TEACHING HOMOSEXUALITY IN THE CLASSROOM

Vol. VIII, No. 4, April 1995

On March 9th, the School Board of Fairfax County, Virginia voted to continue the homosexuality component of its sex-ed program (Family Life Education or FLE) with only minor changes after an advisory committee had been directed to perform a thorough review. Conservative members of this advisory committee became aware of Family Research Institute (FRI) only weeks before the final vote and turned to us only at the last hour. However, Dr. Kirk Cameron, FRI's statistical scientist, spoke before the school board on February 23rd. Excerpts and elaborations of his testimony follow.

Take note: this same curriculum is being touted as a model for sex-ed programs across the country. Perhaps it is being considered in your own district. We cannot stand on the sidelines any longer. We must stand up for what is right.

After reviewing the proposed FLE curriculum materials and the FLE Curriculum Advisory Committee report, I can state with great confidence and solid scientific evidence that you as a School Board have been conned. It flies in the face of the available empirical evidence to argue that the best way to prevent suicide attempts among gay youth is for the Fairfax County schools, and the FLE program in particular, to promote discussion and encouragement of homosexuality as a positive lifestyle alternative to heterosexuality. In the words of the FLECAC report, that "gay students must have safe places, like school health classes, to receive accurate medical and scientific information... that it may be desirable to provide more information on the subject of homosexuality... that in view of the amount of time spent discussing behaviors from a heterosexual perspective, gay students continue to be shortchanged."

Under what mandate or logic is the school system charged to discuss behaviors from every sexual orientation's perspective? As best we can tell from the empirical literatures, a fair number of students will engage in prostitution in their lives, perhaps as many as go into homosexuality. A certain fraction will become full-time prostitutes. Are they to be accommodated in the same way as homosexually-inclined students? Is the curriculum to be modified so that they can `feel better about themselves?' Is every student to learn to view life from the perspective of prostitutes?

The FLECAC report further added that the current curriculum revision does not go far enough in supporting gay adolescents. The committee found that

"directing teachers to provide a supportive environment which neither endorses nor condemns homosexuality, but provides all students with factual information about homosexuality and other sexual issues can help educate students to be tolerant; [however] this statement as applied withholds from gay students information they need to be healthy, happy, and well adjusted... that providing some positive role models for gay students may help improve the self-esteem and lower the high suicide rate of the gay adolescent population."

What if this same thinking were applied to prostitution and/or prostitutes? Surely many of the pathologies associated with prostitution (e.g., low self-esteem and high suicide and drug-use rates) are at least plausibly related to their not being provided "some positive role models" also. Should the public schools attempt to "fix" this problem by "directing teachers to provide a supportive environment which neither endorses nor condemns" prostitution?

In the 1992 Remafedi study of nearly 35,000 Minnesota adolescents, sexual orientation was not fixed at an early age.(2) In fact, about a quarter of the 12 yr-olds were unsure of their orientation, a percentage that steadily declined to about 5% of 18 year-olds. Likewise, the percentage with predominantly homosexual attractions steadily increased between these ages, giving lie to the notion that sexual feelings are somehow fixed early-on. Furthermore, as Remafedi notes: "The observed relationship between sexuality and religiosity, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status provided further evidence of social influences on perceived sexual identity.,,

For example,"[t]he reporting of homosexual attractions among boys and girls rose steadily with socioeconomic status, reflecting parental education level and, perhaps, tolerance for sexual diversity."

That is, the greater the level of education and tolerance, the more these students expressed explicit homosexual attractions.

If homosexual orientation is inevitable and not influenced by social or learning factors (contrary to Remafedi's results), then more education and tolerance and less discrimination against homosexuality ought to simply provide a more comfortable environment for gay students to express themselves. But the available data suggest just the opposite.

The real kicker is Remafedi's 1991 study of 137 gay and bisexual male adolescents,(3) the largest of its kind. Thirty percent of the subjects had attempted suicide, many had tried on multiple occasions. But rather than being attributable to hostile classroom environments, Remafedi found that suicide attempts were not explained by experiences with discrimination, violence, loss of friendship [after coming out], or current personal attitudes toward homosexuality.

