It has been a roller-coaster week, with the back-and-forth story of George Rekers. The latest from his side is that he’s (of course) denying allegations of sexual activity with his rent boy and threatening to sue the “alternative newspaper,” Miami New Times, that broke the story.
Rekers’ denial claims he had no sexual involvement with the young man he hired from Rentboy.com to travel with him. In an email he sent to reporters around the nation on the day he posted the denial on his Professor George website, Rekers also launches into a bizarre diversionary point-by-point rebuttal of incidental aspects of his story, as it’s been told in the media—a rebuttal that focuses on questions like who lifted whose luggage, rather than the obvious question of why one would hire a luggage carrier through a website that specializes in offering prostitutes. (A picture of Rekers and Jo-Vanni Roman, his young traveling companion whose identity was made known by bloggers shortly after the story broke, shows Rekers hefting his luggage in the Miami airport while Roman stands by.)
Rekers’ denial claims he had no sexual involvement with the young man he hired from Rentboy.com to travel with him. In an email he sent to reporters around the nation on the day he posted the denial on his Professor George website, Rekers also launches into a bizarre diversionary point-by-point rebuttal of incidental aspects of his story, as it’s been told in the media—a rebuttal that focuses on questions like who lifted whose luggage, rather than the obvious question of why one would hire a luggage carrier through a website that specializes in offering prostitutes. (A picture of Rekers and Jo-Vanni Roman, his young traveling companion whose identity was made known by bloggers shortly after the story broke, shows Rekers hefting his luggage in the Miami airport while Roman stands by.)
Jo-Vanni Roman tells a very different story from Rekers’ “Professor Rekers was not involved in any illegal or sexual behavior with his travel assistant.” Roman has told the media that Rekers requested erotic massages, something Rekers dubbed the “long stroke,” which involves penile and anal rubbing. And as late as last evening, when Joe Jervis interviewed Roman by phone, he was insisting on that story despite Rekers’ subsequent attempts to cast doubt on its veracity.
Meanwhile, the University of South Carolina, whose website previously listed Rev. Dr. Rekers as a Distinguished Professor of Neuropsychiatry and Behavioral Science, suddenly and without any announcement deleted Rekers’ faculty listing from its website yesterday.
As Frederick Clarkson notes, though there will now be much they-said, he-said two-stepping with this story, what remains incontrovertible—and should not be forgotten with all the diversionary lists about who hoisted whose sacks—is that Rekers played “a pivotal strategic role in the development of the Religious Right,” by helping to found the Family Research Council, James Dobson’s D.C. lobbying arm.
As Fred Clarkson also notes, Rekers remains an officer and “scientific adviser” to NARTH (the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality), and has played “an integral role in the development of the intellectual and political infrastructure of the Religious Right.” Rekers’ spectacular exposure opens a vista on what the religious right is all about, particularly in its anti-gay culture war, that ought to give people with any sense at all pause to think: about the hypocrisy that lives inside this movement from its very foundations; about the plain mean-spirited cruelty of what it’s all about; and about the tragic misuse of money and energy that could be far better spent on truly deserving missionary causes, which is used instead to spread lies about and make the lives of gay people and their families miserable.
This should be, and should remain, a teachable moment for American culture, as significant groups within our society continue, in the face of all scientific evidence to the contrary, to insist that those who are gay can (and should) be “cured.” This is a story that’s not going to go away anytime soon. Not if Jo-Vanni Roman is correct when he tells Joe Jervis that Anderson Cooper and CNN are working on the story . . . .
Meanwhile, the University of South Carolina, whose website previously listed Rev. Dr. Rekers as a Distinguished Professor of Neuropsychiatry and Behavioral Science, suddenly and without any announcement deleted Rekers’ faculty listing from its website yesterday.
As Frederick Clarkson notes, though there will now be much they-said, he-said two-stepping with this story, what remains incontrovertible—and should not be forgotten with all the diversionary lists about who hoisted whose sacks—is that Rekers played “a pivotal strategic role in the development of the Religious Right,” by helping to found the Family Research Council, James Dobson’s D.C. lobbying arm.
As Fred Clarkson also notes, Rekers remains an officer and “scientific adviser” to NARTH (the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality), and has played “an integral role in the development of the intellectual and political infrastructure of the Religious Right.” Rekers’ spectacular exposure opens a vista on what the religious right is all about, particularly in its anti-gay culture war, that ought to give people with any sense at all pause to think: about the hypocrisy that lives inside this movement from its very foundations; about the plain mean-spirited cruelty of what it’s all about; and about the tragic misuse of money and energy that could be far better spent on truly deserving missionary causes, which is used instead to spread lies about and make the lives of gay people and their families miserable.
This should be, and should remain, a teachable moment for American culture, as significant groups within our society continue, in the face of all scientific evidence to the contrary, to insist that those who are gay can (and should) be “cured.” This is a story that’s not going to go away anytime soon. Not if Jo-Vanni Roman is correct when he tells Joe Jervis that Anderson Cooper and CNN are working on the story . . . .
