They seem to do a lot more than the “anti-gay brainwashing” that might actually be positive. People *do* recover from addictions by asserting their faith.

Professional reporters on the ground, working on the story, haven’t been able to uncover any more information than bloggers have. So, I suppose if I followed your standards I wouldn’t have blogged it at all, and neither would a number of other people. Zach’s story wouldn’t have gotten the attention it did and LIA would be quietly going about their business instead of facing an investigation. And that would be just fine by you, right?

The sites maintain that the participant must agree to go, and unless records indicate otherwise, they aren’t violating their rules. They seem to do a lot more than the “anti-gay brainwashing” that might actually be positive. People *do* recover from addictions by asserting their faith.

So, rather than stirring things up on one case that can’t be proven, some people would need to get together, do some legitimate research, and present a case to the appropriate people in a professional manner. If a systematic problem can be shown to exist, it is a lot harder for lawmakers to ignore. furthermore, if they do ignore it, the objective information gained can be sent to the mass media. Public scrutiny in that way always puts pressure on the government to take some sort of action, whereas angry people in the streets can be made to look like nutcases, allowing matters to be swept under the rug rather than dealt with.

Second, there’s agreeing to something, and there’s actually having a choice whether to agree or not. A 16 year old minor, with no other means of support doesn’t have a choice whether to agree or not, unless he can convince his parents that it’s not a good idea to send him to this place. Zach was pretty clear on his blog how he felt about going.

So, I don’t think anyone’s over reacting. But just out of curiosity, what kind of “positive action” would you suggest?

http://www.loveinaction.org
http://www.asafeplace.org

I can see why people would protest against this sort of thing anyway, but I think that it hurts the credibility of protestors if everyone is getting worked up about a hoax. I mean,

Protestors: “Free Zach!”
Camp: “Who? We don’t have a Zach here…”

pretty much kills it right there. It’s important not to let emotion and hype cloud the issue if there is hope of taking positive action.

Can’t you just feel the “love” dripping from that statement? I’m sure these kids would have.

And I’m probably going to get hemorroids from sitting down so much to blog. But this story is worth a read. Apparently, those camps you hear about that are supposed to “fix” gay teenagers are very real and worse than…