Defending Paul Cameron

Paul Cameron, PhD, has been accused by the gay lobby of multiple things. Whether it be his removal from the APA, his "misrepresentation" of research, or his overall research quality. Actually, the more I read into him, the more credible he becomes. Which is odd, because almost everything is in opposition to him. Lets go down the list of claims. 
I will use this website for the main claims against Cameron.
1.) "[Cameron has been] Rejected by the scientific community for fraudulent research and misrepresenting the research of others." Actually, this claim (misrepresentation) is based on a court case. Generally, I don't know if a federal judge should be in control of this. I think other academics must also comment to validate the courts finding. And, this has happened. A correction to a dissertation from Capella University, formerly agreeing with the courts, has changed opinions, noting that there is no proof that Cameron has willfully misrepresented research.  They have noted his extensive contribution to the research of homosexuality, and the way they explain his contributions seems to put him in a favorable light. Second, they merely assert that his research is fraudulent, and give no proof. There is actually a lot of literature which replicates his research. 

2.) "Cameron was dropped from membership in the American Psychological Association in 1984 for ethical violations concerning his biased research. That same year, the Psychological Association in his home state of Nebraska adopted a formal resolution disassociating itself from Cameron's work." Here are the original letters. We see that first, Cameron resigned, he did not get dropped. Further, Cameron quit because he thought that the APA was unfair, biased, and that the APA no longer held a proper view based on the evidence. Nothing is wrong with this. Of course the APA will disassociate itself, because they do no agree with Cameron. The APA response, see the link, was that they no longer agree with Cameron. That's it. Not that he is a liar, discredited, etc. The critics of Cameron misread the resignation fury. Note that he was dropped after he resigned. If anything, he was never really found guilty. Cameron further notes (see link from Capella): "Having no APA charges against me, 26 years ago, on November 7, 1982, I resigned and got a letter of acknowledgement from the President of the APA November 29, 1982. My letter explaining my reasons for my resignation, as requested by the APA President, was published in the Monitor in March 1983. My letter said that I believed the APA had abandoned its scientific stance and become an advocate for abortion and gay rights. Following the publication of this letter, the APA informed me I had been dropped from membership while under charges. I have since been asked at least three times to rejoin." To rephrase: at the time of resignation, he was not being investigated. Then, after he resigned, the APA attempted to claim that he was dropped after he resigned. But reading the original documents refuted their claim. And since then, they have wanted him back, which kinda refuted the part where people think that he scientific community hates him.

3.) "his sworn statement that homosexuals abuse children at a proportionately greater incident than do heterosexuals" is based upon the same distorted data  and, the Court notes, is directly contrary to other evidence presented at trial besides the testimony of Dr. Simon and Dr. Marmour. (553 F. Supp. 1121 at 1130 n.18.)" This is based on an old survey, which was updated and used superior datasets, which have been confirmed by other surveys. His overall numbers have stayed the same. 

4.) "According to an interview with former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, Cameron was recommending the extermination option as early as 1983." - Mark E. Pietrzyk,
News-Telegraph, March 10, 1995" Cameron writes (see replication link), "The Forum interviewer remarked that many societies have considered homosexuality a capital crime. Noting that it would be cheaper to kill homosexuals in primitive societies than jail or quarantine them is hardly an endorsement. In fact, Cameron is quoted in the same article as saying that such an idea is “not politically, ethically or socially acceptable” today. Where former Surgeon General Koop got his information is mystifying. He never asked Dr. Cameron whether he advocated such a policy."

5.) And the last part is about homosexuality taking over heterosexuality because homosexuality "feels better".  He never said this. He said that it "feels better", basically, and that if we don't condone it to some degree people will experiment with it. Its a pretty logical statement. People do things unless they are condoned, people want to be accepted. Now, I don't agree with him, homosexual sex sounds gross more than anything, but he is correct that if we fully embrace homosexuality, homosexual rates will likely increase somewhat.

