Homosexual Activists Intimidate American Psychiatric Association into Removing Homosexuality from List of Disorders

BY RYAN SORBA

“It was never a medical decision—and that’s why I think the action came so fast…It was a political move.”

“That’s how far we’ve come in ten years. Now we even have the American Psychiatric Association running scared.”
-Barbara Gittings, Same-gender sex activist

Let us, for a moment, rewind to the year1970. In this year, same-gender sex activists began a program of intimidation aimed at the American Psychiatric Association (APA). Activist Frank Kameny states the movement’s objective clearly, “I feel that the entire homophile movement…is going to stand or fall upon the question of whether or not homosexuality is a sickness, and upon our taking a firm stand on it…” (The Gay Crusaders, by Kay Tobin and Randy Wicker, p. 98)

In 1970, psychiatrists generally considered sexual desires toward members of one’s own gender to be disordered. Karoly Maria Kertbeny’s term, “homosexual” was the official descriptor for those inflicted by this mental-physical disassociative disorder. Psychiatry’s authoritative voice influenced public opinion, which at the time was negative toward same-gender sex. Of course, public sexual activity in parks and public restrooms contributed to societies negative views about the types of people that did such things, but “scientific opinion” was crucial in the public attitude.

Led by radicals like Frank Kameny, same-gender sex activists attacked many psychiatrists publicly, as Newsweek describes, “But even more than the government, it is the psychiatrists who have experienced the full rage of the homosexual activists. Over the past two years, gay-lib organizations have repeatedly disrupted medical meetings, and three months ago—in the movements most aggressive demonstration so far—a group of 30 militants broke into a meeting of the American Psychiatric Association in Washington, where they turned the staid proceedings into near chaos for twenty minutes. ‘We are here to denounce your authority to call us sick or mentally disordered,’ shouted the group’s leader, Dr. Franklin Kameny, while the 2,000 shocked psychiatrists looked on in disbelief. ‘For us, as homosexuals, your profession is the enemy incarnate. We demand that psychiatrists treat us as human beings, not as patients to be cured!’” (Newsweek, 8-23-71, p.47)

Ironically, at the very moment Franklin Kameny was claiming that same-gender sex was healthy, safe, and natural, a deadly virus was silently passing through communities of men all over the nation as a result of the promiscuous, unhealthy nature of the sex they were having. Only a decade later, thousands of men would be dead or dying, of AIDS.

On June 7, of the following year, 1971, Franklin Kameny wrote a letter to the Psychiatric News threatening the APA with not only more, but worse, disruptions. In this letter he states, “Our presence there was only the beginning of an increasingly intensive campaign by homosexuals to change the approach of psychiatry toward homosexuality or, failing that, to discredit psychiatry.” (The Gay Crusaders p. 130-131)

Same-gender sex activists continued to pressure the APA through 1973. A same-gender sex magazine, The Advocate, talks of “…what happened in 1973…referring to the widespread protests by the gay and lesbian community that led to the APA’s dropping homosexuality from the DSM.” (The Advocate, 12-28-93, p.40) As a result of the pressure, in the words of the prominent journalist and same-gender sex activists, Andrew Sullivan, in December of 1973 the APA, “…under intense political pressure…removed homosexuality from its official list of psychiatric disorders…” (Love Undetectable, book by Andrew Sullivan, 1998, p. 107) Under this “intense political pressure” the APA’s board of trustees finally caved in to the demands of same-gender sex activists. Another same-gender sex activist Mark Thompson writes, “Just before the first of the year, the American Psychiatric Association’s board of trustees declared we were no longer sick.” (The Long Road to Freedom, ed. by Mark Thompsan1994, p. 97)

After the vote by the American Psychiatric Associations Board of Trustees, some members of the APA, led by Dr. Charles Socarides called for a full vote by the APA’s 17,905 members. (The Long Road to Freedom, ed. by Mark Thompsan1994, p. 104)

On April 9, 1974, results of the vote were announced. Only 10,555 of the 17,905 APA members had voted in the election. The results were as follows,

Total APA members eligible to vote: 17,905
Number of APA members that actually voted: 10,555
Number of members that “Abstained”: 367
Number of “ No” votes-votes to keep “homosexuality” in the DSM as a mental disorder: 3,810
Number of “Yes” votes-votes to remove “homosexuality” from the DSM as a mental disorder: 5,854

