The main reason there will be no response to this is simply because there is no appropriate response to this.  Seriously; this is gibberish, and, what’s worse, it’s incredibly destructive gibberish, and it’s very difficult to argue against gibberish.

Just to make it clear, I’m spiritual (though not a “person of faith” according to the standards of the Republican party since I don’t have one male God), and I’m sincerely okay with people using their faith as a comfort, or even hoping for some kind of intervention, but expecting it, demanding it, and abandoning all rational course of action in favor of it, is tragic, and encouraging people to do as much is exploiting their vulnerability.  It’s disgusting.

A bit OT, but here’s what jumped out at me:

As of 2005, [black women] accounted for 64 percent of the more than 126,000 women who were living with HIV/AIDS in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The rate in 2006 of new infections in black women, moreover, was nearly 15 times that in white women—55.7 infections versus 3.8 infections per 100,000 women, respectively—according to the latest data….

Neither the down-low theory nor incarceration theory has been linked by scientific research to HIV/AIDS infections in black women, but “because of how this [disease] is spreading through heterosexual black women, both of those discussions are plausible,” Fields says.

It’s troubling that we have a population with such a high rate of new infection but have yet to figure out why this is happening. If ever there was a research priority, this would be it.

The main reason there will be no response to this is simply because there is no appropriate response to this.

I don’t believe that for a moment, actually. Folks respond to lots of outrage and disbelief at “gibberish”—it’s a matter of being able to see the connection to the larger issues that everyone cares about and/or identifies with. I doubt you’d see a dearth of comments about a post on a church, pundit or fundie organization that uses bogus gibberish propaganda to curtail reproductive freedom. It happens all the time.

All I’m saying is that it is, in fact, a challenge for all of us to move beyond comfort zones, as I’ve seen both on my blog and here. And there is no one who is immune to that.

It’s troubling that we have a population with such a high rate of new infection but have yet to figure out why this is happening. If ever there was a research priority, this would be it.

I recommend reading my post on the Black In America series CNN did not long ago. I go into detail about how the dance around HIV/AIDS and homosexuality silences way too many people on the matter. Phill Wilson of the Black AIDS Institute, who was interviewed for the special, had this to say:

As part of its episode exploring “Black Women & Family,” which will air again Saturday, the series highlighted the epidemic’s impact among Black women. Today, Black women account for 64 percent of all women living with HIV/AIDS. Behind this startling statistic stand real lives and heroic struggles to live with this virus. CNN’s special bravely highlighted these lives by profiling Marvelyn Brown, the author of a new memoir entitled The Naked Truth, and will increase the pressure upon policymakers, funders and community leaders to take action to reverse this ugly trend.

...[T]he special fails to explore HIV’s devastating impact among Black gay and bisexual men. In one significant federal study, researchers found that 46 percent of the Black gay and bisexual men they tested in seven major cities were HIV positive. That infection rate makes America’s Black gay and bisexual men among the hardest hit populations on the planet. That’s a story that must be told if we are to do something about it.

CNN’s special also fails to examine the real energy erupting today in Black America to fight this epidemic. For years, we’ve talked about what Black America has done wrong-and too many of us have indeed waited far too long to mobilize. But that unfortunate history is changing every day. Black families, ministers, civil rights leaders, celebrities, elected officials and people from all walks of life are stepping up to lead the fight against AIDS in our community.

I also recommend this post by National Black Justice Coalition’s chief executive officer, H. Alexander Robinson, “CNN and the invisible black man.”

How this devastation is not front page news says a lot about our country’s priorities.

Thank you for the links.

[T]he play “features the religious church mother, the money hungry deacon, the financially strapped college student that is having an affair with the deacon, the choir member that lives an alternative lifestyle, the members that are in love with the pastor, the ‘down-low brother’ that’s hooked on pornography, and the playboy minister of music.”

what is this, trapped in the closet?

These people have already prayed away their common sense.  The fact that they thing that they can pray away the gay is an important issue and should be addressed loud and often.  If being gay is a choice, something that people can be talked out of, or prayed away from, then they don’t have to treat gay people as equal under the law.  If gay people want to marry they should go down to the church and get the gay prayed away and then marry a member of the opposite sex.  If gay people don’t want to be beaten up by gangs of skinheads and roving bands of Christians, or maybe burned at the stake like the faggots they are they only have to pray, and poof…NO MORE POOF.  Right?

Imagine if someone proposed praying for automobile maintenance, suggesting if you prayed, regular upkeep on your car would be unnecessary.  These people are just as insane, but the mainstream media tiptoes around them, afraid to incur the wrath of the right wing.  Lets all go down to church and pray for our college football teams.  They won’t even have to play the games, the results will be pre-determined by prayer.

How crazy do these people have to get?

The gay rights issue is a human rights issue, not a sexual issue.  A person’s sexual orientation is of no concern to you or me, to anyone but themselves and their partner in fact, especially not the government.  A person shouldn’t be denied equal protection under the law because he or she likes to masturbate a lot in private, or because they like to dress as sailors before having sex, or for any other reason, sexual or otherwise.  The right wing needs enemies though, and gay men, unless they’re closeted rightwingers and pregnant women who might choose abortion are easy enemies.  They have no problem calling out young pregnant women like Jamie Spears and accusing their parents of neglect.

