Tag Archives: Jerry Sandusky Victimization Act

Why Texas Matters: Affirming Therapy Equality a necessary protection for EXLGBT Americans

Texas Resolution

The fight for therapy equality and affirming equal access to counseling options in Texas is no longer just a dream thanks to the courageous actions of the Texas Republican Party. As a native Texan and a 24 year EXLGBT American, Im elated to write about it.

Johnathan Saenz of Texas Values Action told KERA News, “Texas Republicans want to make clear: If a parent wants to take their child and have a discussion with a counselor about their questions about sexuality, they should have the freedom to do that.”

The resolution reads in part:
“…we oppose any criminal or civil penalties against those who oppose homosexuality out of faith, conviction, or belief in traditional values. We recognize the legitimacy and value of counseling which offers reparative therapy and treatment to patients who are seeking escape from the homosexual lifestyle…”

Bucking the trend to punish citizens who seek counseling for unwanted same sex attractions —and the professionals who want to help them— the Texas GOP took an unusual step and voted to affirm therapy equality. The move would have made African American Texas GOP pioneer Norris Wright Cuney (1846-1898) proud. When Cuney and other African Americans were building the party in Texas, passion to build a better social and economic future for African Americans was the catalyst that birthed their innovative drive. At that time, there existed no promises of “affirmative action” to lull them into complacency. What they did face was the consistent attacks of the Democrat-led Klan who conspired at every turn to block access to the well being of black American citizens.

There was strong and widespread support for passage of the resolution among Texas conservatives, perhaps fed up with the anti-American actions of liberals who continue to deny rights and suppress hope for potential millions of Americans seeking avenues to change sexual and emotional dysfunctions. Rape, molestation and sexual abuse have been at the root of much sexual confusion. The New Jersey legislation was dubbed the “Jerry Sandusky Victimization Act”, because opponents contended it would prevent victims of abuse and molestation who subsequently developed homosexual inclinations, from getting much needed counseling.

Equality Matters

Much of the therapy discrimination is based on nonscientific political posturing. To date, there has been no recognizable scientific evidence or research demonstrating that therapy (or ministry) to individuals seeking change from homosexuality is harmful or ineffective.

American citizens who seek therapy and ministry options to help them live out their identity has been under attack. In California and New Jersey, unnecessarily punitive laws have been passed depriving hurting parents of the opportunity to help their OWN children get professional counseling to overcome unwanted same gender sexual desires. In nine other states, serious attempts have been made to deprive tax-paying Americans of the freedom to seek ssa counseling.

The driving force behind this historic move was Jeremy Schwab of Dallas, himself a beneficiary of therapy and counseling. He’s taken a more proactive, positive role in fighting discrimination against EXLGBT Americans.

Schwab found that necessity was the mother of activism.

“Activists have drafted a bill to be introduced in all 50 states which will ban or severely restrict access to Reparative Therapy and all other SOCE (Sexual Orientation Change Efforts) including religious counseling. A similar bill is currently under review in the British Parliament which goes much further,” he said.

Said Schwab, “After California and New Jersey passed these laws last year, I began reaching out to Republican State Legislators and State Senators to discuss the law. In Washington State, the bill flew through their House without any opposition from Republicans, but once we talked with the GOP state senators and they came to understand the full story, they stood up and blocked this awful bill. The same has been the case now for eleven other states.

In each case, it took significant efforts to educate GOP legislators and rally grassroots support before their GOP lawmakers realized the importance of this issue to religious freedom. Since this bill is being introduced in all 50 states, it is a critical and unique addition to the State GOP which is not fully covered by the current language.”

That’s why what happened in Texas matters. State legislatures must understand that its immoral to enshrine into law deprivation of therapy equality. No American should have to go day after day tortured and suicidal because he or she has been told there are no options and no choices for them. LGBT Americans have the freedom to seek counseling to affirm their homosexual behavior and its big business. The San Francisco based Gaylesta, a “GLBTQ Psychotherapy Association” lists some 250 mental health professionals available to homosexuals. Why are EXGLBT Americans treated differently? Why give some unlimited options for personal happiness but deprive others of even one hopeful avenue of change? Why is the fate of their happiness and the happiness of their families placed in the hands of people who despise them? Aren’t all Americans guaranteed the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?

This isn’t empty complaining, but the stark reality that in America homosexual activists are pursuing legal tools to punish people who simply want freedom from a crippling sexual and emotional condition.

Pastor Darryl L. (DL) Foster is the Co-Founder of Voice of the Voiceless and an ordained minister, husband, father, and self-described abolitionist pastor. In 1990, he left homosexuality to follow Christ and subsequently founded Witness Ministries, Inc. a prominent Christian outreach focused on helping people of color gain their freedom in Christ. In 2010, he also founded and organized the Overcomers Network, an Atlanta based EXGLBT empowerment organization with chapters in 18 US cities.

