Calif. Welfare Code: Homosexuality Inborn

[Eupher]

The fudgepackers and rug munchers are winning:

A Christian social worker is taking exception to a new California law that declares homosexuals are "born gay."

 


Beginning this New Year, California will implement AB 2199 and ultimately strike down the requirement on the State Department of Mental Health to conduct research on the "causes and cures of homosexuality." According to Veronica Esqueda, a renal social worker in Los Angeles, the measure will portray alternate lifestyles as acceptable and normal.

"I do think it's going to open up their comfort level, and I think it's going to make it more acceptable," she explains. "Obviously, I am one that believes that it's not an error -- you are born the way God intended you to be," she notes, adding that she believes homosexuality is a choice.

AB 2199, sponsored by Equality California, gained the support of homosexual activists who claim it is discriminatory to search for cures for their sexual orientation. Advocates argue that those in the LGBT (lesbian, "gay," bisexual transgender) community were born to favor alternate lifestyles, so they contend the section of the Welfare and Institutions code is archaic and portrays them as sexual deviants. Esqueda, however, thinks the new law will suppress the Christian voice.

"I believe it is going to impact the conservatives, the Christians, and I think it's going to basically have a discrimination [effect] against the conservative Christian believer," she laments. "It's going to be just another way to silence [their message]."


The California State Senate passed the measure in a 36-0 vote, so now the section of the Welfare and Institutions code that requires research into the cause of homosexuality will be removed.

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Link

[thundley4]

AB 2199, sponsored by Equality California, gained the support of homosexual activists who claim it is discriminatory to search for cures for their sexual orientation

If and that is a big if, what is wrong with wanting to cure or prevent it?  I'm sure than many parents of would opt for the cure and more than a few gays might.  Those that have committed suicide due to being gay might have liked to have that cure.

[Eupher]

If and that is a big if, what is wrong with wanting to cure or prevent it?  I'm sure than many parents of would opt for the cure and more than a few gays might.  Those that have committed suicide due to being gay might have liked to have that cure.

Because they have the unbridled opinion that their sexual orientation isn't a matter of choice - it's something they're predestined to have (and they're perfectly fine with that). 

Anybody who commits suicide as a result of being gay isn't really gay. [/sarc]

[Varokhâr]

If and that is a big if, what is wrong with wanting to cure or prevent it?  I'm sure than many parents of would opt for the cure and more than a few gays might.  Those that have committed suicide due to being gay might have liked to have that cure.

I agree. Wanting to cure and prevent it is normal, like wanting to cure and prevent other psychological disorders like alcoholism or kleptomania.

But, of course, being "gay" has to be seen as basically an inalienable right determined by biology, not an obviously abnormal condition.

[Ballygrl]

Hmm, so does this mean Scientists won't be looking for a "gay gene" because if 1 was found then it would be illegal to abort based on this law?

[rubliw]

Um, looking at the actual bill, and what was amended, it doesn't actually do anything whatsoever to suggest or declare in law that homosexuals are "born gay".   That looks like a flat out lie, as near as I can tell.

You can see the amended portions here:  http://www.sandiego.networkofcare.org/mh/legislate/detail.cfm?bill=AB%202199

And as you can see... nowhere does it say "we declare that homosexuals are born gay".  Complete and total lie.  

Basically it looks like the original law associates homosexuality in with criminal sexual deviance, like sex crimes against children.  It looks like the amendment is meant to remove the implication that homosexuality is some form of sexual deviance which puts children at risk.  And the research requirement only pertains to the State Dept of Mental Health, and while it certainly has an interest in studying things like pedophilia and causes of other criminal sexual activities, it arguably isnt the right place to be conducting causes and "cures" for homosexuality.   Furthremore, it doesnt even look like this portion of the bill was enforced anymore (was instituted in the 1950's) and this amounts to little more than a bit of legislative clean up.

And in light of the actual bill and amendment, this becomes particular hilarious:

"I believe it is going to impact the conservatives, the Christians, and I think it's going to basically have a discrimination [effect] against the conservative Christian believer," she laments. "It's going to be just another way to silence [their message]."

