Friday, September 22, 2006
In Letter,
National Black Justice Coalition Urges Dr. Joseph Nicolosi To Apologize For His Organization's Divisive Article
MIAMI BEACH, Fla. - Truth Wins Out called on Focus on the Family today to cancel a Saturday keynote speaking appearance by Dr. Joseph Nicolosi, the Executive Director of The National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH), after a column was discovered on the group's website that appeared to justify slavery.
The National Black Justice Coalition (NBJC) also
wrote a letter to Dr. Nicolosi this afternoon, calling on his organization to apologize for posting the article. NBJC is a national civil rights organization of black lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered people that fosters equality by fighting racism and homophobia.
"In the name of propriety, respect, common decency and professional integrity, the National Black Justice Coalition strongly urges NARTH to issue a public apology on the front page of its website for publishing such an outrageous and offensive article," wrote H. Alexander Robinson CEO/Executive Director in the group's letter. "We also hope that you reevaluate your relationship with Dr. Schoenewolf whose peculiar views have no place in civilized discourse."
The column causing the uproar was penned in 2005 by Gerald Schoenewolf, Ph.D., a member of NARTH's "Scientific Advisory Committee," and re-posted last week by Timothy Kincaid on the website
Ex-Gay Watch. According to Schoenwolf:
"With all due respect, there is another way, or other ways, to look at the race issue in America. It could be pointed out, for example, that Africa at the time of slavery was still primarily a jungle, as yet uncivilized or industrialized. Life there was savage, as savage as the jungle for most people, and that it was the Africans themselves who first enslaved their own people. They sold their own people to other countries, and those brought to Europe, South America, America, and other countries, were in many ways better off than they had been in Africa. But if one even begins to say these things one is quickly shouted down as though one were a complete madman."The NARTH endorsed comments were discovered only days before Dr. Nicolosi was scheduled to be the keynote speaker at Focus on the Family's Sept. 23 "Love Won Out" conference in Palm Springs. Love Won Out is a traveling road show that purports to teach gay people how to become heterosexual through prayer and therapy.
"This column rips away the veneer of respectability that NARTH has worked to cultivate and has exposed its extremism," said
Truth Wins Out's Executive Director Wayne Besen. "In light of this divisive article, we can't fathom why Focus on the Family would still allow Dr. Nicolosi to speak unless the group sympathizes with the sentiments expressed by NARTH's leader."
TWO is a non-profit think tank and educational organization that debunks the ex-gay myth, counters right wing disinformation campaigns, and provides accurate information about the lives of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.
______________________________________________________________
Friday, Sept. 22, 2006
National Association of Research & Therapy of Homosexuality
Attn: Dr. Joseph Nicolosi, NARTH Executive Director
16633 Ventura Boulevard, Suite 1340
Encino, CA 91436-1801
Dear NARTH:
The National Black Justice Coalition is deeply troubled by an article written by Gerald Schoenewolf, Ph.D that has appeared on your organization's website. His comments reflect not only a misunderstanding of history, but a trivialization of the suffering caused by slavery.
As a member in good standing on NARTH's Scientific Advisory Board, we can only assume that Dr. Schoenewolf's statements are a reflection of your organization's beliefs and values. NBJC would like to know how NARTH rationalizes or justifies publishing an essay that stated the following:
"With all due respect, there is another way, or other ways, to look at the race issue in America," wrote Schoenwolf. "It could be pointed out, for example, that Africa at the time of slavery was still primarily a jungle, as yet uncivilized or industrialized. Life there was savage, as savage as the jungle for most people, and that it was the Africans themselves who first enslaved their own people. They sold their own people to other countries, and those brought to Europe, South America, America, and other countries, were in many ways better off than they had been in Africa. But if one even begins to say these things one is quickly shouted down as though one were a complete madman."Dr. Nicolosi, we are particularly disturbed with Dr. Schoenewolf's comments drawing a parallel between the civil rights movement and the murder of innocent African Americans. Please clarify what message NARTH was trying to impart when Dr. Schoenewolf wrote the following statement?
"The irony is that the Civil Rights Movement has been vehement about pointing out the hysterical lynchings that took place in the Old South, but completely blind to its own hysterical tactics."
