An Open Letter to Dr. Dobson - Focus on the Family

[Maraya1969]

This is a repost of a letter that I sent to Dr. Dobson from Focus on the Family a few months ago. He started one of the largest anti-gay Christian organizations that sell homosexual “conversion therapy” to their followers. The original was quite long so I am reposting a revised smaller version here.

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(Note: I have sent a follow up letter – again no response)


Dear Dr. Dobson:

In your argument against homosexuality being an inherited trait you quote ONE study from 1993! I find this misleading and self serving. I have collected a few NEWER studies that suggest that homosexuality, (and especially gender dysphoria syndrome) indeed has genetic origins. They all come from respected scientific journals.

In your response to whether homosexuality is genetic or not you state:

"Demonstrating that any behavioral state is not only biological but genetic is well beyond our present research capacity. This is especially true for something as complex and nuanced as homosexuality. One psychiatric researcher, Brian Suarez, calculated that at least 8,000 people would be required for a study to confirm a behavioral trait as genetic. No study of homosexuality has come remotely close to these requirements."

Dr. Dobson you are admitting that the case has not been proven one way or another, the "jury is still out". How then can you treat homosexuals as "sinners" when there is so much that you admit you do not know? There is more and more evidence coming out that our sexuality is determined by genetics and/or situations that occur during development in the womb.

I ask you Dr. Dobson, what will you do if in 5 years you are PROVEN to be wrong? How many lives will you admit that you ruined, (or caused to be ended because of suicide or violence) because of your personal beliefs? I think it is reprehensible to target gays as "sinners" and I believe the ramifications of your anti-gay agenda is reprehensible, especially when you personally admit that you do not know whether it is a trait that is created by God or not.

Sincerely,

XXXX XXXXX

The full letter and text of PubMed abstracts can bee found here:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=3839736&mesg_id=3839736

[bluestateguy]

1. They won't let you win this point of argument

So homosexuality is proven to be biological or genetic.

Then the Dobson crowd will just fine tune their argument to say that homosexuality is a mental disorder or disease like schitzophrenia, etc. That will be used as grounds to say that such persons should not be allowed to marry, hold a job free from discrimination or be treated as equal citizens under the law.

[Maraya1969]

4. Oh that is a horrible thought - remember the recent refusal of some

Texas, (I think) pastor who refused to marry two people because the man was paralyzed impotent? (I don't think that is always the case and I don't know how they found out he was impotent unless they ASKED!)

[liberalhistorian]

2. Great letter, but you should also

tell him to focus on his own damned family! I saw that great bumpersticker once, "Focus on Your Own Damned Family", and have always wanted it for my own car. That man and his ilk have done so much damage to so many thousands of people, I'm amazed that gays I know can be as calm as they are when discussing him.

[whistle]

3. Great letter, has Dr. Dobson replied to you yet?

....In addition, 8,000 participants in a study that promises to be the conclusive answer the question is the homosexual a sinner who can overcome his/her homosexual traits or not because they are genetically predisposed, does not sound that large. I think it would be a small price indeed to pay to give the world the truth. Why for the Family Research Council to fund such a study would be pocket change!

[Maraya1969]

5. No he has NOT replied and that is why I am posting it here

I am going to send the link to this tread to him.

[Vanje]

6. Dobson wont reply because theres no money in it

Dobson is in it for the money. He dosnt give a shit what causes homosexuality. He dosnt give a shit about "curing" homosexuality.
He's just big time cashing in on the subject.
Dobson is a rich man. Reading and responding to your letter wont make him any richer, so why would he do it.
In his business , he dosnt have to care what you think, he dosnt have to care whats true.
You think he cares out of the goodness of his heart? (snort!)

If you wrote a letter agreeing with his "ministry" , he would respond, and send you a post-paid envelope for you to enclose your tax-deductable charatable contribution, knowing you would be likely to write him a check. hHe would probably send you a catalog of his books, videos and motivational tapes.

[Dogmudgeon]

7. Who's Your Savio(u)r?

Here's one you can ask a fundy:

"Are gay people bigger sinners than straight people?"

They can't answer in the affirmative -- the Bible states that all sin is equally wicked in the eyes of the Lord.

"If there are no greater or lesser sins, then why are you trifling with pseudoscience when your Christian Walk™ could be leading you to feed the hungry, heal the sick, or win souls?"

Fortunately, most fundies are not as obsessed with sex as most of their leaders, and are actually starting to grumble about it.

The Gospels state quite clearly that Jesus freed us all from the effect of sin -- eternal death. Eternal life requires no performances, simply trust. How this relates to some quack mental-conditioning program is beyond me.

--p!
Praise the Lord and Pass the ICD-9

[Vanje]

8. "Are gay people bigger sinners than straight people?"

Who knows!
But this is for certain, Theres a lot of money for Dr. Dobson in making Christians think so.

[Dogmudgeon]

10. The Bible (NT) opposes the parsing of sin

Sin became a qualitative flaw in the human spirit, as opposed to earlier systems that computed individual sins as if they had different values. At the time of Jesus' ministry, the progressive thinkers within Judaism were starting to consider sin like that; the early Catholic church reverted to the sin-counting idea.

Fundamentalists are not supposed to "quantize" sin. Sin is sin, it is absolute, and sins can not be compared. Christ has ransomed us from death and put us beyond the cosmic consequences for sin -- so why count?

There is actually a philosophical method behind the analysis of sin. It is called hammartiology, which curiourly enough comes from the Greek term for when an archer misses the bull's-eye.

--p!
Now go! and quantize no more!

