Post by Nutcase on Mar 2, 2009 23:51:54 GMT -5
Part I: In which God is totally outraged, I tells ya!
In 2006, Oklahoma Christian University, which requires all its students to take an introductory psychology class as a condition or graduation, introduced a new 100-level textbook into the course curriculum.
A small band of holy warriors got their hot little hands on this book, which is called Psychology: Core Concepts - 5th Edition, and decided it would be a danger to young, innocent college students.
Five of these warriors, presumably under the supervision of evangelist Aiden Humphrey, got together and produced a 20 000-word treatise on the evils of psychology, secular humanism, homosexuality, and whatever else they could throw in without sacrificing brevity.
They sent the whole hairy-nut salad to the president of OCU, as well as several faculty members, in a bid to have Core Concepts pulled from the class syllabus. And the book was removed, quite possibly because OCU faculty feared how mere physical contact with any more letters from Humphrey and his mother-in-law would rot their brains.
Not content merely with traumatizing the staff at OCU, however, Humphrey and his peeps then placed their book review on the web as a warning to others: wisdomfromtheword.blogspot.com (Yar, she totally blows!)
Their comments were so vituperative and their claims so outrageous that I had to see this text for myself.
Turns out their criticisms are filled with factual errors, unsupported assumptions, and mischaracterizations.
While I’ve tried to maintain the “integrity” of their text, even while interjecting my own findings, I was forced to cull many of their comments lest my critique become a novel in its own right.
I left their spelling exactly as I found it.
Anyway, Humphrey began his crusade with a letter to the OCU president. Here’s part of it:
The OCU got a long, long, loooong manifesto from that grab-bag of fruit-loops and decided, as a result, to substitute this particular psychology textbook with another much the same.
(But it's a victory of sorts, I guess, in the same way as a monkey might see himself as victorious after splattering his handler with feces.)
The Bible! Is it the Bible? Bible! Bible! Bible? Is it the Bible? The Bible!
If I were to go on my observations alone, I would say the opposite is true: if our minds were designed to do one thing above all others, this would be to act prejudicially; to look for patterns in our surroundings and categorize people depending on where they “fit in.”
The Bible contains myriad examples of how our nature tends to the opposite of love – a reminder, to Biblical literalists at least, of the lasting damage caused by original sin.
Humphrey doesn’t see it that way, however, and so…
The term “status quo” refers to the state of things, and not to a quorum of people that may grant or withhold approval. That said, there are plenty of Christian psychologists out there already who accept secular data and openly interpret it through the lens of their own belief system.
Now then, let’s get to the real meat of the matter. The following was posted by Lydia Sherman, Humphrey’s mother-in-law and a doyenne of the Ladies Against Feminism group.
Lydia’s shtick is to adopt the most “anti-feminist” position possible, post her views on the internet, and thus earn herself the attention she so desperately craves.
She uses this status to launch the occasional campaign of letter-writing against ideological foes, which makes her a perfect foot-soldier in Humphrey’s crusade.
As part of my research for this post, I picked up a copy of The Purpose Driven Life, that bit of pop-culture pabulum being peddled to Oprah fans everywhere, to see whether it could be used as a psychology textbook. I didn’t see a single mention of post-partum depression or schizophrenia, to name but two conditions of the mind that are fit for study in a psychology class.
Lydia and her people should just cut to the chase and work to outlaw the teaching of psychology at Christian universities. It could be like evolution: verboten.
For the next few dozen pages, Lydia gave the floor back to Aiden Humphrey. This is what he did with that awesome power:
A very dishonest rendering by Mr. Humphrey.
I think reproducing the paragraph in which the above Core Concepts quote appeared will shed more light on what the authors were saying.