It has been exactly one week since Dr. Schoenewolf's article has been uncovered and no action has yet been taken on behalf of NARTH to distance itself from this divisive rhetoric. In lieu of such inaction, NBJC can only conclude that NARTH is in concurrence with such sentiments. Taking the offending article down off your website in the dead of night is no substitute for honestly and earnestly addressing this festering issue.
In the name of propriety, respect, common decency and professional integrity, NBJC strongly urges NARTH to issue a public apology on the front page of its website for publishing such an outrageous and offensive article. We also hope that you reevaluate your relationship with Dr. Schoenewolf whose peculiar views have no place in civilized discourse.
As the leader of NARTH and a prominent speaker on Focus on the Family's Love Won Out symposium, the messages imparted by you and NARTH have an impact on real people. We hope that you consider our concerns and contact us so we can hear NARTH's explanation on how such abhorrent and racially insensitive content found its way onto the group’s website.
Sincerely,
H. Alexander Robinson CEO/Executive Director
The National Black Justice Coalition
39 Comments:
Africans DID sell their own people into slavery in many cases!
And when Mohammed Ali returned from his famous "Rumble in the jungle" boxing match and was asked what he thought of the host country Zaire (which should be a very rich African nation if there ever could be such a creation) he replied words to the effect of: "Thank God my granddaddy got on that boat."
Some of you out there are student of history. If there EVER was a guy who was all for Africanization it was Ali. If there EVER was a leader on that continent who wanted the same thing it was Zaire's then leader Mobutu Sese Seko Kuku Ngbendu wa za Banga.
And yet Ali still made those comments?
Nicolosi's words aren't even worthy of a "tempest in teapot" designation.
posted by , at
9/22/2006 5:03 PM
Congo - how fucking stupid are you? Sure, they did sell their own slaves. But to say that they were "better off" is psychotic. You are real sleaze and a total asswipe.
George
L.A.
posted by , at
9/22/2006 5:29 PM
Slavery still exists on the African continent. All those who engage in the practice are wrong, plain and simple. That Africans did it isn't justification for Europeans and Americans doing it. Nicolosi knows that. He deserves to be slammed.
posted by DC HAMPTON JACOBS, at
9/22/2006 5:51 PM
They removed that article from Narth. And has anyone read any background on the author? Is he black? Did he visit Africa?
posted by , at
9/22/2006 6:16 PM
George,
Take a chill pill, buddy. And then take the next flight to Kinshasa and see how many kinois wish they could be in America just like Mohammed Ali's Grandpa. (You think GLBT people have a hard time over here? Try being a member of the "wrong" tribe over there.)
Was slavery a good thing? No. Never is and never will be. But are there a bunch of African descendants who are better off here than they would be in Africa? Yep, and most of you here know it, as does Nicolosi, who merely said words to the effect of "Try saying it over here and you'll get blasted for it." Would that Africa not be so tribal and not have had so many thuggish leaders...
Meanwhile, I'm supposed to mildly smirk at Hugo Chavez' recent remarks at the U.N. because after all, he's only saying what everyone here in America really thinks, isn't he?
Some of you are in for a LOOOONG election night this November, I fear.
posted by , at
9/22/2006 6:21 PM
how any person can see another human being as property is twisted and perverted. They can try to slant it however they want, but no human is better off in a place where they are bought and sold property. And frankly, live stock was treated better than human slaves in all but a very very few documented cases.
posted by jekelhyde, at
9/22/2006 8:57 PM
Hey - no one wants to leave their homeland. And everyone's trip over here was rough. Some more than others. My family went through hell - some did not make it. But we are better off today than had we stayed and died.
posted by , at
9/22/2006 10:53 PM
Boo - who? Every country or land has been invaded, divided, cut up, intruded on with new cultures and customs - get used to it. It happened to the celts, to the atruscans, to the the native americans, to the africans, to the japanese, to the many many minority groups of china (first emperor of china was a guy named chin) who united all the regions, etc... just shut up and get used to accepting that history throughout the world is filled with this kind of stuff. It still happens in neighborhoods when the dealers move in or the gays move in or the families move in or whatever!!
posted by , at
9/22/2006 10:57 PM
LOLOL, Boo. I don't normally laugh out loud at posts on this blog, but you hit my funny bone.
posted by jekelhyde, at
9/22/2006 11:19 PM
You missed the point. No man is an island to himself. And besides the Romans had moved into AFrica thousands of years ago - or unless you do not read history.
posted by , at
9/23/2006 12:19 AM
I think the negro people should be happy we took them here. Those people are better off here today in the USofA. The doctor is onto something and should not be beaten-up over his conservative principles.
