Main sources : Richard Cohen, HeaIing Homosexuality, International Healing Foundation, P.O. Box 901, Bowie, MD 20718-0901. Congressman Wm Dannemeyer, Shadow in the Land. Homosexuality in America, New York, Ignatius Press, 1989 Jacques Corraze, L'homosexualite, Paris, PUF, 1982.

Introduction

On February 7, 1994 in Strasbourg, the European Parliament voted a resolution affirming equality of rights for homosexuals. They are recognized, in particular, the right to marry and to adopt children.

The motives for such a decision are explained in a text : although the homosexual life-style is more and more accepted by the public opinion, we must observe that acts of violence against homosexuals have multiplied in recent months, their authors beings supporters of ideologies of racism and extreme right-wing. Moreover, some are still trying to portray homosexual lifestyles as taboo, and to prevent them from freely developing their personality.

Let us examine the historical background of this decision, and the validity of its justifications. What is homosexuality? And is it an acceptable lifestyle which should be given respect by social rights, or a perversion, with individual as well as collective dimensions, which needs healing?

Homosexuality has always existed. However, in past centuries, it was considered as an abnormal occasional behavior, not as an exclusive identity. In other words, it was understood that some people occasionally practice sodomy, although it was condemned by religion and by law, but they had no idea that one could be exclusively homosexual. The term homosexual itself did not exist.

Even in ancient Greece, a systematic reference for Gay Rights activists, many see citizens practiced sodomy on young slaves, but in no case considered themselves exclusively homosexuals. Adults who enjoyed the company of young slaves were married citizens and the young slaves in question were discarded after the end of their teens,

It is actually in 1869 that the term homosexuality is used for the first time, by a Hungarian doctor who asked for its legalization. This term had a scientific connotation which allowed to discuss about the phenomenon in an objective way, without negative judgment. Not only was homosexuality invented, but also heterosexuality. Whereas, before, heterosexuality was simply normal sexuality, or just sexuality, it now could be considered as one aspects among others of sexuality. The terms homosexuality and heterosexual were invented in order to stress the equal value of those two sexual orientations.

Moreover, creating the categories of homosexuality and heterosexuality shifted the problem from a question of behavior to a question of identity. We do not say anymore that one practices sodomy, but that one is homosexual. Other terms were coined to discuss about homosexuality. At first, it was defined as sexual preference in order to counter the traditional psychiatric view that it is a sexual deviation. But then, when homosexual activists tried to prove that homosexuality is genetically determined, they changed to the term : sexual orientation. Alternate lifestyle is another term commonly used to characterize homosexuality.

In the 1970's, to reinforce their sense of identity as a community, American homosexuals adopted the term gay to defile themselves and spoke of the gay community. Not content with an objective and scientific sounding name such as homosexuality, they created a positive denomination. Moreover, by this term, homosexuals wanted to answer the psychiatric argument that homosexuality was a result of unhappy childhood. They wanted to emphasize how joyful homosexuality is.

After creating a positive word to define themselves, homosexual activists invented a negative word to attack their opponents : homophobic. Like gay, homophobic is new a term adopted by the medias. Since phobia refers to a psychological symptom, the term homophobra shifts the accusation of mental disorder from the homosexual to any person hostile to homosexuality.

Originally, homosexual activists joined the sexual liberation movement in attacking the family as an old-fashioned institution. However, realizing how strongly the average American is attached to the family, they decided to attack the concept of the traditional family by redefining the word family. Whereas family had always been understood to mean a man and a woman married together and possibly with children, family has now come to designate about anything. Homosexuals refers to their partners as family partners. This flexible use of the term family has proved very useful to them since it made it possible for them to ask for the right to marry. For, if two homosexuals living together constitute a family, why should they not be allowed to marry? By using abundantly the term family, homosexual activists have been able to escape from the accusation that they are destroying the family.

It is very important to realize how language affects reality. Homosexual activists understand this very well. That is why they create words such as homosexual, gay, homophobic, etc, and that is why they redefined words such as family.

The strategy of gay activists v, as to consider homosexuality, and sexual orientations in general, as inborn characteristics, just like the color of skin or the gender, arguing that one is born gay just like one is born black or like one is born a woman. In this way, the homosexual community could define its campaign for recognition as a struggle for civil rights, using the pattern laid by Black Americans as well as by feminists, and mobilizing the public opinion through this identification. This identification of homosexuals to a racial minority such as Blacks or to an oppressed gender such as women has been consistently used by homosexual activists.

It is by using this type of argument that homosexuals have been able to get rid of all laws forbidding their behaviors in the US. In May 18, 1988, the House of Representatives passed a bill called the Hate Crime bill. This bill was designed to fight against prejudices against race, religion, ethnicity or sexual orientation. At the request voiced by some that sexual orientation should not be included, it was replaced by homosexuality or heterosexuality. This bill had in fact been designed by the homosexual community in a way that nobody could refuse to sign it without being labelled racist or antisemitic (Dannemeyer, p. 71).