“A more telling critique suggests that research on moral reasoning may have little practical value. Studies have found no close connection between people’s moral reasoning and their behavior. Moreover, most moral reasoning comes after people have intuitively decided how to act. Moral reasoning, then, may be little more than rational justification for an emotional decision, claims psychologist Jonathan Haidt.” (pg. 166)
I believe certain fundamentalists think more about same-sex attraction than actual homosexuals do. And the fact that Humphrey leaped so blithely from talk of rationality and moral absolutes to a discussion of same-sex orientation serves only to bolster my claim.
Humphrey never explains why he believes masturbation is a perversion. (I dare him to cite the story of Onan.)
And as to accuracy, the authors went on to cite some numbers: in one study, 90% of boys and 60% of girls admit to having masturbated by the time they’re 16. So it sounds as if masturbation is indeed the most common orgasmic expression of sexual impulse for people in that age group.
It isn’t entirely accurate to say the authors present homosexuality as a positive behavior, but they do recognize it as an “orientation.” This fits in quite well with the secular view of homosexuality as an innate characteristic – and there is nothing wrong with examining that view.
One can’t shift focus, subtly or otherwise, from observable behavior to self-reported identity if the two completely overlap.
Humphrey plays a shell game here where he accuses homosexuals of exercising a free choice, and then goes on to indicate such people are mentally ill.
Apparently, he defines mental illness in another way than how mental health professionals define it. That’s a neat trick, appropriating the language of his ideological opponents, reinterpreting it, and expecting them to debate him without the necessary magic decoder ring.
I went through the whole of page 147 and found no mention of pedophilia. The topic of that page was language development in childhood.
At any rate, a pedophile doesn’t see children of either sex as being on par with adults of either sex. That’s why he, if we’re talking about a male child molester, will go after kids even while ignoring “desirable” people his own age.
Pedophilia is a sexual “preference” all its own, and that’s why it gets a special category in which the hunger for children trumps orientation towards adults.
By his own admission, the molester disconnects his behavior with children from his sexual preferences for adult partners. Most molesters who assault little boys won’t have same-sex relationships with men.
And even if a male child molester goes after boys to fulfill some urge for homosexual contact, that would merely put him on par with heterosexual child molesters who go after opposite-sex prey.
Humphrey never comes out and says it, but he seems to imply being a homosexual child molester is somehow worse than being a heterosexual child molester – else why this unhealthy concern about whether man-on-boy pedo-creeps are considered gay?
The observable behavior of most male child molesters who attack boys is to leave off having sexual relationships with grown men. They don’t mingle with the “sodomite community.”
Humphrey disregards that fact in favor of his own interpretation: that people who do studies that conclude things in opposition to his own beliefs are propagandists.
It’s funny how Humphrey complains just two paragraphs above about how pseudo-scientists place more stock in self-reported information than in observable outcomes; and yet he gets all miffy when confronted with the studies of Masters and Johnson.
Instead of accepting self-reported data as accurate, those researchers gathered information about the physical changes that occur during the sex act through observation and electronic measurement.
The page in question – 384 – featured text on their laboratory observations and a graph.
The picture in question featured a color drawing of two figures. The male had testes, because those were germane to the topic, but no penis. He didn’t have nipples, either.
The woman had breasts and a visible labia majora, but no body hair. She was not posed in any way that could be considered erotic.
Within both figures were color drawings of anatomical structures that pertained to the endocrine system. (Hawt!)
In the upper left corner of page 362, one finds the reproduction of a rough pencil sketch that depicts a naked woman in profile, sitting in a crouched position. Her left breast is visible from beneath her arm, but that is all.
In 2006, Oklahoma Christian University, which requires all its students to take an introductory psychology class as a condition or graduation, introduced a new 100-level textbook into the course curriculum.
A small band of holy warriors got their hot little hands on this book, which is called Psychology: Core Concepts - 5th Edition, and decided it would be a danger to young, innocent college students.
Five of these warriors, presumably under the supervision of evangelist Aiden Humphrey, got together and produced a 20 000-word treatise on the evils of psychology, secular humanism, homosexuality, and whatever else they could throw in without sacrificing brevity.
