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from Interviews/Testimonials
Reflections from Jeffrey Satinover
In this interview, NARTH speaks with Jeffrey Burke Satinover, M.D., a diplomate of both the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology and the C.G. Jung Institute of Zurich, Switzerland. A member of NARTH's Scientific Advisory Board, Dr. Satinover is the author of several books including Homosexuality and the Politics of Truth.
The following text is taken from a radio interview in which Dr. Satinover was a guest. He spoke to the interviewer as
follows:
In America of late, truth has become subject to terrible political pressure. The question isn't just homosexuality, but rather,
freedom from all sexual constraint. This has been an issue for civilization for thousands of years.
I think many people have a sense, especially in America, that too many barriers have come down. We now have so little of a
moral compass that we're really completely at sea. We're awash in the tide of unconstrained instinctive behaviors which are all
being labeled "okay" because nobody really has a sense, any more, as to what's right and what's wrong. In Joseph Campbell's
words, "Follow your bliss." This has led us into a growing barbarism.
Now we are now looking at a generation of young people who are exposed to a sometimes explicit, and sometimes implicit
set of values that says that homosexuality is perfectly okay--it's just a complement to heterosexuality.
The implication of such a set of values to an impressionable, possibly confused and certainly exploring youngster, is that there
is no reason whatsoever not to go out and try it and see whether it fits. It's simply that a door has been opened and a certain
number of people will walk through that door and thereby expose themselves to terrible risks at an age where they are not
really capable of making intelligent judgments about the risks.
In the news, now, we're hearing so many overblown claims of a genetic foundation for homosexuality. The whole subject of
behavioral genetics is complex. It does not lend itself to sound bites at all.
The real genetic question is--what is it in the background of people who become homosexual that opens that door for them,
whereas the door is essentially closed for other people?
In a nutshell, every behavioral trait in human nature has a genetic component. For example, basketball playing is clearly
genetic. If you were to perform on basketball players the kinds of studies that have been done on homosexuality, you would
find an unequivocal genetic association--very powerful, probably much stronger than there is with homosexuality. But if you
ask yourself what that's about--it's clear that it's NOT that there is a gene for basketball playing...
The reason there's a genetic association is that there's an intermediate trait which allows people who carry these traits to
become basketball players in greater numbers than those who do not have those traits--namely, height, athleticism, and so on.
So it's not surprising that there is a growing number of studies that show a genetic association to homosexuality. But that is a
far cry from saying that homosexuality is genetic in the way that eye color is genetic.
Of course, there is a political implication to the misuse of the idea that there is a heritable component to homosexuality--that is,
the false notion that if it is "genetic," then it must be unchangeable. But I think the most important point that one can make
about homosexuality is that it is significantly changeable--although statistically, not for everyone.
As a matter of fact, there is an extremely interesting statistic in the more detailed version of the new Sex in America survey
(The Social Organization of Sexuality), which showed that 2.8% of the men in their sample were essentially homosexual.
But a much larger percentage had been homosexual at some point in their lives previously. Somewhere between 10% and
16% had apparently gone through a homosexual phase. By gay activist standards they would be people who would have a
supposed--and supposedly fixed--"gay identity," yet by the time they were adults and were sampled in the survey, they had
given homosexuality up. In fact, the largest proportion by far had given it up.
There are also case reports in the psychiatric literature of single individuals as well as groups of individuals who in a variety of
settings actually do spontaneously leave a homosexual identity.
The debate over homosexuality has been profoundly affected by the current culture of complaint. Many, many areas of
political life, social life and scientific life today are being profoundly influenced by the various competing claims and
cross-claims to victimhood.
A recent article in a psychiatric publication informed us that 30% of all 20-year-old homosexual men will be HIV- positive or
dead by the age of thirty. You would think that the objective, ethical medical approach would be: let's use anything that works
to try to take these people out of their posture of risk. If it means getting them to wear condoms, fine. If it means getting them
to give up anal intercourse, fine. If it means getting them to give up homosexuality, fine. But that last intervention is the one
intervention that is absolutely taboo.
There is no doubt that a cold, statistical analysis of this epidemic would lead you to the conclusion that this attitude of political
correctness is killing a substantial portion of those people. I think there is an element of denial, in the psychological sense, of
what gay-related illnesses really mean.
The normalization of homosexuality was a classic example where the American Psychiatric Association knuckled under to a
victim group's pressure tactics. In that instance, no substantive data was presented either to "prove" that homosexuality is an
illness, or to "prove" that it is not.
Actually, many of the diagnoses that exist in psychiatry are labeled as illnesses for reasons that have nothing to do with
medicine. Instead, psychiatric diagnoses are very subject to intellectual fads that come and go.