It should be noted that the number of “Yes” (5,854) made up only 32.7 percent of the total membership of the APA. Only slightly less than one-third of the APA’s membership approved the change. It should be further noted that the “National Gay Task Force” was able to obtain APA members addresses and the “NGTF” (with-out identifying itself) and they sent creepy letters to all members urging them to vote to remove “homosexuality” from the DSM. Bruce Voeller, the head of the NGTF admits, “Our costly letter has perhaps made the difference.” (The Long Road to Freedom, ed. by Mark Thompsan1994, p. 105-106) Dishonesty and intimidation had won the day for the same-gender sex movement, and when activists publicly claim that this vote was a scientific decision; they hide three years of deceit and intimidation. In same-gender sex publications, however, activists are remarkably candid about the reality of the vote. For example, Kay Tobin Lahausen, co-author of The Gay Crusaders describes a variety of activism. “We did all sorts of protests…When the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations came out of some meeting and got in his big black limousine, I remember going crazy, rocking and beating on the limousine…He had never been besieged by a bunch of homosexuals before. But he had said something that got us going.” (Making History: The Struggle for Gay and Lesbian Equal Rights, 1945-1990: an Oral History by Eric Marcus p.216-217) (–Author Marcus has worked as an associate producer for “CBS This Morning” and “Good Morning America.”)

Lahausen’s lover, Barbara Gittings was a well known activist during this time as well. Gittings was the first head of the American Library Association Gay Task Force, although she was not a librarian her objective was to bring books advocating the same-gender sex movement to the attention of librarians in hopes of having them included in libraries. At one American Library Association meeting Gittings set up a same-gender kissing booth, to attract attention to the same-gender sex. Gittings tells about her activism against the APA. “Besides the ALA, I was also very involved, along with many other people, in efforts to get the American Psychiatric Association… to drop its listing of homosexuality as a mental illness. Psychiatrists were one of the three major groups that had their hands on us. They had a kind of control over our fate, in the eyes of the public, for a long time. “Religion and law were the other two groups that had their hands on us. So, besides being sick, we were sinful and criminal. But the sickness label infected everything that we said and made it difficult for us to gain any credibility for anything we said ourselves. The sickness issue was paramount.” (Making History: The Struggle for Gay and Lesbian Equal Rights, 1945-1990: an Oral History by Eric Marcus p.221)

Gittings took place in the disruptive attacks (“saps”) on the APA. She states, “I am not opposed to sap tactics. In fact, I spearheaded a sap at a psychiatrists meeting and I’m ready to do it again.” (The Gay Crusaders, p.234) Barbara Gittings recounts, “The 1970 convention in San Francisco was disrupted by a group of feminists and gay men who were enraged by what the psychiatrists were saying about them—and newspapers all around the country carried the story” (The Gay Crusaders, p.216). The “Gay” Militants, a book about that time, adds details, “On May 14, 1970 psychiatrists became the hunted. An invasion by the coalition of ‘gay’ and woman’s liberationists interrupted the national convention of the American Psychiatric Association in San Francisco to protest the reading of a paper by an Australian psychiatrists on the subject of ‘aversion therapy,’ a system of treatment which attempts to change gay orientation by keying unpleasant sensations (such as electric shocks) to homosexual stimuli. By the time the meeting was over, the feminists and their gay cohorts were in charge…and the doctors were heckling from the audience.’” (The Gay Militants, by Donn Teal, p.272-273)

Same-gender sex activists took over the podium and microphones. Then, “Konstantin Berlandt, of Berkeley GLF, paraded through the hall in bright red dress. Paper airplanes sailed down from the balcony. With two papers still unread, the chairman announced adjournment.” (Ibid., p.274) On June 23, 1970 same-gender sex activists disrupted yet another meeting, this time in Chicago, be repeatedly shouting down the main speakers discourse. (Ibid., 275) Then, in October at a meeting at the University of Southern California, same-gender sex activists shouted down a speaker and then took over the stage and the microphone. (Ibid., pp.276-280)

Kay Lahusen and Barbera Gittings know what really happened to the APA. In the book, Making History they are quite open about the reality.

