Jeff Johnston, Focus on the Family

Jeff Johnston is Focus on the Family’s resident ex-gay, and he is increasingly being called upon to speak as an expert on various identity issues, though he bears no such expertise. Following up on the group’s promotion of ex-transgender ministries, Johnston is back to spread a series of remarkable falsehoods about what it means to be trans. His claims are built around the false understanding that being trans is a disorder, even though the American Psychiatric Association is declassifying it as such next year. From this false premise, Johnston encourages many mistruths and harmful ideas for supporting transgender youth.

First, Johnston claims that sexual orientation and gender identity are the same, which they aren’t:

[Gender Identity Disorder] is a label usually given to children with same-sex attractions, but it can be given to adults.

Gender dysphoria — GID is now obsolete language — refers to how people experience their gender, which has very little to do with who they are attracted to. Some trans people are heterosexual, some are gay, and some have sexual orientations that do not fit into such neat boxes. Sexual orientation and gender identity can intersect, but they operate independently.

Johnston then claims the best way to support young people who are questioning their gender is to try to force them to accept the body they have, rejecting their gender identity:

Gender Identity Disorder is treatable. There are therapists who work with kids to help them accept the body they were born into and to embrace it as a good thing. This kind of therapy helps children to stop hating their bodies and to embrace their gender.

This sort of “ex-trans” therapy directly contradicts what the majority of medical professionals have found. For example, the American Psychological Association tells parents that “it is not helpful to force the child to act in a more gender-conforming way.” Doing so reinforces the stress young people often feel when their sex does not match their gender identity.

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Mark Regnerus

Mark Regnerus’s “family structure” study has been a hot topic since it was released in June, namely because every single anti-gay conservative organization has cited it as evidence that same-sex couples are inferior parents. An internal audit by the academic journal that originally published it found the conclusions to be “bullshit” because Regnerus’s criteria was whether a kid’s parent ever had a same-sex relationship, regardless of how long it lasted or what role in played in parenting. In a new interview with Focus on the Family — a group invested in continuing to cite the study to oppose LGBT equality — Regnerus admits that the foundation of his study is too weak to draw the conclusions that many have made:

REGNERUS: I got taken to task for leaning on young adults’ assessments of their parents’ relationships. I didn’t ask them whether they thought their mom was a lesbian or if their dad was gay. Because, in part, self-identity is a different kind of thing than behavior, and lot of people weren’t “out” in that era. I think we can all think of moms and dads when we were growing up that we either knew or suspected were gay or lesbian, but never “came out of the closet,” so to speak. So, I didn’t want to make the assumption that these young adults would identify their parents as gay or lesbian, so I kept the focus on relationship behavior. [...]

And when pushed, a lot of people who were critics of mine will say: “Yeah, we know that, obviously, family structure matters,” and then they’ll complain, “Why didn’t you find many stably coupled lesbians?” Well, they just were not that common in the nationally representative population. There were two cases where they said the mom and her partner lived together for 18 years. There was another several who lived together for 15 or 13 years. So, stability in the sense of long-term was not common. And frankly, it’s not all that common among heterosexual population. I take pains in the study to say this is not about saying gay or lesbian parents are inherently bad. [...]

I’d be more careful about the language I used to describe people whose parents had same-sex relationships. I said “lesbian mothers” and “gay fathers,” when in fact, I don’t know about their sexual orientation; I do know about their same-sex relationship behavior. But as far as the findings themselves, I stand behind them.

So, Regnerus’ study was not about parents who openly identify as gay or lesbian. It was not about same-sex couples in long-term relationships raising children together. Regnerus even admits “this is not about saying gay or lesbian parents are inherently bad,” because he knows has no foundation on which to make such a claim. This was a study about unstable couples, possibly in sham marriages, who may have dabbled in same-sex relationships outside of their original marriage at a time when there was no recognition for same-sex couples anywhere in the country. In others words, the study’s results have zero implication for conversations in 2012 about out, committed same-sex couples who are already raising children.

Focus on the Family may be invested in the fraudulent portrayal of Regnerus’s study, but by conducting this interview to draw more attention to it, the anti-gay organization managed to prove that the research has no applicability to the marriage equality and same-sex adoption debates to which it has been applied.

