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crossposted on Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters
Religious right figures giving misleading testimony during Congressional hearings isn't a new occurrence, but this one needs to be shouted about from the rooftops.
According to Equality Matters, the witnesses speaking for DOMA (the Defense of Marriage Act) during the April 15 Congressional hearing gave incorrect testimony on several occasions. I invite everyone to take a look at the section, but the one which stands out for me is a statement made by the National Organization for Marriage's Maggie Gallagher.
She claimed that social science proves that the best place to raise children are in homes with biological, married parents as opposed to same-sex households:
Transcript:
GALLAGHER: From what we know from the social science evidence, marriage protects children to the extent that it increases the likelihood they are born to and raised by their own mother and father in a low-conflict, enduring relationship. We know this because, frankly, children do not do better under remarried parents than they do with solo mothers on average, which means that it is not simply a set of legal benefits that we can transform. It is the extent and way to which marriage as a legal and public institution helps to protect a particular kind of family that it helps to protect children or fails to protect children.
However, according to Equality Matters, in her written testimony, Gallagher cited a study on heterosexual single parents:
We know this from the social science evidence showing that children do no better, on average, in remarried families than they do living with single mothers. 1 Marriage protects children to the extent that it helps increase the likelihood that children will be raised by their mother and father.
[…]1 See Sara McLanahan & Gary Sandefur, Growing Up With a Single Parent: What Hurts, What Helps (Harvard U. Press 1994) (“In general, compared with children living with both their parents, young people from disrupted families are more likely to drop out of high school, and young women from one-parent families are more likely to become teen mothers, irrespective of the conditions under which they began to live with single mothers and irrespective of whether their mothers remarry or experience subsequent disruptions.”). [Statement of Maggie Gallagher, Hearing on “Defending Marriage,” 4/15/11]
Equality Matters went on to use the words of Judith Stacey, Professor of Sociology and Professor of Gender and Sexuality at New York University to call out Gallagher and others on the right who inaccurately use studies on the heterosexual family dynamic to demonize same-sex parenting, and by proxy, marriage equality:
Opponents of same-sex marriage draw on a third body of literature in which researchers have achieved an unusual degree of consensus. Most family researchers agree that, all other things being equal (which, of course, is almost never the case), two parents are better than one. Research indicates that children raised in single-parent families are at greater risk of various negative outcomes (e.g., dropping out of school, delinquency, unwed teen pregnancy, substance abuse, etc.) than children raised in comparable two-parent families. All of this research, however, as Maggie Gallagher acknowledged, has been conducted on heterosexual-parent families. Moreover, this research generally compares children in married-couple and single-parent families, thereby confounding the effects of the number and the legal status of parents. None of the research cited to demonstrate the importance of fathers (or mothers) examines the adjustment of children raised by same-sex couples. Moreover, this research does not indicate that it is the gender or the sexual orientation of the absent parent that is responsible for the different outcomes of children raised in single versus two-parent families. Rather, most researchers conclude that the number and economic resources of parents as well as the disruptive effects that parental desertion or divorce can inflict on children's lives account for these differential risks. N12 [University School of Quinnipiac Law Review, via Lexis, emphasis added, 2004]
Gallagher has done this sort of thing before. In in January of last year, she distorted a study on child abuse to make the case that children in married biological homes do better to protect children from abuse than children in same-sex households.
The distortion comes because the study in question – the one she cited – didn't even look at children in same-sex households. We know this because Gallagher even admitted at the time that same-sex households wasn't a category in the study:
All the other family structures studied (which does not include same-sex parent families probably because these are such a small part of the population), but does include solo parents, other married parents (remarried primarily), single parents living with a partner, cohabiting parents, and no parents.
Please bear in mind that at that same April 15 Congressional hearing, Gallagher said it was unfortunate that people misinterpret things she says as a condemnation of "gay people" and "their parenting skills."
If Gallagher wants people to not think that she is condemning "gay people" and "their parenting skills," then maybe she should stop being so deceptive in her testimony.
