Media Myths of the Homosexual-Transgender Agenda – Special AIM Report by Peter LaBarbera

Photo-story version

Warning: This report contains some offensive descriptions and graphics

Self-Delusion, Self-Destruction: This is a young Massachusetts woman who had her healthy breasts surgically removed to live out her “transgender” fantasy that she is a “man.”  The homosexual-transgender lobby is advocating such body-mutilating surgeries even for “trans” minors–and at taxpayers’ expense through the military and government-subsidized health care.  Photo: MassResistance.org.

This special report by AFTAH president Peter LaBarbera for Accuracy in Media was first published by AIM on August 19, 2016; we have taken the liberty of adding several photos with captions to the original article.

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By Peter LaBarbera, Special Report for Accuracy in Media

The purpose of this report is to expose and refute some of the longstanding statistical lies and propagandistic myths of the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) activist movement. With media support, homosexual and leftist activists now openly campaign to banish dissenting conservative voices. This dangerous dynamic gives the homosexual-transgender lobby nearly full rein to advance its agenda, which now includes:

• Levying large fines to punish Christians and traditionalists who do not want to participate with their small business in homosexual “weddings”;
• Criminalizing pro-heterosexual change therapy for sexually confused minors;
• Using the government to force schools and businesses to allow “transgenders”—e.g., men who think they are women—to use public female (opposite-sex) restrooms and locker rooms;
• Using LGBT “nondiscrimination” laws to mandate that public schools and businesses punish anyone who does not adhere to politically-correct transgender-inclusive language—such as using “zir” instead of “her.” New York City now demands “respect” for 31 “gender identities,” including “genderqueer,” “third sex” and “pangender”;
• Taxpayer-funding for horrifying, body-disfiguring “sex reassignment surgeries,” e.g., a woman having her healthy breasts surgically removed to look like a flat-chested “man,” or a man having his penis surgically destroyed to craft a makeshift “vagina”;
• Allowing transsexuals into the U.S. military, and paying for their destructive, gender-bending “surgeries” in the name of “health care”;
• Encouraging young people to adopt opposite-sex “gender identities”—even going so far as encouraging underage children to take hormones to offset puberty—in a futile attempt to “become” the opposite sex—or worse: allowing minor boys and girls to have their sexual organs surgically mutilated to appear like the opposite-sex; and
• Teaching very young children—even kindergartners—to accept homosexuality and the radical “transgender” idea that they can choose a “gender identity” that does not match their biological sex.

So awash is the public in pro-homosexual propaganda that a 2011 Gallup poll found the average American “guesstimated” that a whopping 25 percent of the population is “gay.” (Women and people under 30 put the number even higher, at around 30 percent.) The actual percentage of homosexual men, lesbians and bisexuals in the U.S. population is just 2.3 percent (see below).

The 10 Percent Myth

This ’10 Percent’ Lie Helped Grow “Gay” Power: For decades homosexual activists promoted the myth — started by a homosexual activist — that a full 10 percent of the populace is “gay.” Reality finally caught up with the LGBT Lobby: a major U.S. government survey found that only 2.3 percent of those polled in 2013 identified as lesbian, gay or bisexual. Above is a book by homosexual activist Kevin Jennings claiming that one in ten teachers is homosexual. 

The “10 percent” myth is one of the most enduring propaganda claims of the homosexual activist movement. Concocted in the late 1970s by Bruce Voeller, founder of the National Gay Task Force (predecessor of today’s National LGBTQ Task Force), it was accompanied by the slogan, “We Are Everywhere.”

Thus, just as “gay” militants pressured and bullied America’s mental health professionals to remove homosexuality from the list of mental disorders in 1973, they greatly exaggerated the homosexual population to expand their political power in subsequent years. And the media duly cooperated by promoting the statistical sham. For decades American reporters treated the 10 percent claim—a misreading of deviant, pioneering “sexologist” Alfred Kinsey’s discredited research—as fact, using it to “report” huge numbers of alleged homosexuals in society.