What did differentiate those who attempted versus those who had not attempted suicide?

"However, gender nonconformity and precocious psychosexual development were predictive of self harm.... For each year's delay in bisexual or homosexual self labeling, the odds of a suicide attempt diminished by 80%. These findings support a previously observed, inverse relationship between psychosocial problems and the age of acquiring a homosexual identity."

In other words, the most important risk factors for suicide in gay youth were getting into sex early-on, adopting feminine characteristics and mannerisms, and most significantly, adopting a homosexual orientation earlier in adolescence.

Can we afford to continue this grand social experiment on our students, hoping that orientation is basically fixed early-on so that the promotion of gay-friendly curricula and positive role models will result only in the development of healthy, happy, and well adjusted gay students? Are we to continue hoping against hope that if only the dust of discrimination would just settle, homosexuality could take its place alongside heterosexuality as a healthy, normal alternative lifestyle?

The fact is that orientation is not only impacted significantly by type of early sexual experience and family dysfunction but is often not established until adulthood is near or even during adulthood. The promotion of homosexuality in schools may be nudging a percentage of sexually confused youth into that lifestyle, heightening greatly their risk of attempted suicide.

As Remafedi notes in yet another study, "[t] heveryexperienceof acquiring a homosexual or bisexual identity at an early age places the individual at risk for dysfunction. This conclusion is strongly supported by the data."

The gay lifestyle is a lonely and isolated one, but not primarily because of discrimination and intolerance. Even in San Francisco, easily the most gay-friendly city of this country, the gay life is not a happy one. Rather, it is a lifestyle of either shallow or short-lived relationships; brief, noncommitted, and often violent sexual encounters; sexually transmitted disease; normative promiscuity, and gay vs. gay violence.

With only the change of a word or two many of the same things legitimately could be said about those who go into prostitution: "not a happy choice. Rather, it is a lifestyle of either shallow or short-lived relationships; brief, noncommitted and often violent sexual encounters; sexually transmitted disease; normative promiscuity, and violence."

In the final analysis, the gay life is a short life. Our study of over 7,000 gay and lesbian obituaries, published last year in Omega,(5) indicates clearly that gay males' median age of death is in their early 40s in this country, over 30 years sooner than the median age of death of married men. The same holds for lesbians, who are dying on average in their mid-40s, likewise about 30 years younger than married women.

How can we discriminate against smokers and smoking, or prostitutes and prostitution because of the medical risks and not do the same for homosexuality? The last thing we need to do in a society that is increasingly sexually confused, is to encourage a lifestyle that is so self-destructive and dangerous to its participants. I urge you to reject the proposed FLE curriculum.

Testimony Before the Fairfax County School Board on the FLE Curricula for 9th Grade (2123195)

References 1. Cameron, P., Cameron, K., & Proctor, K. Effect of homosexuality upon public health and social order. Psychological Reports, 64, 1989, 1167-1179.

2. Remafedi, G., Resnick, M., Blum, R., & Harris, L. Demography of sexual orientation in adolescents. Pediatrics, 89(4), 1992, 714-21.

3. Remafedi, G., Farrow, J.A., & Deisher, R.W. Risk factors for attempted suicide in gay and bisexual youth. Pediatrics, 87(6), 1991, 869-75.

4. Remafedi, G . Adolescent homosexuality: psychosocial and

medical implications. Pediatrics, 79(3), 1987, 33137.

5. Cameron, P., Playfair, W.L., & Wellum, S. The longevity of homosexuals: before and after the AIDS epidemic. Omega, 29(3), 1994, 249-72.

This Special Report prepared by

Family Research Institute

P.O. Box 62640

Colorado Springs, CO 80962-2640

Dr. Paul Cameron, Chairman Phone: 303-681-3113

www.familyresearchonst.org

Family Research Report is $25/ year U.S. ($40 foreign).