Posted on 07/24/2009 10:15:42 AM PDT by NYer
Twenty years ago, Greg Quinlan was living as a homosexual and was a homosexual-rights grassroots lobbyist. He had no doubt he was born homosexual.
Advocacy groups like the Human Rights Campaign, for which Quinlan worked, claim that homosexuals have the right to marry and adopt children. These rights are presumably based on the idea that sexual orientation cannot be changed.
“To whom one is drawn is a fundamental aspect of who we are,” proclaims the Human Rights Campaign website.
Yet, scientific, medical and professional groups increasingly acknowledge that the notion that same-sex attraction is inborn and unchangeable does not hold water.
“Heretofore, no clear-cut ‘gay gene’ has been found,” said Clinton Anderson, director of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Concerns Office at the American Psychological Association, in an e-mail to the Register. This does not rule out biological causality, he said. Last year, the APA changed its definition of homosexuality to increase emphasis on environmental causality.
Not all agree. Dean Hamer, a behavioral geneticist at the National Cancer Institute, published a controversial study on male twins in 1993 that indicated a gene on the X chromosome linked to male sexual orientation.
Hamer told the Register that “sexual orientation has a very strong genetic and biological influence” from a combination of “anywhere between a dozen to hundreds of genes” that scientists have not identified. Hamer’s study has not been replicated.
Homosexuality is not genetically “hardwired,” according to Dr. Francis Collins, who received the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his work sequencing the human genetic code. Any genetic contribution to male homosexuality represents a predisposition, not a predetermination, he stated.
If genetics were determinative, then identical twins should “virtually always” show the same pattern of same-sex attraction, said the Catholic Medical Association. But a study of the Australian Twin Registry cited by CMA showed that only 11% of identical twins with same-sex attraction had a twin brother who also experienced it.
An Emotional Breach
The causes of same-sex attraction are more complicated.
Quinlan recalls being physically abused by his father as a child. “He was beating me and I remember yelling, ‘You hate me, don’t you?’ And my father yelled, ‘Yes, [expletive], I hate you!’”
Certain “family dynamics that are scientifically validated” are at the root of same-sex attraction, psychologist Joseph Nicolosi told the Register. Nicolosi is director of the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality and treats clients with unwanted same-sex attraction. Same-sex attraction, at its root, is not biological but emotional, he said.
Male clients often report having “a distant, detached, critical father and an over-involved, intrusive mother,” said Nicolosi. Female same-sex attraction is more complex but follows a similar pattern, he said.
Dr. Richard Fitzgibbons, a psychiatrist with 30 years of clinical experience, has drawn similar conclusions. Men with same-sex attraction demonstrate “weakness in male confidence” resulting from “deficient bonding” with the father, Fitzgibbons said. The result is a sexualized desire to bond with another male, which therapists call the “reparative urge.”
Quinlan’s first sexual experience occurred at age 11 with a male friend. “I got something I was missing,” he recalled. “For the first time, I received approval, affirmation and affection from a male.”
Both Nicolosi and Fitzgibbons have seen reparative therapy work for their clients. Thirty percent return to normal heterosexual attraction, 30% reduce same-sex attraction, and 30% show no change. The latter usually have been coerced into therapy or have some overriding psychological issue like addiction, said Nicolosi.
The APA plans to adopt a model for reparative therapy based on forthcoming research.
In this light, the Catechism of the Catholic Church’s teaching that the homosexual inclination is “objectively disordered” and “constitutes a trial” for most of the men and women who experience it takes on profounder meaning (see No. 2358).
Mythical Victory
Despite scientific and psychiatric evidence to the contrary, the media, culture, government, schools and even some in the Church perpetuate the myth that same-sex attraction is inborn. For that, promoters of homosexuality can claim a victory.
Research used by homosexual activists shows that public opinion regarding homosexuality will change if people believe it is genetic. “To the extent people are not responsible,” said Nicolosi, “their behavior will be tolerated.”
Friends and families of persons struggling with same-sex attraction should provide them with the hope (and resources) that they can change if they want to, said Regina Griggs, executive director of Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays.