If it’s a Republican woman running for Vice President though, somehow her daughters pregnancy is holy and shouldn’t be questioned.  The double standard among these people is beyond belief.

they believe that God heals it, question answered, problem solved, and anyone who questions it just doesn’t have faith

This is the thing I don’t get since I come from a Catholic background—we were taught that God is not a magic wish-dispensing machine.  Sometimes you ask for things and He says, “No.”  Even if you’re really, really sincere and really pray with all of your heart to get what you want, sometimes the answer is “no.”

Crazy Protestants ...

A little ot:

I have a question on the “ex-gay” thing. Is it wrong to think that there are in fact people who once idenfitied as gay and then no longer identify as gay? I dont believe in a straight/gay binary and think that there are people who fit at many points between those two. Seems logical to me that at one point in their lives, for whatever reason, they might identify as wholely gay and then at a later point change how they feel as they learn about themselves and identify themselves as bi or whatever other label they choose. Is it wrong to think that?

Is it wrong to think that there are in fact people who once idenfitied as gay and then no longer identify as gay? I dont believe in a straight/gay binary and think that there are people who fit at many points between those two.

The problem is usually that you have people who are bisexual who decide that only having heterosexual relationships magically makes them straight, instead of bi.  I think it’s probably pretty rare to have someone who’s completely hetero at one point in their lives and then completely gay at another point.  They were probably at a middle point in the spectrum to begin with.

The thing that bugs me about these people is that they always claim to be “cured” and then admit that they struggle with their “bad” gay urges every day.  So it’s not really much of a cure, is it, if you still feel that way?

I’m with Mnemosyne on this.
It seems that these people just split off parts of themselves. As long as they aren’t acting upon their desires they don’t identify as Gay and but see themselves as Christians who are tormented and tempted by ‘demonic spirits of homosexuality’ and are fighting the good fight.
I do find myself at a loss as to how to deal with people who seem to have almost medieval psychologies. They reject an identity that from my perspective is more whole and integrated for one that is fundamentally sundered. Then, if they become infected with HIV while possessed by this ‘spirit’ they are led to believe that they can be magically cured if they repent.

Why is it that the CDC is careful to point out that the black men at greatest risk are gay, while failing to likewise specify that the black women at greatest risk are *heterosexual*?  That last bullet point should read:  “Among heterosexual women, blacks had the highest rate of infections, 56 per 100,000. The rate for white women was 3.8. For Latinas, it was 14.4.” 
It ain’t lesbians that are at sexual risk for HIV or AIDS.

Is it wrong to think that there are in fact people who once idenfitied as gay and then no longer identify as gay?
The key word is “identify.” The more we learn about the chemical basis for sexual attraction (and really, the more we listen to other people’s sexual experiences), the more we have to admit that there is no such thing as “straight” or “gay” except within the context of our (nominally) monogamous culture. The fact is that each person is attracted to a varying degree to men and women. There are people that are attracted to one sex, attracted to both, and even some that are attracted to neither. Speaking as a biologist who has observed some of the strangest reproductive behaviors I could imagine, I would guess that there are also people whose levels of attractions have changed as they’ve grown older.

The problem occurs when one is a) bigoted or b) dishonest. To say that preferring one’s own sex is immoral or “objectively disordered” is bigoted. To say that one is an “ex-gay” because one is now in a heterosexual relationship but still having “urges” is dishonest.

The college needs to get out real information to the kids to combat this. I would be completely freaked out as a parent if I thought my kids didn’t think condoms were important because they could pray HIV away.

Well, okay, I wouldn’t raise any child gullible enough to fall for that in the first place. But I’m still upset because I know there are people who are raised to be that gullible, and their lives matter, too.

If being gay is a choice, something that people can be talked out of, or prayed away from, then they don’t have to treat gay people as equal under the law.

Which is a very curious attitude, when you think about it, considering that being an evangelical Christian is definitely a choice, something that people can be talked out of, or prayed away from—and yet you don’t find any of these people suggesting that evangelical Christians don’t have to be treated as equal under the law . . .

Thank you for the responses, makes a lot of sense. I would agree that it is probably rare for someone to identify as 100% gay and 100% straight within their lifetimes but I think it does happen. I see the problems shifting sexuality creates in our culture and its a shame that it all has to get so tied up in being “cured” or something like that. I just find it frustrating that if someone identifies as gay and that person gains some degree of fame, if they stop identifying as gay they get attacked from both sides for either “proving” that being gay is a choice or “proving” they were never really gay in the first place. 

“If being gay is a choice”- This is where I get myself in a lot of trouble in various circles. I don’t even know how to fully define gay since I believe the percentage of people who are for lack of a better term 100% gay is pretty low, in the single digits. In my circle of friends there are people who have flowed back and forth, have grabbed different labels over time and have made the choice to identify as gay and then later on made a choice to identify as bi or even asexual. In that way being gay can be a choice, as far as it relates to choosing a socially acceptable label, not as to how it pertains to love/sex/being. the labels, as usual, fail us but the debate is framed around them.

Thanks again for the responses, lots to chew on.

Well, realistically in the grand scheme of issues relevant to this election and governance of a country that is strong and competitive and knows how to use its power on the world stage, ruminating on the spread of HIV/AIDS in the black community is rather low on the priority list.

How stupid can you get?  One idiot after another attacking religious jackasses because they think they can pray gays out of being gay.  The same batch of idiots then attack republicans as the root cause of HIV/AIDs? 
How about this, condoms protect equally…try one on before you root like at each other like pigs.

As to the numbers and sexual orientations, I’d say we call that surveying. Surveys tend to disaggregate the population being scrutinized. Not a hard concept to follow.