‘Insane’: What Experts Say About Dr. Ben Carson’s Claim That Prison Turns Men Gay

Two experts wholly refute Dr. Ben Carson’s claim that prison can turn people gay, so it’s a choice.

The Washington Post’s Philip Bump responded to Dr. Ben Carson’s outrageous claims that prison turns people gay, and therefore being gay is a choice, by interviewing two experts. Carson, who just formed a presidential exploratory committee, this morning told CNN that being gay is “absolutely” a choice, and cited what he claimed as factual evidence people entering incarceration heterosexual, and leaving homosexual.

“The fundamental assumption of the analogy he’s using is insane,” Helen Eigenberg, professor of criminal justice at the University of Tennessee, told the Post. “I don’t know of any research that substantiates the [claim] that men to go to prison and come out gay. There’s no data to support that claim.”

Eigenberg, the Post notes, has “been studying sexuality and incarceration for about 25 years,” which certainly qualifies her as an expert on Carson’s false claims.

UPDATE:Ben Carson Apologizes And Makes ‘Liberal Press’ A Gay Rights Promise (Audio)

“Who you fall in love with is never a matter of choice,” former professor of psychology at Columbia and Rutgers June Reinisch told the Post by phone. “Behavior is one thing and the heart is another thing. You ask people, ‘Did you choose to be heterosexual?’ and they say, ‘No, it’s who I fell in love with.’ It’s not a matter of choice. You can choose behavior.”

Reinisch “also ran the famous Kinsey Institute at Indiana University for 11 years,” making her yet another expert denouncing Carson’s false claims.

The Human Rights Campaign, while not scientific experts, certainly are political experts. HRC VP Fred Sainz weighed in this mornng on Carson’s attack.

“The only thing that’s really been proven here is that when Ben Carson says what he really thinks, he reveals himself as utterly unfit for office,” Sainz said in a statement. “Ben Carson is putting his own personal ambition ahead of medical science by suggesting that a person can change their sexual orientation. As a doctor, Carson surely knows that countless mental health and medical organizations have condemned the idea that you can change a person’s sexual orientation.”

Dr. Ben Carson was a renowned neurosurgeon. He’s retired, and now looking to try his hand at politics, by sharing his misguided bigotry with a nation that can ill-afford it.

 

 

Image: Screenshot via CNN