Kay: This was always more of a political decision than a medical decision.
Barbara: It never was a medical decision—and that’s why I think the action came so fast. After all, it was only three years from the time that feminists and gays first sapped the APA at a behavior therapy session to the time that the Board of Trustees voted in 1973 to approve removing homosexuality from the list of mental disorders. It was a political move.” (Making History, p.224)

The APA was thoroughly intimidated. Later in the same year (1974), after the APA’s vote, Gittings was interviewed by a historian of the same-gender sex movement, Jonathan Ned Katz. Gittings brags, “That’s how far we’ve come in ten years. Now we even have the American Psychiatric Association running scared.” (Gay American History, by Jonathan Ned Katz, 1992, p.427. This interview was taped July 19, 1974). Anytime a scientific organization endorses same-gender sex, remember Gittings words: “They are running scared.” Same-gender sex activists have learned that intimidation works and they are never hesitant about using intimidation, psychological manipulation and deceit to reach the goals of their radical agenda.

Later in 1974, same-gender sex activists set their vicious sights on an individual member of the American Psychiatric Association, Dr. David Rueben, who was perhaps the best-known psychologist in the area of human sexuality at the time. Unbeknownst to Dr. Reuben, same-gender activists were lying in wait outside one of his lectures, and his physical safety was at risk. A same-gender sex activist and writer, Leigh Rutledge describes the attack in her book The Gay Decades, “June 16, A fist fight broke out at a Philadelphia playhouse when ten gay activists interrupt a lecture by Dr. David Rueben and denounce him as ‘a criminal’ for his views on male homosexuality. One policeman and a protestor are injured in the melee.” (The Gay Decades, by a man that engages in same-gender sex and writer, Leigh W. Rutledge, 1992, p.69) On that same page, this book tells us that, “The Centers for Disease Control estimate that gay or bisexual men account for as much as one-third of the syphilis cases in the U.S.”

Apparently, the American Psychological Association also got the message of intimidation, because they caved in to same-gender sex activists in 1975. In the book, The Long Road to Freedom the author writes, “January…The American Psychological Association and American Association for the Advancement of Science echoed the American Psychiatric Association in deeming homosexuality not an illness.” (The Long Road to Freedom, pp.115) The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) publishes the scientific journal Science, intimidation by same-gender sex activists was over for them. “Under pressure from gay scientific groups, Science magazine banned anti-gay bias in its staff hiring and advertisement.” (The Long Road to Freedom, pp.214)

Could the AAAS have been thinking about “pressure from gay scientific groups” when they published the poorly done studies by LeVay (“gay” brains) and Hamer (“gay” gene)? Two scientists who protested the LeVay study raise serious questions about AAAS, Science, and same-gender sex activists. “The appearance of LeVay’s paper highlights a serious issue in science public policy. Should such a study, based on a questionable design, with subjects drawn from a small, highly selected and non-representative sample, receive the kind of international attention and credibility that publication in a journal with the stature of Science lends?” (Science, 11-1-91, p.630)

If Dr. LeVay was not able to draw a proper sample and to fulfill other basic requirements for a scientific study, why did he conduct the study at all? If the study was not done for scientific reasons it must have been done for political reasons. Indeed, LeVay’s study was part of a public relations campaign, (the born “gay” hoax) to make the public believe that individuals were born “gay.” Science, a supposedly reputable publication, must have been intimidated to risk their own legitimacy by published such shoddy work. When unethical political movements dominate science, pushing science in unscientific directions, science suffers and leads society astray. One lesson from these facts is unmistakable: every time a scientific group repeats the same-gender sex movement’s propaganda, you may justifiably suspect that these groups are acting out of ignorance or intimidation.

Another lesson is that same-gender sex activists are so desperate to cover their deeply dysfunctional condition that they will stop at nothing to hide the facts from the public. Award-winning writer and same-gender sex activist Randy Shilts describes the denial among men that have sex with men, about their unhealthy lifestyles causing AIDS to be epidemic among them when he writes, “…the desperation of denial: how when something is so horrible you don’t want to believe it, you want to out it out of your mind and insist it isn’t true, and how you hate the person who says it is.” (And the Band Played On, 1988, p. 182) Desperate denial –this seems to be what drives the deceit, psychological manipulation, and intimidation of both scientific groups and the public.

Here is a link to a video about same-gender sex activist, Frank Kameny: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_4S_iQ3fEo