The 10 percent myth served its purpose of projecting enormous “gay” political strength when the movement was still weak. But study after study came up with estimates of the homosexual-bisexual population under 5 percent. A massive 2014 survey of 35,557 Americans by the federal National Center for Health Statistics dealt a death blow to the Ten Percent claim. It found that only 1.6 percent of those polled identified as “gay or lesbian,” while 0.7 percent said they were “bisexual.” In 2011 the pro-LGBT Williams Institute at UCLA estimated that 0.3 percent identified as transgender. Thus a combined estimate for homosexuals, bisexuals and transgenders in America is around 3 percent.

Born Gay?—No Way

Another popular “gay” activist myth is the notion that homosexuals are “born that way.” This convenient narrative—stoked for many years by LGBT advocates—takes morality out of the homosexual debate by suggesting that homosexuals are not responsible for their sexual behaviors because “being gay” is a genetic part of “who they are.”

From a scientific perspective, however, the “born gay” myth—like its bogus “10 Percent Gay” counterpart—has fallen on hard times. In the 1990s, talk of a “gay gene” was all the rage after then-closeted homosexual researcher Dean Hamer published a media-ballyhooed 1993 study in the journal Sciencepurporting to find a “genetic marker” for male homosexual “orientation.” But Science could not replicate its own study, and other attempts failed as well. Now genetic homosexuality is no longer in vogue, although the possibility of a “gay gene” still excites reporters.

The most serious blow to the “gay gene” theory has come from identical twin studies. Once used to promote the idea of inborn homosexuality, they are now widely seen as demonstrating the opposite. Dr. Neil Whitehead, one of the world’s leading conservative researchers on the issue states:

“From six studies (2000-2011): if an identical twin has same-sex attraction the chances that the co-twin has it too, are only about 11% for men and 14% for women.”

“Because they have identical DNA [concordance on sexual orientation it] ought to be 100 percent” Dr. Whitehead told OrthodoxNet.com.

Childhood Trauma and “Gayness”

Victims of Homosexual Predators, Now “Gay”? Both Don Lemon of CNN (left) and Thomas Roberts of MSNBC (right) were victimized as boys by homosexual predators. Yet both are now proud “gay” icons. Lemon as a young boy was molested by an older teenage boy in his neighborhood, and Roberts was molested by a priest and mentor, “Father” Jeff Toohey, while attending an all-boys Catholic school in Baltimore. LGBTQ activists and President Obama are pushing to ban pro-heterosexual change therapy for minors–which would tragically ban homosexual molestation victims like Lemon and Roberts and their parents from getting help for unwanted homosexual desires resulting from same-sex predations. Laws barring heterosexuality-affirming “conversion therapy” (an ominous-sounding description used by LGBT ideologues) exist in five states and the District of Columbia.

Finally, some researchers are coming forth with alternative theories linking the development of adult homosexual identity to childhood trauma, e.g., incest between twins or child molestation. (Interestingly, two prominent openly homosexual TV personalities—CNN’s Don Lemon and MSNBC’s Thomas Roberts—were sexually assaulted as boys by homosexual adult predators.)

Perverted Predator-Priest: Thomas Roberts (right) shown as a teenager with “Father Jeff” Toohey (left), the chaplain at his all-boys Catholic high school who sexually abused Roberts as a student. In 2006, Toohey was sentenced to an 18-months jail sentence for his sickening crimes. See the abuse-tracking website, BishopAccountability.org.

A 2015 study led by Keith Beard and published in the journal Cogent Psychology found that, “Same-sex sibling incest also significantly increased the likelihood that participants would self-identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or questioning (rather than homosexual).”

Notably, the authors of the study took pains to issue a “gay”-affirming, politically correct disclaimer: “Our results were consistent with the idea that the sexual orientation of adults cannot be changed.”