They sent the whole hairy-nut salad to the president of OCU, as well as several faculty members, in a bid to have Core Concepts pulled from the class syllabus. And the book was removed, quite possibly because OCU faculty feared how mere physical contact with any more letters from Humphrey and his mother-in-law would rot their brains.
Not content merely with traumatizing the staff at OCU, however, Humphrey and his peeps then placed their book review on the web as a warning to others: wisdomfromtheword.blogspot.com (Yar, she totally blows!)
Their comments were so vituperative and their claims so outrageous that I had to see this text for myself.
Turns out their criticisms are filled with factual errors, unsupported assumptions, and mischaracterizations.
While I’ve tried to maintain the “integrity” of their text, even while interjecting my own findings, I was forced to cull many of their comments lest my critique become a novel in its own right.
I left their spelling exactly as I found it.
Anyway, Humphrey began his crusade with a letter to the OCU president. Here’s part of it:
Dear Sir:
I thank you and the professors who reviewed Psychology, Core Concepts Fifth Edition, and decided to reject it from your curriculum.
The OCU got a long, long, loooong manifesto from that grab-bag of fruit-loops and decided, as a result, to substitute this particular psychology textbook with another much the same.
(But it's a victory of sorts, I guess, in the same way as a monkey might see himself as victorious after splattering his handler with feces.)
As you and the professors are about the considerable work of selecting a new book, I would like to commend to you an excellent text-book on the design and purpose of the human mind.
The author is very highly credentialed and has done pioneering work in the fields of:
• Child psychology,
• Human behavior,
• Philosophy of the mind,
• Psychology of Religion,
• the analysis of dreams
• criminal psychology
• and other areas.
Perhaps one of the best things about the textbook is that it fits with your values and behavior statement perfectly. If I were to also add that the text was infallible -- you would immediately know which book I am recommending to you.
The Bible! Is it the Bible? Bible! Bible! Bible? Is it the Bible? The Bible!
There are many things God could have taught in The Bible, such as biology, physics, etc..But He did not.
The one thing He did focus on was the human mind. He wants us to understand the root causes of: depression and anger; and success and peace. God wants us to understand the fundamental nature of wisdom, to understand parenting skills, peer pressure and even mob mentality among many other things. Psychology is the specific domain of the Bible.
Most importantly, God revealed the true purpose of and the central design imperative of the human mind: Our minds were engineered to do one thing supremely above all others: Love. God tells us we are to love Him with our "whole...mind." (Matthew 22:37)
If I were to go on my observations alone, I would say the opposite is true: if our minds were designed to do one thing above all others, this would be to act prejudicially; to look for patterns in our surroundings and categorize people depending on where they “fit in.”
The Bible contains myriad examples of how our nature tends to the opposite of love – a reminder, to Biblical literalists at least, of the lasting damage caused by original sin.
Humphrey doesn’t see it that way, however, and so…
I believe that if your professors were to begin with the firm belief that the highest and best approach to the study of the mind was to assume the design of the mind is God-centered - you could become pioneers in a true alternative to mainstream psychology.
At present there really is no such thing as "Christian Psychology." There is no systemic approach to the study of the human mind from a Christian perspective...
Of course the knee jerk reaction amongst many academics would be to dismiss the Bible as a textbook for serious study of the mind, and to challenge any course that derived significant material from that Book. However - pioneers do not need the approval of the status quo to begin their work. The vision, committment and gifts God has given us are enough.
The term “status quo” refers to the state of things, and not to a quorum of people that may grant or withhold approval. That said, there are plenty of Christian psychologists out there already who accept secular data and openly interpret it through the lens of their own belief system.
Now then, let’s get to the real meat of the matter. The following was posted by Lydia Sherman, Humphrey’s mother-in-law and a doyenne of the Ladies Against Feminism group.
Lydia’s shtick is to adopt the most “anti-feminist” position possible, post her views on the internet, and thus earn herself the attention she so desperately craves.
