I recently had a letter in the local paper in which I pointed out that American Psychological Association’s review of the empirical literature suggested that children raised by same-sex couples did not differ significantly from children raised by dual-sex couples, thus arguments against gay marriages “for the sake of the children” were not based on the actual outcomes of children.
Today, I received at my office a letter with no return address. As I do with such communiques, I opened it away from my face and with my non-dominant hand. Inside I found a note, on paper with little flowers at the bottom, that reads as follows:
FOR YOUR INFORMATION MS. [SURNAME], BECAUSE OF DIVINE DESIGN, LESBIANS AND HOMOSEXUAL MEN CANNOT HAVE CHILDREN–IN OTHER WORDS, YOUR WHOLE ARGUMENT OF CHILDREN BEING RAISED BY SAME SEX PARENTS IS BESTIAL STUPIDITY.
This was paperclipped to 5 typed, single-spaced pages of bible-twisting exegesis a la “stained with a more loathsome and filthy practice,” etc.
I’ve been yelled at, assaulted, threatened, and shunned, but this is my first hate mail (I characterize it that way because of the words “bestial stupidity” and lack of a signature).
I wish the writer had signed his or her name so I could send back a note that says, “That’s **Dr. ** [Surname],” buddy.
Indeed. I agree it’s a woman–this was not what you’d call butch notepaper. Lined note paper with a floral emblem (sunflowers etc. slightly pastel). Old printer–a step beyond dot matrix but not contemporary. Nasty religious text in 12-point Geneva. Two selections, each paperclipped separately and highlighted extensively. The second ends mid-sentence. Sent to my practice office, though the paper printed my university affiliation.
Some say you haven’t arrived until you get hate mail. :dubious: It is frustrating, though, to get anonymous mail filled with comically wrong statements of “fact.” You can’t reply to the dimwit.
Maybe it’s time for a follow up letter to the editor in which you talk about the stupidity of some people and, of course, include quotes from your hate-mail. Enough so the “person” who sent it to you recognizes it.
Of course, such a “person” might actually feel emboldened by being quoted in the paper, even if it is in the context of “look at what sort of ignorance is in our own town.”
I was a newspaper reporter way back when. The paper I worked for offered the reporters a chance to write a column, so I took it. I wrote the column as if I was relaying a discussion between two friends, one liberal one conservative, and me as a moderate (hey, I was less liberal back then). The first column was about the death penalty.
I got several irate letters from people cancelling their subscription to the paper. I kept them as souvenirs for many years, although they’ve long since been lost. I was called “Godless” and “Hippy” and a few other names in those letters. One in particular amused me because I set the story up as a chat over beers. The closing tag was “Hand me a beer,” and one of the letters expressly said they were canceling their subscription because of that.
Homebrew had the gall to print the word BEER in a Christian centered Gawd fearin’ Family newspaper! Why, he might as well have just stood on the street corner crackin’ open cold ones and handing em out to little children as they passed by! He corrupted the minds of little children! Shame on you Homebrew! SHAME! SHAME! SHAME!
Now, gimme a beer!
Gah! I don’t get this. I work for an elected official in California and when they were allowing same sex marriages in SF, we got a lot of calls. The ones that got me were the people who would recite bible quotes as their entire argument. I would usually ask them “why do you keep quoting the bible? We’re not having a religious debate here, we’re discussing the laws of the State.”
That usually seemed to really confuse them. I realize that religion naturally ties in to the issue of marriage but to just quote the bible, then stand there smugly like you won the debate and refuse to discuss it further?
**I appreciated Laura Stevenson’s criticism (letters, Sept. 30) of the inaccurate arguments used to suggest that heterosexual families are better for children than are families with same-sex parents.
Stevenson correctly points out that the studies used to bolster these arguments are based on comparisons of heterosexual couples to single parents with harmonious or acrimonious divorces. However, Stevenson states that she is not aware of “reliable research comparing the well-being of children of married heterosexual couples with the well-being of children of married homosexual couples.”
The American Psychological Association recently reviewed a large number of studies that did just that. The association’s conclusion is that “discrimination and prejudice based on sexual orientation detrimentally affects the psychological, physical, social and economic well-being of lesbian, gay and bisexual individuals, that same-sex couples are remarkably similar to heterosexual couples, and that parenting effectiveness and the adjustment, development and psychological well-being of children is unrelated to parental sexual orientation” (http://www.apa.org/releases/gaymarriage.html).
On this basis, the APA Council of Representatives recently voted unanimously to support legalization of same-sex civil marriages and to oppose discrimination against lesbian and gay parents. APA is the world’s largest psychologists’ association. **
