[Disclaimer: I don't agree with the material that follows. However, I think it is an important resource. In my humble opinion, we, as Lesbians, Gays and Bisexuals should know what our critics say about us. This article is from the Focus on the Family Citizen, Vol. 6, No. 4, April 20, 1992. For information regarding Focus on the Family, write to: Focus on the Family or call Colorado Springs, CO 80955 1-800-A-FAMILY] OPPRESSED MINORITY, OR COUNTERFEITS? HOMOSEXUALS demand the same legal privileges as legitimate disadvantaged minorities. Here's why they don't qualify. by TONY MARCO =====> HOMOSEXUALS want special legal privileges that would permit them to silence or punish their critics. =====> HOMOSEXUALS have an average household income of $55,430, four times greater than disadvantaged African-American households. =====> HOMOSEXUALS generally avoid prosecution for acts of vandalism and violence. Just as the governors in California and Wisconsin. =====> HOW would homosexual class status be determined? After a homosexual performed sex in front of civil rights authorities? One of the most ambitious public image campaigns in American history is under way, with the mass media's generous help. Its message: Homosexuals are an oppressed, disadvantaged minority, much like African- Americans and Hispanics, and they deserve special legal status and privileges. Two marketing experts outlined this campaign's goals in a homosexual magazine article, "The Overhauling of Straight America." "Portray gays as victims, not as aggressive challengers. In any campaign to win over the public, gays must be cast as victims in need of protection so that straights will be inclined by reflex action to assume the role of protector... Straight viewers must be able to identify with gays as victims. Mr. and Mrs. Public must be given no extra excuses to say 'they are not like us'... Our campaign should not demand direct support for homosexual practices, but should instead take anti- discrimination as its theme."[1] Homosexuals claim they need special legal privileges that, among other things, would permit them to silence or punish their critics, coerce businesses to pay spousal benefits to their all-too-temporary partners, and express their sexuality whenever, wherever and with whomever they choose. Do homosexuals warrant the special legal status they seek? Historically, courts and civil rights authorities have employed three 'touchstones," in awarding special protected status to disadvantaged minority classes.[2] ===> Criterion 1 <=== A history of discrimination evidenced by lack of ability to obtain economic mean income, adequate education, or cultural opportunity.[3] Homosexuals claim they are economically, educationally and culturally disadvantaged. Marketing studies refute those claims.[4] * Homosexuals have an average annual household income of $55,430, versus $32,144 for the general population and $12,166 for disadvantaged African-American households.[5] * More than three times as many homosexuals as average Americans hold professional or managerial positions (49 percent v. 15.9 percent)-- again, making homosexuals embarrassingly more advantaged than true minorities in the job market. * 65.8 percent of homosexuals are overseas travelers--more than four times the percentage (14 percent) of average Americans. More than 13 times as many homosexuals as average Americans (26.5 percent v. 1.9 percent) are frequent flyers. "America's gay and lesbian community is emerging as one of the nation's most educated and affluent, and Madison Avenue is beginning to explore the potential for a market that may be worth hundreds of billions of dollars... 'It's a market that screams opportunity,' said Eric Miller, editor of RESEARCH ALERT, a consumer research newsletter based in New York." Robert Bray, a spokesman for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, concurs as quoted in a recent article in the ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS. "Gay greenbacks are very powerful and the gay and lesbian community is a virtual mother lode of untapped sales." EDITOR AND PUBLISHER estimates that there are more than 125 homosexual newspapers in the United States with a combined circulation of more than one million. ===> Criterion 2 <=== Specially protected classes should exhibit obvious, immutable, or distinguishing characteristics, like race, color, gender or national origin, that define them as a discrete group.[6] There is no credible scientific evidence to support homosexual claims that "gayness" is either genetically determined or immutable. "The genetic theory of homosexuality has been generally discarded today... Despite the interest in possible hormone mechanisms in the origin of homosexuality, no serious scientist today suggests that a simple cause-effect relationship applies," according to HUMAN SEXUALITY, a 1984 textbook written by Masters, Johnson and Kolodny. It is unclear how sexual orientation evolves, but a study by the controversial Kinsey Institute found that 84 percent of homosexuals and 29 percent of heterosexuals shifted or changed their "sexual orientation" at least once; 32 percent of homosexuals and 4 percent of "straights" reported a second shift; and 13 percent of homosexuals and 1 percent of heterosexuals claimed at least five changes in sexual orientation.