In the words of a sympathisant to the homosexual movement : The greatest single victory of the gay movement over the past decade has been to shift the debate from behavior to identity, thus forcing opponents into a position where they can be seen as attacking the civil rights of homosexual citizens rather than attacking specific and (as they see it) antisocial behavion>. (Dennis Altmann, The Homosexual/sation of Amer/ca, New York, 1982, p. 9)

The 1994 movie PhiladeIphia is a good example of voluntary confusion between the gay agenda and the fight against racism. It puts together an homosexual victim of AIDS and a black lawer, united together by their experience of persecution. Jonathan Demme, the producer of this movie, who admits being homosexual himself, comments on his movie : "I hope to have brought my modest contribution to a battle for equality of rights in a country full of phobias of all kinds, where it is not always easy to be homosexual, or black..." (Le Point, 5 mars 1994, p. 81)

However, there is a major difference between the social injustice endured by Black Americans and the situation of homosexuals : homosexuals have always been treated, in regard to law, in the same way as everybody else. They have the same civil rights and they even enjoy, in average, a much higher standard of life and a higher level of education. Being homosexual is not something which appears on your face or on your identity card, and has no incidence on your social status. Moreover, the genetic claim is not valid, as we will show later.

To conclude, two points should be made : first, that even in the case when homosexuality was a biologically determined tendency, it would not be enough to make it acceptable. Some scientists have tried to prove that genetic factors can create a predisposition to criminality. They did not conclude that we should legalize criminality. Other scientists believe that the disposition to suicide is caused by a low level of serotonin (Dr. Herman van Praag. quoted in Neii York Times, october 8, 1985). They do not conclude that these people should be let free to express their suicidal impulse (although suicide-as-a-right advocates do exist).

Secondly, it is well known that psychological conditions can affect the body's metabolisms. It is therefore very possible that psychological disorders connected to sexual deviation may affect the hormonal balance. It would then be quite natural that scientists and some specific hormonal level in homosexuals. In this case, the biological condition is not a cause, but a consequence of psychological disorder.

After defining homosexuality as an identity comparable to racial identity, the next aim of homosexual activists was to claim that they represent an important part of American population. This was done by using the Kinsey report, established by Alfred Kinsley in the late 1940's. Based on his study, Kinsey and his associates reported that 10% Americans are "more or less" homosexuals. The homosexual movement later systematically used this report to affirm that homosexuals represent 10% of the population, thus claiming their rights for political representation. It has been routinely reported in academic works, sex education materials, government studies and the media, that 10% of the American population is homosexual. The 10% figure has been a central factor in the homosexual movement's effort to legitimize the homosexual lifestyle and obtain special legislation. It has been declared a fact by the news media. For example, Newsweek, The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times have all used the 10% figure over the past years.

However, this 10% figure has been since discredited by all further studies. Furthermore, it has been proven that Kinsey's methods of sampling were not valid. For example, his sample contained only volunteers who came forward to him to be interviewed. Kinsey even sought out people he knew to be homosexual in order to interview them. A famous scientific psychologist, Abraham Maslow, argued that such method is bound to be biased, since individuals who willingly expose their sexual life are more likely to exhibitionnism. He tried to warn Kinsey, but was ignored by him (Abraham Maslow and James M. Sakoda, Volonteer-Error in the Kinsey Study¯, Journal of Abnormal Psychology, april 1952, pp. 259-62). Moreover, Kinsey's sample contained 25% of prison convicts : it is known that homosexuality is particularly prevalent in prisons, not because natural tendencies but because of "opportunities", or even obligation. Finally, Kinsey considered as homosexual any person who experienced homosexuality during 3 years of his life since 15 years of age. In this category, many are in fact heterosexual males who, in their teenage years, experimented with homosexuality. In short, the Kinsey report is a total imposture, made by a man who was actually in no way a sociologist or a psychologist, but an entomologist, specialist of bees, and who was strongly motivated in his research by his personal values. However, despite the scientific discredit of the 10% figure, the homosexual activists understood that, if they repeat it often enough, it will be accepted by the majority as a fact.

The most recent survey of 3,321 men aged 20 to 39, conducted by the Battelle Human Affairs Research Center in Seattle, found that just 2% had a homosexual experience in the previous decade and only 1.1% described themselves as exclusively homosexual (Family Planning Perspective, 1993)

In France, the 1993 report on Sexual Conducts in France reports that only 4% of men and 2 to 3% of women have had one or more homosexual experience in their life. Most of these, moreover, are not homosexuals, and had only a few of such experiences, usually in their teenage (Les comportements sexuels en France).

One of the great success of the homosexual movement has been won in 1974, when the American Psychiatric Association voted homosexuality out of its list of mental illnesses. It was the 6rst time that a supposedly scientific decision was made by vote. This was the result of continuous arrasment of the APA by a group of homosexual activists over many years. The story of this victory is told by Ronald Bayer, a sympathisant himself to the homosexual movement, in Homosexuality and American Psychiatry : The Politics of Diagnosis (New York, 1981).

Until 1970, the overwhelming majority of psychiatrists believe that homosexuality is a mental illness. Some psychiatrists believed that it had physical causes, like many other mental illnesses. But most of them believed that it was caused by a deviation of the sexual orientation, due to a defect in the psychosexual development. Psychoanalysts, more precisely, always admitted that it was linked to a negative of deficient identification process during early childhood, that is to the failure of the child to find his autonomy and to define his gender identity, in relation with the parents.

Because of this, the homosexual movement accused psychiatry at large to be the - instrument of oppression against them. They declared psychiatry the most dangerous enemy of homosexuals in contemporary society ¯. They voiced wherever they could that psychiatrists' views were racists and repressive, an accusation that the media were quick to support.

