How Speech Gets Suppressed, Reasoning Squelched, and Tyranny Established by the Thin-Skinned

The lion’s share of current legal and political discourse favors social and legal “equality” between people with homosexual, transgender, or gender-undefined feelings (“LGBTQ people”) and people with heterosexual feelings and a sense of their sex that matches the body they were born with (“straight”). (Discussion of asexuals–people lacking sexual feelings–will have to wait for another occasion. They, too, are starting to assert their right to “equality.”) Complaints about passive or active opposition to the “gay equality” agenda, whether in personal or public contexts, are studded with such language as “offensive,” “invalidates citizens’ identity,” “disrespectful,” and “dignitary harm.” More and more, the possessor of truly American sensibilities gets the sense that the whole movement is based on mass emotional blackmail.

Freedom is not for cowards. The defense and use of the political and social liberty that is the American heritage requires thorough and ready discussion of issues. Self-government is a rough-and-tumble game. But the growing army of self-styled champions of the oppressed thinks otherwise. These heroes want to go well beyond placing and enforcing sensible and fair limitations on time, place, and manner of expression of opposing views. They want a society that is “safe” from threats to narcissistic self-inflation. And constitutional rights, correctly understood, must–through reinterpretation–yield to this utopian, infantile goal.

Wikipedia defines emotional blackmail as “a form of psychological manipulation, employing a mixture of threats, appeals, and emotionally punitive behavior to control an intimate.” Surely, the term can also apply to relations with non-intimates.

One subtype of emotional blackmailer is the sufferer. Such people “take the position that ‘if you don’t do what I want, I will suffer, and it will be your fault.'” Another term for this ploy is victim playing. The LGBTQ-affirmatives cannot prove that the feelings that distinguish them are normal, nor can they prove that their tendencies are inborn or necessarily permanent. So they concentrate on guilting the public instead.

There is something to learn by going back in time to the Sixties, when the Leftist orthodoxy we lightly call political correctness was beginning to gain prominence. In 1969 there was a Supreme Court case concerning the right of a small group of public school students to wear protest armbands in class. The majority opinion in Tinker v. Des Moines ICSD defended that right, making the case with such passages as this: “That they [public school administrators and teachers] are educating the young for citizenship is the reason for scrupulous protection of Constitutional freedoms of the individual, if we are not to strangle the free mind at its source and teach youths to discount important principles of government as mere platitudes” (Justice Abe Fortas, Court’s opinion). And this: “The classroom is peculiarly the ‘marketplace of ideas.’ The Nation’s future depends upon leaders trained through wide exposure to that robust exchange of ideas which discovers truth ‘out of a multitude of tongues, [rather] than through any kind of authoritative selection” (Justice William Brennan in the 1967 Keyishian v. Board of Regents, quoted by Fortas).

But there were two dissenting opinions as well, one of them by Justice Hugo Black. Black had grown up in the Appalachian region of Alabama, the youngest of eight. It could be that he wasn’t the most welcome of children; if so, he may have developed a sense of insecurity and an oversensitivity to certain kinds of discord among people. Early in his legal career he specialized in personal injury law. When he ran for political office he joined the Ku Klux Klan. “I would have joined any group,” he said later, “if it help me get votes.” These few facts hint that Black, like many in the legal and political fields, had an excessive desire to be popular.

In any case, in his dissent Black wrote: “Even a casual reading of the record shows that this armband [worn by one of the three children] did divert student’s minds from the regular lessons, and that talk, comments, etc. made [the child himself] “self-conscious” in attending school [wearing] his armband. While the absence of obscene remarks or boisterous and loud disorder perhaps justifies the Court’s statement that a few armband[-wearing] students did not actually ‘disrupt’ the classwork, I think the record overwhelming shows that the armbands did exactly what the elected school officials and principals foresaw they would, that is, took the students’ minds off their classwork and diverted them to thoughts about the highly emotional subject of the Vietnam war [that was the subject of the protest].”

We may set aside the question of whether minors have constitutional rights at all, and of whether children under the age of sixteen, as these children were, are likely to have thoughtful opinions on a particular war. What deserves attention here is the matter of to what extent the sender of a message is responsible for the reactions of the recipient(s).

