Tami Fitzgerald (tfitzgerald@ncvalues.org) is Executive Director of the so-called North Carolina Values Coalition.

The NCVC was founded in 2011 to politic in favor of the proposed anti-gay marriage amendment to the state constitution.

Though NCVC alleges it is “taking the initiative to preserve and promote families,” the welfare and psychological well-being of all gay people in whatever family arrangement is left entirely out of account.

And how is this for “values”?  The NCVC site says “We also believe that private business owners have the right to refuse service to customers on the basis of their religious faith.”

Go figure exactly what this “values” group intends with that.

Recently on its Facebook page, the North Carolina Values Coalition posted this statement; “legalizing gay marriage would take away the right of Christian psychologists to refuse treatment on the basis of their religious beliefs.”

What exactly does that mean?

I e-mailed Tami Fitzgerald, explaining that I was working on an article about this and wanted to be able to include quotes from her.

I asked 1) Which rights of Christian psychologists to refuse treatment was your organization referencing in the post?  2) In a general way, which rights for Christian psychologist does your organization most strongly want to see permanently protected?  3) Are you able to recommend any Christian psychologists in North Carolina that I might interview to gain an understanding of their viewpoint?  4) Can you refer me to any particularly good articles on that topic?

Fitzgerald refused to answer those questions.

Fitzgerald’s organization’s web site includes a video by Focus on the Family’s Glenn Stanton in which he alleges that everything professional modern medical associations say about sexual orientation is ‘wrong.” It defies belief that anybody could listen to Glenn Stanton for fifteen seconds without having the thought that he is a closet case. For reader reference, here is an article “Assessing Internalized Sexual Stigma (“internalized Homophobia”) in Sexual Minority Adults.”

Putting this all together now, we have Tami Fitzgerald as head of an organization that 1) challenges psychology on non-scientific grounds; 2) promotes a perhaps paranoid notion that “Christian psychologists” are going to have their rights taken away, if same sex marriage is legalized and 3) refuses to answer simple questions about her and her group’s understanding of “Christian psychology.” Elsewhere on the site one learns that NCVC is devoted to prayer and to “religious liberty.”  They obviously are not devoted to the “religious liberty” of pastors that wish to officiate at same sex marriages.

United States medical licensing boards license all mental health practitioners according to their medical credentials, not according to their religious beliefs.  What is more is that there are plenty of psychologists of Christian faith who are not anti-gay and do not consider that homosexuality is a state in need of a “cure.”

Tami Fitzgerald earned a Juris Doctor at the University of Oklahoma College of Law. She is not an idiot, and she is intellectually capable of understanding the basics of scientific method. But she has aimed for and achieved the leadership position of NCVC, is encouraging those donating the money to pay her salary to remain ignorant of many vital aspects of modern mental health treatment, and she refuses to explain herself and her organization vis-a-vis their comprehension of modern mental health care when offered an opportunity to do so.

The NCVC attitude towards gay human beings ipso facto causes psychological injuries to young gay people and many others impacted by it, and there is a strong appearance that in other ways, Tami Fitzgerald could be contributing to conditions that endanger child welfare in North Carolina and beyond. All appearances are that she prefers to stay “on message” with her organization’s anti-gay hate speech, over having those anti-gay attitudes examined in the light of scientific reason.

Listen once again to the pathetic and appalling Miss Thing in one of her anti-gay hate speech videos that NCVC has posted to its site. On his FB page, Glenn T. Stanton in addition to citing his association with Focus on the Family says that he is a “Senior Elite Cone Dipper at the Dairy Queen at the Mall” and FB friends with gay novelist Brad Gooch.