[7] Studies of prison inmate behavior, both male and female, clearly demonstrate that, behind bars, for a variety of reasons, homosexual behavior is practiced by inmates who have not previously engaged in homosexual behavior--and who do not practice "gay" behavior after their release from prison. About lesbianism in women's prisons, one authority on inmate sociology remarked: "Graphic excerpts from interviews seemed to suggest that [homosexual] social organization among the women prisoners had an institutional origin, since most of the participants had not been involved in homosexual liaisons prior to the prison experience and were evidently unlikely to continue homosexuality after leaving prison."[8] The same author discovered, about mail homosexuality in prisons... "For males [behind bars], homosexual activity seemed to focus primarily on physical gratification; in many instances it represented a commodity for economic exchange; and it was likely a transitory act."[9] A study by an avowed homosexual, publicized in a cover article in the Feb. 24, 1992, edition of NEWSWEEK, purported to discover "homosexual brains."[10] But on closer examination, the study doesn't hold up. Simon LeVay's study of the brains of 19 homosexual male corpses (all died of AIDS complications) noted a difference in the size of a specific neuron group, INAH3, compared with that of a group comprised of 16 presumably heterosexual male and six female corpses. One problem with LeVay's study is that the researcher presumed that the control group of 16 corpses had been heterosexual. "It turns out that LeVay doesn't know anything about the sexual orientation of his control group, the 16 corpses 'presumed heterosexual.' A sloppy control like this is...enough by itself to invalidate the study," wrote homosexual reporter Michael Botkin in the BAY AREA REPORTER.[11] "LeVay's defense? He knows his controls are het[erosexual] because their brains are different from the HIVer corpses. Sorry, doctor; this is circular logic. You can use the sample to prove the theory or vice versa, but not both at the same time." The homosexual community cannot claim the study as proof of a genetic source for sexual orientation because the study was not designed to consider why the INAH3 neuron groups vary in size. (Based on the size of their INAH3s, a third of LeVay's subjects should have had the opposite sexual orientation than what he reported.) More study is required, but LeVay won't conduct it; he has left science to become a full-time gay activist. ===> Criterion 3 <=== "Protected classes" should clearly demonstrate political powerlessness.[12] Far from being politically powerless, homosexual activists have in recent years demonstrated enormous political clout far beyond their numbers. Combining economic and educational advantage with high- pressure lobbying tactics, homosexual activists have ridden waves of tolerance emanating from the sexual revolution to a position of almost irresistible influence in today's America. They have: * Won passage of legislation granting homosexuals protected class status in five states and 90 cities across America. * Secured political office both in the U.S. Congress and on numerous major U.S. city councils. * Pressured the medical community to discard well-established public health measures and treat AIDS as history's first "politically protected" fatal plague. * Received benefits for "domestic partners" identical to those of married couples, and other kinds of preferential treatment in several major U.S. corporations. * Implemented homosexual-created curricula presenting homosexual sex as a valid, healthy alternative to heterosexuality, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. * Gained ordination in mainline church denominations. Case in point: On April 1, a prominent Marin County, Calif., lesbian minister became a co-pastor of the Downtown United Presbyterian Church of Rochester, N.Y. * Won National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) grants for "works of art" that graphically portray homosexual sex and savagely ridicule traditional religious and family values. * Avoided prosecution for acts of violence and vandalism. Case in point: Homosexuals vandalized California State office buildings, burned state flags and California's governor in effigy after his veto last year of a special-rights-for-gays bill, and pelted Gov. Pete Wilson himself with garbage at a speaking engagement following his veto. There were no arrests. In 1989, "AIDS activists" invaded a Roman Catholic mass at New York City's St. Patrick's Cathedral, shouting obscenities and defiling Communion elements. A few participants in this blatant desecration incurred slight legal penalties. No arrests were made and no charges were filed at San Francisco's 1990 and 1991 Gay and Lesbian Pride Parades. Videotape from one such parade depicts public nudity, both male and female; lewd and lascivious acts, including public fondling of genitalia and several acts of what appears to be public anal sex between homosexuals; and open promotion of pedophilia. In Madison, Wis., on Sept. 8, 1991, homosexuals defaced the state Capitol and threatened the governor. THE CAPITAL [sic] TIMES gave this report: "About 100 ACT UP protesters charged the Capitol today, defacing the hallway leading to