They began an intense action to discredit the psychiatrists in 1970, when the APA held its annual convention in San Francisco. During a panel on transsexualism and homosexuality, psychiatrists trying to discuss the subject were constantly disturbed by a group of homosexual activists, who insulted anyone expressing a critical view on homosexuality. Dr. Irwin Bieber, a specialist on the subject, was almost physically attacked. The meeting was adjourned.

The same strategy was repeated at the 1971 convention, when one leader of the homosexual movement declared : Psychiatry has waged a relentless war of extermination against us. You may take this as a declaration of war against you. After much intimidation, the homosexual activists finally won the right to be represented whenever homosexuality was discussed.

Finally, in 1974, they pressured the APA to remove homosexuality from its list of mental disorders¯. It was then proposed to call it a form of irregular sexual development. The news was widely publicized in the headlines : Doctors Rule Homosexuals Not Abnormal¯. Some psychiatrists, however, appealed the decision and asked for a referendum on the question by all members of the APA, which represented several thousands psychiatrists. But the homosexual activists made an intense lobbying effort and wrote a letter to all members, not in their name, but in the name of the APA, asking them to support the decision already made by the APA, less it be discredited in the eyes of the public opinion. They wan their battle, as the members of the APA confirmed the decision by 58% for and 40% against or abstaining.

It must be noted that psychiatrists are not necessarily psychologists, let alone psychoanalysts. They are formed as medical doctors who consider someone sick only if this person complains of some symptoms. If homosexuals claim to feel healthy, they have no reason to say otherwise. But there is a category of psychiatrists who still believe, unanimously, that homosexuality is abnormal : I mean psychoanalysts, who look at people &om the inside and are able to find the unconscious wounds which lie behind homosexual compulsion. There is virtuously no psychoanalyst who regard homosexuality as healthy.

One last remark : the WHO (World Health Organisation) (OMS, Organisation mondiale de la Sant‚) has taken homosexuality off its list of diseases only since january 1st 1993.

When the HIV virus was first discovered, AIDS was primarily an homosexual's disease. That is why the homosexual community took the lead in fighting against it. Sensing that AIDS could be perceived as a judgment against them, especially in a country like America where the Christian foundation is still strong and ideas about the judgment of God widely expressed, the homosexuals actively fought against any attempt to use AIDS as an argument against their way of life. They organized themselves to fight against AIDS in their own ways. Most of the associations dealing with AIDS prevention and care for AIDS patients, such as the famous Act UP, have been founded by homosexuals. These associations, well funded both by government and by the homosexual community, have very strong influence on the public health policy. They dominate the media and the public opinion regarding all issues dealing with AIDS. Their action resulted in two devastating results, both endearing the public health.

The first result of the gay activists lobbying activity was to prevent the establishment of a medical strategy of systematic testing in order to stop the epidemia. Such a strategy, which had proved efficient in stopping the syphilis epidemia in the 1940's and which had successfully been applied for all epidemia, was strongly requested by most medical doctors. Yet, the homosexual movement managed to prevent it, under the pretext that, AIDS being mostly an homosexual disease, systematic testing would equate to homosexual semegation. They argued that such policy would only drive the epidemia underground, by fear of discrimination in the homosexual community. But the real result of not developing such a strategy is that, in most western countries, an estimation of about half of the HIV carriers do not know that they are seropositive and are likely to contaminate others.

In the words of Congressman Wm Dannemayer, author of Shadow in the Land : Homosexuality in America (Ignatius Press, 1989) : In a very real sense the homosexual community was faced with a choice at the moment AIDS first appeared in this country. They could either insist that they be allowed to continue their sexual practices undisturbed by public health officials, or they could submit themselves to the restrictions and procedures historically employed in treating sexually transmitted diseases and give up the idea of absolute sexual freedom, at least until the disease was eradicated. They chose to defend and advance their sexual revolution, even though to do so meant to risk the lives of tens of thousands of their own constituency. (p. 188) And he adds : Their conduct in regard to AIDS is the best evidence yet that those psychologists who believe homosexuality is motivated by self-hatred are surely correct, because, with few exceptions, they seem determined to murder one another in anal death embrace¯. (p. 192)

One example is what happens with the bathhouses in San Francisco. These bathhouses had become well known homosexual meeting places, where hundreds of homosexual intercourses were taking place every night. The city authorities tried to shut down these houses as a health menace, but the decision was opposed by the gay community, and it took years to finally close most of them (Dannemeyer, p. 189).

The second result of the reaction of the homosexual community has been the promotion of condoms as the only defense against AIDS. Since it is well proven that condoms present a very high failure rate, which can be as high as 20%, this policy is clearly murderous. Under the pretext of prevention against AIDS, associations for the prevention of AIDS organized vast sex-education promams in High Schools and Universities. In these programs, they instruct teenagers about all possible sexual behaviors. Clearly, the main objective of these programs is not prevention against AIDS but the promotion of immorality. Reisman and Eichel, authors of Kinsey, Sex and Fraud, rightfully denounce the hypocrisy of these programs : ®Sex-education about AIDS has been the most powerful drive in speeding this task. It has led to perhaps one of the worst hypocrisy of our time : we pretend to give to children an education about safe-sex, whereas in reality we promote a program which encourage them into free-sex, which pushes them to adopt high risk behavior.(Judith A. Reisman et Edward W. Eichel, Kinsey, Sex and Fraud, Huntington House Publishers (P.O. Box 53788 Lafayette, Louisiana, 70505 USA), p. 218)

On February 7th 1994, the European Parliament, in Strasbourg, voted a resolution assimilating the sexual orientation to a fact of birth, like the color of skin or the gender, and asking for the total recognition of homosexuality. It includes the right to marry and to enjoy the same social advantage as heterosexual marriage, and the right to be parent through artificial insemination or through adoption. Such laws already exist in Denmark.

