Talk:Paul Cameron

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Contents 1 Addition Requests: 2 College 3 Mass Changes 4 Change Made in One Swoop 5 Rights vs. Privileges 6 Stop With the POV Changes 7 LOCK 8 Victim of molestation? 9 Part of the ex-gay movement? 10 Bias and errors in Cameron research 10.1 Child molestation 10.2 Gay obituary study 11 Adding criticism 12 Family Section 13 "Discredited"

[edit] Addition Requests:

More detailed information about his research with either support or critiques of it. Very brief and balanced. Graniterock 03:14, Mar 4, 2005 (UTC)

I'd like to see more info, too (actually, there is some at 1983 ISIS Survey). Maybe that can be my next wiki project, unless someone beats me to it. -Seth Mahoney 02:47, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] College

Los Angeles Pacific College http://www.lapacific.net/ was founded in 1989, so that is not where Cameron went. The Life Pacific College of Los Angeles was founded in 1923, and is associated with the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel. My guess is that that is the college he attended. However I can't find any info in his official bios or the school websites. -Will Beback 22:43, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Mass Changes

FYI, I reverted 13 edits made over the course of 45 minutes by 66.0.248.74 on 28 September 2006. This was not an act of aggression on my part - it's just that the mass of edits and re-edits were rather confusing. I would suggest that if the individual would like to add the changes again, he/she do them in one fell swoop. -- Tim D 01:40, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Change Made in One Swoop

OK, done. However, I fail to see what the original complaint was other than there is a serious POV problem here. It seems that any changes made that tell the other side of the story -- like the links to the letters showing Cameron resigned over a year before he was "expelled" -- keep getting deleted. It appears clear that one or more gay activists are watching this page and will pounce on any attempt to make it a more neutral entry.

More information is good, but please don't delete the original allegations either. -Will Beback 06:27, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Understood, but the APA was not the organization that made that charge. I have added a paragraph with the proper entity after the APA discussion.

Ah, yes, thanks for catching that error. -Will Beback 06:49, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

There were some POV problems with both pro- and con-Cameron opinions, so I tried to fix that up a little bit without removing factual information. And FYI, it's best to sign all discussion with four tildes (~) just so no one gets confused about who's saying what -- Tim D 15:20, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rights vs. Privileges

Once again, I have changed the sentence discussing homosexual foster and adoption "rights" to more accurately reflect what they are -- "privileges". Generally, you cannot have a right to someone else's person. Specifically as related to this subject, you cannot have a "right" to adopt someone else's child. There are actual rights belonging to way too many people, not the least of which is the adopted child, to refer to any "right" to adopt. Adoption, whether gay or straight is a PRIVILEGE for the would be adoptive parents. Referring to adoption as a "right" is clearly, therefore, not a NPOV.

Can't we just reword it to avoid this issue? "Nonetheless, his publications continue to be cited as support by some groups who oppose same-sex marriage and homosexuals as foster or adoptive parents." or something like that. Makes things easier and avoids POV disputes. Jaimeastorga2000 09:26, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. I've gone ahead and followed your suggestion. EALacey 12:26, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Stop With the POV Changes

Just when I thought we had a happy, neutral medium, a gay special rights activist comes in and messes with this article. A statement that Cameron's work does a particular thing (in this case, casting homosexuals as perverts, etc.) is not NPOV. *I* and many others don't think his work does this, so clearly there is a divergence in POV on this topic. Stating that it is his DETRACTORS who claim the research casts homosexuals in a negative light is neutral and gets the information out there that the special rights crowd wants.--Theadversary 20:20, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

What would an alternative interpretation of his work be? Doesn't he overtly state these negative conclusions in his publications? -- Tim D 06:19, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

The problem is that as written, the article makes it look like he says ALL gays are perverts, criminals, etc. His work does nothing of the kind. It shows higher incidences of certain behavior in homosexuals, but stops far short of saying ALL homosexuals display the behavior. There is a world of difference between saying, "ALL gays engage in criminal behavior", and "homosexuals are x times more likely to engage in criminal misconduct." His detractors claim the former. As written, the article states the former. Hence, it must include the word "detractors" to be accurate. --Theadversary 08:10, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

A better statement for the article would be then that he often concludes that homosexuals are more likely to display the behavior. It seems inaccurate to say that only his detractors are making these conclusions from his work. -- Tim D 17:13, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Some advice: if you want your call for neutrality to be taken seriously, you might also wish to avoid ranting about "the gay special rights crowd" and making other such statements that expose your personal biases. PenguinJockey 23:35, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

That's what they are, and calling them what they are is hardly a "rant". Your labeling it as such, besides being a perfect example of argument by ad hominem, reveals your own bias. Theadversary 06:40, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