the governor's office with food and stickers and staging a 'die-in' in the rotunda. They were protesting what they call 'criminal' state policies against prison inmates with AIDS. "The protesters were met by Capitol police and security officers, who closed the governor's office and blocked the group's entry. The protesters then tossed sandwiches and towels toward the door, and left numerous ACT UP stickers on the walls that portray [Wisconsin's governor Tommy] Thompson as a public health menace... Other protesters used some type of black marker to write on the marble floor." No arrests were reported in this incident. TOO MANY QUESTIONS According to John N. Franklin, past chairman of the Colorado Civil Rights Commission, granting special legal privileges to homosexuals invites a number of questions: How would homosexual class status be determined? Simply on the word of an applicant? After a homosexual performed homosexual activities? The first time someone engaged in sex with a member of the same gender--even accidentally, as in a drunken or drugged encounter? After someone became exclusively homosexual? For how long? Once gayness was confirmed (whatever the confirmation process), would protected class status and all accompanying entitlements then become retroactive to birth? In light of the extreme affluence of homosexuals relative to the general population, what would prevent opportunistic individuals form becoming closet heterosexuals, claiming homosexual status in order to secure benefits only available to legitimate minorities? Under legislation granting special minority status to homosexuals, we can expect a plethora of nuisance suits and test cases to clog our legal system and bleed taxpayers and defendants dry financially. FROM SELMA TO SODOM Noted African-American civil rights leaders recognize the difference between their movement and the counterfeit of civil rights that homosexual activists have raised in their own interest: "The equation of homosexuality with the noble history of civil rights in this country serves only to dilute, distort and denigrate true civil rights," says Dr. Anthony Evans, executive director of The Urban Alternative, America's largest ministry to African-American families. "'Gay rights' cannot be likened in any fashion to the black struggle for civil rights. 'Gay rights' is not, nor will it ever be, a civil rights issue, but rather a question of morality and individual values," says the Rev. Gill Ford pastor of Salem Baptist Church in Denver, Colo. An African-American Church pastor in Kansas City, Mo. put it no less accurately, if a bit more colorfully: "The Freedom Bus that went to Selma was never intended to go on to Sodom." If having "divergent" sex becomes all it takes to be considered "ethnic," with special protection and privileges, the concept of ethnicity will soon lose all traces of meaning or value, these civil rights leaders say. - ------------------ Tony Marco is founder of Colorado for Family Values. He has led a campaign to qualify a Colorado initiative that would prevent the state from granting special legal status to homosexuals. This article was excerpted from Special Class Protection for Gays: A Question of Behavior and Consequences, copyright 1991, Tony Marco. - ------------------ END NOTES [1] Kirk, M., and Pill, E., Guide (a homosexual magazine in the Pacific Northwest), November 1987. [2] The U.S. Supreme Court established these three criteria through a number of decisions familiar to civil rights authorities: San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez, 93 SCt. 1278, 1293, 36LED 2D16, 1973. Massachusetts Board of Retirement v. Murgia, 96 SCt. 2562,2566, 49LED 2D520, 1976; Plyler v. Doe, 457 US202, 216,N14, p. 219- 223, 102 SCt., 2382, 2394, N14, 2395-2397, 1982. City of Cleburne v. Cleburne Living Center, 473 U.S. 432,440-441, 105 S. Ct., 3249, 3254-55, 87LEDP2D 313, 1985. The criteria have been affirmed by a federal district case: Jantz v. Muci, March 29, 1991, 759 Fed. Supp. 1543. Also, Frontiero v. Richardson, 411 v.s. 677, 684-687, 93 S. Ct. 1764, 1769-1770, 36 L. Ed. 2nd Ed. 583 (1973). [3] Ibid. [4] A July 18, 1991, Wall Street Journal article, entitled "Overcoming a Deep-Rooted Reluctance, More Firms Advertise to Gay Community," reported findings by the Simmons Market Research Bureau and the U.S. Census Bureau. Other market research studies have been reported in recent issues of The San Francisco Chronicle ("Gay Market a Potential Gold Mine", August 27, 1991), Travel Weekly magazine ("For Gays, Ship Charters Are a Boon, Say Two Travel Companies", August 5, 1991), and a homosexual newspaper, The Bay Area Reporter ("Where the Money Is: Travel Industry Eyeing Gay/Lesbian Tourism", September 19, 1991). [5] Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1990. [6] See endnote 1. [7] Bell and Weinberg, Homosexualities: A Study of Diversity Among Men and Women; op. cit.; Hammersmith, S.K., Sexual Preference: Its Development in Men and Women, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1981. [8] Society of Subordinates, Charles Tittle, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, In, 1972, pg. 17. [9] Ibid., p. 71. [10] LeVay, S., Science, 253 (1991): 1034. [11] Botkin, M., "Salk and Pepper," Bay Area Reporter, Sept. 5, 1991, pp. 21, 24. [12] See endnote 1.