Kinsey
solicited and encouraged
pedophiles—at home and abroad—to sexually violate from 317 to 2,035
infants and children for his alleged data on normal “child sexuality.”
Many of the crimes against children (oral and anal sodomy, genital
intercourse and manual abuse) committed for Kinsey's data are quantified
in his own graphs and charts. For example, “Table 34” on page 181 of
Kinsey's Male volume, claims to be a “scientific” record of
“multiple orgasm in pre-adolescent males.” Here, infants as young as 5
months are timed with a stop watch for “orgasm” by Kinsey's “technically
trained” aides, with one 4-year-old, tested 24-hours around the clock for
an alleged 26 orgasms.
These child “data”
are commonly quoted by sex educators, pedophiles and their advocates to
prove children's innate need for sexual satisfaction. The claim of a
legitimate need by children for a satisfactory sexual life results
ultimately in the teaching of “safe sex” inclusive of all forms of “sexual
orientation,” homosexual, heterosexual, bisexual, etc., via school sex
education. (“Crafting
‘Gay’ Children,” p. 3, summarizing some of the research of her book)
To document
even a significant portion of the links between homosexual activism and
advocacy of adult-child sex would involve another large article. Instead,
I refer readers to an article by Steve Baldwin entitled “Child Molestation
and the Homosexual Movement” in a theme issue on “Homosexuality”
in Regent University Law Review 14.2 (Spring 2002; cf. also the
article by Judith Reisman in the same issue). Here is an excerpt
from Baldwin’s article (pp. 272-77, minus notes):
The most
comprehensive gay networking website, the Queer Resource Directory
(www.qrd.org), links every gay group in the country including NAMBLA [the
North American Man-Boy Love Association] and other homosexual groups that
focus on youth. NAMBLA marches in gay pride parades with the consent of
the gay leadership. Many of the homosexual movement’s most prominent
leaders endorse NAMBLA and its goals. Gay authors and leaders such as
Allen Ginsberg, Gayle Rubin, Larry Kramer (founder of ACT-UP), Pat Califia,
Jane Rule, Michael Kearns, and Michel Foucault have all written in favor
of either NAMBLA or man-boy relationships. Harry Hay, whom many consider
the founder of the American homosexual movement, invited NAMBLA members to
march with him in the 1993 "March on Washington" gay rights parade. He
also marched in the 1986 Los Angeles gay parade wearing a shirt emblazoned
with the words "NAMBLA walks with me."
Leading
mainstream homosexual newspapers and magazines such as the Advocate,
Edge, Metroline, The Guide, and The San
Francisco Sentinel have not only published pro-NAMBLA articles and
columns but also many have editorialized in favor of NAMBLA and sex with
children. The editor of The Guide, Ed Hougen, stated in an
interview with Lambda Report, "I believe they [NAMBLA] are
generally interested in the right of young people to be sexual . . . . I
am glad there is a group like NAMBLA that is willing to be courageous."
The San Francisco Sentinel was more blunt: "NAMBLA’s position on sex
is not unreasonable, just unpopular. [W]hen a 14 year old gay boy
approaches a man for sex, it’s because he wants sex with a man."
There is
also the matter of NAMBLA’s membership status in the International Lesbian
and Gay Association (ILGA), recognized at one time by the United Nations
as the official Non-Government Organization (NGO) representing the gay
community worldwide. When NAMBLA’s ILGA membership became public, a
whirlwind of international controversy erupted. Some gay leaders viewed
this attention as harmful to the gay movement’s image and goals and urged
the expulsion of NAMBLA for purely political purposes.
However,
the media failed to report that ILGA itself had hosted workshops on
pedophilia and passed resolutions in 1985, 1988, and 1990 to abolish age
of consent laws claiming that "same sex age of consent laws often operate
to oppress and not to protect" and supported "the right of every
individual, regardless of age, to explore and develop her or his
sexuality."
Eventually,
reacting to congressional legislation threatening the reduction of $119
million in financial support, the United Nations kicked out ILGA in 1995
for refusing to sever ties with a half dozen member groups that advocated
or promoted pedophilia. Revealingly, even though ILGA did expel NAMBLA
(many say it was for show), it could not muster enough support among its
membership to expel other more powerful and discreet pro-pedophile
organizations from Germany and other countries. It is extremely revealing
that the majority of members of the world’s leading homosexual coalition,
the ILGA, decided they would rather be excluded from UN deliberations than
vote out groups that advocate sex with children.
. . . [O]ver
the last fifteen years the homosexual community and its academic allies
have published a large quantity of articles that claim sex with children
is not harmful to children but, as stated in one homosexual journal,
"constitute an aspect of gay and lesbian life." Such articles have
appeared in pro-homosexual academic journals such as The Journal of
Homosexuality, The Journal of Sex Research, Archives of
Sexual Behavior, and The International Journal of Medicine and Law.
The editorial board of the leading pedophile academic journal, Paidika,
is dominated by prominent homosexual scholars such as San Francisco State
University professor John DeCecco, who happens to edit the
Journal of Homosexuality.
Indeed, the
Journal of Homosexuality is the premier academic journal of the
mainstream homosexual world and yet it published [in 1990] a special
double issue entitled, Male Intergenerational Intimacy,
containing dozens of articles portraying sex between men and minor boys as
loving relationships. One article states that parents should view the
pedophile who loves their son "not as a rival or competitor, not as a
theft of their property, but as a partner in the boy’s upbringing, someone
to be welcomed into their home." . . .
A 1995 content analysis by Dr. Judith
Reisman of the Institute for Media Education, focusing on advertisements
in the nation’s most influential homosexual newspaper, The Advocate,
reveals that 63% of the personal ads sought or offered prostitution. Many
of them openly solicit boys. The Advocate also advertises a
"Penetrable Boy Doll . . . available in 3 provocative positions." Reisman
found that the number of erotic boy images per issue of The
Advocate averaged fourteen. . . .
Indeed, NAMBLA and other
pro-pedophile literature can be found wherever homosexuals congregate
(homosexual bookstores, bathhouses, festivals, gay bars, etc.) [examples
follow] . . . .
The most
popular gay fiction books on the market today are rich with idyllic
accounts of intergenerational relationships according to writer Philip
Guichard in a Village Voice article. Doubleday published a book in
1998, The Gay Canon: Great Books Every Gay Man Should Read, which
recommends numerous works that portray sex with boys in a positive manner.
The Border bookstore chain sells a book, A History of Gay Literature:
The Male Tradition, which includes a chapter devoted to the history of
pro-pedophile literature as an indisputable part of homosexual literary
history [examples follow] . . . .
"Mainstream" homosexual conferences commonly feature speeches about
intergenerational sex as it is now called. For example, at one of the
nation’s largest homosexual gatherings, the annual National Gay Lesbian
Task Force convention, featured a workshop at its 2001 confab entitled,
Your Eyes Say Yes But the Law Says No, which included a speech by an
S&M activist about laws affecting intergenerational sex. The convention
also featured another workshop entitled Drag 101: How to Turn Kids in
Make-up into Kings and Queens.
Pick up any
gay newspaper or gay travel publication and one finds ads for sex tours to
Burma, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and other countries infamous for
boy prostitution. . . . The most popular travel guide for homosexuals,
Spartacus Gay Guides, is replete with information about where to find
boys for sex and, as a friendly warning, lists penalties in various
countries for sodomy with boys if caught. . . .
Homosexual
Internet sites are no different. A quick search using the words "gay" and
"boys" easily locates thousands of homosexual sites that promote sex with
young boys and/or contain child pornography. Indeed, it is the mainstream
homosexual groups who filed suit to block Virginia Legislation, passed in
2001, restricting Internet use that proves harmful to children (such as
chat rooms commonly used by pedophiles to find victims)….
The Holy
Grail of the pedophile movement is the lowering or elimination of all age
of consent laws. The main warriors in this political and legal battle are
"mainstream" homosexual groups [examples follow]. .
Given the
above it would be absurd to pretend that the drive for normalizing
adult-child sexual activity has not been fueled to a considerable and
disproportionate extent by individuals and organizations connected with
efforts at normalizing homosexual practice. Of course, too, the historical
roots of contemporary homosexual movements lie in the pederasty of ancient
Greece and Rome and of many other cultures.
C. Pedophilia and homosexuality: Is
one an inherent mental illness and the other not? What are Peterson
and Hedlund’s specific charges against me as regards my view on the
pedophilia problem? Peterson and Hedlund allege that I misrepresent the
evidence by not telling readers the following things:
-
“Pedophilia, unlike
homosexuality, is a pathological mental disorder.”