Looked at from one angle, the school situation was one of protesters “disrupting” their classes, as nonroutine and apparently (subtly) disturbed reactions by fellow students were perceptible by the school staff. Looked at from another, though, the situation was one of nonprotesting students faced with a challenge–not so much of how to think about the war issue but of how to conduct themselves in the face of a political-social demonstration in their midst. They could have be helped to respond in any number of ways conducive to the educational process. And they could have been helped to maintain their poise–if their poise was an issue for the school–when in the presence of a potentially exciting (positively or negatively) communicative event.

What connects the Tinker opinions to political correctness today and the “gay equality” campaign in particular is the question of how much tolerance for disagreement–including major moral disagreement–people in a given context should be expected to have. (One form of tolerance is removing oneself from a group communicative interaction one finds personally intolerable, thus allowing it to continue uninterrupted.) How long has it been since we have heard the old saying, “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen”?

With increasing thoroughness, the gay-affirmative crowd is demanding not just tolerance but affirmation from everyone everywhere. All bakers must bake and decorate cakes for gay weddings; all photographers must photograph gay couples in romantic poses. Even ministers must watch themselves when it comes to denouncing homosexuality from the pulpit. What was recently heretical is now orthodox.

What Americans need to do now is to get beyond the question of fairness–the imposition of the gay orthodoxy is blatantly unfair–to the psychology of the new “gay” inquisitors.

One of the world’s foremost authorities on homosexuality is psychologist Joseph Nicolosi. He is a psychotherapist and the author of several books on the subject. His article “Gay as Self-Reinvention” is instructive:

…. I wish to clarify my belief that there is no such thing as a gay person. Gay is a fictitious identity seized upon by an individual to resolve painful emotional challenges. The man who recognizes that he has a homosexual problem [see also Joseph Nicolosi, “Fathers of Male Homosexuals: A Collective Clinical Profile” and “The Meaning of Same-Sex Attraction,” at www.narth.com] and struggles to overcome it is not “gay.” He is simply, “homosexual.”

To believe in the concept of a gay identity as valid, a person must necessarily deny significant aspects of human reality. The foundation typically begins with a significant denial of human reality during childhood. ….

[Regarding males] [In many cases, t]he sensitive son [inadequately supported in his early masculine development by a father figure] seems to decide, “I can’t be male …. I will remain in my own androgynous world, my secret place of fantasy.” ….

We hear echoes of [the theme of gender identity confusion] over and over in gay literature–the repeated story of the pre-homosexual boy who is isolated and “on the outs” from male [peers], feeling different, insecure in his masculinity and alone, disenfranchised from father, and retreating back to mother. ….

[T]he pre-homosexual boy says to himself, “If my father makes me unimportant, [then] I [will] make him unimportant. If he rejects me, [then] I will reject him and all that he represents [masculinity, objective reality].” ….

Gay identity …. is a culturally approved process of self-reinvention by a group of people in order to mask their collective emotional hurts.

In 2014 America, people with psychosexual disorders have every reason to be confident of their ability to heal from them. Ex-gay/ex-transgender psychotherapy, counseling, and bibliotherapy (a fancy term for the patient reading psychological literature pertaining to his or her own case) are better and more widely available than ever. The National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (www.narth.com) has for over two decades led the fight for truth and liberty against Leftist oppression.

The urge to stifle challenge, whether political or personal, is not the product of any particular culture. It is a universal and human problem. Some of the best advice ever given on the subject of speech, conflict, and feelings came from founding father John Adams. In a 1765 essay he gave us words that should be engraved on walls and minds all over this country: “Be not intimidated … nor suffer yourselves to be wheedled out of your liberties by any pretense of politeness, delicacy, or decency. These, as they are often used, are but three different names for hypocrisy, chicanery, and cowardice.”

When will Americans realize that they do not have to yield to the emotional blackmailers–including the ones who sit in the White House, in Congress, or on the Supreme Court?

Sharon Kass is a writer, editor, and activist based in Washington, D.C. She has been doing ex-gay activist for over fifteen years. She may be reached at [email protected].

Groundbreaking Campus Climate Report Documents Medical Inaccuracies, Discrimination, and Bias at Virginia University LGBTQ Resource Centers

Voice of the Voiceless (VoV), the only anti-defamation league for former homosexuals, individuals with unwanted same-sex attractions (SSA), and their families, is pleased to release a groundbreaking report documenting years of medical inaccuracy, discrimination, and bias at Virginia University LGBTQ Resource Centers. Titled: Campus Climate Report:Virginia University LGBTQ Resource Centers an ‘Unsafe Zone’ for Students with Unwanted Same-Sex Attractions. Click here CCR2014-Final-2 to download the 86-page report.