Last week, Focus on the Family president Jim Daly took some time to chat with the extremely anti-gay radio host Janet Mefford about how to “represent God’s heart” when debating LGBT activists. Regardless of how he softens his message, it’s still one of condescension and disdain, because gays are in “pain” and at battle with “the creator of the universe”:

DALY: When you’re on CNN debating and the homosexual activist is shouting over you, you don’t turn around and shout him down. You take it, and then you say, “I understand this person’s pain; however, as I read Scripture, this is how I’m informed.” And the reality is, Janet, the battle that they have is not with us, it’s with the Creator of the universe, and that’s where they’ve gotta take that battle. And that’s where I like to try to point them. I’m simply trying to live out the Scripture; they’ve got to take it up with the author of the Scripture.

Listen to it (via Jeremy Hooper):

Evangelical Christians have no problem admitting that “we’re all sinners,” but as Daly makes clear here, that doesn’t mean that the “homosexual activist” is still less than.

Focus on the Family Action, the secret-money political arm of Focus on the Family, disclosed Monday that it has made a $1.2 million independent expenditure of direct mailings to voters in several swing states in support of Mitt Romney and six anti-LGBT Senate hopefuls.

The group said it spent:

1. $784,644.48 for Mitt Romney. The group’s mailings to Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, Ohio, Virginia, and Wisconsin were both supportive of Romney critical of to Barack Obama. Romney has signed a pledge to push for a marriage inequality amendment to the constitution and gave a shout-out to Focus on the Family in his Denver campaign rally on Monday.

2. $71,404.18 for former Sen. George Allen (R-VA). Allen has argued homosexuality is not “acceptable” and should be “illegal.” A prominent anti-LGBT equality section on his campaign website notes that he will even oppose hate crimes protections for LGBT Americans that were enacted in 2009.

3. $67,896.06 for former Gov. Tommy Thompson (R-WI). Thompson has tried to present himself as a moderate in this campaign, but has a long history of opposing LGBT equality, dating back to the early 1980s.

4. $52,413.67 for Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO). Though conservatives have distanced themselves from Akin after his controversial comments that women who are victims of “legitimate rape” are unlikely to become pregnant, his stridently anti-LGBT record apparently put him in line with Focus on the Family. When President Obama announced his support for marriage equality, Akin lambasted him for showing an “unquenchable desire to tear down the traditional family unit brick by brick.”

5. $15,356.87 for Rep. Denny Rehberg (R-MT). Rehberg proudly pranked a colleague with a gay-mocking “Idaho Travel Package” while dismissing LGBT equality as “extremist.”

6. $33,839.41 for Rep. Dean Heller (R-NV). Though Heller has tried to avoid talking about his opposition to LGBT families throughout this campaign, he has voted against equality at every single opportunity over his time in Congress.

7. $184,124.26 for State Treasurer Josh Mandel (R-OH). Mandel has said the fight against marriage equality is one from which he will “will never, ever back down.”

All totaled, Focus on the Family Action (which now calls itself “CitizenLink”) spent $1,209,679 to encourage voters in key swing states and in states with close Senate races to vote for anti-equality candidates.

A same-sex penguin couple raising a chick together in a German zoo.

“Heteronormativity” or “heterosexism” are more articulate ways of understanding the concept traditionally referred to as “homophobia.” They refer to attitudes that may not be overtly anti-gay, but which continue to oppress gay people by reinforcing hetero-supremacy, a notion that heterosexuality is superior and preferable to any other sexual orientation. According to Focus on the Family’s resident ex-gay, Jeff Johnston, such attitudes are just a part of nature and a reminder that homosexuality is the equivalent of “sexual brokenness“:

Even in our sexual brokenness, we see glimmers of God’s design. One of those glimmers is that though humans have the capacity for all kinds of sexual behaviors, and despite sin, the world is largely heteronormative – and not arbitrarily so. Most cultures recognize the truth displayed in our bodies, that humanity is divided into two sexes, male and female. And almost all have some form of marriage – mainly to keep children with the husband and wife who procreated them.[...]