-
“A ‘homosexual
(adjective) pedophile (noun)’ is not a homosexual who molests children
but a ‘fixated’ pedophile who prefers boys . . . with little, if any,
erotic interest in adults.”
-
“Because heterosexuals
outnumber homosexuals by 25:1, the total number of boys molested by
heterosexuals and pedophiles outnumbers by many times (>10X?) those
molested by homosexuals. Thus the single place where any child is at
greatest risk of being sexually molested is an outwardly heterosexual
household. (Over 95% of all child molesters self-identify themselves as
heterosexuals.)”
-
Childhood same-sex
experience cannot be “a significant cause of homosexuality” inasmuch as
the Etoro tribe in New Guinea where all boys go through an adult-child
sexual relationship nevertheless produces adult males who are not
homosexual.
Let us begin with their first point:
“Pedophilia, unlike homosexuality, is a pathological mental disorder.” One
can get at the inaccuracy of this statement from two different angles. One
is to make the case, as I have done above, that there is a significant
pathological side to homosexuality as regards mental health issues and
relational problems (short-term relationships, nonmonogamy) that cannot be
attributed simply to societal opposition to homosexual practice. That the
two APAs (Psychiatric and Psychological) no longer classify homosexuality
as such in their official literature is not surprising in view of the grip
that homosexual advocacy groups have on each organization.
The other angle from which the
inaccuracy of the statement can be shown is to underscore the
impossibility of proving that adult-child sex does intrinsic
(or inherent) scientifically measurable harm to children. As
with homosexuality, there is at most only a disproportionately high rate
of harm. Indeed, this very point has been repeatedly made in the last
seven or eight years by a number of psychiatrists and psychologists,
particularly among those most active for homosexual causes. Here we merely
cite some of the more salient research.
A 1998 study published in an American
Psychological Association journal argued that “the claim that childhood
sexual abuse inevitably or usually produces harm is not justified” (B.
Rind, et al., “A meta-analytic examination of assumed properties of child
sexual abuse using college samples,” Psychological Bulletin 124
[1998]: 22-53, quote from p. 44). Rind et al. state in their conclusion:
Beliefs about CSA [child sexual abuse] in
American culture center on the viewpoint that CSA by
nature is such a powerfully
negative force that (a) it is likely to cause harm, (b) most children or
adolescents who experience it will be affected, (c) this harm will
typically be severe or intense, and (d) CSA will have an equivalently
negative impact on both boys and girls. . . . Results of the present
review do not support these assumed properties. . . . CSA is not a
propertied phenomenon and . . . has no inbuilt or inevitable outcome or
set of emotional reactions.
. . . Overinclusive
definitions of abuse that encompass both willing sexual experiences
accompanied by positive reactions and coerced sexual experiences with
negative reactions produce poor predictive validity. To achieve better
scientific validity, a more thoughtful approach is needed by researchers
when labeling and categorizing events that have heretofore been defined
sociolegally as CSA.
One possible approach . . .
is to focus on the young person's perception of his or her willingness to
participate and his or her reactions to the experience. A willing
encounter with positive reactions would be labeled simply adult-child
sex, a value-neutral term. If a young person felt that he or she did
not freely participate in the encounter and if he or she experienced
negative reactions to it, then child sexual abuse, a term that
implies harm to the individual, would be valid. Moreover, the term
child should be restricted to nonadolescent children. . . .
Adolescents are different from children in that they are more likely to
have sexual interests, to know whether they want a particular sexual
encounter, and to resist an encounter that they do not want. Furthermore,
unlike adult-child sex, adult-adolescent sex has been commonplace
cross-culturally and historically, often in socially sanctioned forms, and
may fall within the "normal" range of human sexual behaviors. . . .
A willing encounter between an adolescent
and an adult with positive reactions on the part of the adolescent would
then be labeled scientifically as adult-adolescent sex, while an
unwanted encounter with negative reactions would be labeled adolescent
sexual abuse.
Finally, it is important to consider
implications of the current review for moral and legal positions on CSA.
If it is true that wrongfulness in sexual matters does not imply
harmfulness (Money, 1979), then it is also true that lack of harmfulness
does not imply lack of wrongfulness. Moral codes of a society with respect
to sexual behavior need not be, and often have not been, based on
considerations of psychological harmfulness or health (cf. Finkelhor,
1984). Similarly, legal codes may be, and have often been, unconnected to
such considerations (Kinsey et al., 1948). In this sense, the findings of
the current review do not imply that moral or legal definitions of or
views on behaviors currently classified as CSA should be abandoned or even
altered. The current findings are relevant to moral and legal positions
only to the extent that these positions are based on the presumption of
psychological harm. (pp. 46-47)
The authors are quite right in the last
paragraph that “lack of harmfulness does not imply lack of wrongfulness.
Moral codes . . . need not be . . . based on considerations of
psychological harmfulness or health.” Few wrong sexual behaviors cause
intrinsic (inherent), scientifically measurable psychological or physical
harm. Do Peterson and Hedlund agree? And, if they do, of what relevance to
the discernment of moral wrong is their assertion that homosexual practice
does not cause such intrinsic harm (an assertion, incidentally, with which
I have never disagreed)?
The controversial Rind et al. study was
subsequently and extensively critiqued by S. J. Dallam, et al., “The
effects of child sexual abuse: comment on Rind, Tromovitch, and Bauserman
(1998),” Psychological Bulletin 127 (2001): 715-733. However,
although the second study presented evidence that the first study had
overstated the case and misread some data, it began with the following
caveat:
Please note that the purpose of our
article is not to argue that all types of sexual abuse do in fact cause
pervasive and intense harm in all victims. Indeed, it is well recognized
in the empirical literature that the aftereffects of CSA [child sexual
abuse] are extremely varied and that a significant percentage of abused
children remain a-symptomatic” (p. 716; emphasis added).
For a response to the
criticisms of Dallam et al., see, in the same issue, Rind et al., “The
Validity and Appropriateness of Methods, Analyses, and Conclusion in Rind
et al. (1998): A Rebuttal,” pp. 734-58.
Similar conclusions about the absence of
intrinsic or inherent pathology to pedophilia are stated in a book by
David M. Fergusson (the same person who wrote one of the two key studies
on homosexuality and psychopathology, cited above) and P. E. Mullen,
Childhood Sexual Abuse: An Evidence-Based Perspective (SAGE
Publications, 1999). Although Fergusson and Mullen note that studies
indicate an increased risk of problems for children who experience sex
with an adult (e.g., depression, anxiety, substance abuse, eating
disorders, and relational difficulties), they also contend that there is
no fixed and universal pattern of symptomatic harm. In fact, as many as
40% of those affected may be without any symptoms.
A 2001 study by Bruce Rind (cf. the Rind
et al. study above) assessed “Gay and bisexual adolescent boys’ sexual
experience with men” (Archives of Sexual Behavior 30:345-68). From
a college sample of 129 homosexual and bisexual men,
26 were identified as having
had age-discrepant sexual relations (ADSRs) as adolescents between
12 and 17 years of age with adult males. Men with ADSR experiences were as
well adjusted as controls in terms of self-esteem and having achieved a
positive sexual identity. Reactions to the ADSRs were predominantly
positive, and most ADSRs were willingly engaged in. Younger adolescents
were just as willing and reacted at least as positively as older
adolescents.
Of course, a small sample size such as
this, and of college students no less (where the incidence of positive
adjustment is likely to be significantly higher), is hardly a
representative sample. Self-esteem is also not an adequate index of
non-harm. But it does suggest the obvious: sex between young adolescents
and adults probably does not produce intrinsic harm.
The journal Archives of Sexual
Behavior devoted an entire issue in 2002 (31.6: 467-510) to discussing
“Is pedophilia a mental disorder?” opening with an article by Richard
Green (pp. 467-71), a researcher renown for pioneering work on the
correlation between femininity in boys and homosexual orientation (cf. his
book, The ‘Sissy Boy Syndrome’ and the Development of Homosexuality
[Yale University Press, 1987]). Green had been an influential advocate
thirty years earlier for the removal of homosexuality from the DSM
(Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) list of
mental disorders. In the article Green now argues for the removal of
pedophilia from the DSM, which at any rate since the 2000 edition
has treated pedophilia as a mental illness only if a pedophilic
orientation is acted upon.