She uses this status to launch the occasional campaign of letter-writing against ideological foes, which makes her a perfect foot-soldier in Humphrey’s crusade.
Tuesday, March 21, 2006
This textbook was successfully removed from Oklahoma Christian University for ethical and moral reasons. There were five us in the family who participated in this. It reminds me of the scripture, "Lev 26:8 And five of you shall chase an hundred, and an hundred of you shall put ten thousand to flight."
We are leaving the review online for anyone else who is concerned about it in their school. The University has promised to choose the textbook more carefully. We suggested several alternatives. "The Purpose Driven Life" would be more pure and make more sense than what passed as a textbook in PCCFE.
As part of my research for this post, I picked up a copy of The Purpose Driven Life, that bit of pop-culture pabulum being peddled to Oprah fans everywhere, to see whether it could be used as a psychology textbook. I didn’t see a single mention of post-partum depression or schizophrenia, to name but two conditions of the mind that are fit for study in a psychology class.
Lydia and her people should just cut to the chase and work to outlaw the teaching of psychology at Christian universities. It could be like evolution: verboten.
For the next few dozen pages, Lydia gave the floor back to Aiden Humphrey. This is what he did with that awesome power:
Let me cover several key points:
1. Moral reasoning
The authors of this book maintain a vague appeal to the student's moral structure, especially when trying to reinforce the evils of those who do not approve of homosexual behavior. Yet, in the abstract, moral reasoning is treated as little more than after-the-fact rationalization for emotional decisions. "Moral reasoning may be little more than rational justification for an emotional decision...." p.166 paragraph 2.
If you will read the context, you will understand that the authors do not mean that an isolated instance of moral reasoning could be a fraudulent cover for a mere impulse, but that moral reasoning itself - in the abstract - may have limited meaning.
A very dishonest rendering by Mr. Humphrey.
I think reproducing the paragraph in which the above Core Concepts quote appeared will shed more light on what the authors were saying.
“A more telling critique suggests that research on moral reasoning may have little practical value. Studies have found no close connection between people’s moral reasoning and their behavior. Moreover, most moral reasoning comes after people have intuitively decided how to act. Moral reasoning, then, may be little more than rational justification for an emotional decision, claims psychologist Jonathan Haidt.” (pg. 166)
Interestingly enough, this attack on moral reasoning follows immediately upon the heels of the satanically contrived presentation of "same sex orientation in adolescence."
I believe certain fundamentalists think more about same-sex attraction than actual homosexuals do. And the fact that Humphrey leaped so blithely from talk of rationality and moral absolutes to a discussion of same-sex orientation serves only to bolster my claim.
2. A Permissive tone for Perversion:
"Masturbation is the most common orgasmic expression of sexual impulse in adolescence..." p 162. Calling perversion an "expression" is scripturally speaking, criminal negligence.
Humphrey never explains why he believes masturbation is a perversion. (I dare him to cite the story of Onan.)
And as to accuracy, the authors went on to cite some numbers: in one study, 90% of boys and 60% of girls admit to having masturbated by the time they’re 16. So it sounds as if masturbation is indeed the most common orgasmic expression of sexual impulse for people in that age group.
Sodomy is presented not as a behavior but as an innate "sexual orientation" which one "discovers" about themselves. pg. 163 paragraph 3.
It isn’t entirely accurate to say the authors present homosexuality as a positive behavior, but they do recognize it as an “orientation.” This fits in quite well with the secular view of homosexuality as an innate characteristic – and there is nothing wrong with examining that view.
The Bible views this not as an orientation but as an observable, criminal behavior. The punishment for the crime of committing an act of Sodomy was, under the Mosaic dispensation, death. In the Biblical view, the matter is treated as a behavior; a practice; a sin; a crime....
This seemingly subtle change of focus from observable behavior to subjective reported "identity" is not Biblical or scientifically valid, and leads to a pseudo-science which actually supports mental illness.
One can’t shift focus, subtly or otherwise, from observable behavior to self-reported identity if the two completely overlap.