A study realized in France in 1993 reveals that 39% of homosexuals have a desire of children (enquete ralise en Rhone-Alpes par 'Agence franqaise de lutte contre le Sida, Le Quotidien du medecin, 21 decembre 1993). This facts assures us that, unless the trend of laws favorable to homosexuality is reversed, we will soon have many children raised in homosexual couples and homosexual communities. Given the taste of many homosexuals for pedophily, we can fear the worst for these children.

One of the strongest revendication of homosexuals is the right to teach homosexuality and sodomy in schools. Their goal is to be able to freely proselytize among children and teenagers; Already, they are doing it : Project 10 is an active association in Los Angeles which encourages High School students who think they might be gay to attend meetings and explore homosexuality.

Their proselytising extends to young children : The homosexual community has been consistently distributing children's books promoting homosexuality in public schools and public libraries. One of these is called Daddy's Roommate and portrays a child motivated by conscious or unconscious pedophil desires. In France, for example, novelist Michel Tournier, who openly declares his homosexuality, writes many books for children. His latest tells the story of a prince whose fiance is raped. The child conceived by this rapes swears to kill his father. The book contains a series of sexual and physical violence and could be called a book of initiation to sadomasochism (Edition Signe de piste, collection Angus).

In some countries, transsexualism is now recognized. This means that a male homosexual who has, through hormone absorbtion and surgery, acquired a feminine appearance and sense of identity, can change his civil indentity. Gay rights movements are further asking for the reemboursement by the social security of transsexualist surgery. It must be known, however, that transsexuals are, all, without exception, prostitutes who have artificially changed their body not, originally, by a natural desire, but for the purpose of increasing their income.

In most countries, after intense lobbying by the homosexual movement, not only homosexuality has been entirely de-penalized, but the legal age for homosexual relationship has been brought down to the same age as the legal age for heterosexual relationship, that is, in most countries, 15. This age is considered as a kind of "sexual majority", way before the actual majority. A male adult who seduces a 15 year old boy can in no way be charged, even by the parents, unless it can be proved that there has been rape.

On february 21, 1994, the British Parliament lowered the legal age for homosexual activity from 21 to 18. Gay movements, however, were asking it to be lowered to 16, and demonstrated by occupying the House of Parliament in London.

Furthermore, gay rights activists lobby for the legalisation of pedophily. For example, the North American Man-Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) is a registered association of pedophils in America who ask for the legalisation of pedophily. Affirming the Children's Rights, they pretend that little boys have as much right than adults to have homosexual relationships and that society should not repress their natural need for such experiences. Their slogan is : "Sex before eight or it's too late". The NAMBLA regularly appears in Gay Pride Parades.

Wardell Pomeroy, former academic dean of the Institute for the Advanced Study of Human Sexuality in California, and co-author of the famous Kinsey Repport on the sexuality of Americans, proclaims : Incest can be a satisfying, non-threatening, and even an enriching experience¯. (J. Gordon Muir, From Prudery to "Freedom"; A Brief History of the Sexual Revolution, The World and I, pp. 577-97). It is time to recognize that incest is not necessarily a perversion or a form of mental disease, but that it can be sometimes beneficial. And James W. Ramey, American sexologist : Our attitude towards incest today is identical to the reactions of fear towards masturbation a century ago¯. (quoted in Elisabeth Badinter, L'un est I'autre, Odile Jacob, 1986, p. 239) -

When we know the close connection between homosexuality and pedophily, we have reasons to think that child molesting will only increase with the spread of homosexuality. In the US already, the National Center for Missing Children estimates that 1 out of 5 girl and 1 out of 10 boys has been sexually abused before the age of 18 (March Bell, "The case for censorship of pornography", The 8'orId and I, pp. 90-93). In 85% of these cases, the child knows his agressor, who is often a member of the family. In 85% of cases, these crimes are repeated.

Homosexuality is also greatly responsible for the sexual exploitation of countries like Philippines, Brasil, Malaisia, Zaire, Ghana, Vietnam, Kenya, South Corea, where tens of thousands of "tourists" travel every year in order to practice pedophily with prostitute children. Sexual tourism represents 60% of tourist incomes in Thailand, where 200 000 children are kidnapped from their families or sold by them every year to be used as prostitutes.(Le Nouvel Observateur, 11 novembre 1993 ; Marie-France Botte et Jean-Paul Mari, Le Prix d'un enfanf, Laffont, 1993)

There are two kinds of arguments used by homosexuals to justify and promote their life-styles. The genetic argument pretends that homosexuality is biologically determined. This argument belongs to the naturalist or instinctivist theory, which claims that sexuality is like an animal instinct, which is predetermined. The other argument is the exact opposite : it relies on psychoanalysis which has shown that sexual orientation is not innate but acquired. If sexual orientation is acquired through environmental influences and personal choices, homosexuals say, then bot homosexuality and heterosexuality - as well as any sexual orientation - are acquired and therefore equally valid orientations. This argument belongs to culturalism, which views all behaviors as cultural therefore relative and equally acceptable. In the US, the homosexual community has consistently tried to use the genetic argument. However, in Europe, homosexuals disliked that their behavior be reduced to genetically determined instincts. They prefer to rely on the psychoanalytical argument. This situation is a good example of how any theory, when abusively stretched, can be used to justify any behavior. We will discuss those two kinds of arguments.