The reason the APA talks about disorders--rather than illnesses--is precisely because there are very, very few mental illnesses
where underlying pathophysiology is even suspected. In most cases, if you are going to use the term illness, you would have to
use it as a metaphor. They are possibly spiritual illnesses, or they are ways of life that are consensually undesirable. But they
don't necessarily reflect some underlying disorder in the hardware that backs up the mind.
And so the whole question of what constitutes psychiatric illness is already so weak that it opened the door for activists to
come in and make a change in the nomenclature without even having to appeal to rigorous scientific standards. Had they done
so, there simply would have been no data one way or another.
The underlying problem is clearly that we've lost our moorings in terms of what life is all about. We don't know what's good
and what's evil. People simply have lost the ability now to stand up and say this is good, this is bad, this is what I believe in.
We've now entered into a stage in our civilization of absolute nihilism, where the opinion leaders--the people who should be
the moral exemplars--are simply espousing a philosophy of absolute nihilism. That's simply what it amounts to. The language is
very fancy--deconstructionism, relativism, etc.--but what it all boils down to is that there is nothing outside of the cogitations in
one's own skull. It seems to me that anybody with even a passing familiarity with history should see that that kind of an attitude
leads nowhere but to destruction.
What happened is this: when we began exploring the mind as an object of scientific scrutiny, independent of the spirit--which
is a very new idea--we inevitably reduced it to the consequences of mechanism. What that means, then, is that man is nothing
but a machine. A very complicated machine--so complicated that we won't be able to put all the pieces together--but in the
end we're merely a gigantic collection of molecules bumping around in a stochastic universe.
In adopting the methods of science to understand the human psyche, psychology and psychiatry have inadvertently put forth a
philosophy of life that says the psyche is really illusion. Our personalities are illusion; everything can be seen through, reduced,
turned into something prior... and human personhood ultimately disappears. Of course, our link to the spiritual then becomes
ever more distant.
I don't suppose that one can actually break through the armor of nihilism using intellect. I don't think it can be argued--you
have a debate and just go around and around. I think, and here I'm speaking as a psychiatrist, really--I think an individual like
that can only give up those kinds of intellectual constructions when he is so deeply touched personally--possibly so deeply
wounded personally--that he sees that that philosophy of life offers no succor whatsoever, and so he's forced to throw himself
into dependency onto others. What has happened with some people, is that they must throw themselves onto dependency on
God as well. That, then, gets around this hyper-intellectual egotism. The gift of grace, then, comes through suffering and its
healing...
I think what we need in this country is a very frank, very wide-open debate, free of political correctness, about fundamental
values. And I think that if the stifling effects of political correctness could be eliminated, what would happen is that many
people who are possibly not terribly articulate, but have a very firm and accurate moral compass--it's just that they don't have
the articulation skills of the "chattering classes"--they too would begin to be heard, and I believe that the intellectuals would
follow.
Intellectuals, I've come to believe, are definitely creatures of fashion, and much less leaders than they are followers.
NARTH Interviews Dr. Satinover
Q: How did you get involved in the issue of homosexuality?
A: I had been reading Leanne Payne's The Healing Presence. The book describes a sophisticated system of depth
psychology from a religious context, where psychological insights are united with healing prayer. After striking up a
correspondence with Leanne, I was invited to a conference of hers and I accepted. At that time, I did not even know that the
conference was related to homosexuality.
There I met hundreds of people struggling with that issue, and many who had successfully emerged on the other side and were
married with children. As I got to know them, I found them to be quite remarkable. The struggle to be healed had left an
indelible imprint. I saw a humility, an empathy and a fearlessness about life. They knew exactly what it meant to stand up for
what they believed in, since the struggle to become who they truly were had exacted such a cost in suffering.
The struggle against homosexuality is like so many of the desperate challenges that are common to our modern age--so many
people are wrestling with the results of emotional deprivation within the family, because damaged childhoods are so endemic.
The life story of a homosexual has parallels for anyone struggling with spiritual, moral and character issues... which is to say, all
of us!
These people's particular problem happened to be homosexuality, but that was incidental. Their battle was a microcosm for
the identity problems of so many people today, who are struggling with what it means to be a man or a woman--with the way
that men and women can best relate to one another in the world--as well as with the larger problem of personal identity.
These people had found their way back from the greatest degree of brokenness to embody the values that our culture has
always held dear (at least, until recently). They've lived through the most extreme possible crisis and come out the other side.
They've wrestled with self-deception to find the truth, and come out with an assurance and self-possession which makes them
exemplars of what the therapeutic process ought to produce, but only rarely does. I wanted to be around these people as
much as I could, because I knew I had a lot to learn from them.
Q: Before going to this conference, what had you believed about homosexuality?
A: I had always been somewhat of an iconoclast and I had therefore been wary of the extent to which the psychiatric
profession consistently sold itself out to political fashion on a lot of issues. So I had not bought the PC line entirely. Yet, I was
still uncertain. But after meeting these people who were struggling successfully, I realized that to some extent, the wool had
been pulled over my eyes by both our culture and the psychiatric profession. Clearly homosexuality was not good, and was
changeable.
