Consortium Responds to Virginia AG About University Non-Discrimination Policies

The Consortium of Higher Education LGBT Resource Professionals has issued a response to Virginia’s Attorney General, Ken Cuccinelli II, who last week advised Virginia’s public universities to rescind their non-discrimination protections for sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression.

That I know of, the Consortium is the first student affairs organization to speak out in this way. I’m proud of my colleagues in the Consortium for leading a trend of higher education professionals who preach what they practice.

Here is the full statement:

The Consortium of Higher Education LGBT Resource Professionals, a national organization of more than 400 college faculty, staff, and administrators who provide support and services to LGBT students, strongly urges institutions of higher education throughout the Commonwealth of Virginia to maintain protections based on sexual orientation, gender identity and/or gender expression in statements of non-discrimination.

The lack of inclusive policies place students who might identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual and/or transgender (LGBT) at great risk, as discrimination against students, faculty and staff who are LGBT or perceived as LGBT is widespread.  A national campus climate study by Sue Rankin, entitled Campus Climate for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender People: A National Perspective, found that 41 percent of the self-identified transgender students who participated reported experiencing verbal and/or physical harassment on their campuses.  Many of the transgender participants were not open about their gender identity for fear of being harassed. Similarly, more than one-third of all LGBT respondent experiences some sort of harassment. In the same study, 74 percent of respondents rated overall campus climate as homophobic.

As educators and administrators, we are charged with ensuring that our campuses remain a safe, affirming environment for all students of all identities. One of the most important signposts of an institution’s welcoming environment is their non-discrimination statement.  These policies not only provide tangible support to those directly named, but also send a strong message that discrimination will not be tolerated.  By removing sexual orientation, gender identity and/or gender expression, institutions essentially signal that discrimination against LGBT students, faculty and staff is acceptable.

We hope you will reaffirm your commitment to serving all students by maintaining named protections for LGBT people in statements of non-discrimination.

In Solidarity,

Executive Board

Consortium of Higher Education LGBT Resource Professionals

Chatroulette Spin #2: Talking Sex, Plus Magical Ninja Snacks

Despite the number of penises and mean people, Chatroulette continues to be an intriguing and amusing experience. As a social scientist, it just leaves me wanting more. Because of its very nature, it would be difficult to study, but part of me feels like if I keep exploring it, I’ll be able to draw some sort of conclusions about it. Obviously, my sample size is indeterminable and my examiner bias is severe, but I still feel like I can make some observations about my experiences so far.

Without a doubt, the anonymous nature of Chatroulette has a profound impact on how people interact with it. Even though faces are much less anonymous than simple screennames like in the chat rooms of yore, there is still a sense of freedom and liberation that makes Chatroulette interactions quite different than how people interact in person. It’s sort of like “no strings attached” interactions with people. If people embarrass themselves, it doesn’t matter, because they just hit Next! and all trace of them is gone. This allows people the freedom to talk more openly about sex and sexual behavior more than you’d usually expect, and while not everyone is masturbating on cam, it seems that people’s motivations for meeting others on Chatroulette are driven to at least some extent by their sex drive and attractions.

One question that will plague curious social scientists like me is: “What motivates a Next!?” More often than not, the Next! happens instantaneously, a split-second superficial judgment. What assumptions are made from that first glimpse? What are people’s expectations and who do they really want to meet? At first, it might be easy to take it all personally, but you soon realize it’s just the nature of the beast. And before you know it, that whole “give each person a chance” thing just isn’t working for you. And soon, you have to start examining your own motivations, because you are Next!ing people just as quickly. If I were to be honest, I would have to admit that I had made judgments based on age, race, gender, and looks, among other things. So what is it that I would prefer to find? What are my motivations at any given moment during my spin on Chatroulette? I’m not sure I even know, which I think makes Chatroulette an interesting opportunity for not only sociological research but self-reflection as well.

I have observed that there seem to be more men on Chatroulette than women, and that’s even without counting all the men masturbating. As a young, single gay man, I’ll admit that my ego is best pacified by meeting a good-looking guy who enjoys talking to me and this seems to motivate a lot of my Chatroulette choices. And the man-meets-man interactions are an interesting phenomenon. A lot of men are looking for women, so many will Next! me right away, or some will stop to chat for a second just to opine that they haven’t seen enough of the ladies. On the occasion that a guy will stop to have a real conversation, I’ve even begun to assume that they are more than likely gay. Truly, I have met some cute guys who also find me cute and we have an enjoyable little flirtation that totally makes up for all the other garbage on there. On the occasions that I have told guys that they’re cute only to learn that they are straight, I applaud them for being comfortable enough with themselves to take a compliment from a gay guy without just freaking out and hitting Next!. In my opinion, credit is due when credit is deserved.

