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News

New study on open relationships in the gay community

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Story from the San Francisco Chronicle. (H/T Andrew)

Excerpt:

A new study released this week by the Center for Research on Gender & Sexuality at San Francisco State University put statistics around what gay men already know: Many Bay Area boyfriends negotiate open relationships that allow for sex with outsiders.

[…]”I think it’s quite natural for men to want to continue to have an active and varied sex life,” said 50-year-old technology consultant Dean Allemang from Oakland, who just ended a 13-year-open relationship and has begun another with a new boyfriend.

“I don’t own my lover, and I don’t own his body,” he said. “I think it’s weird to ask someone you love to give up that part of their life. I would never do it.”

Hoff, who just received a $3.5 million grant from the National Institute of Mental Health to continue the study for five more years, initially started her research based on findings that HIV infection is on the rise among male couples.

“So much of the HIV prevention effort is aimed at a different set – men in dance clubs or bathhouses having anonymous sex,” she said. “HIV prevention might want to expand its message to address relationships; we have to look at risk in a greater context.”

In her study of gay couples, 47 percent reported open relationships. Forty-five percent were monogamous, and the remaining 8 percent disagreed about what they were.

Another researcher quoted in the story explains how same-sex marriage is compatible with an “open relationship”, and that this interpretation of marriage would be a redefinition of traditional marriage.

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News

British Medical Association opposes therapy for unwanted same-sex attraction

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Here’s an article from the Sydney Morning Herald written by Polly Vernon, talks about Grindr, which is an iPhone application that facilitates anonymous sex between strangers in the gay community. (H/T Secondhand Smoke via ECM) I want to talk about Grindr first, in order to set up the news story below.

Excerpt:

Ever heard of Grindr? If you have, I’m going to guess that you are male and gay; or male, technically straight and somewhat curious; or the straight friend of a gay man. If not, allow me to enlighten you.

Grindr (pronounced “grinder”) is a free downloadable iPhone app which, it promises, will help you “Find gay, bi, curious guys for free near you!” Grindr harnesses GPS, allowing you to establish who else in your direct vicinity is also using Grindr. It shows you — on a gridded display — who these men are and what they look like; it will tell you how far away from you they are standing; and it will allow you to “chat” them, if they take your fancy.

[…]Grindr was launched on March 25, 2009; now more than 700,000 (and counting) men in 162 countries are using it to phenomenal effect, if J, W, Kevin and the other gay men I’ve asked are any kind of a guide. “I’ve never, ever had so much sex in my life!” R told me gleefully. “I’ve probably had as much in the past eight months of Grinding as I have over the 20 years since I came out. Maybe more.”

[…]Others condemn it more directly. “Grindr’s addictive,” writes one man — the ex-boyfriend of a close friend — by email. “A lot of gay men have addiction issues . . . Things like Grindr . . . enable that sort of sex, sex which is compulsive and which dehumanises you; and means you in turn dehumanise the people you are having sex with.”

He puts me in touch with G, a man he met while seeking treatment for sex addiction. “I’ve lost entire weekends to sex,” writes G. “Downloading porn, going on Grindr, meeting men whose names I don’t find out, having sex; downloading more porn.”

“Low self-esteem,” says Todd. “I see it a lot in gay men – it’s inevitable after years of repression and shame. And what’s better for self-esteem than someone having sex with you?”

I noticed, in a Life Site News story, that people in Britain who would like to get therapy for their unwanted same-sex attractions may soon be blocked from doing so.

Excerpt:

The British Medical Association (BMA) has passed a motion asserting that therapy meant to treat unwanted same-sex attraction is harmful, calling on the Royal College of Psychiatrists and other professional bodies to repudiate such treatments and forbid them in their codes of practice.

More than two-thirds of the doctors who voted supported the motion. They also said that alleged cases of conversion therapy funded by Britain’s National Health Service should be investigated.

[…]The case echoes a similar suppression of therapies meant to help treat SSA in Spain. The Catalan government said in June that it would fine the clinic Policlinica Tibidabo if it was confirmed that it was carrying out such treatments.

Be sure and check out Wesley J. Smith’s ideas on how this will impact the culture as a whole.

See below for some research showing the differences between heterosexual relationships and same-sex relationships.

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Commentary

Dawn Stefanowicz explains her experience being raised by a gay parent

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*** WARNING: This post is definitely for grown-ups only! ***

I was listening to the latest Dr. J podcast on “Why Marriage Matters”, and I heard about a woman named Dawn Stefanowicz, who was raised by her gay father in Toronto.

So, I looked around and found this interview with Dawn posted on MercatorNet. This is mature subject matter.

Intro:

Gay marriage and gay adoption are being fiercely debated in a number of countries. Usually these issues are framed as a human rights issue. But whose rights? Patrick Meagher, MercatorNet’s contributing editor in Canada, recently interviewed a woman who was raised by a homosexual father. She feels that her rights as a child were completely ignored.

Dawn Stefanowicz (www.DawnStefanowicz.com) grew up in Toronto. Now in her 40s, she has written a book, Out From Under: Getting Clear of the Wreckage of a Sexually Disordered Home, to be released later this year. Stefanowicz has now been married for 22 years, is raising a family, and also works as an accountant. She has also testified about same-sex marriage in Washington and Ottawa.

Sample:

MercatorNet: How did you feel about what was going on around you?

Stefanowicz: You become used to it and desensitised. I was told at eight years old not to talk about this but I knew that something was wrong. I was not thinking “this is right or wrong” but I was disturbed by what I was experiencing. I was unhappy, fearful, anxious and confused. I was not allowed to tell my father that his lifestyle upset me. You can be four-years-old and questioning, “Where is Daddy?” You sense women are not valued. You think Daddy doesn’t have time for you or Daddy is too busy to play a game with you. All this is hard because as a child this is the only experience you have.

MercatorNet: How did this affect your relationship with others?

Stefanowicz: I had a hard time concentrating in school on day-to-day subjects and with peers. I felt insecure. I was already stressed out by an early age. I’m now in my 40s. You’re looking at life-long issues. There is a lot of prolonged and unresolved grief in this kind of home environment and with what you witness in the subcultures.

It took me until I was into my 20s and 30s, after making major life choices, to begin to realise how being raised in this environment had affected me. Unfortunately, it was not until my father, his sexual partners and my mother had died, that I was free to speak publicly about my experiences.

And:

MercatorNet: Why do so few children speak out?

Stefanowicz: You’re terrified. Absolutely terrified. Children who open up these family secrets are dependent on parents for everything. You carry the burden that you have to keep secrets. You learn to put on an image publicly of the happy family that is not reality. With same-sex legislation, children are further silenced. They believe there is no safe adult they can go to.

I noticed that Bill Muehlenberg has an even more controversial review of Dawn’s book about her childhood, too. When I was doing research on these issues, I read Dr. Jeffrey Satinover’s “Homosexuality and the Politics of Truth” and Dr. Joseph Nicolosi’s “A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Homosexuality“. But I think I am going to buy Dawn’s book, too. It sounds like a tough read, but it may be necessary to understand what is really at stake, so my views can be formed by real data.

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