By Michael M. Bates
Wednesday, June 8, 2005
a press release from the Family Research Institute this week announces a study that purportedly "provides additional evidence that the practice of homosexuality, with its attendant lifestyle, shortens the life of practitioners by about 20 years." This is the sort of news that will absolutely, positively make some people less than gay.
Titled "Gay obituaries closely track officially reported deaths from aIDS," study results will appear in the journal Psychological Reports. The president of the Family Research Institute, Paul Cameron, led the project.
The latest report builds on an earlier one in which Dr. Cameron examined deaths reported in homosexual publications, tracked the ages of the deceased and averaged the results. The life expectancy of a male homosexual, it was determined, was in the early 40s.
Those results have been cited by some conservative commentators. They've also been widely derided by those on the other side.
I think some skepticism is justified. The methodology is flawed because the sample population isn't representative. Most likely, the publications reviewed disproportionately report the deaths of out-of-the-closet homosexuals who were active in the gay rights movement and very possibly died of aIDS.
Excluding the deaths of people not covered in publications targeted to gays leaves too many gaps. Extrapolating the numbers leads to skewed results.
Dr. Cameron says that his newest findings closely correlate to statistics compiled by the Centers for Disease Control. Even if true, his report will be ridiculed as vicious, homophobic propaganda.
It's not that there haven't been other studies concluding that homosexuals tend to die earlier. It's just that the subject is so emotionally charged that merely bringing it up is accepted in some quarters as irrefutable evidence of bigotry.
In 1997, the International Journal of Epidemiology carried an article with the excitingly provocative title, "Modelling the impact of HIV disease on mortality in gay and bisexual men."
Just in case you misplaced your copy, I'll mention that half a dozen scholars scrutinized vital statistics for several years from a large Canadian city. Their finding: Life expectancy at age 20 for gay or bisexual men was 8 to 20 years less than that for all men.
Those figures aren't remarkable, knowing what we do about the devastating impact of HIV/aIDS among homosexuals. What was notable is what happened four years after the publication of the article.
The six authors wrote a letter to the editor of the publication in which their work originally appeared. They were displeased because – you guessed it – homophobic groups were using their data to intimate homosexual practices were somehow self-destructive.
Tut, tut, things have changed dramatically, they now said. Medical advances have reduced the number of deaths due to aIDS. The actuarial tables used to estimate life expectancy for a gay or bisexual man should be the same as those used for all other males.
Interestingly, their letter included little supporting scientific documentation. This differed greatly from their 1997 analysis, which was chockfull of statistics, graphs, footnotes and references.
I can't say what the motivation might have been in writing that letter to the editor, but it wouldn't surprise me if it were intended as a mea culpa for causing homosexuals any discomfort. as I've written before, Oscar Wilde's "love that dare not speak its name" has turned into a lifestyle that won't shut up. The "we're here, we're queer" chant may not be heard as frequently as it was once, but gay activists and their sympathizers tolerate little deviance from their orthodoxy.
Even using the word "homosexual" can infuriate. I've heard from readers who claim to be profoundly offended by it.
Possibly, that's because the word has traditionally carried a disparaging connotation. But we've come a long way, baby.
It's been three decades since the american Psychiatric association yielded to pressure and removed homosexuality as a category of mental illness. Time Magazine described the change as "an awkward compromise by a confused and defensive profession."
But to be PC now, one must use the favored "gay" rather than that other old, hate filled word. How such things are decided I don't know. It's said that gay folks prefer it.
Was a vote taken? a national survey of public opinion within the "community," wherever that may be? Did Congressperson Barney Frank introduce a congressional resolution?
Regardless of how it was determined, much of the media and the scientific community plays along. a quick computer check of articles in the Chicago Tribune over the past three months shows "homosexual" used in an article or as an index word 91 times. By contrast, for the same period "gay" was used 252 times.
The homosexual agenda is advancing rapidly. Even in the late 60s, could any of us have imagined a time when same-sex marriage would be accorded serious consideration by any legislator or any court?
Yes, we've certainly come a very long way.
This appears in the June 9, 2005 Oak Lawn (IL) Reporter. Mike Bates is the author of Right angles and Other Obstinate Truths.
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