Selling Homosexuality to America

Regent University Law Review ^ | Spring 2002 | Paul E. Rondeau

[quidnunc]

I. Introduction

Among America's culture wars, one of today's most intense controversies rages around the issue alternatively identified, depending on one's point of view, as "normalizing homosexuality" or "accepting gayness." The debate is truly a social-ethical-moral conceptual war that transcends both the scientific and legal, though science and law most often are the weapons of choice. The ammunition for these weapons, however, is persuasion.

This article explores how gay rights [3] activists use rhetoric, psychology, social psychology, and the media — all the elements of modern marketing — to position homosexuality in order to frame what is discussed in the public arena and how it is discussed. In essence, when it comes to homosexuality, activists want to shape "what everyone knows" and "what everyone takes for granted" even if everyone does not really know and even if it should not be taken for granted. [4]

The first strategy of persuasion is to establish a favorable climate for your message so that the communicator (marketer) can influence the future decision without even appearing to be persuading. Pratkanis and Aronson refer to this as pre-selling. [5] This is at the heart of the homosexual campaign: to get consent via social construct today to determine whose idea of personal freedoms will prevail in our legal codes tomorrow.

Part II of this article provides a brief overview of the social climate and politics that ultimately led to the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) imprimatur of homosexual behavior. The declassification of homosexuality as a disorder by the APA provides context for the propaganda war proposed by Kirk and Madsen's homosexual manifesto fifteen years later. The section ends by reviewing the main elements of the campaign including the call to specifically discredit, intimidate, and silence opponents with particular attention paid to conservative Christians.

Part III presents the connection between persuasion and democratic processes. Rhetoric, persuasive communication, propaganda, and social psychology theories are foundational to the concept of selling homosexuality as presented in this article. The purpose of this section is to provide a greater understanding of why persuasion works in order to strengthen the later discussion of how it is applied in the mass persuasion techniques evidenced in today's "gay rights"-style marketing.

Part IV moves to the "4-P's" of the traditional marketing paradigm — Product, Price, Place, and Promotion — to deconstruct and to illustrate how homosexuality is packaged and sold as a competitive product in the marketplace often through education [6] and through positive media coverage. "What is pitched is different — a product brand versus an issue — but the method is the same. In each case, the critical thing is not to let the public know how it is done," [7] states Tammy Bruce, a self-described lesbian feminist and ex-president of the Los Angles chapter of the National Organization for Women. [8]

Part V presents several real examples of how this strategy is employed in five important markets of social influence. The areas examined, which touch every citizen in America, are government, education, organized religion, the media, and the workplace.

Part VI concludes by recapping some achievements of the gay rights campaign and discussing what these may portend for their opponents and American society in the future.

-snip-

[little jeremiah]

Thanks for your august appearance here! A very reasoned reply. If only the simple and unvarnished truth were to be broadcast publicly. Falsehood (and coercion) is the very foundation of the "gay movement". When the light of plain truth is shone on their network of lying propaganda, the homosexual activists and their shills are seen for what they are.

[tuesday afternoon]

Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. Seems to be a double entendre.

[Libertina]

Yuk Will NOT check it out. I rarely turn on the TV except to play videos... I am certain that porn is very addictive and it is best to stay away.

[mrustow]

Man, do I hate PDF files, even though my just completed skim convinced me that this is a very important article. And how did you manage to excerpt it? Did you print out some pages, and type excerpts?

[quidnunc]

mrustow wrote: Man, do I hate PDF files, even though my just completed skim convinced me that this is a very important article. And how did you manage to excerpt it? Did you print out some pages, and type excerpts?

The best way to read a PDF is to print it out and read it from the printed pages.

To post I highlighted the text on the pages with a mouse-drag, copied to my computers clipboard, pasted to my word processor and then edited to make it presentable for posting.

Some PDFs are locked to prevent copying to the clipboard, this one is not.

[FUMETTI]

If you think kleptomania is a social problem and a mental problem.

The only thing being "begged" is your naitivity. Mental illness is defined as an abnormality in cognition, emotion,
mood, or social function. SOCIAL FUNCTION. A person who has an abnormal sexual/social (social=interaction) attraction where the units "do not fit" are acting against normal social action (consentual heterosexual contact).

Not to go off topic, but I am pretty sick of rationalizations that they cannot be mentally ill because of history's "brilliant" homosexuals, but then, there are "brilliant" autistic people and savants.

Second, homosexuality is clearly not a "sexual preference," per se, because it results in a net gain of "zilch" in the mating game, which continues the speciies.

Now please answer the question...why is it so terrible to admit one has a mental illness? Is it a way to justify a behavior which is adherrent and

You think incorrectly.

Next.