There are definitely some straight men looking for locker room talk. I play along sometimes, but I generally don’t try too hard to hide the fact that I don’t like the same things they do. It’s amusing to see those reactions. Often, upon the revelation that they are not talking to a fellow straight guy, they Next! right away. Sometimes they’re like, “Oh, that’s cool, that’s cool,” and play it off, but it’s clear then that they are done talking to me because I can’t relate to their love of breasts and vaginas. On several occasions there was confusion and denial; one guy said, “Wait, it almost sounds like you just said you were GAY.” Not almost, buddy; I did!

To try to offset all the guys trolling for tits, whenever a female comes up, I do my best to say nice things to them and be a sassy gay friend. They seem to appreciate it.

I have to share this one other little tidbit, because it just makes me laugh so much. Among the many Chatrouletters intent on just being mean (mostly teenage and college-age guys), there is a significant contingent who believe that identifying a person as “gay” is the meanest thing they can do. Immediately calling a guy a “faggot” must have gotten old, because on my last spin, they tried a different tactic. As soon as I’d appear, they’d insistently ask, “You suck dick?” On the several occasions that this happened, I chose to respond by saying, “Sure, when I feel like it.” Their reactions to this are hilarious. It’s a total backfire of their plan to humiliate me, and it’s clear they have no additional retort. After a few seconds of confusion, they usually just Next! and I move on feeling quite amused.

In education, we learn that a little positive feedback goes a long way, and that’s definitely true on Chatroulette. It only takes one person making you smile to make up for a lot of idiots being dumb. One person just had the words “I love you!” up where their cam should be. It was precious. There are plenty of folks out there just trolling for smiles, and they make it all worth it. That’s what will keep me going back and is surely a notable draw to the bizarre social experiment that is Chatroulette.

Here are some highlights from my latest spin! Click to embiggen each! (Word of advice to those of you thinking about taking screenshots of your experiences: Make sure you look back up at the cam when you’re hitting the Print Screen button… it makes for a much better picture.)

1) Even though one of my very good college friends is an amazingly talented magician, I still never get tired of sleight-of-hand tricks, and that’s exactly what this chatter was offering:

2) Do they even have telephones in Hell? Hopefully for this individual they have webcams in Heaven; he was apparently not blessed with a functioning one on Earth.

3) This guy was one of those super-cute straight guys who was just a delight to chat with. He was Canadian, so of course he was awesome. In case you’re curious, I was chewing when I first appeared on cam.

4) Check this guy out:

He went on to pour lighter fluid all over his hands out of a Bic lighter, explaining that he would bust ninjas up with hands of fire. That’s when I hit Next!

I don’t think I’m done playing with Chatroulette, so if I have more funny experiences, I’ll share them here!

Religion Motivates Racism: The Supporting Research

Yes! It’s another research study being featured on ZackFord Blogs! As per usual, I’ll break things down and share some highlights so you get the most out of the research without digging through the whole report yourself.

Today we’re looking at “Why Don’t We Practice What We Preach? A Meta-Analytic Review of Religious Racism” by Hall, Matz, & Wood, published December 16, 2009 in Personality and Social Psychology Review (hat tip: Joe.My.God.). The goal of this study is to look at how religiosity impacts racism. The results may or may not be surprising, but they’re certainly interesting.

Before we even look at the abstract, I just want to clarify what a meta-analysis is. In this study, the researchers looked at 55 studies conducted between 1964 (when the Civil Rights Act passed) and 2008 and developed measures to synthesize the results of all of those different studies into one cohesive report of conclusions. In other words, the report we’re reading today tells us what we can learn from 40 years of studies on the topic of religious racism.

The Abstract

Here’s the gist:

A meta-analytic review of past research evaluated the link between religiosity and racism in the United States since the Civil Rights Act. Religious racism partly reflects intergroup dynamics. That is, a strong religious in-group identity was associated with derogation of racial out-groups. Other races might be treated as out-groups because religion is practiced largely within race, because training in a religious in-group identity promotes general ethnocentrism, and because different others appear to be in competition for resources. In addition, religious racism is tied to basic life values of social conformity and respect for tradition. In support, individuals who were religious for reasons of conformity and tradition expressed racism that declined in recent years with the decreased societal acceptance of overt racial discrimination. The authors failed to find that racial tolerance arises from humanitarian values, consistent with the idea that religious humanitarianism is largely expressed to in-group members. Only religious agnostics were racially tolerant.

