Wednesday, April 10, 2013

'Anti-gay study author facing new allegations of misconduct' and other Wednesday midday news briefs

Mark Regnerus, University Of Texas Professor, Wades Further Into Gay Marriage Debate - Slowly but surely, the truth is coming back to haunt the creator of that descredited anti-gay parenting study. A lot of us lgbt bloggers knew that he was lying in regards to his "objectivity." A big part of this story are the mysterious talking points given to Regenerus in order to bypass crucial questions regarding his study. No one will say where they came from:

As The American Independent reported last month, the Witherspoon Institute, the conservative think tank that funded the bulk of the New Family Structures Study, pushed to have the study’s results out before “major decisions of the Supreme Court,” according to documents obtained through a public records request. Among those documents – which are still being released in chunks – is a document titled “Mark Regnerus Media Training,” which encouraged the professor to focus on the fact that his study was a large, random, nationally representative study, unlike the majority of the existing research on gay parenting. He was told to avoid politics.

The origin of this training document, which is undated, is unknown. David Ochsner, director of public affairs at the University of Texas’ College of Liberal Arts, said he did not believe the guidelines were issued by UT, and he said Regnerus told him he could not remember where they came from. Witherspoon Institute President Luis Tellez said they were not issued by the Witherspoon Institute.

Regnerus’ “key points to make” included:
  • This study does not ascribe a cause to the effects, it simply reports the data.
  • For many years, gay advocates have claimed that there are no meaningful differences between children of same-sex couples and other children. This study shows this not to be true.
  • Young adults raised in a same-sex household are [list key findings such as more likely to have considered suicide, etc.].

In other news:

State sues WA florist for refusing service to gay couple - If you can use "religious beliefs" to deny services to gay couples, where does it stop?  

Mormon Apostle Warns That The Family Is ‘Under Attack’ From The ‘Tolerance Trap’ - Because apparently lgbts don't have families. Or at least people want you to think that.

South Africa gay 'cure' school found guilty of human rights violation - Good!

Gay Bullying Opponents Denied an Injunction - Not bad at all!

DADT Isn’t All The Way Gone Until DOMA Is Gone - Very astute observation by Truth Wins Out.

Bauer: Progressives Waging 'Cultural Jihad'- We are? Doggone it! How did Gary Bauer get MY memo?




2 comments:

Matthew Martin said...

The point needs to be made that the study does not look at children in same-sex households. More than 99% of the children of "gay" parents in the study were actually children of heterosexual parents and continued to live with their heterosexual parent after their other parent came out of the closet and left the household.

This data provides meaningful information about the state of LGBT rights in society--where lots of gay people are coaxed into heterosexual relationships only to have them fall apart years later with negative consequences on the children. But there is nothing in the paper about "gay parenting"--nearly all of the parenting is done by the heterosexual parent. Regnerus's paper itself is honest about this, but in retrospect the referees should have insisted that he make this much more explicit for non-scientists who would inevitably want to use the paper to direct social policy.

I personally do not believe that Regnerus actually falsified the data or his statistical results, (though there is an investigation underway) he just hasn't been forthright about what he actually did and did not show in that paper.

Mike said...

More about the Day of Silence court ruling that you mention, here: http://www.youthallies.com/day-of-silence-amber-hatch-email-trail/

Also here: http://www.youthallies.com/day-of-silence-amber-hatcher-lambda-legal-april-13-ruling/

Best,
Mike