The BSA decision on homosexuality

I applaud the BSA for preventing adult leaders who choose to indulge in a homosexual lifestyle, however, I am deeply saddened at their willingness to allow gay members under the age of 18. Here's why:

1. This is contradictory to the BSA oath, which includes the phrase "morally straight". The LDS church, and the Baptist church, both urged the BSA to keep the traditional membership policy. The LDS church and the Baptists are some of the largest contributor to the Boy Scouts, and allowing the gay members may shrink their religious support as homosexuality is against their biblical teaching. Furthermore, the Boy Scouts have a policy regarding religion: all children must have some type of religious affiliation. In most cases, the kids come from some Semitic religion (Islam, Christianity, Judaism). All of which oppose homosexuality. To allow homosexuals is not "morally straight" in the minds of the BSA's main religious body, according to natural law theory, etc. We might as well remove morally straight from the oath.

2. I cannot find any reasons (yet) which support their decision, other than the gay lobby pushing this. However, if homosexuality is not genetic or natural, which it isn't, homosexuals are not a protected suspect class. As such, any reason relating to the legal threats of discrimination or upholding a immutable lifestyle are irrelevant.

3. Allowing gay children but not gay adults tells the BSA that homosexuality is ok, and this begs the question, why not adults? This will lead to discrimination lawsuits.

4. A recent survey of 200,000 leaders and parents affiliated with the BSA shows that 61% (LOL, gays were allowed in with 61%) support the policy of excluding gays, and only 34% want gays to be allowed in.

5. People would be up in arms about allowing men into girl scouts. Why? Because intercourse is likely to occur, and this is not what the girl scouts want. If girls were to come into boyscouts, they would be given a separate living quarters on campgrounds, as is what happens at any other camp. No one would have a problem with this. If people did this to homosexuals, people would sue. Which is odd, because only women can claim the rights to a suspect class (under current evidence, at least. Who knows, maybe we will find a gay gene[s]). The only reason people care about this is because it is a political hot button issue. It is very hypocritical, and simply does not make sense. Unless we make allowing girls into the BSA an issue, then the fact that people care about this is really ignorant itself... but its called BOYscouts... And the same goes for you: morally straight. So, its the same issue. The fact that girls made a separate but equal program but gays have merely shows what the gay agenda wants: to pervert another institution.

I might sound like an extremist, but so did Moishe the Beadle.

Here is a more scholarly paper I put together on this. It's arguments still stand: http://social-conservatism.blogspot.com/2013/02/the-boy-scouts-and-homosexuality.html

Open Letter to the Supreme Court: Uphold DOMA and Prop. 8

I hope this post gets significant traffic. Also, the fact Justice Kennedy generally does internet research prior to making his decisions I may be lucky to influence the debate (or, at least I hope I do, though the chances are slim). Regardless, standing up for a noble cause means a lot. This year, I read two very significant literature pieces on this issue. Well, I have read many, but one point made keeps ringing in my ears.

Lawyer Lynn D. Wardle has equivocated the debate over same sex marriage to the book Night by Elie Wiesel. Not in the way that gay marriage will lead to the slaughter of millions, but in the way of "we told you so". Moishe the Beadle, a seemingly minor character at first glance, is one of the first Jews in the area to be taken into a concentration camp. He was one of the few that escaped and returned to the town where he was from. He told the populace about what he saw. No one would listen. His student heard him out (Elie), but did not believe him. He told stories of horror that no one would believe. They ignored him, this was absurd, he was lying, this will never happen. How can they do this, how can this lead to that, you are obviously wrong [1]. Ignoring them lead to obvious consequences. I, and Wardle in fact, feel like Moishe the Beadle. We warn of the consequences, we present arguments we feel are based on facts, but are discarded as liars or bigots. The similarities are striking.

Now, I proceed onto an essay on the issue.