Is it not cruel to tell a man who was raped as a boy by an adult pervert—or seduced into incestuous sex by an older brother—that he is now destined to be stuck with a deviant and immoral sexual identity for the rest of his life? With so many ex-“gays” like Dennis Jernigan proclaiming freedom from past homosexuality, how can anyone—journalist, “gay” activist or scholar—claim that adults cannot change their “sexual orientation?”

The “Born Gay” Myth Is Still Popular

Tragically, despite growing evidence to the contrary, about half of Americans surveyed still believe that homosexuals are “born that way,” according to a 2015 Gallup poll. Gallup has polled on this and other homosexual issues every year since 1977. In that initial year, only 13 percent of Americans believed people were “born with” homosexuality while 56 percent cited a person’s “upbringing and environment” as the main causative factors. By 2013, those findings were reversed, and a record 51 percent of respondents believed homosexuals were born with that inclination while a record low of 30 percent cited environmental factors.

Such data shows the tremendous, suffocating power of the media to drive the “gay” debate. Now the same media are working overtime to mainstream transgenderism, which is also said to be an innate condition.

Homosexuals Can Change

Greatest Story Never Told (by the “Mainstream” Media): The fascinating stories of ex-homosexuals like Rosaria Butterfield, author of “The Secret Thougths of an Unlikely Convert: An English Professor’s Journey into Christian Faith,” are rarely told by secular journalists.

There is no truth despised by homosexual activists more than the simple reality that people who once lived as “gay” or lesbian (or “transgender”) can change and live honorably according to the natural, created purpose of their bodies before God. Homosexual activists continue to assert that people cannot change their “sexual orientation”—ignoring the many testimonies of people like Stephen Black and Dr. Rosaria Butterfield who have overcome the pull of homosexuality in their lives. See this Mastering Life Ministries website for video testimonials of ex-homosexuals. Notably, ex-“gays” rarely get serious treatment in the media—rewarding the lobby efforts of powerful LGBT media pressure groups like GLAAD.

Now the pro-homosexual lobby, including leftist allied groups like the Southern Poverty Law Center—mislabeled as a “civil rights group” by news organizations—have taken it up a notch by pushing for state and national laws to ban pro-heterosexual change therapy for minors. Such anti-freedom laws now exist in California, Oregon, New Jersey, Illinois, Vermont and the District of Columbia. President Obama has endorsed a federal bill designed to ban so-called “conversion” (change) therapy for minors. This highly dangerous legislation would curtail the freedom of parents and children—including those victimized by homosexual predators—to pursue the healthy change they desire.

Dangerous “Sex Reassignment” Surgeries

Walt Heyer is a former transsexual who went through “male-to-female” “sex reassignment surgery” to become his female alter ego (“Laura”). Heyer was not “born transgender” but instead was the childhood victim of some tragic circumstances—including a grandmother who dressed him up in fancy dress when he was a little boy. Now he has regained his natural male identity and urges gender-confused men not to go through the radical operations and hormone therapy to pursue a fantasy. See Heyer’s website,SexChangeRegret.com.

Reality versus Fantasy: Walt Heyer (left) as the restored man he truly is, versus Walt Heyer living out his transsexual fantasy life as a “woman” named “Laura.” See Heyer’s website, SexChangeRegret.com. See AFTAH’s multi-part interview with Heyer HERE.

Heyer cites the testimony of Dr. Paul McHugh, the Distinguished Professor of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, who shut down the university’s “sex reassignment surgery” program after studying the outcomes of men who went through the “sex change” operations compared to those who did not. Wrote McHugh in 2014:

“Most of the surgically treated patients described themselves as ‘satisfied’ by the results, but their subsequent psycho-social adjustments were no better than those who didn’t have the surgery. And so at Hopkins we stopped doing sex-reassignment surgery, since producing a ‘satisfied’ but still troubled patient seemed an inadequate reason for surgically amputating normal organs.”

