Talk:American Family Association

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1 Incorrect statement listed in Controversial remarks
2 Jewish upbringing = Crime
3 American Family Foundation
4 Controversial statements
5 Hate Group?
6 Hate Group? Cont.
7 Hate group?
8 Categories

[edit] Incorrect statement listed in Controversial remarks

Deleting the "After the Hurricane Katrina disaster in 2005, the American Family Association's AgapePress published praise for the hurricane's destruction as an instrument of God's mercy, in that it "wiped out much of the rampant sin common to the city." quote. When reading the article, they present two different opinions of people from New Orleans, and don't favor either side like the controversial remark entry suggests.

[edit] Jewish upbringing = Crime

I deleted this:

In the March 2005 issue of American Family Association Journal, the American Family Association author Randall Murphree suggested that a Jewish upbringing leads to hatred of Christians, and by extension, a criminal lifestyle.

Because I was unable to substantiate it. If you go the web site and look in the archive, there is no article by or quote from Randlall Murphree regarind Jewish upbringing or hatred of Christians.

I did a google search, and turned up [1], which quotes from Murphree's article. My read is that someone is INFERRING, from Murphree's description of one Jewish guy, what Murphree thinks of Jews in general. I think the inference is not warranted, at least based on the excerpt that was quoted. So I agree that the deletion, above, is correct. John Broughton 17:41, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] American Family Foundation

Ive seen a lot of people online interchanging american family association with american family foundation. Are they one and the same?

No. John Broughton 14:50, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

The International Cultic Studies Association (ICSA) is an interdisciplinary network of academicians, professionals, former group members, and families who study and educate the public about social-psychological influence and control, authoritarianism, and zealotry in cultic groups, alternative movements, and other environments. Founded in 1979 as AFF (American Family Foundation), ICSA took on its current name in late 2004 to better reflect the organization's focus and increasingly international and scholarly dimensions. ICSA, the leading professional organization concerned about cultic groups and psychological manipulation, is known for its professionalism and capacity to respond effectively to families, former and current group members, helping professionals, and scholars.[2]

[edit] Controversial statements

I don't see references for some of the statements in the controversial statements section. I think we need references, to ensure accuracy, or some items should be removed. DavidBailey 11:05, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Done. I also cleaned up the wording to be more accurate. ChristopherM 22:29, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. DavidBailey 20:57, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hate Group?

I know the AFA is extremely controversial, but who has labeled it a "hate group?" That's a pretty strong term. Even the SPL doesn't consider them as such: http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=524

Finally, the statement is totally unsourced.

[edit] Hate Group? Cont.

I agree with the previous post--it is strong. I changed the introduction in an effort make it more faithful to the group's purpose and actions. I also included a reference to the SPLC, which seems to support much of what I added.

Looks good. If we are going to keep the reference to "some" calling it a hate group, there should be a source for at least one group or pundit that has made the claim.

[edit] Hate group?

Many organizations have labeled the AFA as a hate group, but I doubt they have as much of a solid standing as the SPLC or ADL.

People for the American Way have put the AFA on "Right Wing Watch" [3], however they make no mention of it being a hate group.

Aside from political blogs, a couple organizations that do list the AFA as a hategroup include:

Hatecrime.org which advocates passage of laws that add sexual orientation and gender identity to definition of what a hate crime is and who it is committed against - basically adding stiffer penalties for murdering gay people for being gay.

They also compare the AFA to Adolf Hitler's Nazi regime.

[4]

Cybercast News Service published an article detailing how the SPLC is watching the AFA (among other anti-gay groups) and although the SPLC does not refer to the AFA's anti-gay literature, it does describe it as a "vicious personal attack" and a "holy war" and an "anti-gay crusade".

[5]

I am not sure if those two organizations have as much standing as the SPLC (although CNS is simply reporting on the SPLC's activities and seems relatively neutral) or ADL.

Other sites that list the AFA as a hate group or refer to them as a hate group are mainly composed of staunch critics of the AFA.