Green reminds readers that homosexuality
was removed from the DSM on the grounds that homosexuality was
relatively widespread historically and cross-culturally, exists in other
species, and does not intrinsically cause homosexual persons individual
distress or societal maladaptiveness; moreover, that societal condemnation
of homosexuality harms the mental health of homosexuals. The same
arguments, he notes, can be made as regards pedophilia. He cites a unique
British study of 77 “non-prisoner, non-patient pedophiles” that concluded:
The most striking thing about these
results is how normal the paedophiles appear to be according to their
scores on these major personality dimensions—particularly the two that are
clinically relevant [neuroticism and psychoticism]. . . . [Significantly
higher levels of introversion are not a problem since introversion] in
itself is not usually thought of as pathological. (p. 57)
Green also notes that a number of
studies indicate that 17-25% of men experience significant arousal to
sexual images of children and/or adolescents. He concludes:
Sexual arousal patterns to
children are subjectively reported and physiologically demonstrable in a
substantial minority of “normal” people. Historically, they have been
common and accepted in varying cultures at varying times. This does not
mean that they must be accepted culturally and legally today. The question
is: Do they constitute a mental illness? Not unless we declare a lot of
people in many cultures and in much of the past to be mentally ill. And
certainly not by the criteria of DSM.
Then, too, there is a 2004 study of “Gay
and bisexual men’s age-discrepant childhood sexual experiences” (J. L.
Stanley et al., Journal of Sex Research 41:381-9). Among “192
homosexual and bisexual men recruited from a randomly selected community
sample” “fifty (26%) reported sexual experiences before age 17 with
someone at least 5 years older.” Of these fifty half (specifically 24 men
or 49%) “perceived their sexual experiences as negative, coercive, and/or
abusive.” This half had “higher levels of maladjustment” than the
homosexual and bisexual men who as adolescents had not experienced sex
with an adult. However, “participants with age-based CSA experiences who
perceived their sexual experience as non-negative, noncoercive, and
nonabusive were similar to non-CSA participants in their levels of
adjustment.” As with the 1998 Rind et al. study, the authors of this
study propose that the term “child sexual abuse” be limited to adult-child
relations where the child perceives the relationship as abusive.
My point in mentioning these studies is
obviously not to argue in favor of adult-child sex but rather to show that
the distinction that Peterson and Hedlund draw between homosexuality as a
non-pathology and pedophilia as a pathology is simplistic and not
substantiated by the data. Neither homosexuality nor pedosexuality causes
intrinsic measurable harm, though both are associated with increased risk
of measurable harm. A secondary point is to show similarities in the
advocacy for each. Both homosexuality and pedosexuality are sexual
orientations. Therapeutic success in completely eliminating all desires in
question is far from the norm. Both associated behaviors can be documented
in the animal kingdom and have existed in societies historically and
cross-culturally, with some degree of approval. Modern “phobias” about the
behavior may contribute to the poor mental health of those who engage in
the behavior.
D. Are
homosexuals and homosexual pedophiles mutually exclusive categories?
The next contention by Peterson and Hedlund is this: “A ‘homosexual
(adjective) pedophile (noun)’ is not a homosexual who molests children but
a ‘fixated’ pedophile who prefers boys . . . with little, if any, erotic
interest in adults.”
This idea
that “homosexuals” and “pedophiles” are mutually exclusive groups is just
‘smoke and mirrors’ by psychiatric and psychological associations
concerned to protect the image of homosexual persons. A person attracted
only or primarily to children of the same sex is by definition
homosexual (a term that means ‘same-sexual,’ with the prefix homo- derived
from the Greek homoios, “like, same”). An age-restrictive or
pedophilic homosexual is a homosexual nonetheless. Both age and sex
constitute the structural criteria for such attraction. The very
terminology “homosexual pedophile” makes the point, even though an attempt
may be wrongly made to distinguish such a person from a pedophilic
homosexual. By the same token, a man attracted exclusively, or nearly so,
to girls rather than women is an age-defined (i.e., pedophilic)
heterosexual or heterosexual pedophile. And a man attracted to both girls
and boys may be labeled either a bisexual pedophile or a pedophilic
bisexual.
It is a
semantic sleight of hand and pure sophistry to
define a homosexual person solely as one who has a primary attraction to
adult males, as Peterson and Hedlund do (denoted in the
scientific literature as “homosexual teleiophiles” or “androphiles”)
and then to proclaim proudly that we have discovered that homosexual
persons, so defined, do not do much molesting of children. If, with
Peterson and Hedlund, a pedophile is defined as a person who shows
“little, if any, erotic interest in adults” and a “homosexual” as a person
who shows little, if any, erotic interest in children, then, by
definition, no homosexual can be a pedophile and few homosexuals will ever
engage in a pedophilic act. Voila!
This
sophistry is, in fact, a fatal flaw of a study that claimed to show that
homosexual persons have as little sexual interest in children as
heterosexuals: Kurt Freund, et al., “Heterosexuality, homosexuality, and
erotic age preference,” Journal of Sex Research 26 (1989): 107-17.
Using a phallometric test (which records penile volume changes during the
presentation of nude pictures or other potentially erotic stimuli), Freund
et al. found that “homosexual males who preferred physically mature
partners responded no more to male children than heterosexual males who
preferred physically mature partners responded to female children.”
However, the study did not evaluate whether homosexual persons of
all types had a higher incidence of attraction to prepubescent children
than heterosexual persons. In other words, it screened out homosexual and
heterosexual persons who did not experience primary attraction for
children before testing for attraction to children. Nor did this study
evaluate sexual attraction for adolescents aged twelve to seventeen. Nor
did the study attempt to evaluate the rates of actual sex with adolescents
and/or prepubescents by homosexual and heterosexual teleiophiles. So this
study did not demonstrate that homosexual persons, more broadly defined,
were as unlikely to have sex with prepubescents and adolescents as
heterosexual persons.
However, a
later study by Freund (and R. Watson) acknowledged that the “proportion of
true pedophiles among persons with a homosexual erotic development is
greater than that in persons who develop heterosexually”; otherwise
stated, “a homosexual development notably often does not result in
androphilia [sex between adult males] but in homosexual pedophilia” (“The
proportions of heterosexual and homosexual pedophiles among sex offenders
against children: an exploratory study,” Journal of Sex and Marital
Therapy 18 [1992]: 34-43, quotes from the abstract and from p. 41
respectively). The very next statement following both quotes is
apologetic: “This, of course, would not indicate that androphilic males
[males attracted to men] have a greater propensity to offend against children.” But, as noted
above, such a statement—which incidentally confirms that the authors are
not biased against homosexual
interests—begs the question of what percentage of homosexual males have
little or no sexual attraction for children. According to Freund and
Watson:
Previous
investigations have indicated that the ratio of sex offenders against
female children vs. offenders against male children is approximately 2:1,
while the ratio of gynephiles [men attracted to women] to androphiles [men
attracted to men] among the general population is approximately 20:1. . .
. Using phallometric test sensitivities to calculate . . . true pedophiles
among . . . sex offenders . . . and taking into consideration previously
reported mean numbers of victims per offender group, the ratio of
heterosexual to homosexual pedophiles was calculated to be approximately
11:1.
The
implication is that if heterosexual males outnumber homosexual males 20:1
but heterosexual pedophiles outnumber homosexual pedophiles only 11:1,
then “homosexual development results in pedophilia” twice
as often as “heterosexual development” does.
However, as
even Freund and Watson admit, this estimate is probably an exaggeratedly
low estimate (see below). And if one takes into account only the actual
figures for incarcerated sex offenders against children, not
imaginary projections of uncaught perpetrators of sex with children, one
can readily compute that homosexual development produces societally-prosecuted
child-sex offenders seventeen times as often as heterosexual
development does. For the ratio of heterosexual males to homosexual males
is more like 33:1 than 20:1 (3% male homosexuals to the total male
population rather than nearly 5%), while the ratio of incarcerated
heterosexual offenders to incarcerated homosexual offenders is (as Freund
and Watson acknowledge) only 2:1. As a more recent study sums up,
The best
epidemiological evidence indicates that only 2 to 4 percent of men
attracted to adults prefer men . . . ; in contrast, around 25 to 40
percent of men attracted to children prefer boys. . . . Thus, the rate
of homosexual attraction is 6 to 20 times higher among pedophiles. (R.
Blanchard et al., “Fraternal Birth Order and Sexual Orientation in
Pedophiles,” Archives of Sexual Behavior 29 [2000]: 464, emphasis
added)
It is
important to note that Blanchard et al. give the same kind of disclaimer
that Freund et al. give: “Ordinary (teleiophilic) homosexual men are no
more likely to molest boys than ordinary (teleiophilic) heterosexual men
are to molest girls” (p. 476). As we seen, this apology begs the question
as to what percentage of homosexual men are “teleiophilic” in relation to
heterosexual men. They add:
The causes of
homosexuality are irrelevant to whether it should be considered a
psychopathology. That question has already been decided in the negative,
on the grounds that homosexuality does not inherently cause distress to
the individual or any disability in functioning as a productive member of
society (Friedman, 1988; Spitzer, 1981).” (ibid.)