I. Introduction
II. What is marriage?
III. Conclusion
IV. Final Remarks

I. Introduction

Why do I care about what gays do? Why would a straight, young, not even out of high school male care about this issue at all? How would it affect me?  Well, the answer is it may or it may not even affect me at all. Whether it affects me as a human being is irrelevant. I do care about what marriage is, and the well being of children, which leads me to the conclusion that gay marriage should not be legal. The state should be obligated (indeed, in most states it actually is obligated) to get marriage right. The state must understand why marriage exists in the first place, and what societal goods marriage can create.

II. What is marriage?

What is marriage? A recent group of scholars on many occasions have tried to make this point central in the marriage debate--indeed, the main ones (Sherif Girgis, Ryan T. Anderson, and Robert P. George) have made some of the most interesting comments on the issue. They have separated marriage into two large encompassing categories: First, marriage as a comprehensive union, and second a comprehensive union with a special link to children.

Girgis et al. has looked into the counter argument provided by the revisionist crowd (or, as more commonly known as SSM supporters). When asking a revisionist what marriage is, they provide the ambiguous answer of marriage is a loving union between spouses. But, as Girgis et al. notes, this definition can't hold up under scrutiny. If this was true, any loving union (for example mere cohabitation) should be treated as marriage, or a close friendship should be recognized by the state [2].

Marriage itself is an intrinsic good furthered by coitus. The loving generative act leads to a union connecting the mind, body, and soul. Procreation and child rearing, though important, are merely other social goods produced by the unions. To be simplistic enough to say marriage is only about love is false. Love is needed, or preferable, in a marriage and is what (generally) causes couples to marry. Love causes people to enter marriage, but that is different from what marriage actually is.

So, the key to this part is to focus more on the public purpose of marriage, which involves the intrinsic good of marriage. This good is the reason the state has decided to legislate its existence in the first place.

The state legislates marriage because of children--the special link to children. Tim Hsiao (who I also model the argument after) has written, "[m]arriage produces and cultivates the development of future citizens within a family unit held together by norms of fidelity, monogamy, exclusivity, and permanence." In many debates with teachers (even our former Young Republicans leader) had a quarrel with this argument on the grounds that he thought marriage required children. However Hsiao further notes, "[t]he claim isn’t that you need to be married to have children, it is that marriage is oriented toward child well-being in a way that other sexual relationships are not."[3]

The point can be expanded. When two people are together, bodily and mentally through marriage, they function better. A car functions best with four wheels, a car functions best with an engine. Having the ability to go forward is NOT the definition of a car, just like procreation is not necessary to have a marriage. Having the product of children through coitus, then, is an optional extra that makes marriage build upon its goods. A car would not be a car if it did not have a proper build. Just like marriage is not marriage when it is homosexual. In other words, coitus through marriage completes the marriage, and all marriages that are heterosexual are procreative in type, if not in effect. Marriage, then, is oriented towards procreation and children, though it does not require procreation or children. The state regulates it because coitus is the first step towards both of those means, and promoting heterosexual marriage merely encourages (does not force) more children raised by their mothers and fathers. Girgis et al. in their expanded book write, "... bodily coordination is possible even when its end is not realized; so for a couple, bodily union occurs in coitus even when conception does not. It is the coordination toward a single end [emphasis original] that makes the union; achieving the end would deepen the union but is not necessary for it."[4]

Other scholars have chimed in ad nauseum on the point. The infertile objection is really weak, as stated, because procreation is not a requirement, rather a benefit which builds upon marriages intrinsic good. The infertile argument must assume marriage has only extrinsic benefits.

