| Kinsey
Rehabilitation?
by Michael Flach
The
rift between Hollywood and mainstream American values was never
more evident than during the recent presidential election. Actors
and musicians heaped mounds of criticism upon President Bush and
other political candidates who had the temerity to speak out against
abortion, same-sex unions and fetal stem-cell research.
Voters who did not follow the Hollywood party line were labeled
"religious fanatics" and "idiots" because they
refused to condone a permissive sexual lifestyle. Hollywood is attempting
to canonize one of the "fathers" of the sexual revolution,
researcher Alfred Kinsey, with today's national release of the movie
Kinsey. Kinsey's pseudo-scientific studies about the supposed sexual
habits of American men and women have been used to shape laws and
school curriculums for generations.
The
movie features a star-studded cast, including Academy Award-winning
actor Liam Neeson, John Lithgow and Timothy Hutton. The movie's
supporters have called it "provocative," "erotic"
and the "hottest script in town." The USCCB Office for
Film & Broadcasting has classified it L (for a limited adult
audience) "because it contains graphic sexual situations that
even adults would find troubling."
The film portrays Kinsey as a dedicated scientist
whose research was sound. The viewer is left with the impression
that his data came from interviews with a cross-section of Americans.
In reality, Kinsey's data about adult sexuality came from
prisoners and pedophiles.
"The movie portrays the life and work of a
man who was almost single-handedly responsible for dismantling many
of the sexual mores that governed American culture for two centuries,"
said Matthew Pinto, one of the founders of the lay-run initiative,
Catholic Outreach.
Pinto's group has released a 96-page book
written by Catholic journalist Susan Brinkman entitled The Kinsey
Corruption: An Exposé on the Most Influential "Scientist"
of Our Time. The book is based on 20 years of research by Dr. Judith
Reisman, a leading Kinsey critic. It points out the distortions
and presents the truth that is left untold by the film and offers
another view on the man who is lionized in the controversial movie.
Catholic Outreach says the film's writer and director
leaves out critical facts about Kinsey's real life and portrays
him as a visionary who helped free popular culture from its repressed
sexuality. The truth is that Kinsey was instrumental in bringing
about the widespread acceptance of perversity and immorality that
exists today.
"Kinsey is an effort to rehabilitate a 'father'
of the hellish sexual revolution who has been discredited because
of his debauched lifestyle and the misinformation he spread about
sex," said Morality in Media President Robert Peters, who recently
previewed the film in New York.
"In Kinsey's mind, religion and morality
were the hated enemies that stand in the way of sexual freedom.
Kinsey's father is the predominant religious figure in the
film, and with the exception of one scene, he is stereotypically
portrayed as overly strict, mean spirited and anti-sex."
Peters said the film gives the impression that sexual
deviations of all kinds, especially homosexuality, are widespread.
"Kinsey thought that very few people were totally heterosexual;
and in one scene, the film depicts Kinsey as saying that his own
sexuality had changed from primarily heterosexual to bisexual. This
undermines the lie that sexual orientation cannot be influenced
by environment, an environment that includes endless promotions
of homosexuality in the secular media."
To order copies of Brinkman's book, call 1-888-488-6789
or visit www.CatholicOutreach.com.
Michael
F. Flach is editor of the Arlington Catholic Herald, where this
article first appeared.
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