“‘Gay’ is not an identity: It is a feeling and a decision to act on those feelings,” said Griggs, whose son has same-sex attraction. “It’s never a choice to have those feelings,” she added.
Quinlan made the decision to quit the homosexual lifestyle cold turkey not because his feelings toward men changed, but because he was deeply unhappy. “I was sick of it, and I knew what I was doing was wrong,” he said.
He eventually deepened his relationship with God, which led to forgiving his abusive father. That burden released, his same-sex attraction diminished.
Today, Quinlan is a pro-family lobbyist. “I am doing for the Lord what I used to do for the gay-rights movement,” he says. “I hope I can make up for some of it.”
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Neurosis is very complex, and becomes addictive due to the ability of the brain to add brain cells in brain areas that we exercise often, as recent discoveries in stroke research have revealed. (Stroke recovery also shows that we can "reprogram" our brains to varying extents.)
Emotionally, persons who have been shamed and ridiculed as children, especially by their parents, may unconsciously seek out more of the same. It becomes confused with the quest for love because it's the only thing they've known. This configuration is seen in women who were abused in childhood and then unconsciously find abusers as partners to a greater extent than women who were not abused as children.
I agree with your entire post, part of which is reproduced here. I went to art school 'way back in the day and of course met many homosexuals. Their focus was on "being outrageous!" Many were guys who had poor relationships with their parents. "Being" gay was a way that they could place themselves beyond the pale of parental reproach. It was a way to force an artificial barrier between themselves and their families, sometimes because of rage at abuse; other times because of an overwhelming and inappropriate mother who tried to turn her son into a husband emotionally.
I read recently that the monies spent on AIDS research and support far exceed the funding for breast cancer, which affects exponentially more people than AIDS, often devastating entire families if a young mother dies.
Very interesting post — thanks.
The entire thrust of the gay-rights legal agenda is to put legal barriers in the way of any criticism of the lifestyle whatsoever. This is the basis of the "hate speech" codes, which in other countries have resulted in Christian pastors being jailed for reading the words of scripture concerning homosexual behavior. The stimulus bills in Congress during the present administration are trying to slip "hate speech" punishments under the radar here, mandating Federal penalties.
It's all been part of a long, slow, planned takeover:
You know that they have, and always will. That is what politics has become in this country; and it will only get worse.
Here, as a recent spokesman for Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays & Gays (PFOX), Greg Quinlan comments on the Democrat Congress' attempt to shoehorn "hate crimes" legislation into the recent Defense Authorization bill:
Ex-'gays' would suffer under 'hate crimes' law (7/20/09)
Greg Quinlan has been an ex-gay activist for a long time. He married an ex-lesbian many years his junior, and the couple used their relationship as part of their "proof" that change is possible. Unfortunately, this was a bad decision, because they divorced after a few years. With a 50% divorce rate in this country and the problems of age difference to begin with, it's hard to say what really happened. But of course, this divorce plays into the vitriol of the "born-gay" camp.
"Ex-Gay Watch" tells its spin on Greg Quinlan's story: Wife Divorces Ex-Gay Activist Greg Quinlan
ping!
Yes, I did a search on Greg Quinlan after posting and saw the acrid vitriol launched against him on several homo-activist websites. It is a shame that he divorced after a few years, but that proves nothing of the homo-activists’ arguments, only that brokenness may last many years after healing begins. The homosexual activists are absolutely horrified at the prospect that same-sex attraction may, in fact, be mutable and not inborn. They will viciously fight any evidence that supports this - hence their absolute contempt for ex-”gays.”
In a very real way, the demise of heterosexual marriage due to the abandonment of religion and conservative traditions is one of the prime enablers of the fight for "gay marriage". Marxists have worked long and diligently to accomplish the take-down of conventional morality and the promotion of gay "normalization." When the people are stripped of private family and extended family networks, strong communities and common decency, they are much easier to overtake. As we are now seeing...
See post 27 (above) -- click the link and read how much the communist agenda has accomplished in the past half-century.
You are so on target.
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