Ummm... yea... Hopefully we're all trusting the press a little less now?

[MrsSmith]

Um, looking at the actual bill, and what was amended, it doesn't actually do anything whatsoever to suggest or declare in law that homosexuals are "born gay".   That looks like a flat out lie, as near as I can tell.

You can see the amended portions here:  http://www.sandiego.networkofcare.org/mh/legislate/detail.cfm?bill=AB%202199

And as you can see... nowhere does it say "we declare that homosexuals are born gay".  Complete and total lie.  

Basically it looks like the original law associates homosexuality in with criminal sexual deviance, like sex crimes against children.  It looks like the amendment is meant to remove the implication that homosexuality is some form of sexual deviance which puts children at risk.  And the research requirement only pertains to the State Dept of Mental Health, and while it certainly has an interest in studying things like pedophilia and causes of other criminal sexual activities, it arguably isnt the right place to be conducting causes and "cures" for homosexuality.   Furthremore, it doesnt even look like this portion of the bill was enforced anymore (was instituted in the 1950's) and this amounts to little more than a bit of legislative clean up.

And in light of the actual bill and amendment, this becomes particular hilarious:

Ummm... yea... Hopefully we're all trusting the press a little less now?

Amends existing law that requires the State Department of Mental Health to plan, conduct, and cause to be conducted scientific research into the causes and cures of sexual deviation, including deviations conducive to sex crimes against children, and the causes and cures of homosexuality, and into methods of identifying potential sex offenders. Requires the department to plan, conduct, and cause to be conducted scientific research into such crimes and identifying those who commit them

AB 2199, Bonnie Lowenthal. Sexual deviation: research.

Existing law requires the State Department of Mental Health, acting through the superintendent of the Langly Porter Clinic, to plan, conduct, and cause to be conducted scientific research into the causes and cures of sexual deviation, including deviations conducive to sex crimes against children, and the causes and cures of homosexuality, and into methods of identifying potential sex offenders.

This bill would, instead, require the department to plan, conduct, and cause to be conducted scientific research into sex crimes against children and into methods of identifying those who commit sexual offenses.

Actually, the bill does remove the language stating that they would search for the "causes and cures of homosexuality," and restricts the state to only searching for the causes and cures for sex crimes against children, and in general.  In other words, the state no longer recognizes homosexuality as a deviant action or lifestyle...exactly as the article stated...and it will not search for the cure to assist people stuck in this unhealthy, life-shortening lifestyle.      Lousy attempt at spin, wil.

[compaqxp]

I don't see the big deal with California doing this, there are more important things then trying to cure being gay.

I find it just a bit ridiculous they even would however, I don't see how doing so would be discriminatory.

[MrsSmith]

I don't see the big deal with California doing this, there are more important things then trying to cure being gay.

I find it just a bit ridiculous they even would however, I don't see how doing so would be discriminatory.

Have you looked at the health stats for gay men?  It may well be cheaper to treat the behavior than the resulting health problems...

[rubliw]

Actually, the bill does remove the language stating that they would search for the "causes and cures of homosexuality," and restricts the state to only searching for the causes and cures for sex crimes against children, and in general.  In other words, the state no longer recognizes homosexuality as a deviant action or lifestyle...exactly as the article stated...

Here's exactly what the article stated:

... a new California law that declares homosexuals are "born gay."

 

And that is blatantly false.

... and ultimately strike down the requirement on the State Department of Mental Health to conduct research on the "causes and cures of homosexuality.

This part is accurate.  But you're interpretation is flawed.  In CA, as in most states, the boat has long since sailed on this... homosexuality hasn't been considered an intrinsically deviant practice or mental health disorder for a long time - welcome to 2011.   Even more than that, the boat has sailed on the belief that homosexuality is either in essence the same or a cause or precursor to pedophilia or other sex crimes - insinuations that this bill (drafted in the 1950's to in response to sex crimes) clearly made.