[FUMETTI]

I have read the old Gay Liberation books for a psychology class and you are indeed right, they wanted consent laws taken off the books. No wonder NAMBLA is a frequent marcher in gay pride parades. Anyone who says "gays despise pedophiles" obviously have not witnessed their presence in gay parades (I living in Boston in the early 1990s, observed one and saw them handing out literature... literature to commit a crime in reality!)

I have noticed some bizarre societal "acceptance" of some pedophilia, which is scary. Remember the case in Washington where that teacher LeTourneau had sex with an underage student, and the press almost made it a "love story" with very little mention of pedophilia, more "crossing the line between teacher and student." If a male teacher did the same to an underage girl, it would be "pervert, deviant" et al. Not at all condoning this, but this shows that many people in society is somehow "accepting" older woman-younger boy pedophilia, which is disturbing as it shows further erosion of sexual boundaries which are blurring at an alarming rate.

[Joe_October]

I caught the end of a movie called "The Gift" on the dish last night. It was sandwiched between "The Fluffer" and "Crash" and just down from "Short Eyes". All sad (and protected) films.

The Gift was about HIV negative men complaining that they weren't positive like their dying lovers. I couldn't turn it off, it was so disturbing. These men were crying that they didn't have the disease. Yea, crying.

They showed a section on "parties" where hundreds of men get together and have unprotected sex even knowing that half of them are infected.

Make no mistake, this was a pro-homosexual film, made for and by gay film makers. By the end, the men on the film were trying to figure out how to spread the message that the gay community has to do something.

They talked about the drugs (at ~$12K per year) which cause as many problems as they fix (cardiac arrest being a principal symptom).

Finally, they showed some startling statistics that half the gay black male population will be HIV positive soon. 1/3 of all gay men are positive now. And soon, over half will have strains which are immune to current drugs.

The most revealing statement was when the gay men trying to figure out how to fight the disease said that hetero men do better in making the point to homosexuals. One young man in particular said he was deadly afraid of hepatitis because it told him what he couldn't do after getting it (no booze, no drugs, no sex, etc.). Yet, the AIDs ads all said you could live a "normal" life with drugs.

The most vile hater of homosexuality couldn't do to these men and their community what they did to themselves. As sad as it sounds, if the statistics are right, the problem will take care of itself in not very many years.

It is hard to watch humans suffer.

[little jeremiah]

My spousal unit has seen "Gay Pride Parades" (fortunately, I haven't except for a couple of excerpts on video) while stuck in SF - and saw men dressed in chains and leather, pulling little boys on chains with collars around their necks, like a dog on a leash, and sitting on their shoulders. The supposed horror and disapproval by many homosexuals for NAMBLA and sex with minors is but a show to pull the wool over our eyes.

[little jeremiah]

It is hard to watch humans suffer.

I agree. But when humans go out of their way to commit suicide, no matter what anyone says or does, what can be done?

And I can't help but feel angry when these same homosexuals recruit, proselytize, seduce, and molest young people into their "deathstyle".

[little jeremiah]

It is hard to watch humans suffer.

I agree. But when humans go out of their way to commit suicide, no matter what anyone says or does, what can be done?

And I can't help but feel angry when these same homosexuals recruit, proselytize, seduce, and molest young people into their "deathstyle".

[little jeremiah]

Sorry for the duplicate.

[Woahhs]

The best way to read a PDF is to print it out and read it from the printed pages.

You can also google the exact file, then get it as cached html directly from them.

[scripter]

I caught the end of a movie called "The Gift" on the dish last night.

I've never seen the movie and would imagine it's difficult for a compassionate person to watch. Here's some links on the subject:

Acting Up
Bug Chasers: The men who long to be HIV+

[Woahhs]

See Tammy Bruce's latest book for real insight into the "movement." It's hard for me to believe she's a liberal lesbian. I'd begun to think such people incapable of scruples.

[scripter]

I've read her articles and have read about her books. They do sound like a good read.

[lentulusgracchus]

The most vile hater of homosexuality couldn't do to these men and their community what they did to themselves. As sad as it sounds, if the statistics are right, the problem will take care of itself in not very many years.

You're my nominee for post of the month. You are absolutely right -- what the politicized, Leftist homosexual agitators did to their own, back in the early 80's when they were fighting off the attentions of the national health apparatus, absolutely beggars any attempt to describe their irresponsibility and their politically-driven, emotionally-charged purblindness.

[Woahhs]

Do yourself a favour. Drop a few bucks at the itunes store, or audible.com, and get the audio book. Then you'll know if it's worth the read.

Believe me, any liberal open lesbian that is regularly celebrated by Dr. Laura, Sean Hannity, G. Gordon Liddy, and served on Schwarzenegger's transition team, is not someone to ignore.