Gay Lawmaker to Christians: We’ll Take Your Children
7:00AM EDT 8/26/2013, Matt Barber
Few people doubt that New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie hopes to
become president in 2016. Unfortunately for him, he may have just signed away
any chance of that.
Last week, Christie signed A3371, a draconian piece of legislation
that bars licensed therapists from helping children overcome unwanted same-sex
attractions, behavior or identity. This law bans help for minors even
when—as is so often the case—those same-sex attractions arise from childhood
sexual abuse by the likes of a Jerry Sandusky.
This law will prohibit minors and their parents from receiving
counseling they desire and will force counselors to violate ethical codes
because they will not be able to help clients reach their own counseling goals.
This law would enslave children—whether abused or not—to a subjectively
determined sexual identity they reject.
The connection between homosexual abuse and “gay
identity” is undeniable. Consider this: Researchers from the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have found that homosexual men are “at
least three times more likely to report CSA (childhood sexual abuse)” than
heterosexual men.
Moreover, the Archives of Sexual Behavior—no bastion of
conservatism—determined in a 2001 study that nearly half of all gay-identified
men were molested by a homosexual pedophile. The study notes, “46 percent of
homosexual men and 22 percent of homosexual women reported having been molested
by a person of the same gender. This contrasts to only 7 percent of
heterosexual men and 1 percent of heterosexual women reporting having been
molested by a person of the same gender.”
For obvious reasons, this politically motivated law has been dubbed
the “Jerry Sandusky Victimization Act.” Liberty Counsel, one of the
fastest-growing civil rights law firms in the country, has
stepped in to protect New Jersey
children, parents and licensed therapists. We’ve filed a suit to block the law,
as we’ve already blocked a similar law in California.
In his signing statement, Gov. Christie wrote, “Government should
tread carefully into this area and I do so here reluctantly. I have scrutinized
this piece of legislation with that concern in mind. However, I also believe
that on issues of medical treatment for children we must look to experts in the
field to determine the relative risks and rewards.”
Beyond the fact that Christie and the New
Jersey legislature have just violated the First Amendment
rights of New Jersey
parents, children and counselors, there remains another problem with his
assertion: It’s not true. As with any form of therapy, the “experts” are all
over the board on the issue of change therapy.
For instance, both New Jersey Democrats and Christie cited the
American Psychological Association (APA) as justification for this gross
infringement on the right of self-determination. Although, no doubt, the highly
liberal APA supports this and similar "Sandusky laws" for political
reasons, the group’s own task force on change therapy—led entirely by members who
themselves are “gay”-identified or known political activists—has had to admit,
nonetheless, that homosexuality itself “refers to feelings and self-concept.”
The task force confessed that such therapy has shown “varying
degrees of satisfaction and varying perceptions of success.” It acknowledged
within its own skewed, very limited “study” that some people had “altered their
sexual orientation. ... Participants had multiple endpoints, including LGB
identity, ex-gay identity, no sexual orientation identity, and a unique
self-identity. ... Individuals report a range of effects from their efforts to
change their sexual orientation, including both benefits and harm.”
Reports of “both benefits and harm”? Exactly what might be expected
from any form of therapy.
But that’s for adults. Here’s the kicker: The APA also acknowledged
that there is no evidence whatsoever that change therapy harms minors. Mat
Staver, founder and chairman of Liberty Counsel, addresses this, the most
outrageous aspect of the law.
“The very report that the governor cited for signing this law also
admitted that there is absolutely zero research—none—regarding the effect of
change therapy with minors,” Staver says.
Get that? Gov. Christie just signed into law a bill purporting to
prevent harm to minors from change therapy, citing as the reason an APA report
that admits there is neither research nor empirical evidence to suggest that
change therapy harms minors.
Is your head swimming? It should be.
The governor is one of three things. He is either ill-informed,
politically motivated or stupid.
I don’t know. I guess he could be all of the above.
Meanwhile, many experts are outraged by this gross overreach by
Christie and other New Jersey
liberals. Dr. Nicholas Cummings, former president of the APA, wrote in USA
Today, “Contending that all same-sex attraction is
immutable is a distortion of reality. Attempting to characterize all sexual
reorientation therapy as ‘unethical’ violates patient choice and gives an
outside party a veto over patients’ goals for their own treatment. A political
agenda shouldn’t prevent gays and lesbians who desire to change from making
their own decisions.”
Cummings has testified to personally helping hundreds of formerly
homosexual clients achieve the change they desired.
Things get more sinister yet. Last Wednesday, New Jersey
Assemblyman Tim Eustace, who sponsored the bill and is openly homosexual,
bombastically compared change therapy to “beating a child” and suggested the
government take children seeking change away from their parents. He told
Talk Radio 1210 WPHT, “What this does is prevent things that are harmful to
people. If a parent were beating their child on a regular basis, we would step
in and remove that child from the house. If you pay somebody to beat your child
or abuse your child, what’s the difference?”
Mat Staver responded on the same program, “It is shocking to hear
the law’s sponsor threaten parents that the state will remove their children
from them if they provide the counsel they need and which helps them. This is
the ultimate nanny state.”
I’ll take it a step further, and I think I speak for many Christian
fathers: None of my three children suffer from unwanted same-sex
attraction, but if any of them did and they decided to seek change
therapy to reconcile their feelings with their faith, Mr. Eustace and the rest
of his "Gaystapo" would be extremely ill-advised to crest my front
porch with designs on taking my children.
Is this George Washington’s America
or Joseph Stalin’s Russia?