Basically, religious people see other races as other religions. Because they see their own religion as morally superior, they are more likely to see other races (religions) as morally inferior. Also, the more likely people are to conform and uphold tradition, the more likely they are to be racist. As we know from recent disaster relief efforts in Haiti, religious groups are more concerned with helping (or converting and then helping) members of their own religion, which reflects what the researchers found that humanitarian values do not motivate racial tolerance.

And yeah, did you see that last little part? The only group who was found to be consistently racially tolerant was the group that regularly questioned religion. Huh.

Read on for more detailed excerpts from the study!

Considering Religious Identity

First, consider the ways that simply identifying with a religious group might motivate racism (p. 3, emphases added):

To the extent that religion tends to be practiced within race, people of other races may appear to belong to religious out-groups. Thus, one basis for the religious identity–racism link is that race serves as a proxy for religious affiliation. Another reason for this link is that people who strongly identify with a religion may be ethnocentric in general. Especially when people undergo early socialization into a particular religion, they might develop a strong tendency to differentiate their own faith from others, and social categorization that contrasts an “us” as opposed to “them” might generalize to other social distinctions including race (Altemeyer, 2003). Further supporting race distinctions, people who appear to be different from the self may be judged to hold different values, perhaps values that are in competition for resources such as political representation or even religious converts. Such perceived competition promotes intergroup prejudice (Sherif, 1966). For example, religious fundamentalists discriminated against homosexuals and single mothers to the extent that these groups were judged to threaten their personally important values (Jackson & Esses, 1997).

It seems as though subscribing to religious belief motivates a characterization of “other” as “bad.” This fits with what Dahlia Lithwick wrote in Slate today about how people’s disgust with homosexuality leads them to condemn it (a worthwhile read itself).

Religious racism also correlates with fundamentalist religious beliefs as well as extrinsic religiosity (religion motivated by social status, security, and acceptance from others) (p.3, emphases added):

Like religion, racism is a set of beliefs that explain societal traditions, especially those associated with social hierarchies involving White dominance in America. Consistent with this reasoning, stronger values of social conformity and traditionalism are associated with greater intergroup prejudice (Schwartz, 1996). Similarly, political conservatives in the United States are more likely than liberals to endorse ethnocentrism and racism (Federico & Sidanius, 2002; Napier & Jost, 2008). Also relevant, the traditional values associated with the Protestant work ethic are central components of ambivalent racism (I. Katz & Hass, 1988) and have been linked with the expression of modern racism (McConahay, 1986) and symbolic racism (Tarman & Sears, 2005).

Studies have also shown that highly religious people “endorse benevolent values of humanitarianism, which reflect selflessness in relations with close others…but not universalism, which involves accepting diversity and expressing concern for the welfare of all people and nature” (p. 4). In other words, humanitarianism itself does not promote racial tolerance because it does not explicitly address out-groups.

Individuals who were intrinsically religious (i.e. “committed to religion as an end in itself”) were more overtly racially tolerant, but were not necessarily less racist (p. 4):

…intrinsically religious people may report racial tolerance largely because of a desire to appear nonracist (Batson & Stocks, 2005) but nevertheless may show racial prejudice when it is indirectly measured.

They talk the talk of tolerance, but they don’t walk the walk of tolerance.

The study also looked at agnosticism, or what they call a quest motivation (a spiritual quest or readiness to face existential questions,  acknowledge religious doubts, and accept change). This definition totally confirms my point of view that some clear distinctions can be made between agnosticism and atheism, though the study found that “quest and racial tolerance in the general population are best understood in terms of a lack of religiosity” (p. 4). The important piece here though is that there were positive associations between quest and racial tolerance.

Some Interesting Findings – Imagery, Cognitive Style, Doubt, and Sex Differences

Here are some of the other interesting ideas from the discussion and conclusion (p. 10, emphasis added):

A related reason why religious in-groups may be prejudiced toward dissimilar others is that the divine in religious worship is often imbued with in-group attributes. That is, religious figures are constructed in believers’ own images. As Xenophanes in the sixth century B.C. noted, “Greek gods were invariably fair skinned and blue-eyed whereas African gods were invariably dark skinned and dark-eyed (joking that cows would surely worship gods that were strikingly cowlike)” (quoted in Epley, Waytz, & Cacioppo, 2007, p. 865).