Your own opinion, and a loaded one at that. I'd be willing to bet that the others who have edited this page are quite unlike one another and would resent being lumped into a "crowd"... though I do confess to having something of a bias against folks who come here with an obvious agenda and try to pass themselves off as arbiters of truth. If that makes me unfit to point out inconsistencies in your position, please let me know. PenguinJockey 23:51, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Its not just my opinion, its backed up by empirical evidence. Look at the rewrite of the page. 80% or more of it is negative in nature. Two thirds of the external links are to gay special rights sources. The bias you have is obvious. You are a member of the gay special rights crowd and will do anything to get your message across and drown out dissenting voices. And you've won another one. I've pretty much given up on Wikipedia as it is run by nothing but the left wing extremist noise machine. There is nothing neutral about this website. --Theadversary 07:09, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Regarding the external links, it would be good to have a suitable pro-Cameron link besides FRI; can you suggest one? Other than that, which parts of the current article do you consider POV? Information about criticisms of Dr. Cameron is (a) collected in a single section rather than mixed in with the biographical details; (b) attributed to specific critics; (c) accompanied by references to responses from Cameron or FRI where those exist. In the version of February 10, five out of six paragraphs discussed criticisms of Cameron. In the current article, five out of thirteen paragraphs cover criticism. So I can't see that my additions have made the article more negative as a whole. EALacey 09:23, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] LOCK

Looking back through the history of this page, it appears that it has been vandalized several times recently. Given the controversial nature of Dr. Cameron and the demonstrated tactics of the gay special rights crowd to shout down and/or demonize anyone who disagrees with them, as well as the vanadalism on this page, someone with the appropriate power should lock it from further editing as has been done with the "homosexual" entry. Its the only neutral and fair thing to do. Theadversary 20:29, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

The article has barely been edited at all recently, much less vandalized. One time, maybe? I don't think it'll be locked any time soon... -- Tim D 06:14, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't either, but that has nothing to do with the amount of vandalism and everything to do with the ideology of the people with power on Wikipedia. --Theadversary 08:11, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

"Bob Saget" gets vandalized a couple of times a day. I'm not sure what that says about the ideology of Wikipedia. -Will Beback · † · 08:33, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Cute, but I doubt that Bob Saget is as controversial as Dr. Cameron or homosexuality. When one side of a debate receives favorable treatment that the other does not get, it speaks volumes about those in charge and their POV. --Theadversary 19:17, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

The only recent instances of vandalism on this page appear to have been corrected within minutes. Can you provide some diffs to illustrate your point? -Will Beback · † · 19:44, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

I did in the beginning of this thread. Homosexuality is locked Dr. Cameron isn't. It isn't a matter of "correcting" within minutes. I'm sure the homosexuality page was quickly fixed when it was vandalized as well. It is the fact that one is locked and the other isn't after both have been vandalized. Proof positive that pro-homosexual topics receive favorable treatment and protection. Theadversary 15:23, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Then, of course, there is this excellent reason for at least giving semi-protection to this page, directly from the semi-protection policy page: "However, Jimbo Wales has suggested semi-protection may be used in cases of '...minor [biographies] of slightly well known but controversial individuals...' which are not widely watchlisted, if they are '...subject to POV pushing, trolling [or] Vandalism.' In such cases, semi-protection '...would at least eliminate the drive-by nonsense that we see so often.' Wikipedia:Semi-protection policy Theadversary 15:44, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

<-- My point is that there is minimal vandalism of this article and so no protection is called for. You haven't demonstrated that vandalism is a problem with this article. If it reached the level of a couple of vandal attacks a day we'd certainly protect it until the problem passed. Protection doesn't necessarily help an article, often the best editors are anonymous folks without a strong bias. This article does appear to be widely watched, so there's not a problem. -Will Beback · † · 19:21, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Widely watched? Really? It looks like its me, you, Tdowling, and the occasional driveby. But whatever helps you sleep at night. I doubt this article would be protected if it was vandalized twice a minute. Theadversary 04:18, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Victim of molestation?

According to this interview [1] it seams that he was a victim of molestation by a homosexual in his childhold. This is not mentioned in the article. If his claim about the sexual abuse can be found in other sources, too, I guess it should be included into the article. (It might, in a certain sense, explain his motivation for searching the connection between homosexuality and molestations.) --Kompik 16:07, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Part of the ex-gay movement?

This article has been added to Category:Ex-gay movement, as has Family Research Institute. One of Cameron's pamphlets states that "there are many ex-homosexuals" and that changes can be prompted by "psychotherapy" or "a religious or spiritual conversion". However, I'm not sure that this qualifies Cameron or FRI as part of the "ex-gay movement".

The material I can find on FRI's website isn't positive about the movement. This July 2002 article in FRI's newsletter criticises James Dobson and NARTH for explaining homosexuality using "the hocus-pocus of Freudian thought" rather than as a "choice", and concludes, "Dr. Dobson and the ex-gay ministries need to decide whether they are going to fish from the mental health pier or the Christian pier." An October 2000 Article considers that ex-gay ministries are responsible for "at least some success", but notes ex-gay leaders who have "fallen back into" homosexuality and argues, "if you get 'saved' from a bad habit, it is terribly foolish to hang around that habit and to associate with persons who enjoy that habit".

