Truth Wins Out Launches New Website
Urging Scientists To Report
Right Wing Distortion Of Research

by Wayne Besen
Feb 26, 2007

RespectMyResearch.org Leads New Trend
Where Top Researchers Speak Out
To Stop Manipulation of Science For Political Gain

Miami Beach, FLA. - Truth Wins Out unveiled a new campaign today encouraging scientists to report right wing distortions of their research on the website RespectMyResearch.org.

Truth Wins Out will also join the gay rights group SoulForce today in a media conference call featuring a panel of experts who will discuss how groups, such as Focus on the Family, manipulate social science to help justify discrimination.

"This website is a powerful response to the brazen and outrageous manner in which the far right has hijacked science to support their discriminatory aims," said Truth Wins Out's Executive Director Wayne Besen. "Our goal is to make it easier for legitimate researchers to fight back and demand their work be respected and not co-opted for an extreme political agenda."

"When people start spinning science you have to respond," said Dr. Kyle Pruett, professor of child psychiatry, Yale University School of Medicine. "Journalism used to handle this, but not anymore. So it's bounced back to become increasingly the responsibility of the people doing the research."

In a new trend, several researchers have come forward this year to say that Focus on the Family has distorted or exaggerated their work.

RespectMyResearch.org features six such esteemed scientists who were "mortified" when they learned how Focus on the Family leader James Dobson cravenly manipulated their findings. The new website contains exclusive Truth Wins Out videos interviewing these professors. Letters from scientists, obtained by Truth Wins Out, are also posted asking for Dobson to either stop using their work or to accurately portray their studies.

"If 'Double-Talk Dobson' had been accused by only one professor of manipulating research, it might be a legitimate mistake," said Besen. "However, when six researchers in three countries have stepped forward in less than a year, I think it is fair to say that a disturbing pattern of deception has emerged. Unfortunately, Dobson has refused to address the concerns of these researchers and continues to portray their reasonable requests for scientific integrity as a liberal conspiracy."

Wayne Besen is a nationally recognized advocate for gay and lesbian rights. He has appeared as a guest on leading news and political talk shows including: NBC Nightly News, The Roseanne Show, CNN's Talk Back Live and The Point, Fox's O'Reilly Factor and Hannity and Colmes, Fox News and MSNBC News.

Truth Wins Out is a non-profit organization that counters right wing propaganda, exposes the "ex-gay" myth and educates America about gay life.