I post this entry with an extreme caveat. We don't know the entire story as of yet but if this turns out to be true, it's an awful thing to happen. And I'm just itching to hear how the religious right - particularly NOM - will defend this nurse's actions:
More at The Dallas Voice.
A wounded lesbian Marine veteran who sought mental health treatment at the Dallas VA Medical Center claims she was subjected to an extended anti-gay tirade by a nurse practitioner.
Esther Garatie, 28, a former Marine lance corporal who lives in Dallas, has filed complaints against the nurse practitioner, Lincy Pandithurai of Cedar Hill, with both the VA Medical Center and the Texas Board of Nursing.
Garatie and her friend, Jessica Gerson, have also launched an online petition at Change.org calling for Pandithurai to be fired. By Thursday, Oct. 27, the petition had more than 1,300 signatures.
. . . In a three-page written statement about the incident, Garatie alleges that Pandithurai inquired about her sexual orientation at the outset of their meeting. After Garatie responded that she was a lesbian, Pandithurai told Garatie she was living in sin and said that was the reason for her mental health issues, according to the statement.
“She sat down and looked at me, and her first question was, ‘Are you a lesbian?’” Garatie wrote in the statement. “Her second question to me was, ‘Have you asked God into your heart? Have you been saved by Jesus Christ?’ This is when I realized that I was no longer a United States veteran in her eyes, I was just a homosexual.”
The session lasted for more than three hours, with Pandithurai citing the Bible and repeatedly telling Garatie she was living in darkness and would be doomed to hell if she didn’t “come back to ‘the light,’” according to the statement.
Pandithurai told Garatie she could change her sexual orientation. Pandithurai also told Garatie homosexuality was a diagnosable condition until President Barack Obama changed that, the statement alleges.
Penny Kerby, a spokeswoman for the VA Medical Center, confirmed that Garatie’s complaint is under investigation.
More at The Dallas Voice.
4 comments:
I can tell you that the groundwork is being laid by the right (or somebody) to take up this case.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Support-Lincy-T-Pandithurai-nurse/129413637165835
I know exactly what the religious right is going to say, "the homosexuals are trying to take this nurse's religious freedom away from her." It is guaranteed.
What I don't understand is how a United States Marine sat through three hours of this crap. You are a fucking Marine! Tell the bitch to get you a qualified therapist and then go to hell!
If she is reprimanded or fired they will scream discrimination against religious freedom. The problem with their arguement is that the nurse was not refusing to treat the marine based on religious objections, as is the position of pharmacists who refuse to sell birth control because they are catholic. So that arguement would be sooooo baseless.
The second I was told I was "living in sin", I would have marched to the next in charge and filed a complaint. I would have NEVER sat for 3 hours taking that kind of abuse. I'm sure the right will spin this to make the counslor the victim.
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