Ask any old colored person and he will tell you how much he appreciates America.
Red O.
posted by , at
9/23/2006 12:25 AM
oh, red, you must be joking. I hope to god you are joking. I hope you are just trying to stir up trouble. I hate to think that any person could be so ignorant. We brought them here in Chains. Of course they were better off in Africa. Get a fucking clue.
posted by jekelhyde, at
9/23/2006 1:07 AM
Duh, hundreds of years ago, the diversity of cultures on the European continent was huge. And Rome overtook Egypt (North Africa.) Let's not forget about all the tribal changes and mixing that went on in Africa amongst the races over there before "Europeans" arrived there. No is of pure blood anymore. My brother looks AFrican, my sister looks Persian, I look dutch. Call it what you like but intermising was bound to happen. You can no more say Africa would have been better off without Europeans than you can say it isn't. You just don't know. I'm not saying that all the wrong doing is not wrong. I am saying - it happened. Get over it!
posted by , at
9/23/2006 2:12 AM
jekelhyde...you fell for it ("Red O.").
boo...and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (and Rwanda, and Sierra Leone, and Liberia, and Nigeria/Biafra, and Sudan) has seen millions of its native inhabitants butchered because all of the people in those countries are just really, really nice guys.
posted by , at
9/23/2006 11:28 AM
Bringing a GLBT angle into it...ever noticed how in some of the roughest areas of Africa those males who are doing the killing like to dress up as women?
- In Liberia, (http://www.slate.com/id/2086490/)
"And in common Liberian initiation rituals—which exist in memory throughout the country, if not always in practice—a boy's passage to adulthood is symbolically represented by the donning of female garb. He must first pass through a dangerous indeterminate zone between male and female identity before finally becoming a man. A soldier dressed in women's clothes—or Halloween masks, or shower caps, etc.—on the battlefield is essentially asserting that he's in a volatile in-between state. The message it sends to other soldiers is, 'Don't mess with me, I'm dangerous.'"
- In Rwanda, in the film "Hotel Rwanda" there was one point where the camera lingered on a Rwandan with a firearm that as I recall looked like an automatic weapon...he was wearing a t-shirt and a pink wig.
- In the old Zaire, what's now the Democratic Republic of the Congo, There's a book called "In the footsteps of Mr. Kurtz" which says this around the last days of the aforementioned Mobutu Sese Seko, the first quote coming from page 6:
"The atmosphere was prickly. Starting what was to prove a seven-month looting and raping retreat across the country, Zairean forces had lashed out indiscriminately before pulling out, leaving corpses scattered for kilometres. No one was too sure of the identity of the rebel movement, the new bosses in town. And then there were the roaming Rwandans, whose intervention in Zaire was being denied to the government next door but was too prominent to ignore. Speaking from the corner of his mouth, a resident confirmed the outsider presence: 'We recognise them by their morphology.' The he hurried away as a baby-faced Rwandan soldier - high on something and all the more sinister for the bright pink lipstick he was wearing - swaggered up to silence the blabbermouth."
...and, from page 28, on her discovery that members of fleeing, dying former Zairean dictator Mobutu Sese Seko's special prodection unit (and all around thugs) and their families were holed up in the same Kinshasa hotel as she:
"I could see their menfolk patrolling nervously up and down toting sub-machine guns and draped in cartridge belts. They were wearing their trademark sunglasses, those gold-rimmed feminine accessories which should look comic on a man but instead manage to look as sinister as the wedding dresses and blonde wigs worn by Liberia's drugged fighters. They are the modern equivalent of the wooden masks donned around night fires by warriors preparing to do battle, which turn their wearers into something utterly alien - faceless instruments of violence capable of unspeakable acts."
posted by , at
9/23/2006 11:36 AM
I wonder how much of Africa's homophobia was drummed up by 'christian' missionaries? Most animist/pagan type cultures arent particularly homophobic. According to the book Another Mother Tongue, many Native American and other similar type cultures around the world throughout history have treated gays like shamans. They were believed to be a mixture of both male and female and had a special connection to the spirit world.