At the time
of article submission Blanchard et al. were unaware of the 1999 studies on
the association of homosexuality and psychopathology that were published
in the Archives of General Psychiatry in 1999 (discussed in section
I. above). Again,
as noted above, few sexual attractions, even among those that society
strongly disapproves, “inherently cause distress . . . or any
disability in functioning,” including sexual attraction for prepubescent
and adolescent children. Moreover, child-molesting priests, for example,
have been able to function well for decades in their ministry, at least to
all outward appearances, and undoubtedly for some with a minimum of
personal distress. So what? At any rate, apologetic comments such as these
by Blanchard et al. are a good indication that the authors cannot be
charged with grinding an anti-homosex axe.
For those
interested, here is the evidence why Freund and Watson have probably (even
by their own admission) significantly underestimated the extent to which
homosexual development results in pedophilia:
As stated above,
Freund and Watson estimate that true heterosexual pedophiles outnumber
true homosexual pedophiles by a ratio of 11:1. In other words, even though
heterosexual males vastly outnumber homosexual males (Freund and Watson
say 20:1 but, as noted above, the real ratio is probably closer to 33:1),
true heterosexual pedophiles outnumber true homosexual pedophiles by only
11:1. Moreover, even Freund and Watson acknowledge that the 11:1 ratio is
“an upper limit or, more likely, quite exaggerated” (see Freund’s online
article, “In
Search of an Etiological Model of Pedophilia”). The lower the ratio of
heterosexual pedophiles to homosexual pedophiles, the higher the
likelihood that homosexual development will lead to pedophilia as compared
with heterosexual development.
Why is the
11:1 ratio likely to be “quite exaggerated” on the high end? Freund and
Watson start with a generally acknowledged estimate that “the ratio of
[caught] sex offenders against female children vs. [caught] offenders
against male children is approximately 2:1.” Then, using data from
phallometric test measurements to determine “true pedophiles” (i.e., those
who experience a higher attraction for children than to adults) they
recomputed the 2:1 figure for offenders to a 1.4:1 figure for true
pedophiles. Then they multiply the 1.4 figure by 7.6 to determine the
ratio of total offenders (caught and uncaught) as 11:1.
Where do
they get 7.6? A 1987 study by Abel et al. indicated that victims of
offenders against male children are 7.6 times larger than victims of
offenders against female children. Freund and Watson reason that the more
victims, the higher the probability of being caught. They then reasoned
that “the risk of an offender being caught can be expected to increase
proportionally and linearly with each victim” (p. 38), which in turn led
them to multiply the 1.4 figure by the 7.6 figure, which gives then
(rounded off) 11. However, Freund later admitted that “this estimate did
not take into account that the low number of victims of offenders against
female children, found by Abel and co-workers, must have been strongly
influenced by the fact that there were substantially fewer pedophiles
among the offenders against female children than there were against male
children” (“In
Search of an Etiological Model of Pedophilia”). In other words, the
number of incarcerated sex offenders against female children is as
proportionately low as it is not just because they offend less than sex
offenders against male children and so get caught less but also because
offending less is itself a mark of a less intense erotic desire for
children (i.e., of not being a true pedophile).
So the
ratio of true heterosexual pedophiles to true homosexual pedophiles in the
general population, not just among those caught and incarcerated, may well
be closer to the real ratio for incarcerated child molesters than it is to
Freund’s imaginary estimate of caught and uncaught child molesters. Even
if the 11:1 ratio were only brought down to 6:1 or 5:1, then, using an
overall heterosexual-to-homosexual ratio of 33:1 for the general
population, homosexual development would result in pedophilia six
times as often as heterosexual development does.
The next
question that arises is: In terms of etiology (origination), how different
is homosexual teleiophilia (man-man attraction) from homosexual
pedophilia, apart, of course, from the obvious difference of age
preference? To be sure, that some differences would exist is to be
expected; otherwise, all homosexual persons would be homosexual pedophiles
when, in fact, most homosexual persons are not homosexual pedophiles. One
difference is over the extent of bisexual attraction. Phallometric studies
by Freund and others indicate that pedophiles differentiate erotically
between females and males less than males who erotically prefer adult
partners (“Erotic gender differentiation in pedophilia,” Archives of
Sexual Behavior 20 [1991]: 555-66; “Deficient erotic gender
differentiation in pedophilia: a follow-up,” Archives of Sexual
Behavior 22 [1993]: 619-28). This is not all that surprising, given
the fact that the category of sexual orientation intersects with a second
category, age, and too that sexual differentiation in children is less
pronounced than in adults. Nevertheless, despite the higher bisexual
incidence, significant and distinctive types of homosexual and
heterosexual pedophiles remain. Other possible differences between
homosexual teleiophilia and homosexual pedophilia are suggested in two
studies by Freund and Blanchard. Male homosexuals attracted to adults, as
compared to male
homosexuals who prefer prepubescent or pubescent children, “show
significant levels of feminine identification” in childhood and reported
“significantly poorer father-son relations” (“Feminine gender identity and
physical aggressiveness in heterosexual and homosexual pedophiles,”
Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy 13 [1987]: 25-34; “Is the distant
relationship of fathers and homosexual sons related to the sons’ erotic
preference for male partners, or to the sons’ atypical gender identity, or
to both?” Journal of Homosexuality 9 [1983]: 7-25).
At the same
time, there are also connecting links between homosexual pedophilia and
homosexual teleiophilia. The most obvious, of course, is the presence of a
dominant attraction to the same sex. Beyond that, one study of pedophiles
and teleiophiles by Freund et al. that compared childhood curiosity to see
people in the nude suggests that “the establishment of erotic sex
preference precedes that of erotic age preference” and that a “process of
active devaluation of the nonpreferred age bracket” (i.e., minimizing
erotic interest in children or in adults) does not culminate until puberty
(“Toward a testable developmental model of pedophilia: the development of
erotic age preference,” Child Abuse & Neglect 17 [1993]: 315-24).
Attraction by sex generally comes before attraction by age. A 1988 study
found that male child molesters “responded with moderate sexual arousal .
. . to the [slides of] nude males of all ages” (W. L. Marshall et al.,
“Sexual offenders against male children: sexual preferences,” Behavior
Research and Therapy 26: 383-91). In addition, the 1987 study on
“Feminine gender identity and physical aggressiveness in heterosexual and
homosexual pedophiles” (cited above) found that “male homosexuals in
general” (i.e., those preferring prepubescent, pubescent, or adult sexual
partners) “tend to be unaggressive in boyhood,” in contrast to male
heterosexuals in general. Finally, a 2000 study of “Fraternal birth order
and sexual orientation in pedophiles” by R. Blanchard et al. found that
fraternal birth order correlates with homosexuality in pedophiles, just as
it does in men attracted to physically mature partners. Results suggest
that fraternal birth order (or the underlying variable it represents) may
prove the first identified universal factor in homosexual development.
Results also argue against a previous explanation of the high prevalence
of homosexuality in pedophiles (25% in this study), namely, that the
factors that determine sexual preference in pedophiles are different from
those that determine sexual preference in men attracted to adults. (Archives
of Sexual Behavior 29: 463-78, here cited from the abstract)
In other
words, this study lent support for the conclusion of a 1998 study by R.
Blanchard and A. F. Bogaert; namely, that “homosexuality in men attracted
to immature males is etiologically related to homosexuality in men
attracted to mature males” (“Birth order in homosexual versus heterosexual
sex offenders against children, pubescents, and adults,” Archives of
Sexual Behavior 27: 595-603; see also: Bogaert, Blanchard, et al.,
“Pedophilia, sexual orientation, and birth order,” Journal of Abnormal
Psychology 106 [1997]: 331-5).
Consequently, while there are some developmental differences between
pedophilic homosexuals and teleiophilic homosexuals, significant
continuity exists that justifies seeing a spectrum of developing
homoerotic possibilities rather than a sharp line separating two polar
extremes.
E. Is
pedophilia more a heterosexual problem or a homosexual problem?
The research cited above puts us in a position to respond to the next
contention of Peterson and Hedlund:
Because
heterosexuals outnumber homosexuals by 25:1, the total number of boys
molested by heterosexuals and pedophiles outnumbers by many times (>10X?)
those molested by homosexuals. Thus the single place where any child is at
greatest risk of being sexually molested is an outwardly heterosexual
household. (Over 95% of all child molesters self-identify themselves as
heterosexuals.)
First,
Peterson and Hedlund confuse the issue by talking about “total numbers”
and drawing an absolute distinction between the categories “homosexuals”
and “heterosexuals” on the one hand and “pedophiles” on the other.