Is it really so hard to understand?  Wouldn't have a slight problem if laws on the books mandated that the Dept of Mental Health causes and cures of religious belief and categorized such belief with hallucinations and delusions?

And "life-shortening lifestyle"?!  I do hope you arent referring to the old obituary studies...  

[rubliw]

Have you looked at the health stats for gay men?  It may well be cheaper to treat the behavior than the resulting health problems...

Oh please, bring them on MrsSmith....

[MrsSmith]

Oh please, bring them on MrsSmith....

Yes, wil, I do have time to do your homework for you.    

http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00016243.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00001096.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/resources/reports/mmwr/pdf/mmwr04jul81.pdf


Now you can note that this unpopular information comes from not some "weird" Christian site, but the Centers for Disease Control.  

And the fact remains that your spin is still wobbly.  If the state is striking language that has been in the law for decades, then it is changing it's position on the origin and causes of homosexuality...exactly as the OP stated.  It is not "remov(ing) the implication that homosexuality is some form of sexual deviance which puts children at risk," that implication was not contained in the original language.  It is removing homosexual behavior from the list of sexual behaviors that should be studied to reduce their prevalence, despite the clear evidence that it causes both physical and mental harm to those that practice it.

[rubliw]

Yes, wil, I do have time to do your homework for you.    

http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00016243.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00001096.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/resources/reports/mmwr/pdf/mmwr04jul81.pdf

Now you can note that this unpopular information comes from not some "weird" Christian site, but the Centers for Disease Control.  

Oh, I have a problem with any of this information.. but I'm not sure what you want me to make of this linked info.   Your thesis seems to be that homosexuality is significantly harmful to those who practice it, so much so that we should seek a cure.   But these statistics do not show that.    They each look at a particular disease and describe how, given the incidence of a particular disease in a patient, that patient was likely to be homosexual.   In other words, given disease X, there's a high probability that the patient is homosexual.  What they don't show is this:  Given that a particular person is homosexual, there is a high probability that the patient has the disease.  

If that doesn't make sense to you, think about another example.  Almost all confirmed cases of hemophilia are males, since it is an X chromosome disorder.  So if you took a survey of hospital visits from patients suffering from hemophilia, you'd find that nearly all of them are male.   If you were to do a survey of all males searching for incidences of hemophilia, you'd find that very few actually suffer from it.  You'd find that simply being male does not put one at a severe or alarming risk for hemophilia.

Therefore, the information you provided does not establish any significant risk inherent in being homosexual.  Nor does it establish that there is any compelling reason to attempt to "cure" homosexuality.  

Furthermore, we can slice up many other demographics in similar ways that show shocking rates of disease transmission or social ills.   Take the black population - they account for 70% of all gonorrhea cases, and 51% of all reported aids cases (see http://www.cdc.gov/nchhstp/healthdisparities/AfricanAmericans.html).  If we were to remain consistent with your principles, it seems as if we should be searching for a cure for blackness too.

Additionally, in each of your citations the samples were small and only from a few select cities - not enough to make any conclusive judgments about the general national or worldwide homosexual population.

And the fact remains that your spin is still wobbly.  If the state is striking language that has been in the law for decades, then it is changing it's position on the origin and causes of homosexuality...

Huh?  The text in the bill, either in its original or amended form, has nothing to say about the origin of homosexuality, at all.  Not one bit.  Not even close.  You're just wrong.

It is not "remov(ing) the implication that homosexuality is some form of sexual deviance which puts children at risk," that implication was not contained in the original language.

Erm... Yes it was...  given the historical context of the bill, what it was drafted for, it most certainly does contain the implication and assumption that homosexuality is a form of sexual deviance related to sex crime and that homosexuals are sexual predators.    Hell, this bill was created at a time homosexual activity was still criminalized, under sodomy laws.    Homosexual conduct WAS a sex crime back then, and there was even more misinformation surrounding it than there is today.  

It is removing homosexual behavior from the list of sexual behaviors that should be studied to reduce their prevalence, despite the clear evidence that it causes both physical and mental harm to those that practice it.