posted by , at
9/23/2006 3:10 PM
Boo. Get a new name. A new idea. A new mind.
posted by , at
9/23/2006 4:15 PM
Boo - you just don't get it when you can't get past the slavery issue.
posted by , at
9/23/2006 4:18 PM
He was not supporting slavery. Read the WHOLE article in context. Quit reading bits and pices of things. Hey - my family starved too, at one time. And just because someone thinks differently than you does not mean they are on dope. But that is always the level you dip to.
posted by , at
9/23/2006 5:15 PM
No - he said that out of a bad situation he has decided to see some good from it. If you think any one would be better off living in AFrica now - then say so. There are millions of lives lost throughout histroy to savage treatment. It's not just the slavery issue here in America. It's the Jews in the bible, the minorities during WWII by the Nazi's, the Catholics by the Protestants. I for one am going to choose my families misery as a good thing for my life now. I think that author has the right idea. You on the other hand are stuck in victim mode and just want to cry at every chance you get. Stay that way. I will live my life with integrity and dignity.
posted by , at
9/24/2006 12:23 PM
Why do you insist on calling me dumb? You sound like those little kids on the playground who ran out of arguments.
He evens states that he would be considered a madman for suggesting something good came out of the troubles. He is not saying that we should return to slavery.
Even if jumping on the bandwagon to call someone who thinks homosexuality can be changed a racist might promote an agneda - I just can't do it. I do not see the racism in this indivdual. I see a bad example of trying to make his point - but the truth is - he has a point. No one thinks slavery was a good idea - and you can look at it in negative ways and positive ways. I personally am grateful for the opportunity to live in this country. No one's story to America is great. It was difficult for all families and races and religions. Let's try to stay focused on the truth not just parts of truth. If we want to promote homosexuality as a valid life then picking on one point of an author looks dubious.
posted by , at
9/24/2006 1:34 PM
I'm not anti -gay. I vote for your rights - protected rights. Nice try? I'm not trying fool anyone.
Can you stay focused on the subject? Again - you are using ad hominem tactics to try and force your opinion.
posted by , at
9/24/2006 2:58 PM
New flash. Boo is looking for trouble where there was none to begin with. She is just a scared little girl shouting names across a playground. It amounts to nothing.
posted by , at
9/24/2006 4:35 PM
That is very consistent. I am saying, stick to a balanced view not just one of victimization. Gays are more than just victims and minorities. They are people with hope and dreams and rights.
posted by , at
9/24/2006 7:14 PM
If I love animals but am not an animal and concede that many scientific advances have been made by experientmenting on animals does that mean I am anti-animal or believe in animal experimentation?
No.
We = humanity. Not, we = gay.
Not agreeing with you about a man's comments being racist does not make me anti-gay. It means, I don't agree with you that the man's comments were racist.
And because you have taken this man's comments from an article about sexuality - you have somehow made racism and homophobia one issue in one person. He may not like homosexuals - but I do not see his comments about slavery as being racism.
Nor do I see disagreeng with you as being anti-gay. To me that's just thinking without your consent. Waiting around for yours or anyone's consent is slavery to thoughts, ideas, etc..
posted by , at
9/24/2006 10:40 PM
Is this my anonymous friend, or some other anonymous? Curious.
posted by jekelhyde, at
9/27/2006 8:13 PM
your friend
posted by , at
9/30/2006 12:08 AM
So, to sum up: It doesn't matter that American descendants of African slaves have little to no sense of history whatsoever of their origins, they have no religions of their own to speak of but the religions forced on them by their ancestors' oppressors, none of their own languages, and large chunks of them, depending on where they live, still live in poverty due to policies from before the Civil War.
All of THAT doesn't matter -- all that DOES matter is that they don't live in Kenya where some tribes are so poor that the women have to risk contracting AIDS by prostituting themselves for money and food, that they don't have to live in Nigeria where nepotism in every conceivable form runs wild (something I would know a little bit about -- I'm a 2nd-gen Nigerian-American). What really matters is that because Uganda is a pretty unpleasant place to live compared to the U.S. or Sweden, then it was worth it for your ancestor for be stolen from his homeland just so YOU could own a nice house somewheres. He or she lived so you can buy iPods and argue on the internet all day with strangers; so that your biggest concern of the day could be making your car payments and not getting food for your grandkids... He died so you could watch CSI instead of reading a fucking book.
