Tuesday, August 28, 2012

If liberals are so opposed to junk science, then why do they appeal to it themselves?

It's hard to know what to say about a political movement whose advocates seem to spend half their time condemning conservatives for touting junk science, and the other half engaged in starry-eyed adulation of a woman who was a vocal advocate of eugenics and a scientist who apparently collaborated with child molesters in conducting his questionable research.

Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, and Alfred Kinsey, the scientific father of the sexual revolution, are patron saints of liberalism, and still provide its advocates with inspiration and comfort.

That is one of the reasons why their reaction to the controversial remarks of Republican U. S. Senate candidate Todd Akin on rape is important: It gives us some hope that liberals themselves may some day be ready to abandon their own penchant for promoting junk science.

In fact, the next time your favorite liberal Democrat tells you how indignant he is about Todd Akin's remarks on rape, just ask him how he feels about the Kinsey Reports. When he starts mumbling and shuffling his feet, just shake your head, pat him on the shoulder, and walk away.

Akin, the Republican nominee for the U. S. Senate from Kansas, had told a radio interviewer that victims of "legitimate rape" rarely get pregnant, a position he had apparently derived from bogus scientific research. The result was a firestorm of protest from liberals and calls from members of his own party to step down from his position of standard-bearer for his part in the Kansas senate race.

The cries and lamentations from liberals and Democrats were deafening, a stark contrast to the tranquil confidence with which, for decades, they have parroted their own questionable research.

What Alfred Kinsey claimed to have found
In fact, unlike Akin, who has disavowed his remarks, liberals have yet to repudiate Alfred Kinsey, whose two reports, "Sexual Behavior in the Human Male" and "Sexual Behavior in the Human Female" together constitute the central scientific document of the sexual revolution. Not only that, but they still quote these documents, which contain a slough of suspect assertions, grounded in research methodology that have been repeatedly called into question by critics as being not only unreliable, but unethical.

The Kinsey Reports, released in 1948 an 1953, were the documents upon which the American advocates of sexual liberation based their entire social project. Kinsey, the author of the reports, was a zoologist at Indiana University, where the Kinsey Institute is still housed.

Kinsey claimed to have found that, rather than traditional divisions between heterosexual and homosexual, there was a much larger continuum across which people could be categorized and that homosexuality was much more common than most people thought. The report became the basis for the claim that homosexuals constituted 10 percent of the population.

Kinsey also claimed to have found that 50 percent of men and over 26 percent of women had had extra-marital sex; that 12 percent of females and 22 percent of males were attracted by sado-masochistic images; that between 67 and 98 percent of males and 50 percent of females had had premarital sex; and that 69 percent of white males had had at least one encounter with a prostitute.

And this was in the 1940s and 50s.

The apparent intention of the Kinsey Reports, an intention which played out in American society in the 60's and 70's and which still plagues us today, was the breakdown of traditional sexual restraints and the normalization of what had always been considered deviant sexual behavior. The reports and their popular treatment in the liberal media had a sort of bandwagon effect:: Everybody was doing these things, therefore, they must be normal.

The Kinsey Reports continue to be a touchstone for liberal beliefs on sexuality and are still appealed to in arguments for sex education in schools (an important rite in the liberal theology). In fact, a hagiographical movie about Kinsey, release in 2004, was the recipient of numerous awards conferred by Kinsey's Hollywood admirers.

What was wrong with Kinsey's research
As it turned out, Kinsey's claims were based on a sample that included a high percentage of prisoners and prostitutes. Other aspects of the sampling have been questioned, such as the categorization of married couples, which included, strangely, prostitutes who lived with their pimps. The methodology Kinsey used in one of the reports was condemned by the American Statistical Association the year it came out. Statistician John Tukay remarked, "A random selection of three people would have been better than a group of 300 chosen by Mr. Kinsey." It was also criticized at the time by the likes of Abraham Maslow. But that didn't stop the liberal establishment from uncritically parroting the report's prognostications for decades.

Kinsey tried to minimize the seriousness of child molestation and--what is interesting given the liberal reaction to Akin--rape. But even worse, Kinsey apparently collaborated with child molesters and possibly encouraged sexual molestation himself in gaining data on the sexual inclinations of children. There have even been charges that Kinsey paid people to molest children. All of which was apparently considered acceptable, since these "researchers" had note pads and stopwatches.

Calls for investigations into how Kinsey got his data have been stonewalled by the Kinsey Institute. "Stonewalled." Get it?

So the next time you hear a liberal uttering maledictions about Akin--or casting aspersions against Mark Regnerus for his unflattering findings on gay parenting--ask him why he has been singing hosannas to Kinsey. Prepare to be underwhelmed.

11 comments:

Singring said...

