Eleventh researcher complains that the religious right distorted his work

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Posted by alvinmcewen at 5:20 am
August 10, 2010

Eleventh researcher complains that the religious right distorted his work
Posted by alvinmcewen on @ 5:20 am


Yet another researcher is accusing religious right groups of misusing his work.

John Horgan, a science journalist and Director of the Center for Science Writings at the Stevens Institute of Technology, Hoboken, NJ, yesterday published an article in Scientific American calling various religious right groups to task for what he says is a distortion of his work:

. . . Christian homophobes have misused my writings on the biology of homosexuality, particularly “Gay Genes, Revisited,” published in Scientific American in November 1995. In it I reported on weaknesses in the claims of scientists—and particularly the geneticist Dean Hamer, “discoverer” of the “gay gene”—that homosexuality has a genetic basis. (I’ve continued beating up on Hamer over the years for exaggerating the links between specific genes and behaviors; see for example this essay.)

Anti-gay Christians cite “Gay Genes, Revisited” to make the case that homosexuality is not hardwired; people with homosexual inclinations can change their behavior and even minds through therapeutic interventions. See, for example, the references to “Gay Genes, Revisited” on these Mormon and Catholic sites.

Horgan was saying that he wasn’t making a case against the LGBT equality (which religious right groups have done with his piece) but was saying that sexuality is more fluid than the simplistic notions that people are either gay or heterosexual.

Personally I am in favor of Horgan’s opinion that sexuality is fluid. I also believe the phrase “gay gene” is a straw man argument, or a buzzword perpetrated by the religious right such as the phrases “radical homosexual activist” or “protecting marriage.”

But the most important thing to remember is that Horgan is yet another researcher accusing the religious right of distorting his/her work. By my count, he is number 11. ............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2010/08/10/eleventh-researcher-complains-that-the-religious-right-distorted-his-work/