Are you wondering why I omitted any mention of Dr. Laura’s position on homosexuality [in my article “Why Dr. Laura is (Usually) Right”)?
There’s a reason.
When I first wrote this article three years ago, Dr. Laura’s perspective on homosexuality was changing, and I hoped that her views would become more and more biblical. I didn’t want something I was hoping would change, to be part of a static web document. I am glad to say her views have changed. . . and she has been persecuted for it.
Several years ago, she listened to the rhetoric and followed the party line, proclaiming that people are born gay. Some researchers tried (unsuccessfully) for a decade to prove a genetic component, if not a cause, for homosexuality. Apparently believing this explanation for same-gender attraction, she said that she thought something goes wrong somewhere along the way, producing unnatural homosexual desires. She got blasted for calling homosexuals “biological errors,” which was a twisting of what she actually said. On the StopDrLaura.com web site one can listen to her “famous ‘error’ quote”:
“What I did say is that when an individual is not so drawn to a member of the opposite sex, in biology that’s some kind of error.”
There is a huge difference between saying that some kind of error has produced unnatural desires in a person, and that the person who holds those desires is a biological error. It’s interesting to me that she was just taking the genetic-basis-for-homosexuality theory to a logical conclusion, but she got nailed for her political incorrectness. That’s because it is currently unacceptable to suggest that there is anything unnatural about homosexuality. From a purely biological standpoint, however, individuals cannot reproduce without sexual intercourse with members of the opposite sex, so she is merely being consistent with the reigning scientific paradigm.
From what I have heard her say on her program, it appears she recognizes that there is a moral element to homosexual behavior, at least conceding that for gays and lesbians who call themselves religious, any homosexual activity is sin. She has also been criticized by the gay and lesbian community because she believes children need both a mother and a father, so gay or lesbian couples should not adopt babies or young children because it is making a deliberate choice to deprive a child of one or the other. (Although she has supported gay couples adopting older children who wouldn’t be in a family otherwise.)
I grieve for the heat Dr. Laura has taken because of her pro-biblical, non-PC stance. And I have to say I’m proud of her.
Sue Bohlin
August 2001