GAY PEOPle's ChronICLE AUGUST 29, 1997

Drive to block Maine gay rights law is falling short

Portland, Maine-A petition drive to block Maine's new gay civil rights law appears to be falling short of its goal.

Campaign organizers had sought to collect 60,000 signatures by August 22 on petitions that call for a “people's veto" of the law. But on that date, the campaign had gathered only 10,000 names. By law, they must collect 51,131 signatures by Sept. 18 to put the measure to a vote.

"We'd have liked to have more signatures at this point in the campaign, so we're concerned about that," said Michael Heath, executive director of the Christian Civic League of Maine, which organized the effort.

Paul Madore of Lewiston, who has worked on a number of repeal efforts, told the

Lewiston (Maine) Sun-Journal that part of the problem stemmed from not being able to recruit enough volunteers to gather signatures. His opinion is that the repeal drive is all but over.

Madore was successful in repealing an earlier gay civil rights law in Lewiston, Maine in 1993. His group, the Coalition to End Special Rights, has joined Heath's Christian Civic League and the state chapter of the Christian Coalition to spearhead the current veto drive.

"I don't think it's going to make it," Madore said. "I think in September we're going to be living with a gay rights law, and I say that with deep trepidation."

After debating the issue for 20 years, the state legislature amended the Maine Human Rights Act to protect gays and lesbians

against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in housing, public accommodations, credit and employment. The law already prohibited discrimination on the basis of race, religion, color and mental or physical handicap.

Madore and other critics insist gays don't need legal protections, since they believe there is no evidence that gays are being denied access to loans, homes or jobs based on their sexual orientation—an assertion strongly denied by advocates of the new law, including Gov. Angus King.

While Heath said that he "respect[s] Madore's opinion," he also said that he is not ready yet to throw in the towel.

"I think it's too early to make that assessment. We don't have enough information

back from the field."

Heath said the drive will continue until the state-imposed deadline of Sept. 18. If at least 51,131 signatures are certifiedor 10 percent of the number of Mainers who voted in the last gubernatorial election the gay civil rights law enacted last May would be rendered inactive pending a statewide referendum to determine if it should become law.

Fifty-eight percent of registered Maine voters said they would not vote to repeal the law in an early August poll. Thirty-three percent would vote to repeal it, and nine percent are undecided.

In the poll, Strategic Marketing asked 450 voters a series of wide-ranging public policy questions in telephone interviews between July 29 and Aug. 4.

Psychologists restrict attempts to 'cure' homosexuality

Continued from page 1

formed by practitioners who harbor intense bias against gay people," charged David M. Smith, spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign. They “usually are affiliated with extremist religious groups that promote the illusion that sexual orientation can be changed to further their political aims."

Beverly Saunders Biddle, the executive director of the National Lesbian and Gay Health Association argued, “These therapies strengthen the erroneous belief in clients with high levels of internalized homophobia that a homosexual orientation is a sign of illness. And they increase negative attitudes and self-hatred."

The group has begun research "to document the damage which we believe occurs

when a lesbian or gay client encounters psychological help from a homophobic treatment program or provider."

Robert Cabaj, a psychiatrist and board member of the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association, saw the resolution as a reasonable compromise and “a step for further dialogue on this issue."

The National Gay and Lesbian Task

Force believes the APA resolution does not go far enough. "Allowing conversion treatments to remain a viable option assures that many will endure potentially costly, painful, and traumatic procedures that could increase rather than relieve suffering," said executive director Kerry Lobel.

"The most vulnerable are young people at the mercy of confused parents or adult guardians seeking to erase their own shame

or guilt about their child's sexual orientation." She cautioned, "Anything short of full condemnation for this repugnant prac-

"The most vulnerable are young people at the mercy of confused parents or adult guardians seeking to erase their own shame or guilt about their child's sexual orientation."

tice leaves the door open for reparative therapy's further escalation.”

The anti-gay Family Research Council

was quick to condemn the resolution. It said the APA was "cowed by aggressive homosexual activists." It claimed that Christian groups such as Exodus International, the so called "ex-gay" movement, have had “high rates of change by those weary of their homosexual identity."

It is "an attempt to brainwash the public," said Charles W. Socarides. "Homosexuality is a psychological and psychiatric disorder, there is no question about it."

Socarides is a New York City psychiatrist and president of the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality, a leading proponent of “conversion" therapy. He labeled gays “a purple menace."

Socarides' gay son Richard is President Clinton's liason to the gay and lesbian community.

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