Because, you know, present-day crappy governments make the aftereffects of slavery permissable and defensible. Because what Mohammed Ali said three decades ago after going to some stupid boxing match matters. Whine about the supposed embracing of victimization all you want -- you have any idea just how materialistic it sounds to say that slavery saved black Americans from dealing with the *gasp* HORRORS of living in Africa? How amoral? How pathetic?
All of you defending the guy who wrote that stupid article reminds me of the spoiled morons who cried and complained that their precious CSI episode was cut short because the networks DARED to announce that Yasser Arafat died. Yeah, noting the death of the leader of the PLO is far less important than knowing what David Caruso's gonna do next.
And what does that say about my parents? About anyone living in sub-saharan Africa (you guys aren't talking about the northern parts, where all of the evil liberty-hating Arab Muslims are)? My mother isn't dumb: she isn't naive about just how badly run Nigeria is, but I'm damned sure that if the country started to pick up with good leadership and a good economy, she'd move back in a heartbeat. It's where she's from. Africans emigrate to the U.S. not necessarily because the U.S. is some super-duper place that their own countries could never be, but because if their own governments were as rich and well-run as some Western nations, they'd never have to leave, but they do anyway, because they have families and their own well-being to worry about.
And let's not forget how unfeasible activism tends to be in a lot of African countries -- there's Ken Saro-Wiwa, who protested what the oil companies were doing in his Nigerian homelands, only to be executed by Abacha; and then, gay activists can't protest the gay marriage bans in Uganda and Nigeria unless they want to be jailed, because being gay IS illegal in those places. It's not practical, to say the least -- a lot more working- and middle-class folks like my parents usually leave. If they could wait around 'til things got better, they would, but a lot of them can't, and considering how this causes brain drain in the form of shortages of doctors and nurses in countries like Kenya and Nigeria, I don't see how this is something to cheer, particularly in this incredibly self-satisfied way.
And don't flatter yourself: the U.S. isn't that great. My mom overworks at 40-50 hours a week as an accountant in downtown Atlanta just so she can barely make her payments, and then, she STILL has a lot of debt. And let's not forget how our healthcare isn't even free -- my mom's health insurance is sustained by taking money out of her check. I get to pay for every fucking thing at school -- tuition, the food -- unlike every OTHER country in the West where they DON'T pay at all, and NIGERIA's colleges have free tuition, too... And I can't quit school 'til I graduate, or else, I won't be covered by her insurance, either. And then, South Africa, a country with a large white population but with an even larger black population, not to mention thanks to gay activism there by blacks and whites, HAS made gay marriage LEGAL -- the U.S. is more inclined to ban it. What do you say about THAT?
Before I end this thought completely, how many of you would say that the Nazi regime and the Holocaust was worth it so Germany could have such nice roads, so that everyone could know that it probably hurts to have dye stuck in one's eyes, a good economy, and so you could drive BMWs? Or that 9/11 was worth it so you could learn more about the Middle East; and/or if you're a conservative, that it helped Bush's ratings and popularity; or if you're a news buff, so that the media could get weaker and more incompetent, and so blogs could be all dramatic and thus, gain in popularity? Don't be shy, now! It's all HISTORY, after all!
You people need help. Something about Bush getting two terms has allowed people to develop willful self-induced neuropathy.
posted by Godam5, at
9/30/2006 5:22 AM
We have all suffered. And yes there are some really bad things that have happened in history and there have been some godd things that have come out of it. Yep, our freeways in North America are what they are because of what the Nazi's did in Germany. Yep, we have learned more about first response because of 9/11 and Katrina. Yep, we would all return to our homelands (since this is a nation of immigrants) if we thought it would be better than this shit. But it's not.
And the article was attempting to say is that putting one side against another is not getting us anywhere productive but if we look at things in a positive light sometimes we can see some value. No one is saying that slavery was good. No one is saying that America is the place you ought to stay. But it is better than other options - as your mom has so pointed out.
posted by , at
9/30/2006 1:09 PM
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