This discussion point reminds me so much of the movie Dogma (the linked clips have spoilers!). How different would Catholicism be with “Buddy Christ” instead of a crucifix? What if Jesus was black? What if God really was a woman? Imagery reflects and impacts believers in profound ways.

Here we see the way dualistic thinking or belief in one truth over other ways of thinking has profoundly negative consequences (p. 10):

Religious fundamentalism is associated with a rigid, dogmatic cognitive style that preferences one truth and way of being over others and thereby promotes in-group favoritism and out-group derogation. In support, the positive correlation between fundamentalism and prejudice disappeared after controlling for authoritarianism. Thus, the religious fundamentalism–racism relation plausibly was because of authoritarian beliefs as well as conformity values.

In other words, if you don’t believe that there is only one true set of answers to life’s questions, you’re less likely to be racist.

Their research found that “quest” more often reflected agnostic doubt about religion than it did a type of religion itself. Since it was the questioning agnostics who were more likely to express racial tolerance, this added to their conclusion that “religiosity is not associated with racial tolerance” (p. 11).

Another interesting metaregression used distinctions between men and women’s motivations for religiosity to confirm the way values and prejudice are related (p. 11, emphases added):

Additional support for our inference that basic life values underlie religious racism comes from supplementary analyses on the sex composition of the samples. Religious racism should vary with sex because women, compared with men, tend to hold stronger benevolent values that promote religiosity and stronger universalist values that promote tolerance toward out-group members (Schwartz & Rubel, 2005). ….

…studies with higher percentages of women were more likely to report that religiosity promoted racial tolerance. In summary, analyses on the attributes of the participants in the original studies were consistent with our claim that basic life values underlie the religion–prejudice relation.

Conclusion

In addition to concluding that “the intergroup dynamics established by religious identification along with conventional life values appeared to drive religious racism” (p. 11), the researchers also defend the generalizability of their findings (p. 11, emphases added):

The participants in the studies we reviewed were predominantly White Christians in the United States. To what extent can our conclusions about religiosity and prejudice be generalized to other cultures and religious faiths? Given that divinities are accorded attributes of the religious groups and that all religions teach moral superiority, we anticipate that religious group identification is typically associated with out-group derogation. An additional reason to suspect that our findings hold across world religions comes from evidence that the conservative values that promote both religiosity and racism are stable across cultures and across religious faiths. …

Moreover, we found no relation between the endorsement of religious doctrine specific to the Christian faith and racial prejudice. It thus seems that the motives to be religious also are a motivator of racism, and these motives appear to be broadly applicable as a framework for understanding religious racism.

So, next time you hear someone arguing that religion can be a force for good in the world, ask them, “at what cost?” and use this study to support your argument. If we want to have a real conversation about “Science vs. Religion,” we can just look at the mounting evidence confirming the negative impacts of religion on society. It’s disturbing and alarming, but honestly, it’s not that surprising.

Some related posts:

» Society Is Better Off Without Religion: The Supporting Research (12/7/09)
» We Have To Stop Letting God Be A Crutch For Hate (11/6/09)

Chatroulette: My First Spin

So, I wouldn’t be a very good social media correspondent if I didn’t try out the newest fad, Chatroulette. If you’re unfamiliar, you just chat with strangers on webcam and hit “Next” at anytime to connect with someone new. It’s definitely interesting.

I decided to wear my “LGBTerrific!” shirt to see what kind of response I’d get. The rainbow was immediately identifiable, but the responses were not all negative. Some folks were like, “Oh I totally love your shirt!” whereas many others said, “FAGGOT!” What surprised me is that more often than being called a “faggot” I was called “fat,” “fatty,” “fat ass,” “slim fast fail,” and some teenage girls also called me a “40-year-old virgin.” First of all, while I”m no gym rat, I’m not fat (I’ve actually been losing a lot of weight lately), but more importantly, how do you determine a person is fat when all you see is their shoulders up?

I’m not surprised that people are that superficial, but I am surprised that people are that intentionally mean. I don’t have any insecurities about my sexuality or my weight, so I could easily brush it all off, but it was clear that these folks were just scouring the net looking for folks to insult. I’m sure there are plenty of people hurt by these kinds of comments, and I think they take away from the experience a whole lot more than all the penises.

