During the Chick-fil-A "controversy and the subsequent shooting at the Family Research Council, Fox News provided full support for FRC's president's constant whining about the unfairness of the Southern Poverty Law Center's charge that they are a hate group. Missing from the Fox Amen Corner was any mention of the reason for the SPLC designation; i.e. the denigration of the gay community with lies, chief among them being the bogus connection between homosexuality and pedophilia. But to his credit, Bill O'Reilly interviewed SPLC president Mark Potok who was allowed to explain the reason for the hate group label. And to his discredit, O'Reilly validated the FRC's homophobic lies. In other words, O'Reilly put the period in the Fox News sentence about how awful it is that the FRC is being persecuted by these evil libruls when the FRC is just telling it like it is. And why would O'Reilly disagree with the FRC, when he believes that "clustered gays" at ballparks are "inappropriate!"
O'Reilly (August 27) reinforced the meme, articulated on the other shows, that the FRC is just a nice, Christian "family values" group. In summarizing what he felt was the group's purpose, he presented the defense. He said that the FRC is "a Christian organization with an obligation to love our neighbor, including our neighbors who experience same-sex attractions" who "believe sexual acts between persons of the same sex are objectively harmful to those who choose to engage in them and to society at large. In addition to being forbidden by scripture." In response to O'Reilly's question about whether they are a hate group for those beliefs, Potok said that the FRC "lies about scientifically known facts about the LGBT community."
O'Reilly then read an FRC statement which claimed that "It is undisputed that the percentage of child sex abuse cases that are male-on-male is far higher than the percentage of adult males who are homosexual." Professor Bill explained that the FRC is "pointing out that in this area there is a higher percentage of GAY PEDOPHILIA, HOMOSEXUAL PEDOPHILIA, than heterosexual pedophila." He asked if the FRC is a hate group for pointing that out. Potok said that this is a "false allegation" and noted that the FRC said that gays are "fundamentally incapable of being good parents." O'Reilly, as Senator Al Franken used to say, then pulled his facts straight from his ass. In continuing to defend the FRC he said that "I think the statistics are, I could be wrong but we'll get them, are that the male-boy pedophilia problem is much more intense than the male-girl pedophilia problem." Potok explained that those who molest children are not interested in adults. O'Reilly agreed but then, once again, made the false claim "that the same sex thing is more dominant than the other."
The data, that Bill is going to "get," clearly does not support Bill's and the FRC's claim that the "same sex thing is more dominant." The Rape, Abuse, Incest, National Network (RAINN) notes that 7% of girls in grades 5-8 and 12% of girls in grades 9-12 said they had been sexually abused and 3% of boys grades 5-8 and 5% of boys in grades 9-12 said they had been sexually abused. A fact sheet from theUniversity ofNew Hampshire states that "It is well known that many more girls than boys are the victims of sexual abuse. This statistic is confirmed regardless of the information that is used. Across different types of research—all reliable studies conclude that girls experience more sexual abuse than do boys. Studies have found that the percent of victims who are female range from 78% to 89%." While the victims of pedophile Catholic priests were mostly male, that is because the priests had far more access to young boys than girls who were also molested by priests. As documented in the research the "same sex thing" just doesn't hold up in the general population.
But even though Bill agreed that sexual orientation has nothing to do with pedophilia, he still characterized male on male pedophilia as "Gay" and "Homosexual" pedophilia and that's so not helpful. But he says that he'll "get" the research, for which I've given him a head start, on the "same sex thing. Wonder when he'll get back to us. I'm not holding my breath.
(2019 update: Video available at Mediaite)