However...

Looking at hate groups such as the Family Research Institute (not to be confused with Family Research Council), Traditional Values Coalition, and American Vision and comparing their attitudes of gay people to that of the AFA, CWA, and Focus on the Family... the biggest difference is what additude the group or group leader (Paul Cameron with FRI and Gary DeMar with American Vision, etc) displays towards homosexuality. Where the AFA and others staunchly oppose any acceptance of gays and any rights for gays, American Vision, FRI and TVC promote criminalization of homosexuality with penalties including the death penalty.

The AFA also makes the claim that they don't hate homosexuals, but believe that their sexual orientation can be cured through faith despite scientific evidence pointing to the fact that sexual orientation is biological.

I hope I made myself sound neutral, despite being a critic of the AFA and other groups. I was the one who added them as a hate group and I apologize. If they are to be deemed as such, leave it to someone else. I'll leave this type of issue alone for now unless the SPLC or ADL has an article declaring the AFA (et al) a hate group - then I'll gladly jump on the opportunity to update Wikipedia.

--Joe Capricorn 00:29, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

If your goal was to sound neutral, you have failed miserably. You quote a number of extremely far left sources and then repeat the highly debatable idea of a biological root of homosexuality as fact.

Still, I think it would be very noteworthy if the SPLC or ADL labeled them a hate group and it should be included in the article.

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 207.195.254.109 (talk) 22:24, 29 November 2006

I thought it was pretty balanced. The "highly debatable idea" has some pretty sound scientific backing - perhaps you should read on the subject with an open mind.

Orpheus 15:35, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

To each their own, but I don't think you can honestly say many of the groups cited are moderate or even, in some cases, mainstream.

It's because I've examined the issue of a biological origin of homosexuality with an open-mind that I've arrived at the conclusion that it's an open question. Several studies have pointed to the posibility of it being the case, but others have all but disproven the notion. At this stage in the research, being dogmatic on either side is just that - dogma.

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 209.59.43.126 (talk) 01:52, 30 November 2006

You're right, it's very much an open question. However, describing it as "highly debatable" implies that the case for is much weaker than it actually is. Ah, English, where the literal meaning and the generally understood meaning can be poles apart. As for the dogma - I think the current article does a good job of pointing out that the AFA does take an extremely dogmatic view of the subject, and shows no sign that they would be willing to change if there was a bit more scientific evidence.

Incidentally, you should sign your posts with four tildes, and it's polite not to remove previous posts (especially other people's) from talk pages. Orpheus 02:19, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Very interesting, first you imply the matter is settled, then quickly back peddle to the position of "very much an open question." I stand by my assertion that it is "highly" debatable, particularly in light of recent breakthroughs in the field of genetics.

I can't speak for AFA and nor can you. Who knows if they would or would not change their position if conclusive evidence was produced. Unless you can provide a sourced statement from one of their management to that effect, your idea is purely conjecture and nothing more.

I don't know why you suggest I deleted anyone's post because I didn't. I'm behind a common proxy, so the IP address may come up as the same. This is also the reason I didn't sign my post, because I am not logged in at the moment and I'm behind the aforementioned proxy.

[edit] Categories

There's a mild dispute at the moment over which categories this article belongs to - specifically, if Category:Discrimination and Category:Censorship are appropriate. I think that both of them are. The censorship category should be self-evident - the reason the AFA exists is to promote compulsory restrictions on publically available media content. If that doesn't fit in the censorship category, I'm not sure what does. I can see that discrimination might be considered a bit POV. However, having looked at the other articles in that category, I think this article fits perfectly. Other examples of articles categorised as "Discrimination" include Affirmative action, Children's rights movement, Desegregation, Sexual stereotyping and List of anti-discrimination acts. In my opinion, it's not a particularly extremist view to say that the AFA advocates a form of discrimination - making judgements about other people in order to decide (in this case) whether their voices should be heard. If you think that the category name is inappropriate, then rename the category, but this article belongs alongside the others listed. Orpheus 04:15, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Hello. It's not an extremist view to say that the AFA advocates discrimination. However, it is POV to say that the AFA advocates discrimination. As I included in the edit summary: WP:CAT: "Unless it is self-evident and uncontroversial that something belongs in a category, it should not be put into a category." Although you wouldn't get any disagreement from me that AFA promotes discrimination and censorship, you will get disagreement from me when it comes to being self-evident and uncontroversial because it is neither. ~a (user • talk • contribs) 04:31, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