VOV Condemns Kangaroo-Court Committee That Advanced Therapy Ban in New Jersey

New Jersey Gay Activists Continue to Misrepresent Truth in Committee Hearing on Bill That Would Deny Therapy for Child Sex Abuse Victims 

Trenton, NJ, june 13, 2013 – New Jersey Citizens Against the Jerry Sandusky Victimization Act, A 3371 charged in their testimony today before the Assembly Women and Children’s committee that gay activists and their allies continue to fabricate stories and misrepresent the facts and scientific research related to the development and treatment of same-sex attraction.

The bill would ban licensed psychotherapists in New Jersey from providing widely accepted and proven sexual orientation change effort (SOCE) therapies to children and adolescents with unwanted same-sex attraction, including victims of abuse by sexual predators like Jerry Sandusky. The ban would apply even if these victims and their parents seek it.
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New Jersey Gay Activist Lies May Have Sealed Jerry Sandusky Victimization Act’s Fate

Garden State Equality and Brielle Goldani’s Lies To Advance Legislation Catching Up

It is now crystal clear that Troy Stevenson, Executive Director of Garden State Equality and Brielle Goldani’s lies are catching up to them. On May 30, CBS New York reported:

New Jersey Senate has put off a vote on a bill banning licensed therapists from trying to convert gay minors into heterosexuals. The postponement was made Thursday so some unspecified changes could be made to the legislation. It will be heard next by an Assembly panel.

Interestingly, the report failed to include some key facts that have been leading up to this decision. While the story mentions an Assembly panel hearing, it fails to report the fact that the same hearing was scheduled for May 15 and was also postponed, presumably due to “unspecified changes,” which is code for “we’re backing away from this toxic bill and we don’t want to tell you why.” Voice of the Voiceless (VOV) previously reported:

May 15 was supposed to be the nail in the coffin for New Jersey opponents of SOCE, who were attempting to push this legislation through a partisan legislature and put pressure on Republican Governor Chris Christie to take sides in an election year. After successfully moving the bill out of the Senate Health, Human Services, and Senior Citizens Committee, activists had secretly scheduled an Assembly hearing for May 15. In fact, Gay City News reported on May 8 that Dr. Jack Drescher, a prominent New York gay psychiatrist, was scheduled to testify on May 15 before the New Jersey Assembly in favor of the bill.

But now, gay activists in New Jersey are running away from their fraudulent statements on March 18, and legislators are following the same course. Below is summary of their lies:

Lie #1 – Transgender Brielle Goldani said she was tortured in 1999 in a Columbus, Ohio “conversion therapy torture camp.” No one has been able to corroborate her story, including the Ohio Secretary of State, Attorney General, and her home church in New Jersey, whom she said paid for the camp. Additionally, mental health practitioners who have been working for decades in Ohio have never heard of a camp called “True Directions,” except of course, in Draq Queen RuPaul’s 1997 film But I’m a Cheerleader.

Lie #2 – Garden State Equality claimed there were an additional six “conversion therapy camps” after the Jerry Sandusky Victimization Act Press Conference in May. After multiple e-mails and phone calls to their office, Executive Director Troy Stevenson failed to produce any evidence or provide any names, as he promised he would. Not surprisingly, the New Jersey mainstream media has failed to hold him accountable to produce the names of these so-called “conversion therapy camps.”

Lie #3 – This week VOV discovered yet another allegation from Troy Stevenson of a “conversion therapy camp” in Oklahoma. Apparently, this “conversion therapy camp” caused Troy’s childhood friend to commit suicide. Who knows how much truth is in this story. If this boy did commit suicide, that is obviously a tragedy. Any loss of life at any time is a tragedy, and we grieve for this boy and his family.

But what is really concerning is Troy Stevenson and Brielle Goldani’s attempt to use half-truths and downright fabrications to advance their political agendas in New Jersey. Just how far will these activists go? How many lives will they exploit in order to score cheap political points for Senator Barbara Buono’s campaign against Governor Christie? How many children in New Jersey will be told they are born gay and their same-sex attractions did not result from childhood sexual abuse from the likes of Pedophile Jerry Sandusky?

It appears, at least for now, that the New Jersey Senate is backing away from this toxic legislation. But who knows what Troy Stevenson and Garden State Equality are up to next? Who knows how many more unsubstantiated allegations of “conversion therapy camps” will come next without a news media to challenge them? Below is the e-mail I sent to Stevenson this week, asking him once again, to provide evidence of his allegations. To date, he has not responded.

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

 

 

Mr. Stevenson,

I wanted to follow up once again to the e-mail I sent you below, as well as ask you a question in response to your personal story of a conversion camp in Oklahoma (see below).

You have yet to provide, as promised, the names of the six Ohio conversion camps. We can only conclude that these camps do not exist. If they do, please give us names so we may investigate. Also, please give us the name of this conversion camp in Oklahoma.

It is to your benefit to be transparent about these allegations you and your organization have continually made against those of us who work in this field. I am happy to work with you and Garden State Equality to end any abusive practices, if they exist. However, all we have heard to this point is unsubstantiated allegations and half-truths from your side.

Thanks,

Christopher Doyle
Co-Founder
Voice of the Voicelesss

 

Personal – I’ve never told anyone this.