The genetic argument

There is plenty of evidence that one is not born homosexual in the same way as one is born Black or as one is born woman. We will discuss later of the causes of homosexual tendencies, but let us here briefly analyse the argument that homosexuality is genetically determined. There has been studies trying to prove that homosexuality was linked to different biological conditions, such as abnormal levels of hormones or testosterones. These studies were not widely publicized by the gay rights movement because, if homosexuality has physical causes, it can still be classified as a disease. If it could be proven that it is written in the genes, however, it cannot anymore be called de disease, unless we classify it as a genetic disease, which no-one would dare to do. That is why the genetic theory has been pushed forward by gay activists.

Regularly, some scientific studies appear which try to support this view. Whereas these studies are rarely taken cery seriously by geneticiens at large, they are widely publicized in the medias. The first of these theory was made in 1952 by F.J. Kallman and called : A Comparative Twin Study on the Generic Aspects of Male Homosexuality. Kallman analysed the histories of 37 pairs of identical twins and observed that the twins are, in all cases, either both heterosexual or both homosexual. However, this study has been severely criticized for its unscientific methods. Moreover, it has been answered that the concordance of homosexuality in identical twins can result from intense identification of the twins to one another from early childhood, or &om the fact that they grew up in exactly the same family and social environment. Furthermore, it is not rare that twins who become homosexuals have practices homosexuality together, encouraging each other in the same direction. Finally, if it is true, as many psychoanalysts say, that homosexuality is linked to narcissism, then it is no surprise that twins have a higher risk of becoming homosexuals, since their potential narcissism can easily be projected onto their twin brother or sister.

The latest attempt to prove the genetic theory was in 1993, when the American magazine Science published the result of the research of some scientists in the National Cancer Institute, who report that on 40 pairs of homosexual brothers, 33 share a same sequence of ADN in the chromosome X. This lead those scientist to conclude that homosexuality is transmitted genetically, through the mother since the X chromosome comes from the mother. However, this study can be criticized on two points. First, t is clear that homosexuality depends on a multiplicity of factors and it is very unrealistic to pretend that it can depend on a single chromosomic character, like the color of hair. For example, if homosexuality was genetically determined, why is it that the percentage of homosexuals vary greatly from one country to the other? Secondly, the study does not report if the same chromosomic character is found in pairs of brothers in which one is homosexual and the other one heterosexual.

In conclusion, it can be said that such study is heavily marked by the political and cultural context in the U.S.. The homosexual community needs a scientific justification and widely publicizes any study which supports its view, even if this study is criticized by the scientific community. The same genetic theory as is now applied to homosexuals was, in the past, supported by some scientists who tried to prove that genetic factors determine toxicomania, criminality or, in recent years, schizophrenia and alcoholism. All these theories have finally been discredited, and it is very likely that the theory of genetic of homosexuality will follow the same fate. (Le Monde, 10-11- 93)

The conclusion of some widely known psychiatrists remains untouched. In their authoritative study entitled Human Sexuality, Masters and Johnson affirm (William H. Masters, Virginia E. Brown, and Robert C. Kolodny, Boston, 1984 : The genetic theory of homosexuality has been generally discarded today. {...] Despite the interest in possible hormone mechanisms in the origin of homosexuality, no serious scientist today suggests that a simple cause-effect relationship applies. (pp. 319-20)

George A. Rekers expresses a more open conclusion in ®The Formation of Homosexual Orientation¯, an address before the North American Social Science Network Conference (1987) : At the present time, we may tentatively conclude that the main source for gender and sexual behavior deviance is found in social learning and psychological development variables ... although we should recognize that there remains the theoretical possibility that biological abnormalities could contribute a potential vulnerability in some indirect way.

Those who say that homosexuality is acquired are right, for there is a lot of evidence that the sexual orientation of an individual depends more on early learning processes than of predisposition. Many psychiatrists and psychoanalysts new homosexuality as an acquired condition due to environmental factors. This is the opinion expressed by Wainwright Churchill in Homosexual Behaviorism among Males (New York, 1967) : There are no sexual instincts in man... human sexuality is entirely dependent upon learning conditioning. The individual's pattern of sexual behavior is acquired in the context of his unique xperiences and [is] in no sense innate or inherited (p. 101, cited in Dannemeyer, p. 47) H.C. Resnik and Marvin Wolfgang in Sexual Behaviors : Social, Clinical, and Legal Aspects (Boston, 1972), write : One is normally born with a given sex and the capacity to manifest the sex drive, but the expression of that drive is more intimately related to one's culture and social system than any other drive. (p. 397, cited in Dannemeyer, p.47))

Likewise, Charles Socarides writes in Homosexuality : Basic Concepts and Psychodynamics (in InternationaI Journal of Psychiatry, 10, 1972, pp. 118-25) : Homosexuality, the choice of a partner of the same sex for orgastic satisfaction, is not innate. There is no connection between sexual instinct and choice of sexual object. Such an object choice is learned, acquired behavior ; there is no inevitable genetically inborn propensity toward the choice of a partner of either the same or opposite sex.