So the best - the *best* - angle you can think of to attack liberals on their scientific credentials is Alfred Kinsey, who published in the 50s? And the only way you can think of attacking liberals via Kinsey is to assert that liberals today 'still cite' Kinsey (whether they do so uncritically or even approvingly you don't mention - hmmmm, I wonder why?) without giving a simple example of - say - a liberal politician (since we are contrasting this to Akin, right?) who cites Kinsey to support his or her point?

Nor do you include any references save an unsourced Tukay (not 'Tukay') quote to support any of your rather drastic claims regarding Kinsey's conduct and supposedly flawed data.

For example, I would really like to know where you got this claim:

'But even worse, Kinsey apparently collaborated with child molesters and possibly encouraged sexual molestation himself in gaining data on the sexual inclinations of children. There have even been charges that Kinsey paid people to molest children.'

Meanwhile we have Republicans - elected, high-ranking Republicans - claiming today, not in the 50s, today, that 99 % of climate scientists are wrong and that climate change is a hoax (Akin among them).

We are talking about the party for which three Republican hopefuls raised their hand on national television in answer to the question of whether they don't believe in evolution.

America has become the laughing stock of the Western world when it comes to science, and trust me - it has nothing to do with Alfred Kinsey's character or his outdated and flawed research.

Anonymous said...

"America has become the laughing stock of the Western world when it comes to science..." Is there any way we can build another Berlin Wall and place it along our entire Eastern seaboard? As the Flying Burrito Brothers once sang..The scientists say it will all wash away, but we don't believe anymore..."

Martin Cothran said...

Singring,

So you're willing to repudiate Kinsey?

Singring said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Singring said...

'So you're willing to repudiate Kinsey?'

What kind of a ridiculous question is that?!

I've never even advocated Kinsey!

You know why?

Because I've never had any interest in Kinsey. Not all liberals obsess about the sexual urges and love-lives of others as Republicans seem to these days.

I am happy to 'repudiate' any and all parts of his research that are methodologically flawed - unfortunately, since you still haven't supplied *any* citations to support your claims as to the reliability of his data or conduct - I can't really check how reliable your accusations are, can I?

As I said- I've never had any interest in Kinsey. I couldn't care less what people do in their bedrooms as long as its consensual and there are no children involved.

So, contrary to your allegations of liberal 'Hosanna-ing' of Kinsey, I have never even looked into his research. If, for whatever reason, I wanted to look into sexual orientation or practice etc. I would look up *current* research on the issue.

It kind of fits with the program here that you attack science that is about 60 years past the times to try and make your point.

I know my disinterest in Kinsey must be a disappointment with you being so convinced that liberals spend their nights reading Kinsey under their bedsheets and all, but I can't help that.

Singring said...

Oh, and need I point out the irony that you just recently proudly posted on an article that claimed there was a link between homosexual marriage and problems in child development - an article which was almost immediately disputed 14 by the scientific community at large for its flawed methodology?

Anonymous said...

Don't you just love it when scientists sit in awe like trained seals when non-scientist Al Gore (who did flunk out of Divinity School) issues forth with tortuously long slide shows babbling about hockey sticks and polar bears and the end of the world because he says so. He's the secular version of the crazy preacher on the corner with the sign which says the end is near.

KyCobb said...

Climate skeptic Richard Muller just conducted an exhaustive study of the data, and concluded that not only was global warming was real, but that human activity was the best explanation. He never sat in awe of Al Gore.

Martin Cothran said...

Singring,

America has become the laughing stock of the Western world when it comes to science

Do you see any irony in someone making proclamations about becoming the laughing stock of the world in science who has himself made the claim that squirrels can pop into existence out of nothing?

Singring said...

'Do you see any irony in someone making proclamations about becoming the laughing stock of the world in science who has himself made the claim that squirrels can pop into existence out of nothing?'

So your citations to verify that Kinsey's research is flawed are...a bad argument regarding quantum theory that I made a long while ago which I retracted and corrected within a few posts of making it (anyone can check that out for themselves here on the blog archives)?

Darn it! And here I was, ready to 'repudiate' Kinsey!

Like I said - typical.

Ioannes Augustus said...

'Akin, the Republican nominee for the U. S. Senate from Kansas, had told a radio interviewer that victims of "legitimate rape" rarely get pregnant, a position he had apparently derived from bogus scientific research.'

Not to get too picayune here, but Akin is from Missouri and said so in a TV interview with St. Louie's Charlie Jaco.

But I wonder what you make of this article defending Akin at American Vision: http://americanvision.org/6278/legitimate-political-gang-rape/#.UD3zncFlRtg

There appears to be solid scientific evidence that the stresses of such an attack would make ovulation less likely and would also present a higher risk of miscarriage. This, combined with the random nature of such attacks (there are at most a few days every month when a woman is fertile and capable of conception) means that Akin was correct at least in some sense that pregnancy from rape is rare for solid biological reasons.

I appreciate your posts on this and other topics, Mr. Cothran.