Heterosexual males vastly outnumber homosexual males in the population (as
I said, more like 33:1 than 25:1 or 20:1) so higher total numbers of
adult-child sex by heterosexual males is to be expected. The real issue
has to do with rates/percentages and proportionality within the groups
“heterosexuals” and “homosexuals.” I refer in my book to
disproportionately high rates of homosexual pedophilia, not to “total
numbers.”
As we have
argued above, the proportion of persons with a homosexual erotic
development who become pedophiles or engage in pedophilic activity is far
higher than the proportion of persons with a heterosexual
development. Otherwise stated: Homosexual development results in
homosexual pedophilia substantially more often as a percentage of
the total number than heterosexual development results in heterosexual
pedophilia. Otherwise stated: The rate of homosexual attraction
among pedophiles is significantly higher than the rate of heterosexual
attraction. Still otherwise stated: The percentage of homosexual men who
are “teleiophilic” (oriented exclusively or primarily to adults), while
significantly greater than the percentage of homosexual men who are
pedophilic, is nonetheless substantially less than the percentage of
heterosexual men who are teleiophilic and not pedophilic.
Certainly as
regards adult-adolescent sexual contact the figures are high. Earlier
studies by A. Bell and M. Weinberg (Homosexualities [Simon &
Schuster, 1978]) and by K. Jay and A. Young (The Gay Report [Summit
Books, 1979]) found that somewhere between a fifth and a fourth of
homosexual men had had sex with boys 16 years of age or younger. A much
more recent study by Z. Silverthorne and V. Quinsey investigated “Sexual
partner age preferences of homosexual and heterosexual men and women,”
using a sample size of 48 homosexual men, 48 homosexual women, 48
heterosexual men, and 48 heterosexual women (Archives of Sexual
Behavior 29 [2000]: 67-76). Each group was shown pictures of persons
of the desired sex ranging in age from 18-60 years and asked to gauge the
intensity of attraction for each age group (late teens, early- to mid-20s,
late 20s-early 30s, etc.). Unfortunately, the investigators didn’t go
earlier than 18 years. Nevertheless, the study did show that whereas
heterosexual male interest peaked for women in their early- to
mid-twenties, homosexual male interest peaked, within the limited confines
of 18-60 years, at the earliest category, that is, for men in their late
teens. Not surprisingly, the attraction for young sex partners was
considerably less pronounced among the women (heterosexual and homosexual
women showed no differences in age preference). The fact of significantly
higher rates of childhood sexual experience on the part of persons who
then or later self-identify as gay (see below, and the Rind 2001 and
Stanley et al. 2004 studies above) also provides indirect evidence that
homosexual men are more likely to engage in sexual relations with minors
than heterosexual men.
These higher
proportions partly explain why there is significantly more accommodation
and sympathy extended to adult-minor relationships from within homosexual
advocacy circles than from outside such circles. A second probable factor
for such accommodation is that approval of homosexual practice depends
philosophically on a rejection of absolute structural prerequisites for
sexual relationships when evidence of genuine affection between the
participants is given and measurable harm cannot be demonstrated as
intrinsic. It is precisely such philosophical underpinnings that make it
impossible to categorically reject all adult-child sexual bonds.
Peterson and
Hedlund claim that “over
95% of all child molesters self-identify themselves [sic] as
heterosexuals.” They do not cite any specific studies to document the
claim but doubtless they were thinking (with faulty memory) of the
oft-cited study by C. Jenny et al., “Are Children at Risk for Sexual Abuse
by Homosexuals?” Pediatrics 94 (1994): 41-44 (cited, incidentally,
in The Bible and Homosexual Practice, 480 n. 227). Jenny et al.
examined sexually abused children who received treatment at a children’s
hospital in the course of the year. Among the 47 boys who had been abused
by a man (42 by a man alone, 5 by a man and woman), 37 (nearly 80%) were
abused by a man who was or had been in a sexual relationship with a female
relative of the child. Jenny et al. ‘identified’ as a gay man only one of
the 47 men who had molested a boy (i.e., 2%). The conclusion: The risk of
children being molested by “recognizably homosexual adults” are “within
current estimates of the prevalence of homosexuality in the general
community.”
However, the
Jenny study was seriously flawed. Not a single molester was interviewed,
much less subjected to phallometric testing. Jenny et al. simply consulted
hospital charts that recorded information from the child victim’s natural
or foster parents and case workers, and sometimes too from the child
victim. But how accurate were these informants in identifying the sexual
orientation of the offenders? If they had been previously unaware of the
molester’s attraction for children, it seems likely that they were also
unaware of other aspects of the molester’s sexuality. Moreover, it is not
at all uncommon for homosexual men to have sexual relations with women
during the course of their life, some even producing their own biological
children. Does that cancel out their homoerotic preferences? Not according
to homosexual activists: they have simply suppressed or concealed from
others their dominant homosexual orientation (the playwright Oscar Wilde
is a famous case in point). A 1998 study, for example, found that 8.5% of
self-defined homosexual (non-bisexual) men had had heterosexual
intercourse in just the past year (B. A. Evans et al., “Heterosexual
behaviour, risk factors and sexually transmitted infections among
selfclassified homosexual and bisexual men,” International Journal of
STD & AIDS 9:129-33). Some pedophilic homosexuals view a sexual
relationship with a woman as an opportunity to have
access to
children.
The Jenny et
al. study can be contrasted with the only study in a refereed journal that
based its findings on self-reports by molesters: W. Erickson et al.,
“Behavior patterns of child molesters,” Archives of Sexual Behavior
17 (1988): 77-86 (cited in my book in the same footnote that I cite the
Jenny study). Erickson et al. reported that, of 69 male offenders who had
molested boys under 14 years of age, 86% self-identified as homosexual.
Problematic for the assumption that the boys were simply functioning as
substitutes for girls is the fact that 41% of the boy-molesters engaged in
oral stimulation of the victim’s penis.
F. Is
childhood same-sex experience a risk factor for homosexual development?
The final contention of Peterson and Hedlund on the pedophilia issue is
that I am wrong in allegedly asserting that “childhood same-sex experience
is a significant cause of homosexuality.” At the outset it is important to
note that my words are more carefully chosen than Peterson and Hedlund’s
characterization of my views. This is what I wrote in The Bible and
Homosexual Practice:
There is also
evidence that self-identified homosexuals and bisexuals are three to nine
times more likely to have experienced sex as a child (usually with an
adolescent or adult male) than their heterosexual counterparts. The higher
correlation suggests that sexual abuse may be at least a causative
factor in predisposing some people to adult homosexual behavior. An
early association of sexual arousal with an adult or adolescent of the
same sex (particularly in the case of boys), or an association of
heterosexual sex with trauma (particularly in the case of girls), may
incline the child in the direction of homosexual relationships. (pp.
412-13; emphasis in the original)
We have already
noted that same-sex molestation of children increases the chances that the
child will later identify his orientation as homosexual. The problem of
molestation pertains not only to adult male homosexual molesters but also
to adolescent male homosexual boys who are increasingly being encouraged
by sex-ed programs and gay-activist groups to engage in same-sex sexual
experimentation with their peers. (p. 480)
My statement
“sexual abuse may be at least a causative factor in predisposing
some people to adult homosexual behavior” is a fairly cautious
statement. Even the later statement that “same-sex molestation increases
the chances” of homosexual development merely presents it as a risk
factor, not as an act leading to a predestined outcome. Nowhere do I
attribute the majority of instances of homosexual development to childhood
sexual experience. How much of a factor it might be is simply not known at
the present time. But that it is a factor in some homosexual
development appears likely. In the first of the two excerpts that I give
above I substantiated the claim that “homosexuals and bisexuals are three
to nine times more likely to have experienced sex as a child” with the
following footnote:
According to the
1992 National Health and Social Life Survey, among those who had been
sexually touched as a child by an adult, 7.4% of the men and 3.1% of the
women identified themselves as homosexual or bisexual. Yet self-identified
homosexuals/bisexuals accounted for only 2.8% of the men and 1.4% of the
women in the survey (Edward O. Laumann, et al., The Social Organization
of Sexuality: Sexual Practices in the United States [Chicago:
University of Chicato, 199], 297, 344). A nationwide survey by Family
Research Institute found that homosexuals and bisexuals were nine times
more likely to have been sexually molested as a child (Paul Cameron et
al., “Child Molestation and Homosexuality,” Psychological Reports
58 [1986]: 327-37). A review of the literature on molestation of boys in
the Journal of the American Medical Association noted that adolescents who
were sexually molested by men were up to seven times more likely to
identify themselves later as homosexual (W. C. Holmes et al., “Sexual
Abuse of Boys,” JAMA 280 [1998]: 1855-62).