12 Comments
It’s an old trickJames Dobson used to use the same tactic — claiming that studies that compared single-parent and two-parent households “proved” that children to “best” with their married biological parents as an argument against adoption by same-sex couples. It’s become Tony Perkins’ standard opening gambit.
Repeat after me, class: these are the most fundamentally dishonest people in public discourse today.
It isn’t always a trickAs nice it would be to believe it. They aren’t all dishonest. I know many people in the religious right who are opposed to all things LGBT, including my own family. They truly believe what they are saying, and that these studies support their views. And as a result, they in turn see us as the dishonest ones trying to “trick” them.
It is a problem we all have, so I find as much as I hate it, I cannot despise them for it. We all find support for what we already believe wherever we look. They believe something is fundamentally wrong, and so they find “proof” in every study they find. This is why you will hear them so often say they don’t hate gay people – in their minds they don’t. They hate the few public faces they see as twisting reality to support their evil “Gay Agenda”.
And often times their belief is simply a lack of exposure to real people who aren’t like their preconceptions.
Look at Louis Marinelli. For years he was on that side. He promoted NOM and for all intents and purposes seemed to be just like the others. Until he actually talked face to face with real normal people trying to live their lives. And even then it wasn’t an instant change. He says it was a struggle, not just because it is hard to change deep seated beliefs, but also because he had to “come out” to others, to admit he had been wrong for all these years.
Peer pressure can be as hard to overcome as our own well-worn preconceptions about the world, and when you combine them they may never be overcome.
Perhaps Maggie really is as dishonest as she appears to us. But I think it often hurts us to treat those who oppose us as if they are fundamentally dishonest, because it makes them feel martyred, vindicated. The “angry gays” lashing out again. “We told you!”
Should we point out the logical fallacies? Absolutely. But creating an aura of anger directed at them, only reinforces their existing preconceptions, making them that much more opposed to us.
I understand your point except for one thingWe need to distinguish between folks like Marinelli and Gallagher.
Marinelli changed because he truly believed the lies and saw that they weren’t true. Gallagher is getting paid a mucho amount of money to exploit the lies. And we should get angry at people who get their paychecks from perpetuating lies and fear.
What we do with that anger is the important thing. We can yell, scream, and insult or approach this thing like a game of chess or war. We need to access the strengths and weaknesses of these groups, making sure to exploit the weaknesses every chance we get.
Wow!You can lie to Congress and get away with it? I will remember that if I ever have to go in front of them.
The problem is, the studies don’t support their views. That’s my whole point: to cite studies comparing the children of two-parent families versus single-parent families as an argument against same-sex marriage and same-sex adoption is nothing more than sleight of hand: the studies they are citing are not germane and do not support the idea that same-sex couples are somehow inferior — particularly since the relevant studies come to the opposite conclusion. It is, in a very real sense, dishonest.
Trying to drag in “many people” who sincerely believe these things is just dodging the question: we’re not talking about them, we’re talking about Maggie Gallagher and Tony Perkins and others who know better but are making comfortable livings by telling lies. (Have you ever seen Perkins’ reaction when he gets called out? He blinks like a lizard that’s just swallowed a stinkbug and changes the subject — that’s not the reaction of a man who believes what he’s saying.)
You undercut your own argument by bringing up Louis Marinelli. Once people realize that they know someone gay and that they’re not all degenerates, they have the same reaction Marinelli did: they may still find homosexuality wrong, but they don’t think that gays should stripped of civil rights, either. That’s the difference: knowing gay people is not going to change Maggie Gallagher’s congressional testimony or Tony Perkins’ stump speech.
The bottom line on this is that people are certainly entitled to their beliefs, but most people are going to change their attitudes once they have some contact with reality. If we’re afraid to point out the dishonesty of the Maggie Gallaghers and Tony Perkinses, that’s never going to happen.
Hm …
Many of them either don’t have the mental capacity or the education to understand this. And those who do react with cognitive dissonance: It can’t be true if it destroys their world view.
I wonder about the case of Louis Marinelli how much time and effort it took to correct himself on this issue.