Some homosexuals have stretched this observation, originally due to Freud, in order to fit their agenda. They argue that man is, by nature, bisexual, and that it is in teenage that the choice of heterosexuality or homosexuality is done. If most teenagers choose homosexuality, they say, it is partly because of the social pressure and the shame attached to homosexuality. In other words, many people have repressed their natural homosexual desires.

To answer this argument that sexual orientation is totally undetermined by birth, we must remark that the family and social conditions which influence or determine the sexual orientation can be positive or negative. Positive conditions (care, love) lead to heterosexuality whereas negative conditions (neglect, abuse) may lead to homosexuality (see later).

2. Homosexuality is a psycho-sexual deviation

To understand homosexuality, it is important to dispel a certain number of myths spread by homosexuals. One of them is the myth of moral and monogamous homosexual couple. Nothing is further from the truth of homosexuality than the image of an homosexual couple faithful to each other. On the opposite, the compulsion of homosexuals to seek new partners is a sign that homosexuality is linked with personality disorders. The most authoritative study on sexual deviations is a collection of essays edited by British psychiatrist Ismond Rosen, (Sexual Deviation, Oxford, 1979).

Joyce McDougall writes in this book :

Female homosexuality is an attempt to resolve conflict concerning the two poles of psychic identity ; one's identity as a separate individual and one's sexual identity. (p.206)

In the same book, A. Limentani writes : The developement of homosexual attitudes and impulses can and often [is] used as a defense against neurotic and psychotic processes¯. (p. 197)

In the opening essay, Anthony Wakeling, senior lecturer in psychiatry at Royal Free Hospital Medical College of London, summarizes current psychoanalytical theory : It is the persistent and compulsive substitution of some other act for heterosexual and genital intercourse which chiefly characterizes the behavior called sexual deviation (p. 3) He then lists the main types of sexual deviation, in which he includes homosexuality, and argues about them : In contrast to normal sexual behaviour, deviant behaviour is often asociated with stong affects of guilt and hate. Whereas normal sexual behaviour is more likely to occur in a setting of affection and mutual sharing, of equal giving and receiving of pleasure, deviant sexual behaviour frequently occurs without discrimination as to partner, and without consideration to the feelings of others. It appears to be dictated more by neurotic or non-sexual than by erotic needs, which leads to a large element of compulsiveness and risk-taking associated with the behavior. (pp. 3-4) And : As sexuality is intimately interwoven throughout all aspects of personality, it is to be anticipated that deviant sexual behaviour will frequently co-exist with profound personality maladjustment, severe neurotic difficulties, and fears of heterosexuality. (p. 4)

Wakeling is in fact echoing Freud, who considered homosexuality as resulting from the hindered psycho-sexual development, and a psychological regression to infantile needs.

In 1978, the Kinsey Institute published a study conducted by Bell and Weinberg, over a vast sample of homosexual men living in the San Francisco Bay area. They found that : - 43% of them had sex with 500 partners or more, - 28% had sex with 1.000 partners or more, - 79% of them said that over more than half of their sex partners were strangers.

The American Public Health Association Survey reported that 78% of homosexuals surveyed have been infected by sexually transmitted diseases. Moreover, according to the Center for Disease Control, nearly 2/3 of all AIDS cases in the US are directly attributed to homosexual conduct.

A National Lesbian-Gay Health Foundation report revealed that alcohol and drug abuse problems were three times more prevalent among homosexuals than among heterosexuals. This show that homosexuals are driven by many unresolved wounds of the past, leading them into addictive behaviors ("Gays Are More Prone to Substance Abuse", Insight, November 5, 1990).

(This sub-section is taken from psychotherapist Richard Cohen's lectures on homosexuality)

A need for the same-sex parent 's love and for gender identification

In most cases, homosexual thoughts and feelings originated in preadolescent experiences. Therefore, it is basically a non-sexual condition. The homosexual love need is essentially a search for parenting. What the homosexual seeks to fulfill are normal needs for bonding that have been abnormally left unmet in the process of growth. That is, a man is looking for his father's love through other men, and a woman is looking for her mother's love through other women. Therefore, the drive is one of reparation, seeking to heal the unmet love needs of the past. That is why psychotherapist Richard Cohen calls it a "homo-emotional" drive.

However, these deeper emotional love needs can never be fulfilled through sexual relationships. It has been tried, tested and proven that sex never heals nor fulfills the deeper love needs. Only through healthy, healing, non-sexual bonding will true and lasting change occur.

The homosexual feels a lack of masculinity or feminity within him or herself, and seeks to fulfill this need through another man or woman. This came about because of either a distant or a disrupted relationship between father and son, or mother and -- daughter, in early childhood or adolescence.

Gender-identity is an awareness of one's masculinity or feminity. In homosexuals, there is a feeling of inadequacy and incompleteness in the inner essence of their being. Therefore, they search for the missing part of themselves in another person. Through a sexual contact or union with another person of the same sex, they feel, at least momentarily, whole and more complete.

In the case of female homosexuality, she may have been abused either by her father or another man or men in her life. The abuse could have been sexual, emotional, mental or physical. This leaves her deeply traumatized by men. An not wanting to experience the memory of abuse, she turns to women for comfort, love and understanding.

In the case of the male homosexual, there may have been an abnormally close mother- son attachment. In a marriage where the mother's emotional and physical needs are not met by her husband, she may turn to her son for emotional comfort and support.- This generally is not done with conscious intent to hurt, but nonetheless, it has profound and damaging effects upon the psychosexual development of the son. He may overidentify with his mother and feminity and dis-identify with his father and masculinity.