The research
cited above can be further supplemented. The Rind 2001 study and the
Stanley et al. 2004 study, already cited, suggest that about 20-25% of
homosexual males had sexual intercourse with an adult while they were
still minors. A 2001 study of nearly 1000 nonclinical adults found that
46% of homosexual men and 22% of lesbian women reported childhood
homosexual molestation as compared to 7% of the heterosexual men and 1% of
the heterosexual women. Homosexual men were thus six to seven times more
likely to report molestation than their heterosexual counterparts (M.
Tomeo et al., “Comparative Data of Childhood and Adolescence Molestation
in Heterosexual and Homosexual Persons,” Archives of Sexual Behavior
30: 535-41). A 1997 telephone probability sample of 2881 urban men who
have sex with males found that one-fifth reported child sexual abuse,
“primarily by non-family perpetrators,” and that these experiences were
“characterized by high levels of force (43%
involved physical force/weapons), and penetrative sex (78%; 46% reported
attempted or actual anal intercourse)” (J. P. Paul et al., “Understanding
childhood sexual abuse as a predictor of sexual risk-taking among men who
have sex with men: The Urban Men’s Health Study,” Child Abuse and
Neglect 25 [2001]: 557-84). The 1995 Massachusetts Youth Risk Behavior
Surveillance, which surveyed over 4000 high school students, did not ask
the students about sex with an adult but it did find that 27% of GLB [gay,
lesbian, or bisexual] youth had had sex before the age of thirteen,
compared to only 7.4% of non-GLB youth; moreover, that one-third of GLB
youth had sexual contact against their will as compared to only 9% of non-GLB
youth (“R. Garofalo et al., “The association between health risk behaviors
and sexual orientation among a school-based sample of adolescents,”
Pediatrics 101 [1998]: 895-902). A British study of homosexual and
bisexual men published in 1992 reported that 25% of the participants had
their first sexual experiences with a man by the age of 12; 50% by the age
of 14 (P. Weatherburn et al., The sexual lifestyles of gay and bisexual
men in England and Wales (Project SIGMA, London, 1992).
An old quote
from David Finkelhor, a prominent researcher in the field of child sexual
abuse, has often been cited to minimize the impact of adult-child sex on
homosexual development. Finkelhor assessed the evidence available to him
from the 1981 Bell and Weinberg study that “only 5% of homosexual men
reported childhood sexual experiences with adults. Such a small figure
means that childhood sexual victimization can have little to do with the
source of most homosexual behavior” (Child Sexual Abuse: New Theory and
Research [Free Press, 1984], 197). Given the studies that we cite
above, this figure probably needs to be revised to at least twice that
percentage and perhaps four to seven times more. At the same time, those
who cite this quote from Finkelhof should note that Finkelhof also wrote:
. . . in our
study, we indeed
found evidence that there may be a connection between
childhood victimization and adult homosexual activity for boys at least. .
. . Boys victimized by older men were over four times more likely to be
engaged in homosexual activity than were nonvictims.
He noted
too: “adolescents themselves often linked their homosexuality to their
sexual victimization experiences.”
It may be common for a boy who has
been involved in an experience with an older man to label himself as
homosexual (1) because he has had a homosexual experience and (2) because
he was found to be sexually attractive by a man. Once he labels himself
homosexual, the boy may begin to behave consistently with the role and
gravitate toward homosexual activity.
Apologists
for the normalization of homosexual practice have taken two approaches in
their effort to deny any causal link between the experience of
childhood molestation by males and homosexual development. Some simply
attempt to deny the significantly higher rates at which homosexual persons
experienced childhood sexual contact with a man. Since the data here is
overwhelmingly against such a denial this position must soon be abandoned for another; namely,
that the homosexuality in all, or nearly all cases, precedes the
molestation. One suggestion is that “gay children” seek out and often
initiate sexual encounters with men. Some studies indicate this happens
for some portion of homosexual youth, though these studies exhibit
significant sample bias. The theory certainly doesn’t account for the
numerous unwanted or unsolicited cases of child molestation. It also
becomes less and less plausible the earlier the age of alleged
solicitation gets and the earlier that one supposes that the child already
has a well-formed sense of his alleged homosexuality. Another suggestion
is that adult male molesters have an uncanny knack for targeting boys that
have not yet publicly identified themselves as homosexuals, perhaps
zeroing in on boys who exhibit significant gender nonconformity (a trait
that sometimes correlates with later homosexual development).
A third
suggestion is that “gay children” put themselves in more dangerous
situations because society does not provide safe channels for expressing
their sexuality. One study examined, among
others, 48 men who as boys had been sexually abused by a man and who had
now been referred to mental health clinics (R. J. Kelly et al., “Effects
of mother-son incest and positive perceptions of sexual abuse experiences
on the psychosocial adjustment of clinic-referred men,” Child Abuse and
Neglect 26 [2002]: 425-41). They arrived at their theory because one
man in particular
reported very early
awareness of being gay in the context of a chaotic, unsupportive family.
His search to explore and validate his sexuality led him to place
himself in dangerous situations where he was molested repeatedly by
older males. He and other men in our groups appeared to be aware of a
gay sexual orientation before the CSA [Childhood Sexual Abuse],
suggesting that molestation by a male perpetrator is not necessarily
causal in the development of a gay sexual orientation. (p. 438;
emphases added)
Note too the reference to some
unspecified “other men.” How many others had such a consciousness of being
gay before abuse? The authors don’t say. And to what extent could they, or
some of them, be engaging in revisionist history as they seek to validate
their current homosexual identity? The authors don’t explore this
question. At the same time, such a description of antecedent gay
consciousness certainly does not fit the profile of “several men in our
study [who] wondered whether they were sexually attracted to other men
because of their sexual abuse experiences”; nor of “some [who] sought
treatment hoping that they would no longer be attracted to men once they
‘worked through’ their sexual abuse issues” (ibid.). Clearly such persons
didn’t think that they were “gay” before the abuse. Yet nearly two-thirds
of the 48 men now identified themselves as gay (16 or 33%) or were unsure
of their sexual identity (14 or 29%); only 38% (18 men) said that they
were heterosexual (18 or 38%). Compare this to the fact that only 2-4% of
the male population identifies itself as gay or bisexual. Where is the
evidence that the majority of these were not affected by the abuse toward
a homosexual development?
I do not
doubt that the three suggestions mentioned above, which assume homosexual
self-identification prior to CSA, may account for some portion of
the high rates of childhood molestation in homosexual persons. But they do
get dangerously close to blaming the victim and/or exonerating the
molester. Moreover, when they are used to discount any effect on
predisposing subsequent homosexual development, the argument gets a bit
ridiculous and tendentious. It is like claiming that childhood molestation
is in no way a risk factor for subsequent pedophilic development. It
supposes, against the available evidence, that all children have rigid
sexual orientations in place that are completely impervious to major life
events.
Since geographical and educational variables can have an impact on the
incidence of homosexual self-identification (The Bible and Homosexual
Practice, 416-18), since too most homosexual and bisexual persons
shift at least once and usually twice on the Kinsey spectrum in the course
of life (ibid., 418-20), and since adolescents experience a significantly
higher rate of gender identity confusion than do adults (see Part 1, VI.),
there is no good reason to deny that early childhood sexual contact with
an older male can increase the risk for subsequent homosexual development.
The child may wrongly perceive the homosexual molestation to be an
indication of his latent homosexuality, particularly if he experiences any
arousal from the sexual contact. Then, too, the child may confusedly
connect the sexual attention, however twisted, with being loved and
wanted. He may be particularly susceptible to homosexual development if
the molestation occurs in the midst of a personal struggle, one where he
perceives a sense of distance and lack of affirmation from important
same-sex guardians or peers.
G.
Peterson and Hedlund’s bad use of the Etoro tribe example. Peterson
and Hedlund allege that implicating “pedophilic behavior in causing young
boys to become gay,” even any boys and even at any level of
influence, “is inconsistent with substantive contrary evidence.”
Unfortunately for Peterson and Hedlund they don’t provide the reader much
in the way of “substantive contrary evidence.”
Their sole
“example” is the Etoro tribe in Melanesian New Guinea. Here it will be
necessary to back up a bit and provide some background information.
In
my book I briefly mention both the Etoro tribe and the Sambia tribe as
instances of extreme cross-cultural variations in the manifestation of
homosexuality and thus as evidence for the impact of strong socializing
factors on the incidence of homosexual identity and/or practice (p. 414;
cf. pp. 415-16). I cite them in the context of a discussion of David F.