The report, which contains links to video and audio recordings, documents seven undercover visits to Virginia University LGBTQ Resource Centers made by two former homosexuals in September 2013, as well as evidence of discriminatory conduct from at least two universities towards Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays (PFOX), a national non-profit organization advocating for individuals with unwanted SSA and ex-gays.

Liberty Counsel, an international nonprofit litigation, education, and policy organization dedicated to advancing religious freedom, the sanctity of life, and the family continues to represent VoV, and is engaged in ongoing negotiations with the universities and the Virginia office of the Attorney General in the effort to bring reform in the 2014-2015 school year.

“As students and teachers begin to depart for their summer breaks, we are pleased to release this groundbreaking report on our findings. At the same time, we are concerned by the amount of medical inaccuracies and lack of equity for students with unwanted SSA at these centers,” commented Christopher Doyle, President and Co-Founder of VoV. “We look forward to working with university administrators in Virginia over the summer to make meaningful policy reforms for the 2014-2015 school year so that all students experiencing homosexuals feelings in our public higher education institutions are given appropriate, culturally-sensitive resources and counsel.”

Detailed in the Campus Climate Report is the following:

• Evidence documenting a pattern of dishonest communication between University of Virginia administrators and organizations advocating for students who are ex-gay and/or have unwanted SSA. Specifically, this included an effort to suppress resources that were donated from PFOX to the LGBTQ Resource Center for students seeking sexual orientation change and tolerance for the ex-gay community.

• Serious medical inaccuracies at James Madison University regarding the heath risks of homosexual anal intercourse and the resulting disparities of HIV infection rates between men who have sex with men and heterosexual students.

• Inaccurate and unscientific opinions on the outcomes of Sexual Orientation Change Effort (SOCE) therapy at George Mason University, including biased counsel that students would become anxious, depressed, and ultimately commit suicide should they seek help to change sexual orientation.

• Misleading statements on the etiology of homosexuality at Old Dominion University and the College of William and Mary, including the unscientific assertion that homosexual feelings are genetic and/or in-born.

• Inappropriate referrals and a lack of culturally-sensitive resources at Virginia Commonwealth University, including the recommendation that Christian students with unwanted SSA attend gay-affirming places of worship, rather than be referred to faith-based ministries that support their desire to change sexual orientation and/or remain chaste/celibate.

“LGBTQ Resource Centers can be a place of support to all sexual minority students struggling or seeking assistance, but when university administrators favor one viewpoint over another, it becomes a discriminatory and unsafe atmosphere,” commented Doyle. “By offering services in a public forum, universities are obligated to represent all views of sexuality and sexual orientation and provide competent services and referrals. In our visits to these universities, we documented a clear pattern of bias, insensitivity, and discrimination towards students with unwanted SSA, especially towards those who hold to a traditional Biblical view of homosexual behavior.”

The Campus Climate Report concludes with a quote from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) that is especially relevant to these injustices: “How much we value the right of free speech is put to its severest test when the speaker is someone we disagree with most. Speech that deeply offends our morality or is hostile to our way of life warrants the same constitutional protection as other speech because the right of free speech is indivisible: When one of us is denied this right, all of us are denied . . . this is particularly true at universities, whose mission is to facilitate learning through open debate and study, and to enlighten. Speech codes
are not the way to go on campuses, where all views are entitled to be heard, explored, supported or refuted.”

Voice of the Voiceless is the only anti-defamation league for former homosexuals, individuals with unwanted same-sex attractions, and their families. For more information, visit: www.VoiceoftheVoiceless.info

This week, Cheryl Wetzstein of The Washington Times reported that as many as nine state legislatures across the country have rejected bans on Sexual Orientation Change Effort (SOCE) therapy for minors. I was quoted in the article as saying:

Christopher Doyle, a licensed clinical professional counselor who supports sexual orientation change efforts, said the bills were losing because of a coordinated effort by ex-gays to introduce themselves to lawmakers and talk up the potential benefits of the practice. Ex-gays are explaining what the therapy is and why it is a positive experience, said Mr. Doyle, president of Voice of the Voiceless and a former homosexual. They are also arguing that there can’t be a scientific basis for the claim that the therapy is harmful to children since “there is actually not one study” on sexual orientation change efforts and the impact on minors, Mr. Doyle said. These discussions have “created doubt about the legitimacy of these bills” among lawmakers.