Transgenderism Harms Children

Dr. McHugh saves his most devastating critique for those adults who would foist radical transsexual surgeries and hormone treatments on the very young and gender-confused teenagers (emphasis added):

“Another subgroup consists of young men and women susceptible to suggestion from “everything is normal” sex education, amplified by Internet chat groups. These are the transgender subjects most like anorexia nervosa patients: They become persuaded that seeking a drastic physical change will banish their psycho-social problems. “Diversity” counselors in their schools, rather like cult leaders, may encourage these young people to distance themselves from their families and offer advice on rebutting arguments against having transgender surgery. Treatments here must begin with removing the young person from the suggestive environment and offering a counter-message in family therapy.

“Then there is the subgroup of very young, often prepubescent children who notice distinct sex roles in the culture and, exploring how they fit in, begin imitating the opposite sex. Misguided doctors at medical centers including Boston’s Children’s Hospital have begun trying to treat this behavior by administering puberty-delaying hormones to render later sex-change surgeries less onerous—even though the drugs stunt the children’s growth and risk causing sterility. Given that close to 80 percent of such children would abandon their confusion and grow naturally into adult life if untreated, these medical interventions come close to child abuse. A better way to help these children: with devoted parenting.”

Dr. Paul McHugh

To echo Dr. McHugh’s warning, the American College of Pediatricians, a pro-family alternative to the reliably pro-homosexual American Academy of Pediatricians, recently put out an outstanding statement, “Gender Ideology Harms Children,” which includes among its points:

• Puberty is not a disease and puberty-blocking hormones can be dangerous…
• According to the DSM-V [the APA’s diagnostic manual for mental disorders] as many as 98 percent of gender confused boys and 88 percent of gender confused girls eventually accept their biological sex after naturally passing through puberty.
• Children who use puberty blockers to impersonate the opposite sex will require cross-sex hormones in late adolescence. Cross-sex hormones (testosterone and estrogen) are associated with dangerous health risks including but not limited to high blood pressure, blood clots, stroke and cancer.
• Rates of suicide are 20 times greater among adults who use cross-sex hormones and undergo sex reassignment surgery, even in Sweden which is among the most LGBTQ—affirming countries.
• Conditioning children into believing that a lifetime of chemical and surgical impersonation of the opposite sex is normal and healthy is child abuse.

Children of Homosexuals and Transgenders Suffer

Homosexual activists rely on “gay”-authored research with sloppy methodology to claim that there is “no difference” between homosexual and normal, mom-and-dad households—and sometimes assert that “gay”-led parenting is superior to the traditional variety. But again, the facts suggest otherwise.

Writes Jamie Bryan Hall, citing the work of Catholic University sociology professor Dr. Paul Sullins, who analyzed data from the federal National Health Interview Survey from 1997 to 2013:

“Controlling for child sex, age, and race and parents’ education and income, Dr. Sullins finds that children of parents in same-sex relationships fare significantly worse than those of opposite-sex parents on nine of 12 measures of emotional or developmental problems and their use of mental health treatment. In general, children of parents in same-sex relationships are about two to three times more likely to experience such problems.

“In his most extensive statistical analysis, in which he also takes into account relationship stability, stigmatization, and parents’ psychological distress, Sullins finds the prevalence of emotional problems among children living with same-sex parents to be 4.5 times as high as among children living with their married biological parents, three times as high as children living with a married stepparent, 2.5 times as high as those with cohabiting parents, and three times as high as children with a single parent.”

There are now many moving firsthand testimonies available from men and women who grew up in homes with homosexual or transsexual parents. See Dawn Stefanowicz’s testimony of life with her promiscuous “gay” dad, and Denise Shick’s story of living with a selfish, cross-dressing father.

Homosexuals and Health Problems

In every area of life, “gay” activists apply their egalitarian formula to posit a moral equivalence between homosexuality and normalcy (heterosexuality). But what Dr. Sullins wrote in 2004 remains true today:

“Like abortion, homosexuality is associated with increased problems of mental health and distress. Though rarely acknowledged in popular media or discourse, emerging epidemiological evidence in the past decade has clearly established a link between homosexuality and mental illness or emotional problems.”