Greenberg’s massive study, The Construction of Homosexuality
(University of Chicago Press, 1988); Greenberg discusses Melanesian
transgenerational homosexuality on pp. 27-40. All boys in the Etoro and
Sambian tribes (among others) participate in a homosexual relationship
with a man. When they become men it is their turn to enter into a sexual
relationship with a boy. At a certain point in life (for the Etoro, the
age of 40; for the Sambian when they marry) they give up all homosexual
relations. Greenberg uses their behavior, among other illustrations, as
evidence for the following conclusion at the end of his book (which I
quote on p. 415 of my book):
The years some
homosexuals spend trying without success to conform to conventional
expectations regarding gender and sexual orientation tell against the most
extreme claims of sexual plasticity. However, in the absence of any
evidence linking the peculiar sexual practices of Melanesia with genetic
difference, it is reasonable to suppose that if a bunch of Melanesian
infants were to be transported in infancy to the United States and
adopted, few would seek out the pederastic relationships into which they
are inducted in New Guinea, or take younger homosexual partners when they
reached maturity. Similarly, American children raised in New Guinea would
accommodate themselves to the Melanesian practices. Where social
definitions of appropriate and inappropriate behavior are clear and
consistent, with positive sanctions for conformity and negative ones for
nonconformity, virtually everyone will conform irrespective of genetic
inheritance and, to a considerable extent, irrespective of personal
psychodynamics. (p. 487)
Greenberg admits this even
though he is an apologist for homosexual causes. Consider these remarks by
Greenberg:
To some, the
social-constructionist position has seemed troublesome because of its
political implications. When heterosexual chauvinists have told
homosexuals to change, essentialist theories have provided a ready
response: I can’t. When parents have sought to bar homosexual teachers
from the classroom lest their children (horror of horrors!) become
homosexual, essentialist theories have provided a seemingly
authoritative basis for denying the possibility. The present study . . .
cannot make concessions to such opportunistic considerations [namely, to
the convenient but inaccurate claim that no homosexuals and no
heterosexuals could ever experience shifts in sexual attraction]. It
should be pointed out, though, that nothing in the social-constructivist
position legitimates the denial of rights. . . . Assertive gay
liberationists have argued that it may be strategically wiser to concede
the possibility that a few students might be influenced to become gay by
having an openly gay teacher as a role model, and to say, “So what?” (p.
492)
And note the following comment on
Greenberg’s work from a review written by Don Browning, professor of
religion and psychological studies at the University of Chicago Divinity
school, and published in the liberal Christian magazine The Christian
Century: “Accepting Greenberg’s thesis might suggest that the new
tolerance of [mainline] churches, especially the move toward the
ordination of homosexuals, is one more way modern societies help create,
not just liberate, individuals with gay and lesbian identities” (Oct. 11,
1989, pp. 911-16, quote from p. 916).
Significant cross-cultural differences
in the incidence and forms of homosexuality have existed over the
millennia and even within our own time between the “first world” and
“third world.” Congenital influences do not explain all these differences.
Nor is it likely that these differences can be attributed in all cases to
forced ritual conformity. For instance, in ancient Athens homoerotic
practice flourished among the upper classes despite the absence of
mandatory homosex rituals.
How do Peterson and Hedlund seek to
disprove the point that the macroculture can play an important role in the
incidence and shaping of homosexuality? They write:
Gagnon describes this practice in the
singular, indicating that “the boy” gives up the practice as an adult,
neglecting to point out that all boys in this tribe were put through this
practice and later essentially all men gave up this practice. A study of
hundreds of men found only one adult homosexual. (Dr. Simon Rosser of the
University of MN cited this study at the 2004 Wordalone
conference.) Dr. Gagnon fails to mention this in his book, most likely
because this contradicts rather than supports his assertion that childhood
same-sex experience is a significant cause of homosexuality.
The first sentence is another one of
Peterson and Hedlund’s numerous false statements regarding my work. They
say that I “[neglect] to point out that all boys in [the Etoro] tribe were
put through this practice and later essentially all men gave up this
practice.” Yet I say this very thing: “All males must participate
in these activities at the appropriate stages of their life” (p. 414,
emphasis added). So when Peterson and Hedlund refer secondhand, and
without adequate citation, to a study of Etoro tribesmen that showed only
one adult male continuing in homosexual relations, this proves, rather
than disproves my point. To state once more Greenburg’s conclusion: “Where
social definitions of appropriate and inappropriate behavior are clear and
consistent, with positive sanctions for conformity and negative ones for
nonconformity, virtually everyone will conform irrespective of genetic
inheritance and, to a considerable extent, irrespective of personal
psychodynamics.”
Nevertheless, the residual pull of male
homosexuality manifests itself in an ongoing aversion to women even after
homosexual relations are eliminated. Heterosexual relations are prohibited
for 260 days out of the year and must take place in the woods far from the
village (i.e., not at home). Husbands and wives normally have separate
sleeping quarters. The limited contact with women that does exist is
generally hostile. And it is reinforced by a metanarrative of beliefs.
Semen is viewed as a source of masculine vitality; to put too much of it
in a woman’s body threatens to shift the balance of power, sapping men of
their courage and their ability to be good hunters and warriors and
leading to female domination. And yet sexual relations with women must be
undertaken because it is necessary for procreation. These are hardly the
trappings of a robust heterosexuality. Why then do men ever give up
homosexual relations? Men have a responsibility for transferring their
masculine life-force to boys in their care, ideally his wife’s younger
brother. Unless this happens, a boy will not mature into a man. When this
responsibility is discharged, continued homosexual activity would only
debilitate his own vitality to no essential purpose. But, for the Etoro at
least, the system of ritual and belief still provides a warrant for
homosexual activity for most his life (ages 10 to 40).
V. Homosexuality and Sexually Transmitted Disease
This section is still in process so I
will simply make the following brief points.
A. Peterson and Hedlund claim that I do
not link homosexual promiscuity to the disproportionately high rates of
sexually transmitted disease. This is false as any even moderately careful
reading of my work shows. Where I differ from Peterson and Hedlund is over
two key points.
First, as I have clearly stated in II.
above, the dearth of monogamous, long-term homosexual unions is not going to be radically solved by supporting homosexual
practice. These problems are first and foremost related to basic
biological differences between men and women that work poorly in sexual
unions that consist of only one sex. In fact, cultural endorsement of
homosexual practice will likely increase the incidence of homosexuality in
the population and, with it, the incidence of non-monogamous sexual
practice and the frequency of relationship breakups. Additionally,
affirmation of homosexual unions must, in the end, be an affirmation of
the typical manifestations of homosexual unions; namely, sexual unions
that are not monogamous and of twenty years duration or more (to say
nothing of lifelong). Such affirmation is not going to strengthen
heterosexual commitment to relational monogamy and longevity. It is more
likely to weaken it. Logically, how can it not since a monogamy principle
depends upon a common recognition that the twoness of sexual relationships
follows from the twoness of the sexes in sexual combination?
Peterson and Hedlund need to come clean
on the fact that STMs in the homosexual population are not going down;
they are going up. For example:
-
According to the San Francisco Department of Health 2001
HIV Consensus Data (released Jan. 31, 2001), 28.6% of San Francisco’s
estimated 52,000 homosexual men (defined here as MSM or males who have
sex with males)—somewhere between one-in-four and one-in-three male
homosexuals—are HIV-positive. In addition, 85% of the number of persons
living with AIDS are homosexual, even though male homosexuals comprise
only 16% of the adult male population in the city. HIV infection rates
in San Francisco have more than doubled since 1997. Even among
intravenous drug users (IDU) HIV incidence among (IDU) homosexual men
was nine times higher than among (IDU) heterosexual men. The proportion
of male homosexuals “reporting the use of condoms ‘always’ during anal
sex [in the past six months alone] has decreased steadily from 1994
[70%] through 1999 [54%].” “The proportion of [homosexual] men reporting
two or more anal sex partners [in the past six months] who reported not
using condoms ‘always’ [in the past six months] has increased steadily
from 1994 [23.6%] through 1999 [43%].” So much for the long-term
effectiveness of safe-sex education in the homosexual population. See:
http://hivinsite.ucsf.edu/consensus.
-
A 2004 study reported on “Recent trends in diagnoses of
HIV and other sexually transmitted infections in England and Wales among
men who have sex with men,” for the years 1997-2002 (N. Macdonald et
al., in Sexually Transmitted Infections 80:492-97). What did they find?