It may be POV to say that the AFA advocates discrimination. However, I don't think that saying that the AFA article belongs in the discrimination category violates WP:NPOV in any way. If you do think that, then you should probably take them out of the Christianity category as well, because there's a strong point of view that they don't have a particularly Christian attitude towards things. If you ignore the category name for a minute and look at the other articles in that category, I would argue that it is uncontroversial to include this article with them. If you think that the name of the category pushes a particular POV excessively, then I suggest renaming it.

I would also draw your attention to this extract from WP:NPOV: Debates are described, represented, and characterized, but not engaged in. Background is provided on who believes what and why, and which view is more popular. Detailed articles might also contain the mutual evaluations of each viewpoint, but studiously refrain from stating which is better. One can think of unbiased writing as the cold, fair, analytical description of all relevant sides of a debate. When bias towards one particular point of view can be detected, the article needs to be fixed.

Including the AFA from the discrimination and censorship categories does not, to me, seem to violate any policies, especially WP:NPOV, but also including WP:CAT.Orpheus 15:57, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Your response is confusing me. Let me try to simplify the response. Do you think that saying the AFA promotes discrimination and censorship is self-evident and uncontroversial? ~a (user • talk • contribs) 20:49, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

No, I'm saying that the AFA article is self-evidently and uncontroversially related to and belongs with the other articles in the discrimination and censorship articles. As I said, and as is said below, if the title of the category bothers you then get that changed (perhaps a Censorship/Lobby Groups category, for instance). Orpheus 02:39, 17 March 2007 (UTC).

After reading the article, I support the inclusion of this article in the "controversial" categories as listed below with supporting text straight from the article.

~~- Category:Religion and politics~~

"The organization publishes articles that promote...a conservative brand of Christianity..."

"...the AFA released an article entitled "A first for America...The Koran replaces the Bible at swearing-in oath." In this article, the AFA made the claims that it is un-American to swear an oath on any book other than the Bible. The AFA urged members to contact Congressmen to pass a law stipulating that all oaths for federal office must invoke the Bible. This was in response to Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to the United States Congress, stating he would use a Koran in his swearing in ceremony..."

~~- Category:Anti-pornography activists~~

"The AFA claims that it "represents and stands for traditional family values, focusing primarily on the influence of television and other media—including pornography...""

- Category:Discrimination

"The organization publishes articles that...oppose abortion, oppose homosexuality, oppose pornography..."

- Category:Censorship

See above quotes.

I don't really see the problem with including these cats. If the problem is the title of the categories, I suggest you propose a renaming at those categories. ZueJay (talk) 21:14, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't really like the AFA, but I say leave Category:Discrimination and Category:Censorship off. The categories are there for topics about the subject and organizations that are, for example, in charge of censoring material, not for those that merely support or oppose it. Adding Category:Censorship to this article is like adding Category:Censorship to United States or Mother. Furthermore, I don't see how the AFA supports censorship when they oppose censorship of the word "christmas". Tuxide 21:38, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

The AFA actively lobbies for certain censorship standards - opposing some things and promoting others.
As for the categories themselves and the items that should, or should not be incorporated into them, the category labels do not make that clear. Category:Censorship simply describes itself as "These are articles or categories having to do with censorship." Thus, the AFA falls under that very ambiguous umbrella. Category:Discrimination does not define itself in any way. Thus, I still think they fall under these cats until the relevant projects set more definitive guidelines on inclusion or exclusion. ZueJay (talk) 23:14, 16 March 2007 (UTC)