Same-sex lusts, fantasies and sexual activity violate God’s male-female design in a unique way. Instead of normalizing brokenness, calling homosexuality “good,” and identifying people by their sexual attractions, those who follow Jesus are called to bring redemption, grace and transformation.

This is a selective viewing of nature that ignores the reality of sexual diversity. Qualifying one sexual orientation as superior or as the only “good” orientation is the true distortion of “God’s design.”

Focus on the Family has endorsed the Restored Hope Network, an ex-gay splinter group that broke off after Exodus International announced it would no longer try to “cure” homosexuality. Restored Hope describes homosexuality as a “perversion of God’s will for sexual holiness” and tries to “transform” gays and lesbians from being “broken sexual sinners.” Focus’ resident ex-gay, Jeff Johnston, who said recently that there are “a variety of roads into homosexuality,” described the “sexual brokenness” that Restored Hope purports to heal:

Sexually and relationally broken – just think about it for a minute:

• Because of Adam’s sin, our whole self is impacted by sin – including our identity, our sexuality and our ability to connect and maintain healthy relationships
• After they sinned, Adam and Eve feel ashamed, hide from God and begin blaming others; their eldest boy kills his brother; relational brokenness – inside families and between us and God
• Our culture is saturated with broken sexuality, and we’re exposed to it and impacted by it from childhood on; sexual brokenness runs deep in our world; it’s so much a part of our background that we don’t always notice
• Satan roams the earth like a lion, using sexual and relational brokenness to destroy individuals, families, churches, groups, businesses…

This is how conservative Christianity describes homosexuality, as “Satan roaming the earth like a lion.” It leaves no room for the very true love that same-sex couples have for each other, nor the families they are raising across this country. According to Focus on the Family, they are defective people destroying society who need to be fixed and erased. This is simply not a position that can be reconciled with reality.

Following up on their model policy to ensure ongoing bullying of LGBT students, Focus on the Family and Alliance Defending Freedom have released new model legislation about “parents’ rights.” Much of the access they seek for parents greatly endangers children and deprives them the opportunity to learn about their own identities and the world around them. Here is the risky access these anti-gay groups seek for parents:

• The right to be notified if courses teach sex education, family planning, homosexual themes, diversity issues, and extreme violence. This is broad, vague language that could scare teachers and administrators from even allowing certain topics to be discussed in class, not unlike the stifling “Don’t Say Gay” legislation proposed in various states or the failed “neutrality” policy once employed in Minnesota’s Anoka-Hennepin School District.
• The right to opt the child out of any course or activity the parent finds “morally or religiously offensive.” This is similarly broad access that could deprive children of learning important information about their own bodies, their own identities, their own families, the political issues impacting the world they live in, and quite possibly the basic tenets of biology, if evolution is also covered.
• The right to opt the child in to any course or school activity that includes information about contraceptive services. “Opt in” means that the child cannot be enrolled without permission. Even though abstinence-only education is demonstrably ineffective, such a policy would allow parents to prevent public education that benefits the health of society.
• The right to review all curricula and teaching materials. Such a policy would undermine the credentials and expertise that qualifies teachers to teach and allow parents to pick and choose what their kids can learn.
• The right to access the child’s record, including grades and counseling records. This provision could be particularly detrimental to young people who are struggling with coming out and are  not yet out to their parents. Studies have found that 40 percent of homeless youth are LGBT, primarily because of family rejection.
• The right to remove the child from school on days of religious observance. This policy is already in place.
• The right to be informed of all disciplinary proceedings. As with the counseling records, this policy could similarly out young people to their parents without their consent, particularly if simply being a victim of anti-gay bullying warrants a disciplinary record. Administrators should have a certain amount of discretion in how to proceed in each situation to act in students’ best interests.
• The right to opt the child out of any extracurricular activity in which the parent does not want the child to participate. This is yet another attempt to violate young people’s privacy, should they be participating in a gay-straight alliance or similar group but have not yet come out to their parents.

Once again, Focus and ADF have proven that their top priority has nothing to do with protecting children, but actually ensuring that LGBT young people remain as vulnerable and misinformed as possible.