Posted by Troy Stevenson, Executive Director, on March 18, 2013 (Image)

Right now, I’m on the train to Trenton with members of the Garden State Equality team. We’re getting ready to testify in front of the Senate Health Committee to talk about “gay cure” and “conversion” therapies and why they are so harmful for LGBT youth.

As I was going over my prepared remarks, I realized that there is a story I’ve never shared before that I’m ready to tell — because this issue is deeply personal to me, and it’s important for legislators to hear it.

When I was 15 years old, I met a young man from the rival high school in my home town in Oklahoma. He was the first person I felt I could truly connect with, the first person I came out to, and the first person I ever kissed.

But that first kiss was interrupted. The football team caught us behind the school after practice. We ran for what we felt was our lives, and what may very well have been in Oklahoma in the early 1990s.

We made it to our homes safely, and my first call was to my friend to make sure he was OK.

But he wasn’t OK. He described the “conversion” camp his parents sent him to when he told them he was gay. He described things that I couldn’t imagine, indignities that I won’t repeat. He said, “I will never go back.”

That was the last time we spoke. The next day I found out that he took his life. There is no doubt in my mind that the thought of returning to that torment was more than he could take.

It took me another decade before I was brave enough to honor his memory and honor my true self-identity by coming out of the closet once and for all. I became a better person, an advocate, and stronger than I knew I could be. I found a new home, here in New Jersey, and I am proud to lead an organization that works every day to fight for the equality, fairness, and acceptance that I never felt as a young person.

I’ll be telling this story to the legislators later this morning, but I wanted you to hear it first from me directly.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart for all that you do and for the role you play in this organization, our community, my chosen home.

–Troy Stevenson
Executive Director, Garden State Equality

Anti-Ex-Gay Activists Soooooooo Angry About Sandusky-Branded New Jersey Bill

Wayne Besen, David Roberts, and Other Ex-Gay Haters Throw Tantrums on Blogosphere

It was bound to happen. Now that the New Jersey bill to ban therapy for minors with unwanted same-sex attractions has been successfully branded the Jerry Sandusky Victimization Act, anti-ex-gay/gay activists are throwing tantrums on the blogosphere.

In a May 7 post, Toby Grace whines that “Brielle Goldani is now living a nightmare because of her courage and willingness to testify to the New Jersey Senate committee holding hearings on bill S2278, also known as “The Jerry Sandusky Victimization Act . . . Ms. Goldani says she has been essentially driven into seclusion by harassing phone calls at both home and work and stalking on social media sites. Troy Stevenson, director of Garden State Equality, characterized it as a “re-victimization,” and points out that, while there may be no camp with such a name in Ohio today, that in no way means there was none 15 years ago.”

To be clear, Brielle Goldani’s fraudulent testimony on March 18 has been thoroughly discredited in articles published byWorldNetDaily.com and Townhall.com. To sum it up, no one can corroborate Goldani’s story of being tortured in a camp called “True Directions,” which only exists in a 1999 movie starring Drag Queen Ru Paul. The Ohio Secretary of State and Attorney General’s office confirmed that no such camp has ever existed, as well as several licensed mental health practitioners in Ohio who have been working in the sexual orientation field for decades. Additionally, the top official in the Assemblies of God church network in Ohio denied such a camp has ever existed, as well as Goldani’s church in New Jersey, who she said paid for her (him at the time) to attend the so-called “conversion therapy torture camp.” Re-victimized? Sorry, one would have to be victimized in the first place to be re-victimized, and Goldani clearly has not.

But that hasn’t stopped the gay activists in New Jersey from doubling-down on their discredited conspiracy theories of “gay conversion therapy” camps. Troy Stevenson, Executive Director of Garden State Equality, claims there are an additional six camps in Ohio doing similar work as True Directions. Really Troy, six camps that use aversion therapy such as forced IV injections and electroshock therapy intended to zap the gay out of youngsters? The scene in New Jersey is quickly turning into a full-fledged circus with these unsubstantiated allegations, and the activists are getting nervous. So much so, that they cancelled the May 15 Assembly hearing where they intended to bring in “prominent” gay psychiatrist Dr. Jack Drescher to put a nail in the coffin for sexual orientation change effort (SOCE) therapy and send the Jerry Sandusky Victimization Act on its way to Governor Chris Christie’s desk.

Clearly on the defense, anti-ex-gay activists are sooooo angry that their lies are being called out. David Roberts of Ex-Gay Watch complained last night on Facebook that therapists like me who are against children being victimized by pedophiles like Jerry Sandusky, and then lied to by gay activists that their same-sex attraction isn’t caused by sex abuse, are using this bill for political purposes and to “further our profits.”

Even better, Wayne Besen at the hilariously-named Truth Wins Out claims that ex-gay advocates are desperate and relying on “junk science” to make the connection with Jerry Sandusky and the New Jersey bill. If we were so desperate Wayne, why did your fellow anti-ex-gay activists in New Jersey cancel the May 15 hearing? Why not go forward and push this bill through the Assembly committee just like they did with the Senate hearing? Could it be that all their lies are coming back to haunt them? Could it be that THEY are desperate to create distance from these lies and the Sandusky-branded bill?