Speak Compassion

Today I emailed Stephen Bennett ministries. I tried to keep the tone of my email neutral and used no name calling. I didn’t want it to sound like hate mail, I want it to sound my heartfelt and honest. I think it came off that way. If you decide to send him a letter, try to keep you letter honest, heartfelt and christian in nature. Otherwise it will just sound like hate mail and then you have only sunk to his level. Here is the email I sent:

Dear Stephen and Irene,

I have gone over your website and taken in some of your radio programs. I have noticed that you advertise yourself as a ministry that helps homosexuals free themselves from unwanted same sex attractions. I have looked over your site and I see nothing about how this is done, nor do I see anything on your site that is useful or resourceful for those who have unwanted same sex attractions. What I do see is lots of information and radio programming that talks about how evil gay people are and how dangerous they are and how criminal they are. I fail to see how this “helps” anyone. It certainly isn’t useful to those who want to be happy as “ex-gay” since is does nothing to help them become heterosexual. It does nothing for people who are gay and happy since it paints a very inaccurate and generalized view of what gay people look and act like. The reality is many gay people are nothing like what you describe and research has long proved most of your claims to be false. That would in fact mean that you lie to your listeners about your fellow human beings so their life will look unattractive, but in reality you are profiting from the dehumanizing of an entire population.

So exactly how do you help homosexuals? What resources do you give to those wishing to “not” be gay anymore. That is what I would expect to see on your site. I would expect to see you deliver the goods you say that you do, but that isn’t what is there. I fail to see how constantly bashing gays helps those you want to help. If I wanted to help smokers quit smoking I would have a website filled with “how to” stuff on quiting smoking. Makes much more sense to me. If I wanted to help people lose weight I would give them tips on eating better and making better food choices. I wouldn’t just bash fat people, but theoretically that is what you have done with gays.

I would presume your mission is well intended but you don’t seem to be doing what you say you are doing. If you wish for people to become non-homosexual based on biblical beliefs then that is what you should do. Your constant rhetoric of presenting the evil of gay people just adds to the climate where violence breeds. A famous propaganda film from the Nazi’s in Germany called “The Eternal Jew” portrayed the Jews as diseased, immoral people who controlled everything. The film claimed the Jews were a threat to children, that Jews were a threat to Christians, and more famously the film called for the extermination of Jews. I only point that out since on your radio show you Had John Diggs on whose paper on homosexuality relied heavily on the research of Paul Cameron who does in fact advocate the extermination of gays and lesbians:
“At the 1985 Conservative Political Action Conference, [Dr. Paul] Cameron announced to the attendees, ‘Unless we get medically lucky, in three or four years, one of the options discussed will be the extermination of homosexuals.’ According to an interview with former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, Cameron was recommending the extermination option as early as 1983.” - Mark E. Pietrzyk, News-Telegraph, March 10, 1995. (FYI - Cameron’s now-debunked research forms the foundation of most religious right anti-gay ’studies’ )

Maybe you should rethink your approach. Maybe you are doing more harm to people than good. I would hope that some of what I have said will sink in, but I can only guess you didn’t bother to read this far down in the page.

Sincerely,
Joe Brummer