New “Gay” Disease: Homosexual men make up the vast majority of new syphilis cases. See this AFTAH article.

The Obama administration’s successful campaign to allow male homosexuals to donate blood has exposed how the LGBT lobby is more concerned about scoring another “gay rights” win than protecting our nation’s blood supply. It is as if the many thousands of stories over the last few decades including those about the AIDS crisis—showing the high correlation between “Men who have Sex with Men” (MSM) and various diseases—had never been published. Consider these facts from the Centers for Disease Control CDC (emphasis added):

• HIV—In 2011 an astonishing 94 to 95 percent of new HIV cases among males ages 13 to 24 were linked to MSM (Men who have Sex with Men).
• Syphilis—84 percent of new syphilis cases were linked to MSM in 2012—effectively making it the new “gay disease.”
• Hepatitis—“New research shows that gay men who are HIV-positive and have multiple sex partners may increase their risk for Hepatitis C.”
• Shigellosis—“Anyone can get shigellosis but it is recognized more often in young children. Those who may be at greater risk include children in daycare centers, foreign travelers to certain countries, institutionalized people and people exposed to human feces through sexual contact.”

More than 25 years ago, Americans were shocked as “gay” activists and educators introduced children’s picture books like Daddy’s Roommate and Heather Has Two Mommies to indoctrinate children into accepting homosexual behavior and “gay families” as natural and harmless. Now a new generation of very young children is growing up with picture books like My Princess Boy (available at Walmart.com) that popularize and glamorize extreme gender confusion.

Unless citizens demand an end to the media’s incessant promotion of the gay and transgender agenda, it will be too late to return America to a state of sexual sanity, in which the health and well-being of our children is protected, instead of being undermined.

Helpful Websites

American College of Pediatricians (ACOP)—A pro-family alternative to the pro-LGBT American Association of Pediatrics (AAP); Excellent resource: “Gender Ideology Harms Children”

SexChangeRegret.com—A website by former transsexual Walt Heyer

MassResistance.org—A site that does excellent work exposing LGBTQ activism

FactsAboutYouth.com—Produced by the American College of Pediatricians (ACOP)

NARTH.com and the Alliance for Therapeutic Choice and Scientific Integrity—Websites that present scholarly research from opponents of “gay” advocates; provide evidence for pro-heterosexual change through therapy; defend right to treatment for people seeking to overcome unwanted same-sex attractions

Mastering Life Ministries—Features dozens of heart-warming ex-“gay” video testimonials and is founded by former homosexual David Kyle Foster; a Christian site that also contains resources on overcoming: sex and porn addiction, child sexual abuse and transgender confusion

CDC has a site on STDs and Gay & Bisexual Men—The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is strongly pro-homosexual, but its reports provide ample evidence on the relationship between homosexual/bisexual behavior and disease. Start here.

RobGagnon.net—A site by Prof. Robert Gagnon, a leading authority on the Bible and homosexuality

Help 4 Families—A transgender resource, a Christian ministry to families of transsexuals headed up by Denise Shick, whose own father desired to be a woman

mygenes.co.nz—Dr. Neil Whitehead’s “My Genes” website; a leading site presenting academic research debunking genetic homosexuality; Dr. Whitehead is the author of My Genes Made Me Do It: Homosexuality and the Scientific Evidence

Public Discourse—Witherspoon Institute site with excellent essays on homosexuality and gender issues

Heritage Foundation—Heritage Foundation discusses family and marriage issues; has excellent public policy research

AmericansForTruth.org – Americans For Truth About Homosexuality (AFTAH) reports on and confronts the homosexual/transgender agenda.

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Peter LaBarbera

Peter LaBarbera is president of Americans For Truth About Homosexuality (AFTAH.org), and a former reporter for the Washington Times. He can be reached by email: americansfortruth@gmail.com.