Focus on the Family’s founder, fundamentalist christian leader, and self-described moral values warrior, James Dobson broke the eighth commandment this last week in a big way (via Media Matters):
Psychologist Carol Gilligan and Dr. Kyle Pruett, the two researchers cited by Focus on the Family chairman James C. Dobson in his December 12 (previously dated December 10) Time magazine guest column arguing that same-sex parenting is harmful to children, have both accused Dobson of misusing their research. As Media Matters for America previously noted, Dobson made unfounded assertions in the column about gay and lesbian parenting while appearing to distort “social-science evidence” to claim “that children do best on every measure of well-being when raised by their married mother and father.” […]
On December 14, Time.com posted an online rebuttal to Dobson, “Two Mommies or Two Daddies Will Do Fine, Thanks,” written by Family Pride executive director Jennifer Chrisler, in which Chrisler noted that “when asked about his use of her research” Gilligan “stated emphatically that its inclusion constitutes ‘a complete distortion of my work’ and went on to say that there is nothing in her research that would support Dobson’s stated conclusions.” Additionally, on December 14, the weblog Truth Wins Out posted a letter that Gilligan reportedly sent to Dobson in which she accused Dobson of distorting her research:
I am writing to ask that you cease and desist from quoting my research in the future. I was mortified to learn that you had distorted my work this week in a guest column you wrote in Time Magazine. Not only did you take my research out of context, you did so without my knowledge to support discriminatory goals that I do not agree with. What you wrote was not truthful and I ask that you refrain from ever quoting me again and that you apologize for twisting my work.
[…]
Finally, there is nothing in my research that would lead you to draw the stated conclusions you did in the Time article. My work in no way suggests same-gender families are harmful to children or can’t raise these children to be as healthy and well adjusted as those brought up in traditional households.
I trust that this will be the last time my work is cited by Focus on the Family.
Pruett also accused Dobson of “cherry-pick[ing]” his research. As Media Matters previously noted, Dobson cited Pruett’s book Fatherneed: Why Father Care Is as Essential as Mother Care for Your Child (Random House, 2001), to argue against same-sex child-rearing by asserting that children need a father because “[a] father, as a male parent, makes unique contributions to the task of parenting that a mother cannot emulate.” As Truth Wins Out noted December 14, responding to Dobson’s column, Pruett stated:
I was startled and disappointed to see my work referenced in the current Time Magazine piece in which you opined that social science, such as mine, supports your convictions opposing lesbian and gay parenthood. I write now to insist that you not quote from my research in your media campaigns, personal or corporate, without previously securing my permission.
You cherry-picked a phrase to shore up highly (in my view) discriminatory purposes. This practice is condemned in real science, common though it may be in pseudo-science circles. There is nothing in my longitudinal research or any of my writings to support such conclusions. On page 134 of the book you site in your piece, I wrote, “What we do know is that there is no reason for concern about the development or psychological competence of children living with gay fathers. It is love that binds relationships, not sex.”
That’s our Dobson. No lie is too big if it helps him spread the word that gays and lesbians should be discriminated against, despised and shunned. The ends justify the “moral values” means, I guess.
Jesus said we should love our neighbor as we love ourselves. I suspect James Dobson has never met a liberal, homosexual, transgendered person or non-fundamentalist Christian that he could call his neighbor. I think Jesus needs to have a little talk with him about his shortcomings, don’t you? And this time little Jamie “Kids Should be Whipped if They’re Bad” Dobson needs to pay attention, for a change.
James Dobson
Does that mean that they routinely publish articles in their guest column w/out fact checking?
Probably, but only if you’re a Republican.
You beat me to it, Olivia. That was my first thought on reading this. It’s no surprise that Dobson et al lie — that’s what they do for a living. But what in hell is Time doing giving space to this con artist, and why would they totally fail in their duty to do at least the level of fact checking that would be expected of a high-school yearbook.
The authors of the research did the first step in confronting Dobson. The second, and much more important step, is to demand a public apology, explanation, and retraction from Time, which, older readers might recall was once thought to have some degree of credibility. Did I miss the news that Time was bought out by Murdoch or the Reverend Moon?
Research and news journals cannot afford to have their credibility questionned. If it is shown that they have failed in their fact checking, it tarnishes all their published material.
Apparently, a commanding ideology, not the Commandments, is predominant in Dobson’s sensibility.
He’s as lost as the loneliest errant sheep.
One more reason to be glad I cancelled my Time subscription after the ‘Coultergist’ cover several years ago.
And who isn’t wondering when Dobson is going to get caught in yet another gay sexcapade…and I wouldn’t doubt if it also might not involve a little s/m to boot.(no pun intended with the boot image)
People like him scare the crap outa me, just looking at him gives me the creeps.
I’ve often had the impression that Dobson’s writings would never be able to pass muster in a peer-review journal – what you cite above is one piece of evidence for why. Dobson would no doubt claim that scientific psychology is “biased” but that’s not the problem: it’s his failure to write in a scholarly manner. Misrepresenting others’ work is poor scholarship on his part.
As for Time, I guess I’m not that surprised that they’d publish his tripe. After all, Dobson is a big name, and big names sell magazines. I also imagine that the editorial process is a bit less rigorous for opinion pieces such as Dobson’s if for no other reason than the Time editorial staff is less likely to have the expertise in, say, developmental or clinical psychology to make a sound judgment about the accuracy of Dobson’s article.
but I know when we request opinion pieces we still fact check the articles using the references they quote in the article — especially one that is stating something so controversial
The difficulty with Dobson is that he takes legitimate findings of Pruett and Gilligan e.g. kids with two parents generally do better than kids with one parent (Pruett); and men typically interact differently than women with their children (Gilligan). Big whoop, hardly surprising results. However, he doesn’t stop there, but gives readers the impression that P & G are therefore drawing conclusions that indicate gay parents are bad for kids.
That is taking their work out of context. Neither Pruett’s nor Gilligan’s research focuses on gay or lesbian households (such households are hard to recruit for research studies because they are not common). They have studied predominately the kind of parents who most commonly volunteer for research, because their numbers are so great: heterosexual persons.
Neither of these two fine scholars is trying to study or make statements that compare children raised by gay or lesbian parents (whether single parents or in two parent families) to “traditional” 2 parent families or to straight single parents.
Dobson’s distortion is in how he took actual statements of theirs, legitimate results of their research, and applies it to fit his political aims.
I don’t think Time is necessarily guilty of failing to check facts – Time could have done so. They would find statements essentially like what he was paraphrasing in Pruett and Gilligan’s work. What they would not have found is those statements being based on studies of gay vs. straight parents! His writing, of course, makes it sound like Gilligan and Pruett are supporting his bigoted conclusions, which they certainly are not.
Time is guilty of giving valuable space and access to a rabidly bigoted person who misconstrues scientific evidence for his own purposes.