[Maraya1969]

11. Wow you are right

Not that I expected you to be wrong but I looked up that word. What a strange business to be in.

"So what do you do for a living?"

"I study sin" :crazy:



1 entry found for hamartiology.

Main Entry: hamartiology

Part of Speech: noun

Definition: the branch of theology which studies sin; the doctrine of sin


I've written to other organizations that seem to be obsessed with homosexuality. I've asked them "why" and I've never gotten a straight answer. Either they are like our administration that tries to amend the Constitution so as to ban gay marriage while a gay male escort is obviously servicing some of them; or they just concentrate on the one sin that they are not guilty of.

It must be very easy to hammer down the anti-gay message when you are heterosexual. That way you don't have to worry about all the other "sins" you are committing on a daily basis. Gays are the ultimate scape goat for Preachers looking for something to preach about.

Or you could just be in the closet and full of hate toward YOURSELF.

[Dogmudgeon]

13. The harvest of Holy Homophobia

One "M" in hamartiology? I've been spelling it wrong! I guess that makes it meta-hamartiological. :)

My own experience with homophobia may be instructive to some of the Christiant gay-haters. I have never been homophobic myself, and have never really given it much thought. In 1986, I was at a "venue" -- a place where punk-rock and "college" musicians played and people drank -- and as I was leaving, a large, irate drunk confronted me and began screaming that I had been "looking at him" like a "f**kin' homo". He knocked me to the ground and began to beat me, while two of his pals looked on.

There had been a cop there just minutes before. I was told that as soon as he saw the "fight" starting, he found other coply duties to busy himself with.

Anyway, two of my pals started to take action. One of them began to swing his $400 portable recorder (he recorded bands to make live tapes for them) like a bolo, and the other one picked up a large piece of something big, hard, and ugly looking. The thugs ran off, the big one screaming that he would come back and kill me and "them other faggots".

To give you an idea of how valiantly my friends had acted, each of them were about as non-macho as you could imagine. One had been a socially awkward radical in the late 1960s who had eventually been kicked out of his peace-action commune because they didn't like him, and the other was a physically inept AND socially awkward guy who had a talent for audio engineering and nothing else, including physical activity of any kind. The would have lasted 30 seconds or less against those thugs, had they not run off.

I went back down into the bar (it was set into a basement) and the barman laughed at me. I asked him to call the cops and he walked away. I eventually found the phone, called the cops myself, and they never came. I went home, cleaned up, and quickly discovered that my family considered it a little bar fight that I had "lost" and were paranoid that I had called the cops.

Fortunately, the damage was superficial -- my face was purple for two weeks -- but I had just started a job as a busboy. I ended up wearing so much "base" for the next two weeks that I looked like a mannikin, and the stuff only lasted for 5-6 hours of an 8-hour shift.

I eventually sued the club (Woe unto the Litigious Society™! Where is the Personal Responsibility™!) and won the princely sum of $700. The only satisfaction I got was to find that the perp had been arrested for assaulting an off-duty cop a couple of weeks later, and was cooling his heels at the local house of correction. I am certain that if my friends had not been there, I would have been beaten much worse, probably by all three of them.

The moral of the story is that the godly gay-bashers don't know what the hell they are doing. Sexual violence can happen to anyone, at any time, under any circumstances. And if you're selected for the honor, you will NOT be asked to produce Proof Of Sexual Orientation -- they will just bash you.

This kind of bashing will not be in the form of an editorial you disagree with, it will be actual physical violence.

Sometimes I think that the bulk of the Christian community has just gone nuts and decided that if they made their golden idol in the shape of Jesus, everything would be all right. But it never works that way, and the idolaters never learn. The reality 2000 years ago involved rough-hewn wood, crude iron nails, an "ironic" crown of thorns, and the body fluids of Jesus as his body died in agony. There is no gold or glory in earthly violence, and those who promote it will someday understand how it was their hands that swung the lash, cut the scalp, drove the nails in, and cast lots for the soiled clothing.

In this world, no one is free from sin, but the often-futile effort to lighten the burden of others counts more than we know. My friends, avowed atheists each, followed the example of Simon of Cyrene without a moment's reflection on Biblical exegesis, and in spite of the fact that I was as far from being a "savior" as could be imagined. The same way, the often-successful effort to increase that burden eventually breaks the back of the tormentor as well as the tormented.

One of these days, I hope the holy homophobes understand that.

--p!

[Maraya1969]

9. That is a great point!

:applause:

[Maraya1969]

12. I just thought of something else

Maybe I thought of it because you essentially said it in your post! :headbang:

Born Again Christians always talk like they know they are sinners and no one is without sin so WHY do they demand gays get rid of that one particular sin? You don't see them running around saying, "YOU MUST REPENT OF YOUR GREEDY NATURE OR YOU ARE GOING TO HELL!" or "IF YOU CONTINUE TO BE ENVIOUS OF YOUR NEIGHBOR'S LEXUS YOU ARE GOING TO HELL!"

Yup it seems that the only sin that SOME Christians want to do away with altogether is homosexuality. All the others are acceptable in the eyes of THEM!

And just think of all the votes Bush got by playing with this absurd belief. (makes me wonder if this tactic is hidden somewhere - like the Downing Street memo). Yes, 1/2 of the US population are below average intelligence, and they all voted for Bush.


Oh, and while I am at it someone told me once that the Supreme Court is never going to overturn Roe v Wade because it is one of the biggest running tickets for the Republicans. Can you imaging if abortion was illegal and no one wanted it legal and they were no gays in this county?

The Repubs would have NOTHING to sell their party with!