To conclude this segment I will provide what I feel is one of the most important quotes for understanding what marriage is:

The key is to understand the specific type of community marriage actually is—in particular, how it is bodily, sexual, and of a type that would naturally be fulfilled by procreation. In every society, we find something like the following type of relationship: men and women committed to sharing their lives together, on the bodily, emotional, and spiritual levels of their being, in the kind of community that would be fulfilled by procreating and rearing children together. That such a distinctive type of community—marriage—does exist in every society is undeniable. There are, of course other relationships similar in some ways to marriage. For example, men and women may cohabit, regularly have sex together, and view the possibility of having children as a possibly attractive optional “extra,” or perhaps instead as a burden to be avoided. Or, by contrast, two or more individuals may form an alliance for the sake of bringing up children—two sisters, for example, or several celibate religious men or women. But these relationships are not marriages, and no society recognizes them as marriages. Marriage is that type of community that is both a comprehensive unity (a unity on all levels of the human person, including the bodily-sexual) and a community that would be fulfilled by procreating and rearing children together. Moreover, there is an intrinsic link between these two aspects of the community; the comprehensive (and therefore intrinsically sexual) relationship is fulfilled by, and is not merely incidental to, the procreating and rearing of children.[5]

III. Gay Parents

I will quote DOMA:

Marriage exists in virtually every known human society. . . . At least since the beginning of recorded history, in all the flourishing varieties of human cultures documented by anthropologists, marriage has been a universal human institution. As a virtually universal human idea, marriage is about regulating the reproduction of children, families, and society . . . . Marriage across societies is a publicly acknowledged and supported sexual union which creates kinship obligations and sharing of resources between men, women, and the children that their sexual union may produce.

I see this quote everywhere, and don't see the need to cite it (one of my future sources has it in there!)

No difference theory states children raised by homosexuals do as well as children raised by heterosexuals. Honestly, I don't understand how this myth perpetuates today. Even the APA and the ASA claim this theory to be correct. The ASA actually have claimed there are large representative studies claiming that no difference theory is correct [6].

The ASA claim the pro-family studies do not apply to homosexuals, only single parents and such... But wouldn't having one mother be the same as having lesbian parents? If anything, it might even be better. One of the larger studies on gay parents actually finds children of single parents do better than those raised by homosexuals [7]. Further research, expanding of that by Paul Cameron, and adding to the data set and looking at other culture finds that children raised by homosexual are more likely to be homosexual [8]. Indeed, this coincides with the vast amount of evidence that homosexuality is not a genetic phenomena. The largest twin studies indicate that homosexuality is about 10% genetic. Everything we do is genetic, and this influence is not surprising. It is universally agreed upon that homosexuality (like everything we do, almost) is genetically influenced, not genetically determined. The American College of Pediatricians notes, "Every trait is influenced by genes, but only some are determined by them. “Genetically determined” is destiny, “genetically influenced” is not." The evidence indicates that people may be predispositioned for a certain behavior, but they only become gay if influenced by environmental factors which would influence those genes. The College writes, "Environment and free will decisions interact with these predispositions and play an important role in the development of SSA."[9] Indeed, homosexuality is only possible in humans if the right environmental factors are induced. 

Since homosexuality is environmental in origin, it is quite easy to understand why children of homosexuals are more likely to be homosexuals. Even parenting studies authored by homosexual activists come to these conclusions, that homosexual parents increases the chances of children becoming gay, but the results are often minimized in the study (or fully ignored). Dr. Trayce Hansen writes, "Studies thus far find between 8% and 21% of homosexually parented children ultimately identify as non-heterosexual. For comparison purposes, approximately 2% of the general population are non-heterosexual. Therefore, if these percentages continue to hold true,[emphasis original  children of homosexuals have a 4 to 10 times greater likelihood of developing a non-heterosexual preference than other children."[10]

