With various LGBT organizations deciding to be silent because they “don’t want to draw more attention to the issue” (hmmm….too late!) COLAGE is the only organization I know of that has chosen to speak out. Here is their press release. I am re-posting it here well after the fact; COLAGE released this statement on May 10, 2006.

COLAGE Net News
May 6th, 2006
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Paul Cameron Action Alert

You may have heard that Paul Cameron, the discredited researcher who publishes articles (maybe it would be more accurate to call them stories) on sexuality recently authored a piece in the Journal of Biosocial Science. The article is titled, “Children of Homosexuals and Transsexuals More Apt To Be Homosexual” (For more info about Cameron who
was removed from the APA in 1986, see: http://psychology.ucdavis.edu/rainbow/html/facts_cameron_sheet.html

His methodology is ridiculous and totally illegitimate. Basically his “sample” is not really a sample at all. He claims to have 77 participants but really, he knows nothing of those individuals as they are all interviewees in 3 books: Families Like Mine: Children of Gay Parents Tell It Like It Is by Abigail Garner, Out of the Ordinary: Essays on Growing Up with Gay, Lesbian, and Transgender Parents edited by Noelle Howey and Ellen Samuels, and Sons Talk About Their Gay Fathers: Life Curves by Andrew Gottlieb. For a point by point analysis of the entire flaw-filled article, see: http://www.boxturtlebulletin.com/Articles/000,012.htm

Abigail Garner alerted the Journal in February after she learned about the pending publication of the article, but she did not receive a response. (see details on her blog at: http://damnstraight.oversampled.net/2006/04/20/). Many members of COLAGE are featured in both Abigail’s book as well as the Out of the Ordinary anthology. The Journal should be held accountable for allowing a discredited researcher to use their pages to feed sensationalism. Contact Cambridge University Press and demand they retract the article they permitted to get published in the Journal of Biosocial Science. It is especially important that they hear from social scientists in academia. Contact them at: http://journals.cambridge.org/action/contactUs

We are very concerned that his official-sounding article will end up being used in a court of law regarding the custody of a child of LGBTQ parent(s), or will be cited in future studies, and that it will continue to perpetuate the prevailing myths about LGBTQ parents and their children. The Family Research Institute (where Cameron works) has already released a press release, stating as if it is fact, “A third of homosexuals’ children become homosexual.”

Please help to denounce this distorted and dishonest work by Cameron in whatever way you can. Make sure that your colleagues are aware of the situation. Please consider writing letters to the editor and other public forums demanding a retraction and apology.

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