Later in puberty, this son may then experience sexual attraction for his mother, which leads to extreme guilt and repression of a normal sexual drive toward women. He might then turn to men for intimacy and sex, not wanting to "betray" his mother or re-experience his guilt. This process is generally unconscious.

In conclusion, we can say that homosexuality is a psychological reaction to deficient family dynamics and the pain resulting from these deficiencies. There is perhaps no better illustration of this than the famous writer Andre Gide, famous for his homosexuality and for his violent attacks against the family : Familles, je vous hais! Portes ferm‚es, foyers clos!¯ (Families, I hate you! Closed doors, locked homes!).

If we look more deeply into the causes of homosexuality, we can find that they develop in three stages : the root of homosexuality is to be found in early childhood. The second stage begins with puberty, when the "homo-emotional" unmet needs are erotized. The third stage is when the person indulges into an homosexual life-style, beginning a process of dependency on homosexual sex and on the homosexual life- style.

To understand the root causes, some notions of psychosexual development are necessary. The first years of the child's life determine the foundation of his or her personnality. As say the title of a child's education best-seller by Dr Dodson, Everything is determined before six (Tout se joue avant six ans). At this age, the child is entirely dependant on his parents. He develops his or her personnality through a. double process of identification and differenciation with the parents. He begins to define his gender identity. Freud has shoi~® that gender identity is developped through identification with the same sex parents. Later, Erich Erikson has shown that gender identity is also developped through differentiation from the other-sex parent (Identity Crr'sis).

For exemple the boy begins to discover that he is like Daddy and different from Mummy. As he identifies with Daddy, he also wishes to marry Mummy, mostly because this is what Daddy does. The girl, likev;ise, discover that she is like Mummy.

However, many problems can come in this process of identification and differentiation if the parents are immature and do not properly love the child. In order to simplify, we can distinguish four typical phenomena, which are combined in most cases.

When the child is two close to the opposite sex-parent, he may have difficulty to find his identity. This is especially true in the case of a boy with a mother compensating her unmet love need with her child. In order to gain his sense of autonomy and identity, the boy must leave the state of fusion with the mother. If the mother tries, even unconsciously, to keep her child in this state of fusion, the child cannot develop his autonomy and sexual identity. In other words, he cannot build his "ego-boundaries". This is an incestuous type mother-boy bind, described by' Patricia Love in The Emotional Incest Syndrom (1990).

Freud, in his study on Leonardo de Vinci, described the cause of homosexuality as : A very strong erotic attachment to a woman, most of the hme to the mother, attachment encouraged by the exagerated tenderness of the mother herself, and reinforced by the absence of the father from the child's life¯. (quoted in Jacques Corraze, L'homosexualit‚, Paris, PUF, 1982, p. 85)

According to Bieber, 69% of homosexuals had an over-intimate mother. Most of them described her as seducing (s‚ductrice) or castrating (castratrice) (cit‚ dans Corraze, p. 86)

Dr. Gerard van den Aardweg (1987), Marmor (1980), Freud (1910, 1922), Siegelman (1974), Westwood (1960), Schofield (1965), Thompson et al. (1973), and Kronemeyer (1980) have observed that homosexual men had an abnormally close mother-son attachment. In such instances, the male homosexual will later over-identify with his mother and dis-identify with his father.

Dr. Charles Socarides, in his many studies and articles on homosexual development (Homosexuality : Psychoanalytic Theory, Jason Aronson, Inc., 1989), has found that there is a lack of separation/individuation, or differentiation, between the child and parent, which is decisive for gender identification.

An absent mother can cause insecurity, an absent father can cause lack of raw model for the boy. Martensen-Larsen (1957) finds that 4 times more homosexuals than heterosexuals have lost their father before the age of 15. M.T. Saghir et E. Robins (Ma1e and FemaIe Homosexuality, Baltimore, the Williams and Wilkins Company, 1973) make the same remark : 35% d'homosexuels et 46% de lesbiennes ont perdu un parent avant 15 ans, contre seulement 12% des hommes et 7% des femmes heterosexuels. Sources : Bieber, Male Homosexuality, 1988 ; P. Love, The Emotional Incest Syndrome, 1990.

Abuse can create confusion over sexual orientation. An hostile or abusive father will create in his son a reaction of rejection against men. The boy will thing, in his very intuitive mind, "I don't v ant to be like Daddy", and this reaction will be equivalent to "I don't want to be a man", since for the young child, the father represents manhood. It is therefore a rejection of the masculine identity. Such a decision, becoming unconscious because of it is made in early childhood, will later remain as part of the boy's personality.