Because it would be stupid to do so.  If homosexuals are suffering from high incidences of certain diseases, the solution is to cure those diseases.   Even if the prevalence of a disease is extraordinarily high in the homosexual population, its almost certain that many more heterosexual people actually suffer from the disease as well.  And you can't cure them by "curing" gayness.  

It seems like you just want to slice up these problems at the level of sexual orientation because your ideologically aligned against homosexuality, not because fighting the problems at that level would the most rational or effective place to do so.

[Eupher]

wilbur, I don't have time to walk down your gay-is-okay road and point out the fallacy of your spin, but I will point out that you are a one-trick pony.

You wander in after an absence, locate a thread that seems to fit your agenda (gayness) and proceed to spin and twist words and refute data from even your sacred government's files.

Are you sure you don't work for the government?

Mrs Smith is doing a fine job of outlining your poor logic and I'm sure she'll be back for the next round. In the meantime, One-Trick-Pony-named-wilbur-in-reverse, your incessant memes on the gay lifestyle are boring and meaningless. Your attempts for spin are noteworthy, but they fail in the end.

No pun intended.

[Chris_]

1 I know a few people who CHOSE to be gay
2 People are born with cleft palates, that doesn't mean it is a good thing...

[formerlurker]

I haven't read anyone's comments yet, but wait a minute..... I can't past this sentence:

California will implement AB 2199 and ultimately strike down the requirement on the State Department of Mental Health to conduct research on the "causes and cures of homosexuality."

This state is in the toilet financially and they spend taxpayer money on this????????   Are you freakin kidding me right now? 


 

[formerlurker]

If and that is a big if, what is wrong with wanting to cure or prevent it?  I'm sure than many parents of would opt for the cure and more than a few gays might.  Those that have committed suicide due to being gay might have liked to have that cure.

Honestly, this is money being tossed out the window.   There is just no end game to this, and if they found a "cure" to an alternative lifestyle -- I can only imagine what mandates on parenting and the like would be introduced for complete garbage science findings.    The variables involved in this are tremendous.   

How much money have they wasted on this to date?

[MrsSmith]

wilbur, I don't have time to walk down your gay-is-okay road and point out the fallacy of your spin, but I will point out that you are a one-trick pony.

You wander in after an absence, locate a thread that seems to fit your agenda (gayness) and proceed to spin and twist words and refute data from even your sacred government's files.

Are you sure you don't work for the government?

Mrs Smith is doing a fine job of outlining your poor logic and I'm sure she'll be back for the next round. In the meantime, One-Trick-Pony-named-wilbur-in-reverse, your incessant memes on the gay lifestyle are boring and meaningless. Your attempts for spin are noteworthy, but they fail in the end.

No pun intended.

No, I'm not coming back for a second round.  We're all capable adults on this site, and anyone that cares can read the government evidence for themselves.  The flat fact is that homosexual behavior for men is the single worst health risk out there.  It'll kill someone way faster than smoke of any kind, obesity, or any of the other government targets.  Only an idiot could read the links I provided and argue that homosexuality is equivalent to hemophilia.      Wil is a brick wall.  Only information he likes can penetrate.  I've spent many, many hours explaining things to him, and am quite willing to let him go right on living life with his head up his...you know.   
I have my youngest granddaughter here, and am going to spend the day enjoying her company. 

[compaqxp]

Only information he likes can penetrate. 

I'm immature, I'm sorry.   

[rubliw]

No, I'm not coming back for a second round.  We're all capable adults on this site, and anyone that cares can read the government evidence for themselves. 

Reading the actual bills won't do your claims in this thread (or the blatant fear mongering of the article in the OP) any favors, MrsSmith.

The flat fact is that homosexual behavior for men is the single worst health risk out there.  It'll kill someone way faster than smoke of any kind, obesity, or any of the other government targets.

Risks associated with male homosexual sex are well known, and yep, they do pose lots of problems.   That is why we have many government programs and other social campaigns which attempt to spread awareness, or promote the safe practices which will reduce the spread of disease.

But it does not follow from this fact that "curing" the homosexual orientation is the best - or even a reasonable - endeavor. 