“Between 1997 and 2002, rates of diagnoses of HIV and acute
STIs in MSM increased substantially. . . . Rates of gonorrhoea
diagnoses doubled between 1999 and 2001. . . . HIV was the third
most common STI diagnosed in MSM in England and Wales and the
second in London. . . . The observed changes reflect
concomitant increases in high risk behaviour.” Increases in
high-risk behavior when “safe-sex education” targeting homosexual
populations is at an all-time high and tolerance for homosexual practice
has never been greater? This encourages optimism? Relative to heterosexual
men, homosexual and bisexual men were twice as likely to be diagnosed
with genital warts, herpes or chlamydia, eight times as likely to be
diagnosed with gonorrhoea, and greater than 50 times more likely to be
diagnosed with HIV or syphilis.
Second, high rates of sexually
transmitted disease in the male homosexual population are not just
attributable to promiscuity. They arise also from the frequency of
receptive anal intercourse among male homosexuals. Peterson and Hedlund
attempt to deny this by referring, as an example, two substantive studies
that allegedly show that receptive anal intercourse in isolation from
promiscuous practices does not significantly increase the risk of rectal
cancer (p. 6). This is false information.
I was quickly able to get a hold of one
of the two studies cited by Peterson and Hedlund: the 2003 study by C.
Piketty et al., “High Prevalence of anal human papillomavirus infection
and anal cancer precursors among HIV-infected persons in the absence of
anal intercourse,” Annals of Internal Medicine 138: 453-59. This
study examined 50 HIV-positive heterosexual male injection
drug users with no history of anal intercourse and 67
HIV-infected men who had sex with men. All of the latter group
had a history of anal receptive intercourse. It is true that the study
found that 46% of the heterosexual male group had anal human
papillomavirus infection (a necessary cause of anal cancer), even though
they had never had anal intercourse. So the study demonstrated that anal
intercourse was not a necessary cause agent for acquiring HPV infection
(which can lead to rectal cancer). However, the study also found that the
HIV-infected men who had sex with men had an anal HPV infection rate
nearly twice that of the heterosexual group (85%). The study did not
dispute the findings of earlier studies that “a history of receptive anal
intercourse was an important risk factor” for anal cancer. Risk factors
among men who had sex with men included having more than 10
lifetime receptive anal intercourse episodes.
In addition to this study, others can be
cited that discount Peterson and Hedlund’s assertion. A 2004 study of 1218
HIV-negative MSM (men who have sex with men), ages 18-89 and from four
U.S. cities, found that human papillomavirus DNA “was found in the anal
canal of 57% of study participants” (!); that “the prevalence of anal HPV
infection did not change with age or geographic location”; and that “anal
HPV infection was independently associated with receptive anal
intercourse . . . and with [more than] five sex partners during the
preceding months” (emphasis added). Receptive anal intercourse, with or
without high numbers of sex partners, increased the risk for HPV-infection
(P. V. Chin-Hong et al., “Age-specific prevalence of anal human
papillomavirus infection in HIV-negative sexually active men who have sex
with men: the EXPLORE study,” Journal of Infectious Diseases
190:2070-76).
Another 2004 study examined factors that may have contributed to an 160%
increase of anal cancer among men and a 78% increase among women from 1973
to 2000 in the U.S. (J. R.
Daling et al., “Human papillomavirus, smoking, and sexual practices in the
etiology of anal cancer,” Cancer 101:270-80). A
group of men (119) and women (187) who had anal cancer were compared with
a control group of 1700 persons. The study did find that men and women who
had 15 or more sexual partners during their lifetime significantly
increased their risk of anal cancer (fivefold for the men, elevenfold for
the women). But it also found that “among men who were not exclusively
heterosexual and women, receptive anal intercourse was related strongly to
the risk of anal cancer” (a sevenfold increase for the former, twofold
increase for the latter).
In short the studies cited above indicate that receptive anal intercourse
significantly increases the risk of anal cancer, whether or not in
combination with high numbers of sex partners. As it happens in this case
the main object of criticism was not myself but Dr. Harrisville. In
typical fashion Peterson and Hedlund chastise Harrisville as follows: “The
failure to at least do balanced reporting is evidence of a deliberate
attempt to use selectivity to support a negative premise about
homosexuals. This is heterosexist.” Well, apparently, it is Peterson and
Hedlund who are guilty of “a deliberate attempt to use selectivity,” here
to support a positive premise about homosexuals. What does that make this?
Immoralist?
B. Instead of responding to the studies
that I cite, Peterson and Hedlund claim that the mere fact of citing any
studies from Paul Cameron, a psychologist, is enough to invalidate my
survey. Once more, this is nonsense. Kurt Freund, who until his death a
few years ago was one of the world’s foremost researchers on pedophilia
and an apologist for homosexual rights, cited an article by Cameron on
pedophilia in Freund’s important article, “The Proportions of Heterosexual
and Homosexual Pedophiles Among Sex Offenders Against Children,”
Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy 18 (1992): 34-43. He wrote, without
negative comment: “Furthermore, a recent literature search by Cameron,
which involved 17 additional studies on sex offenders against children,
listed the ratio of victimized female to male children in the majority of
cases also as approximately 2:1”—confirming another study that Freund
cited. The article of Cameron’s was: “Homosexual molestation of children:
sexual interaction of teacher and pupil,” Psychological Reports 57
(1985) 1227-36. Does this citation invalidate all of Freund’s work for
Peterson and Hedlund or only any results of Freund’s work (work which
incidentally is widely accepted) that Peterson and Hedlund don’t like?
Cameron is clearly and strongly opposed
to homosexual practice but his biases are no greater than the gay activist
researchers that Peterson and Hedlund cite. And there has been a strong
“out-to-get-him” movement among gay activists. I have no doubt that some of
his studies can be criticized as flawed. Most studies on
homosexuality can be severely criticized for heavy sample bias and thus
flawed research methods, including most of the studies that are used to
support pro-homosex ideology. This is certainly true of identical twin
studies in the 1990s which recruited participants by advertising in
homosexual publications for readers who knew that the aim of the research
was to substantiate the theory that homosexuality was transmitted in large
part through genes. These studies found a 50% concordance rate for
homosexuality but, due to sample bias, are virtually worthless for
assessing representative concordance rates in the general population. And
yet Peterson and Hedlund cite these studies favorably and uncritically in
their article (p. 7 of the “History” portion). By their reasoning, that
alone is to call into question the reliability of their article.
Another area where researchers who were
activists for homosexual causes have allowed their biases to misrepresent
data has to do with the numerous nonrepresentative studies that claim to
show that homosexual parenting is as good as heterosexual parenting.
This has been noted by George Rekers, a reputable scholar in neuropsychiatry. He was recipient
of the 2000 Sigmund Freud Award for Pioneering Research and is the editor
of The Handbook of Child and Adolescent Sexual Problems and 100
scholarly journal articles. In a review of research on children raised in
homosexual households Rekers described a study by Cameron as one of the
best methodological studies to date on the issue (http://www.regent.edu/acad/schlaw/lawreview/issues/v14n2.html).
In
addition, I cite Cameron’s own independent research studies only twice
(otherwise just his references to the research of others) and in each case
it is cited in conjunction with other supportive studies. His 1983 FRI
study (cited on p. 419) has been criticized for its concentration on urban
areas and the relatively small sample of homosexual respondents, but this
is true of many other studies; moreover, it is one of the few random
studies available and many of its results correlate with the highly
regarded 1992 NHSLS study. The Cameron study “Does Homosexual Activity
Shorten Life?” published in Psychological Reports 83 (1998): 847-66
(cited by me on p. 472 n. 208) is frequently criticized for the
methodology of comparing obituaries in periodicals, as Peterson and
Hedlund do. And yet Peterson and Hedlund are silent about another study by
Canadian researchers which estimated that the life expectancy at age 20
for homosexuals and bisexuals was twenty years less than for all men (R.
S. Hogg et al., “Modeling the Impact of HIV Disease on Mortality in Gay
and Bisexual Men,” International Journal of Epidemiology 26 [1997]:
657-61; the 20-year shortened life expectancy is based on the reasonable
assumption that self-identifying homosexual and bisexual men comprise 3%
of the total male population aged over twenty). All scientific research
today is under the watchful eye of institutional homosexual activists and
their allies—certainly this is true of the two APAs. That reality must be
factored into all the reported research and critiques, including the
write-up by Peterson and Hedlund. The charge about my reference to Cameron
is a complete red herring designed to distract readers from the fact that
Peterson and Hedlund make not one substantive or accurate criticism of the
98% of non-Cameron research that I do cite in my book.
VI. Conclusion
This assessment both of Peterson and
Hedlund’s critique of my analysis of scientific research and of their
knowledge and use of scientific research on homosexuality provides ample
evidence of the distorted and unreliable character of their work.