Saghir and Robins reports that 84% homosexuals all have a negative image of their father (against only 18% in heterosexuals) (cit‚ dans Corraze, p. 87)

Generally a combination of these. Robert Stoller, in his Research on Sexual Identity, has studied boys who show in their early years (between 2 and 3) a sense of being a girl. All these children, he showed, came from a very particular family background : A bisexual mother, feminine only in appearance, sexually neutral, without any interest for sexuality or any attachment to the father of the child, and with a deep sense of incompleteness. An absent father, physically and emotionally, who does not worry to see his son dress as a girl or adopt unusual behaviors. Robert Stoller, Recherches sur I'identit‚ sexuelle, Galimard, 1978, pp. 119-22 (quoted in Elisabeth Badinter, XY de I'idenrit‚ masculine, pp. 69-70) :

Ultimately, the deficience in parental love is rooted in deficience in conjugal love between the parent (e.g., the mother who lacks love from her husband becomes possessive and incestuous). Frank Worthen, Steps out of homosexuality (San Raphael, Ca, Frank Worthen, 1984) : We believe that the deepest roots of homosexuality is a break in the relational bonds within the family, producing a lack of sense of belonging or a lack of affirmation. The security of a child depends on a three-way bond : mother to child, father to child, and the often overlooked and neglected bond of father to mother. Any break in this triangle will produce insecurity in the child. (p. 5)

Saghir and Robins report that most homosexuals have grown up in a family where the parents were fighting often, involving even in violence. Alcoholism is also a common problem in those families. According to Westwood (1960), 40% homosexuals remember their parents's relationship as very bad.

Irving Bieber (et al., Homosexuality, New York, Basic Books, 1962) describs the specific traingular system¯ (syst‚me triangulaire sp‚cifique) which typically leads to homosexuality : L'organisation triangulaire "classique" est celle ou la mere pr‚sente une intimit‚ fortement contraignante, exerce la domination et manifestedes marques d'agression et de d‚valorisation a 1'‚gard d'un ‚poux qui se comporte en pere d‚pourvu d'attachement vis-a-vis de son fils et ce, d'uen faqon particulierement hostile... le chances semblent ‚lev‚es pour qu'un enfant, soumis a une telle relation parentale, devienne homosexuel ou d‚veloppe de s‚rieux problemes de cet ordre¯. (p. 172, cit‚ dans Jacques Corraze, p. 85)

If the child's love needs are not fulfilled, they may be erotized (dominate the awakening of the sexual impulse) during puberty. Particularly, the "homo-emotional" need (for the boy, the need for closeness with a friendly and encouraging father) will be submerged by the awakening of the sexual impulse.

Moreover, in the beginning of adolescence, children tend to prefer being close to friends of the same sex and to avoid the other sex. This is a natural tendency designed to insure that they properly achieve their psycho-sexual development ; at this stage, they seek to find their gender identity and interaction with the other sex may disturb this process. However, to conclude, like some psychologists have done, that teenagers are naturally homosexual at some period, is grossly abusive : their attachment to same sex is not sexual, but simply emotional. However, if the foundation of the psychosexual development in early years has been wrongly established, this emotional need may easily become erotized.

When a person "accepts" his/her homosexual tendency, is "initiated" and adopts homosexual lifestyle, he becomes dependent. Dependency comes when seeking internal fulfillment (love) through external means.

Practicing homosexual intercourse creates addiction. The fact is proven by the case of many prisoners who enter prison without any homosexual tendency but, by opportunity or even obligation, practice homosexuality there : after being released, many continue to indulge in homosexual life. They have become addicted to it.

We must therefore clearly distinguish between homosexual tendency and homosexual conduct. Homosexual activists always try to say that someone who has homosexual desires is homosexual and should therefore live accordingly, but a person with homosexual tendency may choose to fight against his homosexual tendency, have a successful married life, and even overcome completely, with time and support from his wife, his homosexuality. There are numerous exemple of such people : a famous example is the French writer Julien Green.

Difference between homosexual tendency and homosexual life-style

Homosexual activists try to abolish the distinction between homosexual tendency and homosexual lifestyle. Having worked consistently to define homosexuality not as a behavior or a way of life, but as an identity comparable to race or gender, they insist that one is homosexual if one has homosexual desires.

However, this is not the case. Many people have struggled with homosexual desires and fantasies without considering themselves as homosexuals. Many of them have married and are happy husbands and fathers. Over the years, some of them have succeeded in completely overcoming their homosexual desires, usually thanks to the healing power of their spouse's love or/and the help of therapists.

The difference between a person struggling to overcome his homosexual desires and a person surrendering to the temptation is the same as the difference between neurosis and personality disorders.

The possible transition

In the march 1994 issue of their magazine, Focus on the family, an association founded by the Doctor James Dobson, published the testimony of several men and women who have been homosexuals for many years, yet succeeded in overcoming their destructive behaviors and are today happy family men and women with children. Some of these ex-homosexuals and ex-lesbians have founded associations (Exodus International, Desert Stream, Breaking Free Ministries, International Healing Foundation, etc.) dedicated to help those who want to make the same transition as they have made, from homosexuality to heterosexuality. One psychotherapist who was himself a former homosexual, Richard Cohen, has healed hundreds of homosexuals and helped them to transition. To counteract the propaganda made in schools by homosexual movements with such books as Daddy's Roommate and Heather Has Two Mummies, he wrote a book called Alfie's Home depicting the family struggles and sexual abuse leading one child to homosexual feelings and the positive influence which were able to get him out of the temptation of homosexuality. Many other famous psychotherapists, such as Alexander Lowen, founder of bioenergetics or Arthur Janov, founder of the Primal Scream, have demonstrated that behind the homosexual behavior lies deep emotional wounds, and they have helped patients to heal those wounds in many cases.

Role of women

Feminism was the break of women from the bondage of false men. Now that they have gained their freedom, women must heal men and help them recreate themselves as true men, true husbands and true fathers. We are in the middle of a severe crisis of manhood and fatherhood. Women must help men to find their value as men. For women themselves need true men.