Sorry, doesn’t work.I don’t dispute your opinion on what motivates your family. If they have never had any real reason to dig into it, and are comfortable with what their preconceptions are, then yes, it may well be a situation of “honest” misinformation.
That does not and cannot apply to Maggie Gallagher. It is simply impossible that she has never been presented with the truth.
First, she has a moral, as well as a professional, obligation to get her facts straight before she calls herself an expert, forms a national organization and starts testifying before Congress. But even it it were somehow possible for her to have an unexamined misunderstanding through her own research, she has been called out on it so many times, in such clear detail – and responded publicly, in writing and on video to what has been written – that it is flat out impossible that she has not been exposed to the truth, and yet continues to double down on the lies, knowing they are lies, and making no effort to clear up any of them.
Your family may be dealing with a lack of exposure to the truth. Maggie Gallagher is not, and papering over her lies does nobody any service.
Please.See also, North, Oliver.
I disagree..You assume that anyone who saw the truth, would know it for truth, and accept it.
I am sorry but this isn’t how most people approach the world. No, not even all “experts”. If they come across research that doesn’t fit their world view, that research doesn’t change their opinion. They just throw it out, assuming it is wrong. Or they find in it just those things that support their world view. You might find this intellectually dishonest, because it is. But this doesn’t mean they are intentionally lying. It means they don’t see the truth for the very reason that it contradicts their world view. Which is why it can be so hard to change their mind.
Look throughout the last 200 years of science and you can see this. Well meaning scientists who see only the results that fit their initial assumptions, and persists in believing those results long after their assumptions have been proven false. They should have known better, and yet they still fell prey to this. This is the very reason we have the system of peer review.
In my experience most people will go out of their way to find any excuse to not believe something that might contradict their preconceptions. They would rather find fault in someone else’s intellectual rigor, than accept that their own is flawed.
I am not saying we shouldn’t continue to call them on it, and refute their claims. But that we cannot assume that they are intentionally being dishonest. Even if they have been faced with truth over and over again.
Obviously we should be calling out every single one of Gallagher’s falsehoods and misrepresentations, and clearly and succinctly showing why she is wrong. I just don’t see it to be of benefit to attack her or anyone else personally, or try and characterize them as intentionally dishonest. Even if they might well be. I would rather assume innocent until proven guilty, lest I fall into the very same trap they have.
Am I angry about the continual perpetuation of these falsehoods? Hell yes. So I do my part to try and educate others as I can.
Angry gays.It is unreasonable to insist that “creating an aura of anger” is counterproductive when in our all too recent history expressing our anger and outrage is the ONLY way we have FINALLY been heard. The Gay Pride Parades of the early 70′s were more like protest marches than costume parties. ACT UP saved lives. The fact is that screaming in the streets is an integral part of our history. Just because we wear suits and use the power of the purse now doesn’t mean that vocally expressing our anger at being forced to live as second class citizens isn’t appropriate anymore.
If those that are intellectually challenged or those that lack the desire to become informed think that we should keep our elbows off the table they can go to hell. I for one have waited long enough for them to figure out that their premise is disingenuous and decidedly NOT Christ-like.
My mom waited 40 years to see me married. We cried when we left Iowa because we were no longer recognized as a family the minute we crossed the Mississippi. I could care less if my anger reinforces the religious rights existing preconceptions. Their lack of empathy and compassion for my family reinforces my preconception that they are bigoted Christofascists. Screw them.
SatyagrahaI understand your view, but I guess in this I hold most strongly with Ghandi and MLK. In my opinion while there was certainly an angry side to the civil rights movements, it was the power of Satyagraha – of civil disobedience without anger, but with right on their side, that made the most important difference. That made it possible for true change and acceptance to begin.
I think the early anger in our movements certainly made an impact, but it was both positive and negative. And we still feel the ripples of the negative today. Had the early protests included more rational, positive attitudes, I believe we would be farther than we are today towards equal rights and acceptance.
Where is the PERJURY INDICTMENT Representative Nadler?