6 Ways Religious Frauds Try to Make Gays and Lesbians Straight | | AlterNet

6 Ways Religious Frauds Try to Make Gays and Lesbians Straight | | AlterNet:

1. Rubber-band therapy
2. Healing touch therapy
3. Beat your mom to death -- with a tennis racket
4. Get face-to-face and crotch-to-crotch
5. Subliminal messages
6. Shock therapy and ... torture

Make no mistake: every major, reputable professional psychological and medical association has stated that not only is there no evidence supporting the possibility of changing somebody’s sexual orientation, but that such programs harm those involved; depression and suicide are all-too-common in the ex-gay world.

i just finished reading the article again and all i can say is that it made me physically nauseous...especially the 6th method, shock and torture (emphasis added to highlight the "christian" barbarism of it all):

Last year, the Kansas State Collegian printed the tragic story of “Thomas Swanson,” who recounted how his father tried to "beat the gay out of him" before handing his son over to a conversion therapist. During therapy sessions, the counselor told Swanson he already had AIDS and was going to die. But after several sessions, the counselor moved to aversion therapy methods:

After he was seated, each of his hands was strapped to the arm of the chair and softball-size ice blocks were placed in each palm. Then photos of men touching appeared on the screen. At times a heterosexual couple was shown, and the ice was removed. The ice was left on his palms, causing freezing pain, as many photos of homosexual men were shown.

But the ice therapy didn’t eliminate the same-sex attractions. So, his counselor upped the intensity:

Swanson was again strapped to the chair by his hands. Again photos were shown, but this time, there was a level of intimacy that had lacked in the previous sessions.

The men were embracing or perhaps kissing on the cheek and Swanson received intense amounts of heat transferred through gel pads applied to his hands.

“Now it was the burn sensation,” Swanson said. “I still had, for a few years, a huge pink mark across my hand because it would literally burn your skin.”

Of course, the ice and heat didn’t work. The next step was electricity:

“Very very thin needles were inserted into my fingers, on all 10 fingers, still strapped down, and then the rest of my body was strapped down because they knew what was going to happen,” Swanson said.

As the man turned on the electricity, the pain was so horrible, Swanson still cannot understand why his mother sat in the lobby and did not race to rescue him as he screamed.....

“Electricity was excruciating,” Swanson said with a look of intensity. “I have no way of describing to people how hard I screamed; it was excruciating pain. The pain was horrible, I would lose bowel control, consciousness, mental capacity, so many things with the electricity.”

thanks, "mom" (not MY mother, thank GOD!!!). how sick must a parent be to allow such heinous torture to be inflicted on a child and not intervene? in CHRIST'S NAME? I. DON'T. THINK. SO.

now, if you'll excuse me i need a shower...that is if i can find the brillo pads and bleach to wash the hatred off of me.

Rita Nakashima Brock, Ph. D.: Prop 8, Judge Walker and the Biblical View of Marriage Equality

Rita Nakashima Brock, Ph. D.: Prop 8, Judge Walker and the Biblical View of Marriage Equality

housekeeping.

fascinating article. go read it.

Dead Sea Scrolls Mystery Solved?

absolutely fascinating...dvr set.

Dead Sea Scrolls Mystery Solved?

Ker Than

Published July 27, 2010

The recent decoding of a cryptic cup, the excavation of ancient Jerusalem tunnels, and other archaeological detective work may help solve one of the great biblical mysteries: Who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls?

The new clues hint that the scrolls, which include some of the oldest known biblical documents, may have been the textual treasures of several groups, hidden away during wartime—and may even be "the great treasure from the Jerusalem Temple," which held the Ark of the Covenant, according to the Bible.

glenn beck makes Jesus weep.

"I'm begging you, your right to religion and freedom to exercise religion and read all of the passages of the Bible as you want to read them and as your church wants to preach them . . . are going to come under the ropes in the next year. If it lasts that long it will be the next year. I beg you, look for the words 'social justice' or 'economic justice' on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes!"

full outrage HERE.

seriously, glenn, that's like saying "if your church web site says 'JESUS', or 'Christian principals', run!"

NOTE: all that "social justice" stuff he's railing about? READ THE BEATITUDES.