The largest most definitive study on the issue was authored by Mark Regnerus last year. He put together a nationally representative study whose methodology was impeccable compared to the studies authored before this. The study found that those raised by homosexuals on nearly every indicator did worse than those who were married or cohabiting [11]. The study prompted mainly political controversy and the scientific portion of the criticism has been misreported by the media. He was hounded for being a conservative catholic; but they forget that most of the studies in the field are written by openly gay or lesbian authors, or those who openly show their biases. If this is considered a valid criticism, which it isn't because if that's the best objection you have, you lost... back to the point. If this is considered a valid criticism, than nearly all of the research in this area needs to be counted as false, and all of the former court cases relying on this evidence reversed. The second objection was their being some conspiracy in the journal. The media claims that Regnerus was found guilty. This is a lie. When looking at the original task, if the journal had an adequate peer review process, he was found innocent. Also, if we care about the messenger, the person who wrote the study allegedly already hated Regnerus and... was no a sociologist, economist or statistical expert, etc. Rather, a music expert. Other reviews of the study have also vindicated its methodology. The analysis found that the Regnerus study had the best sample size of most of the research, that an extensive body of research supports the "children raised by gay are more likely to be gay" result, that all of the decisions made by Regnerus are respected and accepted statistical techniques and have even been used by some of the earlier studies, that his randomized sample is a strong plus to the overall conclusion to the study, and much more. All of the methods used by Regnerus are either far superior to equivalent pro-gay studies or use similar techniques [12]. Further, Regnerus has responded to his critics. Regnerus uses his data, edits it for each critique (for example, the foster care argument), and finds the same result. He uses the original data for other analysis's  where he applies new and different techniques to analyze the data set, all coming to the same conclusion. He responds to the academic response to his study, concluding, "Until much larger random samples can be drawn and evaluated, the probability-based evidence that exists—including additional NFSS analyses herein—suggests that the biologically-intact two-parent household remains an optimal setting for the long-term flourishing of children."[13]

IV. CONCLUSION

I ask the supreme court, but mainly the person reading this whoever they are, to sit down a minute, ignore the media, and objectively review the evidence.






1. Lynn D Wardle. "The Attack on Marriage as a Union between a man and a woman." North Dakota Law Review, (2007).
2. Sherif Girgis, Ryan T. Anderson, and Robert P. George. "What is Marriage?" Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, Winter (2010).
3. Tim Hsiao. "Getting Marriage Right: The Case for Conjugal Marriage." <http://thomists.wordpress.com/2013/03/30/getting-marriage-right-the-case-for-conjugal-marriage/>
4. Sherif Girgis, Robert P. George, and Ryan T. Anderson, What is Marriage? Man and Woman: A Defense. Encounter Books, 2012.
5. Patrick Lee, Robert P. George, Gerard V. Bradley. "Marriage and Procreation: The Intrinsic connection". <http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2011/03/2638/>
6. Their Amicus Brief is here: http://www.asanet.org/documents/ASA/pdfs/12-144_307_Amicus_%20%28C_%20Gottlieb%29_ASA_Same-Sex_Marriage.pdf
7. Soritos Sarakantos. "Children in Three Contexts: Family, Education, and Social Development." Children Australia, (1996).
8. Walter R. Schumm. "Children of Homosexuals more likely to be Homosexuals? A reply to Morrison and Cameron based on examination of multiple sources of data." Journal of Biosocial Science, (2010).
9. American College of Pediatricians. "Empowering Parents of Gender Discordant and Same-Sex Attracted Children." http://www.acpeds.org/the-college-speaks/position-statements/parenting-issues/empowering-parents-of-gender-discordant-and-same-sex-attacted-children
10. Dr. Trayce Hansen. "Pro-Homosexual Researchers Conceal Findings:  Children Raised by Openly Homosexual Parents More Likely to Engage in Homosexuality." http://www.drtraycehansen.com/Pages/writings_prohomo.html
11. Mark Regnerus. "How different are the adult children of parents who have same-sex relationships? Findings from the New Family Structures Study." Social Science Research, (2012). 
12. Walter R. Schumm. "Methodological decisions and the evaluation of possible effects of different family structures on children: The new family structures survey (NFSS)." Social Science Research, (2012). 
13. Study found here: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0049089X12001731