We have been following this legislation for quite some time, and were involved in the defeat of bills in Virginia, Maryland, Washington, Minnesota, and Illinois. But recently, we learned that a few other states have quietly dismissed these measures as well, including Hawaii, Wisconsin, and Rhode Island. Of course, the mainstream media won’t report this news; you’ll only hear about it on this website.

Click here to see a summary of legislation introduced and its progress, prepared by Jews Offering New Alternatives to Healing (JONAH).

In Hawaii, the bill was “deferred” by the committee, ultimately causing it to die in this year’s session. In an e-mail from the Hawaii Family Forum, the organization commented: “We truly believe that the law would violate the patient-physician relationship and the counselor’s freedom of speech. And of course, prevent parents and children from getting the help they deem most appropriate against unwanted same-sex attractions.”

In Wisconsin, SB481 “failed to pass pursuant to Joint Senate Resolution 1.” It appears this bill did not have bi-partisan support, and failed to even get a hearing in the Senate. A similar fate happened in Rhode Island, where S2510 was “held for further study” on March 18; study committees are essentially where bills go to be put on life support until there is enough support in a later session to resurrect them.

Meanwhile, thanks to efforts from Equality And Justice For All, the bill in Pennsylvania has little chance of getting a hearing and out of committee, and in Ohio, a similar fate will likely befall SB 188. That leaves Massachusetts, Vermont, Florida, Washington, DC and New York, whose authors recently announced a public forum to be held on May 15 supporting S.4917- B/A.6983. However, according to our sources in New York, this bill is not going anywhere this session, and the hearing is likely an attempt to gain positive public relations.

In Washington, DC it’s an election year for the City Council and Mayor, so we doubt there will be any movement on any controversial legislation. We are also certain that the bill in Florida will not gain any traction due its conservative legislature, which leaves only Vermont, which is a big question mark, and Massachusetts, which according to MassResistance Executive Director Brian Camenker, “has now gone out of the Health Care Financing committee and is about to go to the Steering Policy and Scheduling committee, which schedules (legislation) to go to the House floor” for a vote.

If you are interested in helping us stop this legislation in Massachusetts or one of the remaining states where a bill is pending, please contact us immediately so we can put you into contact with Equality And Justice For All, who is spearheading the lobbying efforts against this destructive legislation.

 

Christopher Doyle is the President of Voice of the Voiceless. For more information, visit: www.VoiceoftheVoiceless.info

Quote taken from: Walter Hilton,  Scale of Perfection, I, xvi.

State legislatures have continued to reject bills that would ban Sexual Orientation Change Effort (SOCE) therapy for minors. Their decisions rest on the evidence. Ego-dystonic, same-sex attracted individuals can finally overcome their unresolved issues and lead happy, heterosexual lives. Except for the legislators of New Jersey and California, who hastily voted after have been given false, misleading, and/or unsubstantiated allegations about the harm of this type of counseling, the legislators of Virginia, Washington, Maryland, Minnesota, Illinois (and perhaps more as I write this) voted to reject these bills only after hearing and considering the testimonies of reoriented men and women who bravely shared their sexual reorientation journeys.

For these reasons, the legislators in these states could not, in good conscience, deny the right of any child to seek life-changing help they need and desire. How could a legislator listen to a reoriented man testify that he had been raped as a child and then wanted nothing more than to commit suicide because of the effects that rape had on him?  How could a legislator ignore the life changing reality that reorientation therapy gave this man? How could a legislator not realize the long-lasting effects that reorientation therapy can have on history, affecting generations of progeny that would otherwise never exist?

The most important word in the above paragraph is “ego-dystonic.”  Simply stated, the term means “unhappy with one’s mental state.” An ego-dystonic homosexual is not happy with his sexual attractions, desires and/or actions involving his/her same-sex peers. Any ego-syntonic homosexual, on the other hand, would not feel unhappy with his/her attractions, feelings and actions.