This bears repeating: If we remained consistent with your principles here, we'd be probably be committed to curing black skin color as well.

Only an idiot could read the links I provided and argue that homosexuality is equivalent to hemophilia.   

I agree, so its a good thing that I didn't do that (or even come close - seriously, wtf).  I used it as an example make a point about the data in the links you provided.  Talk about missing the point. 

[rubliw]

I haven't read anyone's comments yet, but wait a minute..... I can't past this sentence:

This state is in the toilet financially and they spend taxpayer money on this????????   Are you freakin kidding me right now?  

 

They don't, that's the other part that some seem to be missing, and also what makes the article in the OP so absurd.. this bill was introduced in 1950, and that particular mandate about cures for homosexuality has gone the way of other unenforced laws, like blue laws.  Its unlikely that lawmakers and the relevant bureaucrats even knew this language was there.   They certainly were't spending money on it.   The law was brought to light from the efforts of a homosexual advocacy group, which undertook the task of scouring the depths of the CA welfare codes to remove prejudiced or non-sensical language.

That makes this particular quote from the article especially hilarious (and sad): "I believe it is going to impact the conservatives, the Christians, and I think it's going to basically have a discrimination [effect] against the conservative Christian believer," she laments. "It's going to be just another way to silence [their message]."

The line of the article was clearly designed to get massive circulation and hits among conservative web demographics.  Too bad its just ridiculous, since the law wasnt actually impacting a damn thing to begin with.

[vesta111]

They don't, that's the other part that some seem to be missing, and also what makes the article in the OP so absurd.. this bill was introduced in 1950, and that particular mandate about cures for homosexuality has gone the way of other unenforced laws, like blue laws.  Its unlikely that lawmakers and the relevant bureaucrats even knew this language was there.   They certainly were't spending money on it.   The law was brought to light from the efforts of a homosexual advocacy group, which undertook the task of scouring the depths of the CA welfare codes to remove prejudiced or non-sensical language.

That makes this particular quote from the article especially hilarious (and sad): "I believe it is going to impact the conservatives, the Christians, and I think it's going to basically have a discrimination [effect] against the conservative Christian believer," she laments. "It's going to be just another way to silence [their message]."

The line of the article was clearly designed to get massive circulation and hits among conservative web demographics.  Too bad its just ridiculous.

How I ask could science cure me of being Heterosexual, cure me of liking tall-short, blond- dark haired- bald men.

Can science turn a heterosexual man or woman gay ??

[formerlurker]

They don't, that's the other part that some seem to be missing, and also what makes the article in the OP so absurd.. this bill was introduced in 1950, and that particular mandate about cures for homosexuality has gone the way of other unenforced laws, like blue laws.  Its unlikely that lawmakers and the relevant bureaucrats even knew this language was there.   They certainly were't spending money on it.   The law was brought to light from the efforts of a homosexual advocacy group, which undertook the task of scouring the depths of the CA welfare codes to remove prejudiced or non-sensical language.

That makes this particular quote from the article especially hilarious (and sad): "I believe it is going to impact the conservatives, the Christians, and I think it's going to basically have a discrimination [effect] against the conservative Christian believer," she laments. "It's going to be just another way to silence [their message]."

The line of the article was clearly designed to get massive circulation and hits among conservative web demographics.  Too bad its just ridiculous, since the law wasnt actually impacting a damn thing to begin with.

I see -- makes sense to remove it.

[rubliw]

How I ask could science cure me of being Heterosexual, cure me of liking tall-short, blond- dark haired- bald men.

Can science turn a heterosexual man or woman gay ??

I suppose if we fully understood the biological and environmental mechanisms that probably cause sexual orientation (or the other examples you mention) it may be possible.

[Chris_]

I suppose if we fully understood the biological and environmental mechanisms that probably cause sexual orientation (or the other examples you mention) it may be possible.

Environmental mechanisms? Like, say, putting your son in a dress? Not allowing him to play with guns? Bats? Footballs, or anything deemed "Too Violent"?