Paul Cameron, the virulently anti-gay “researcher” whose name is synonymous with discredited and “consistent misrepresentation of sociological research,” tells journalist David Pakman that he was attracted to men when he was a boy as young as three, after being raped by a man, but he claims he grew out of it by the age of eight or nine. Dr. Cameron adds that on a scale of one to one hundred, with zero being heterosexual and one hundred being homosexual, he’s negative one hundred.
On Monday, The New Civil Rights Movement reported that Dr. Cameron had suggested President Obama may be gay, said gays should be jailed, and claimed the goal of gay people is to ensure every boy and girl be raped at least once. Pakman in the video below addresses these issues. The responses from Cameron are strange, to say the least.
The reason this is such a huge story is that the anti-gay religious right has been spouting Cameron’s anti-gay rhetoric for years. The entire basis of their so-called “scientific” anti-gay hate is built upon Cameron’s anti-gay hate “research.”
When you hear people falsely claim that gay people die decades sooner than heterosexuals, when you hear that “the gay lifestyle” is more dangerous than cigarette smoking, you can look to Dr. Paul Cameron’s “research.”
Certified anti-gay hate groups like the American Family Association and Americans For Truth About Homosexuality have all spouted anti-gay hate based on Cameron’s debunked “research.”
So have Concerned Women For America, Family Research Council,  the National Association for the Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH), and so many more. Cameron’s so-called “research” has flowed all over the place, and then shows up in small town school boards as the basis for their support of anti-gay hate legislation an policies we’re seeing, like the “Don’t Say Gay” bills in Tennessee and Missouri.
Pam Spaulding of Pam’s House Blend, who first posted this story from the Pakman interview, points to this passage from Alvin McEwen for more background:
It was Cameron who in the 80s came up with the idea of aggressively using science to prove that homosexuality is a “dangerous lifestyle.†The problem is to do this, Cameron attained a reputation for either distorting legitimate science or distorting his own work to gain the conclusions he wanted from his “studies.†He has also been discredited and censured by many group and individuals on the left, the right, and in the middle due to his bad research techniques. Several of his studies have been criticized for such errors as having small sample sizes, showing an anti-gay bias in interviews, and not having enough responses to establish a suitable analysis.
Of course the religious right still cites his work, but are very careful not to mention him by name. Of course there are some, such as Peter LaBarbera, who will deliberately cite Cameron’s work, even though he knows that the work is flawed.
…From Box Turtle Bulletin comes a list of almost every religious right spokesperson or group who has ever used Paul Cameron’s discredited research.
Then there’s Cameron’s bio in Wikipedia:
Paul Drummond Cameron (born November 9, 1939) is an American psychologist and sex researcher. While employed at various institutions including the University of Nebraska he conducted research onpassive smoking, but he is best known today for his claims about homosexuality. After a successful 1982 campaign against a gay rights proposal in Lincoln, Nebraska, he established the Institute for the Scientific Investigation of Sexuality, now known as the Family Research Institute (FRI). As FRI’s chairman, Cameron has written papers associating homosexuality with perpetration of child sexual abuse and reduced life expectancy.
In 1983, the American Psychological Association expelled Cameron for non-cooperation with an ethics investigation, although by his own account he had resigned from the organization the previous year. Position statements issued by the American Sociological Association and Canadian Psychological Association have accused Cameron of misrepresenting social science research.
Now, listen to this:
Wow.