The terms ‘syntonic’ and ‘dystonic’ are used by psychologists to describe many conditions relating to a client’s perceptions of themselves. It has nothing to do with being ‘homophobic,’ a semantically convenient, culturally accepted label that is misapplied to individuals who are seeking counseling to reclaim their inherent sexuality. We would not call someone who turns to food as a way of dealing with unresolved anger and anxiety ‘fatphobic.” This client wants help with food. An ego-dystonic homosexual wants help with his relationships with same-sex peers.

Which brings us to Walter Hilton (d. 1396).  His oft cited observance: “He jests at scars who never felt a wound,” may very well describe the basis for ego-syntonic homosexuals’ negative reactions to legislator’s decisions to continue to allow SOCE therapy for minors. It also may be the basis for the extreme hate-filled attacks being made on successfully reoriented men and women.

It is the contention of many who have become re-oriented that while they were in their gay lifestyles, at least for some of the time, “they never felt a wound.” For a time, they were indeed “gay” [read blissfully happy].  At that time in their lives, they could easily jest at the so-called mental “scars” of their former brethren (re-oriented homosexuals) who did feel the mental wounds of their pasts.

In C. S. Lewis’s book, The Problem of Pain, R. Havard, M.D. offers these notes in the Appendix:

“Mental pain is less dramatic than physical pain, but it is more common and also more hard to bear.  The frequent attempt to conceal mental pain increases the burden:  it is easier to say ‘My tooth is aching’ than to say “My heart is broken’.  Yet if the cause is accepted and faced, the conflict will strengthen and purify the character and in time the pain will usually pass.  Sometimes, however, it persists and the effect is devastating; if the cause is not faced or not recognized, it produces the dreary state of the chronic neurotic.  But some by heroism overcome even chronic mental pain…  Pain provides an opportunity for heroism; the opportunity is seized with surprising frequency.”

Re-oriented men and women have been able to say, “My heart is broken.”  They have worked through their pain, mustered the courage to develop non-sexualized, same-sex peer friendships and developmentally evolved into their innate genders. They are the heroes of today; they have seized the opportunity to heal; they have transformed themselves. Despite these triumphs, however, and quite ironically, they are now the newest victims of abuse.

Psychologists have long confirmed that bullies were often the victims of bullying themselves.  We understand only too well that gays have borne the bulk of bullying, and we at Voice of the Voiceless (VoV) feel outrage every time we hear of anyone bashing gays. Yet, now that gays are finally being given protection under the law, they have turned their own anger from having been bullied and are now bullying, of all people, former homosexuals.

We at VoV love all homosexuals. Why?  Everyone at VoV were or have children, family, or friends who are/were homosexuals. Why would we ever want anyone to hurt someone who experiences what we have experienced? Why would we want anyone to continue hurting our children?  We decry anyone subjecting homosexuals to anything but love. We must, however, hold everyone, including gays, to the same level of tolerance, acceptance and respect for ex-gays. We at VoV also deserve the same level of respect afforded to everyone else. We do invite all homosexuals (ego-dystonic and ego-syntonic, alike) to share their thoughts, feelings and ideas in a respectful dialogue or debate.  If we must disagree, we can do so without being disagreeable, let alone hate-filled.  Let’s not attack the man or the woman. Together, let’s look at the substantiated evidence.

Out of love, we also ask anyone who is ego-dystonic about their homosexuality: “Have you ever felt a wound?  More particularly, have you ever felt a wound of the heart? Were you ever hurt through emotional or physical neglect, rejection, or a lack of normal, physical closeness by a same sex parent? Were you ever sexually assaulted by someone who stole your innocence as a child?  Were you ever rejected by same-sex peers? Have you allowed yourself to work with someone who can help you understand why you are searching to heal that childhood wound in the arms of a same-sex individual?  Have you ever asked yourself if a childhood wound can be healed with sex?” Perhaps the hardest question of all is, “Have you buried wounds from the past instead of dealing with them?”

If you still think you were “born this way,” please read “Out of the Desert,” by clicking here.

Gisele Roy is a parent of a son in his twenties who has battled SSA for 13 years. She has struggled with the emotional pain of seeing her son experience rejection from his peers, loneliness, and deep depression. It is Gisele’s hope that she, her husband and her son will continue to work on healing the deep-seated pain and emotional causes of his SSA and that her son will be able to find a wife who will complement him in every way.