Psychiatry has been driven by fashion not just on the issue of homosexuality, but on the subjects of feminist psychology,
self-esteem and narcissism. The current concept of self-esteem is really an upbeat popularization of the formerly negative
concept of narcissism. Now there are whole schools of psychology devoted to the idea that relatively unrestrained narcissism
(like relatively unrestrained, instinctive self-gratification) is perfectly fine. In fact, this attitude is now being taught and cultivated
in our schools.
Freud also wrestled with the problem of narcissism, and he understood that excessive self-interest and the vice of vanity
would weaken human character. But he couldn't solve the problem--for without relying on the framework of a value system,
he simply didn't know what to do with the issue. That's because character is, at heart, a value-based concept.
We tend to forget that an internally consistent psychoanalysis, as Freud created it, is essentially an amoral, value-free
philosophy. Psychoanalysis is valuable as a method of treatment, but it has limited applicability; it cannot be taken as the
fundamental basis for man's world view.
Then the Self-Psychology School came along in the '60's, coalescing around the work of psychoanalyst Heinz Kohut. He was
the prime mover in developing a theory related to self-esteem in the psychoanalytic world, and others built upon his work.
Kohut came up with the notion that we all have a blueprint for a preexisting self which we have an obligation to discover. His
ideas crossed over into the popular psychology of the Human Potential Movement led by Rogers and Maslow, and there
followed a huge interest in finding that preexisting identity.
But the whole Human Potential and Self-Psychology Movement fell victim to the serpent's promise--"Ye shall be as gods!"
Soon society began to view narcissism--in whatever form--as healthy, and began to deny that humility, modesty and
self-sacrifice were really virtues.
We began to believe that we have no obligation to live by any set of absolute standards of good and evil--we could choose
our own. We convinced ourselves that self-fulfillment, self-actualization, self-realization, and so on was the highest standard of
good. But it is an ancient truth that indeed we must live by standards that are outside of ourselves and which may, at times,
conflict with our own natural "blueprints."
History has taught us that any other course will lead us to destruction. For if we imagine that nature and human effort and good
intentions are good enough, it will soon be undeniable that the result is evil.
Q: Should the American Psychiatric Association have de-pathologized homosexuality?
A: In some ways I think the psychiatric establishment was right--homosexuality is not a disease the way that, say, pneumonia
or cancer or schizophrenia are diseases. Homosexuality makes a certain kind of sense as an understandable adaptation to
some types of life circumstances. If you grow up in a Cosa Nostra family, it makes sense to be a sociopath. By the same
token, it's profoundly confusing to label the sociopathic responses, of, say, war orphans as "disordered" when a war orphan
must become a sociopath in order to survive; if he fails to, he may die. So, under the circumstances of war, which response is
"healthier"--that is to say, "adaptive"?
Homosexuality, too, is a method of adapting to adverse circumstances. But like sociopathy, it exacts a cost in terms of
constrictions in relationships.
There are many psychological "illnesses" which cannot be adequately or convincingly explained using the medical model of
psychiatry. Being homosexual is not like having a tumor. We should throw out the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual and start
carefully rethinking all of these so-called illnesses. Right now, the DSM is mostly a collection of problems labeled illnesses
because they are simply consensually undesirable within our present culture. But at base, they are really issues of values,
philosophy, and character.
How can we "prove" to the psychiatric establishment that homosexuality is psychologically unhealthy? When we tried to
defend the idea that homosexuality is a disorder as evidenced by the higher associated suicide rate, gay activists said that the
suicide was not due to the inherently dissatisfying nature of the condition--it was due to the stresses of homophobia. When we
point to the high level of gay promiscuity, they said we were using a narrow, "heterosexist" and outdated definition of
promiscuity. Gays could be emotionally faithful to one partner, they argued, while being sexually active with many partners.
And you can't get around those arguments unless you're actually willing to say that promiscuity is an inferior way of life. You
need to be able to say that some certain standard is better.
If we can't settle on a shared higher vision, then it's amazing what we must be prepared to accept. For example, there is
actually a growing body of literature in sexological journals arguing that the psychological and emotional benefits of
promiscuity more than outweigh the risks to life from AIDS.
So that is the fundamental flaw of psychology--it is meaningless without the backdrop of a framework of values.
There I believe homosexuality--like narcissism--is best viewed as a spiritual and moral illness.
Now psychology as a discipline must step up to the table and accept responsibility for the extent to which it has been
propagating an amoral ethos. Dostoevsky put it best in The Grand Inquisitor: "Without God, everything is permissible."
Dr. Satinover's new book Homosexuality and the Politics of Truth is available from Hamewith Distributors (203) 221-0031.
Updated: 8 February 2008
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