Cameron may believe that people should stop having homosexual sex and that the ex-gay movement has helped some to do this, but by that definition a lot of people with negative feelings towards homosexuality would qualify for the category. Since Cameron and FRI seem to talk about the movement in the third person and regard its views on psychology as erroneous and harmful, I would favour removing them from the category until we have a statement from these sources themselves or a reliable independent source identifying them as part of the "ex-gay movement". EALacey 10:09, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

An addition: FRI's article "Can anything be done to stop gay rights?" (described on their site's home page as a "Vision Statement") states that to conservative Christian organisations "would have to end their support of the psychiatric paradigm, a difficult change given its current ubiquity and the ways in which psychiatric and Christian concepts have been melded. In particular, they would need to sharply reduce (or preferably end) their support for the ‘ex-gay movement,’ an approach which is psychiatrically anchored and highly Freudian in viewpoint." I'm going to be bold and remove the category. EALacey 18:19, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bias and errors in Cameron research

Nothing should be deleted from the article, including Cameron's "side of the story". However his claims should be represented as his own claims, and his actual methods and research should be subjected to non-biased scientific analysis - and if you take a minute or two to look at them, they fail miserably by any test known to statistics. You don't have to be a "special gay rights activist" to see that either, you need only apply the same standard for statistics that is applied to all research.

[edit] Child molestation

He relied on a study by Groth and Birnbaum (1978) that mentioned a 3:2 ratio of "heterosexual" (i.e. female victim) to "homosexual" (i.e. male victim) molestations, and noted 54% of all molestations were performed by bisexual or homosexual practitioners. But Groth and Birnbaum reported that NONE of the men in their sample had an exclusively homosexual adult orientation. And NONE of the 22 bisexual men were more attracted to males than females. The "54%" doesn't appear anywhere in Groth and Birnbaum's article.

And funny that he assumes all male-male molestations meant the perpetrator was homosexual... because he assumed that NOT all of the male-female molestations were committed by heterosexuals! He incorporated a "bisexual correction" to inflate the number of molestors considered to be "homosexual" in his study! He blatantly manipulated the data to slander homosexuals.

[edit] Gay obituary study

He relied on a questionable convenience sample. In place of reliable information, Cameron collected obituaries from gay publications, completely ignoring the obvious facts that millions of gays and lesbians die without ever having their name printed in a gay magazine. Additionally, gay magazines typically don't print obituaries; they only started doing so during the AIDS epidemic, meaning that all Cameron probably got was a list of local queers who had died of AIDS in a specific city.Rglong 05:21, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Adding criticism

I'm adding this scientific criticism because it wasn't articulated well at all before, and for no other reason, so please, no accusations of bias. As it stands this article does hardly anything to get into why Cameron's research is so deeply flawed - which it is, for multiple reasons that have everything to do with science and nothing to do with gay rights.Rglong 05:21, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Family Section

Given this man is into 'Family' research, I found myself wondering if he was married or had a family. Seems a lot of strong anti-gay people end up being somewhat in the closet themselves, so was curious. Would it be POV to point out if he is married or not, or is it relevant? As a reader, I know I wanted to know that information about him. --Bane1998 06:57, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

I did a little bit of looking around, I'm no researcher. Just Googling. Not much about his family at all. Only found this article [2] referencing looking at FRI's tax returns and something about a wife named Virgina Cameron. Not sure if this makes a good source, or there are better ways to verify/collect this sort of information. --Bane1998 07:07, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

He's married with children, according to this article, which includes an interview with him. His son is a statistician who works with him at FRI, so I think that's public and notable enough to be mentioned without raising privacy concerns. I've added a brief mention of him. However, extracting personal information from documents like tax returns is inappropriate per Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons; I don't think his wife's name is relevant to the article. EALacey 17:52, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Discredited"

It's not clear to me what the reference to Cameron's "discredited claims" actually adds to the article. I thought when I changed it (this edit was mine, although I wasn't logged in) that the article was saying nobody believes Cameron's statements on homosexuality (OED's first meaning for discredit, "refuse to credit"). That isn't true: this page gives a long list of links to people citing his work, and it's the fact that he is influential in some conservative circles that makes him notable.

I take it from reviewing the edit comments that the intended meaning was actually "shown to be unworthy of belief" (OED's second meaning). I'd basically agree with this, but it's still an opinion and inconsistent with a neutral point of view. The lead section already says that three national organisations of social scientists have condemned aspects of his work; an adjective like "discredited" is just the negative equivalent of a peacock term and adds no information to the kind of factual statement that's already there. If the problems that have been found in Cameron's writings or public statements need to be underlined more strongly in the lead, I would favour expanding on specific critics or criticisms; for example, Gregory Herek could reasonably be mentioned by name. EALacey (talk) 18:15, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

"Discredited" is not neutral, period. I therefore removed it. Every time I come back to this page it has become an assault on Dr. Cameron by people with an obvious agenda. --Theadversary (talk) 23:02, 28 March 2008 (UTC)