Humphrey plays a shell game here where he accuses homosexuals of exercising a free choice, and then goes on to indicate such people are mentally ill.
Apparently, he defines mental illness in another way than how mental health professionals define it. That’s a neat trick, appropriating the language of his ideological opponents, reinterpreting it, and expecting them to debate him without the necessary magic decoder ring.
For instance: Pro-sodomy "studies" report that "...the adult male who sexually molests young boys is not likely to be homosexual..." (Groth & Gary, 1982, p. 147.) What they mean is that the adult male who molests young boys is not a homosexual, because he reports that he does not think of himself as sexually attracted to members of his own sex, even while actively seeking to have sexual contact with them.
I went through the whole of page 147 and found no mention of pedophilia. The topic of that page was language development in childhood.
At any rate, a pedophile doesn’t see children of either sex as being on par with adults of either sex. That’s why he, if we’re talking about a male child molester, will go after kids even while ignoring “desirable” people his own age.
Pedophilia is a sexual “preference” all its own, and that’s why it gets a special category in which the hunger for children trumps orientation towards adults.
He dissociates his criminal behavior from his self image ("sexual orientation") - a classic sign of mental illness which we the general public are coached to overlook - and even to exhibit ourselves.
Propagandists for Sodomite activity "educate" the public to disconnect a child molester's behavior from his "sexual orientation."
By his own admission, the molester disconnects his behavior with children from his sexual preferences for adult partners. Most molesters who assault little boys won’t have same-sex relationships with men.
And even if a male child molester goes after boys to fulfill some urge for homosexual contact, that would merely put him on par with heterosexual child molesters who go after opposite-sex prey.
Humphrey never comes out and says it, but he seems to imply being a homosexual child molester is somehow worse than being a heterosexual child molester – else why this unhealthy concern about whether man-on-boy pedo-creeps are considered gay?
The pseudo-science of sexual orientation enshrines the break between the practice and the person of a homosexual child molester. Necker Cube notwithstanding, when we elevate a subject's reported "orientation" higher than we do his observable behavior, we not only are in danger of arriving at an unscientific conclusion, we are in danger of playing into the hands of mere propagandists - who wish the public to divorce the reprehensible behavior of men who molest boys from the sodomite community at large.
The observable behavior of most male child molesters who attack boys is to leave off having sexual relationships with grown men. They don’t mingle with the “sodomite community.”
Humphrey disregards that fact in favor of his own interpretation: that people who do studies that conclude things in opposition to his own beliefs are propagandists.
Voyeurism:
A man named William Masters and a woman named Virginia Johnson intentionally invited a man and woman to engage in sexual activity in front of them. They wrote about the experience of what they did, and instead of refuting the deed as immoral and without place in true science, the authors of this text laud the two who "really broke with tradition," and brazenly celebrate their act as science. p. 384.
It’s funny how Humphrey complains just two paragraphs above about how pseudo-scientists place more stock in self-reported information than in observable outcomes; and yet he gets all miffy when confronted with the studies of Masters and Johnson.
Instead of accepting self-reported data as accurate, those researchers gathered information about the physical changes that occur during the sex act through observation and electronic measurement.
The page in question – 384 – featured text on their laboratory observations and a graph.
Speaking of Voyeurism, this book contains graphic nudity….The endocrine system is illustrated with a naked black man and black woman. p. 61.
The picture in question featured a color drawing of two figures. The male had testes, because those were germane to the topic, but no penis. He didn’t have nipples, either.
The woman had breasts and a visible labia majora, but no body hair. She was not posed in any way that could be considered erotic.
Within both figures were color drawings of anatomical structures that pertained to the endocrine system. (Hawt!)
Depression is illustrated with a naked woman. p.362.
In the upper left corner of page 362, one finds the reproduction of a rough pencil sketch that depicts a naked woman in profile, sitting in a crouched position. Her left breast is visible from beneath her arm, but that is all.