There are, by the way, lots of penises. I’m not really phased that much by seeing a penis, but it’s definitely not what I was on there looking for. I really am curious as to the intentions behind showing all these penises. For the probably 40 penises I saw, I saw only one pair of boobs. What’s most disconcerting about the penises is that their owners definitely seem to be targeting women as an audience. I never had to see one for very long because as soon as they saw I was a guy, they’d Next right away. There was one guy in his underwear who didn’t immediately Next me and we even chatted a bit; he was gay, my age, and even showed his face, which was somewhat refreshing. It would be interesting if there were a way to study these men who are putting their penises out on Chatroulette to better understand what they are hoping to accomplish.

My biggest frustration with Chatroulette was actually all the time I spent waiting between connections. I hope that they can improve the system to eliminate these waiting periods, because they got quite annoying  after a while. You’d make three connections you didn’t like and wait another couple minutes for the next. It takes some of the fun away.

Despite all the negative stuff I just described, I definitely had a couple of nice chats with folks. I met some other Chatroulette virgins and we were all having a good time. Some Canadian high school students came on and one of the girls was a curler, which was cool. I met two women from New Hampshire who were nice and chatty, one of whom was a teacher aspiring to be a lady of leisure who just travels the world; I wished her luck accomplishing that on a teacher’s salary. There were also just a lot of goofy college kids and teenagers; some were annoying, some could maintain a conversation and were pretty chill. I asked one group of girls if they were “LGBTerrific!” or at least “a good ally” and none of them knew what LGBT meant and none of them were named “Ally.” There were definitely plenty of folks who made me smile and laugh.

So, that being said, I will definitely try Chatroulette again in the future. And the best part is, if I have some fun interactions, I can share them here on the blog! Below are two highlights from last night (click to embiggen!), and also the clip of The Daily Show’s coverage of Chatroulette.

This guy made me smile:

Elmo Cat STRETCH! (Seriously, whoever was holding this cat had a perfect Elmo voice impression that was hilarious!)

And here, Jon Stewart takes a spin:

A Reminder of Why The Catholic Church Sucks

As if we needed one.

It still bothers me I once identified as Catholic. Let’s see what the Church has been up to.

» Last month, the Washington DC Archdiocese announced they would completely end their foster care program because of same-sex marriage. The thought of having to place homeless children with same-sex couples was just too despairing, so they just said they weren’t going to do any foster care for anybody anymore. Those values of love and service were never more evident. (Washington Post story from 2/17.)

» Further, the Washington DC Archdiocese announced they would no longer offer spousal benefits to anybody. Only those spouses who are currently enrolled are grandfathered in; no spouse will ever get new benefits from the Church in the Washington area. This is the penance straight couples will pay to avoid catering to same-sex couples. Discrimination against gays is more important than… well… anything, apparently. (Washington Post story from 3/2.)

» Just in case these other actions didn’t make it clear, an Italian cardinal set things straight by saying you can’t be Catholic and support same-sex marriage. If any politicians were to suggest otherwise, they could count on being excommunicated. It’s nice to see the Church so open to debate. (Story in The Pilot from 2/19.)

» That’s not all! You can’t be Catholic and try to be safe from AIDS, either. Bishops in the Philippines called for the firing of the Health Secretary and staff there for daring to distribute condoms to help reduce HIV infection rates! How horrid! (AP News story from 2/22.)

» Apparently, though, you can be gay without supporting same-sex marriage, which means you can be Catholic? But, you can be fired for it. Of course, it could be that it’s the prostitution part that’s wrong in regards to the current gay prostitution scandal inside the Vatican. So far, two have been dismissed for it. (New York Times story from 3/4.)

» And let’s put some icing on the cake today: you can’t go to a Catholic-run preschool if your parents are lesbians. The Colorado Archdiocese wants everyone to keep quiet, but that didn’t stop the school’s staff from speaking out anonymously about how horrid this decision is. Here’s the full story from Boulder (3/4):

For the record, this post is just about the Church, not about the people.

Do I hate all people who identify as Catholic? No. In fact, I really try hard not to hate any people.

Do I think all people who identify as Catholic are accountable for the actions of the Church that they support with their membership and tithing? Yes.

You can distinguish yourself and your beliefs from the Church all you want folks, but if you still leave a dollar in the basket at Mass, you are part of the problem. You are responsible for these actions and attitudes.