'Ex-Gay' Flyer Sent Home To Maryland Students Ignites Controversy (VIDEO)

Parents of students attending Albert Einstein High School in Montgomery County, Md. are upset after some high schoolers were sent home with flyers claiming nobody is "born gay," My Fox DC reports.

The flyer, which came from a group called Parents And Friends Of Ex-Gays And Gays (PFOX), states that everyone can choose their own sexuality.

Social worker Karen Yount-Merrell told My Fox DC she was outraged when her son brought the flyer home from school.

"I don't like it," Yount-Merrell told the station. "Everything in this flyer makes it sound like the goal is to be [an] EX-gay, [or an EX]-lesbian. It is not embracing of a different orientation. It reiterates a societal view that there's something 'wrong' with you, if you're not in the norm. If you aren't heterosexual."

The Maryland Schools Insider, a blog by the Washington Post, outlined the controversial parts of the flyer.

"According to mainstream psychological associations, there are no replicated scientific studies to support that a person can be born "gay." No "gay gene" or gay center of the brain has been found. No medical test exists to determine if a person is homosexual. Sexual orientation is based on feelings and is a matter of self-affirmation and public declarations."

The Post also mentions the school district changed its sexual education curriculum 2007, recognizing sexual orientation as congenial.

Last year, Owasso Kids For Christ, a Bible club, filed suit against the Oklahoma's Owasso Public Schools claiming the district was denying their right to free speech by not permitting them to promote their events using flyers at school.

The school district responded by asserting the group was simply unwilling to follow the rules, which state "no literature will be distributed that contains primarily religious, objectionable, or political overtones which may be beneficial to any particular group or business at the expense of others."

For more on this story, watch the video report above and take a look at the flyer, courtesy of My Fox DC:

Comments

[Abe Mundt]

10:16 PM on 05/20/2012

If we can send students home with flyers about abortion, shouldn't we be able to send them with a religious flyer. We can't be one-sided. We have to be fair and equal.

[iknowscottyknows]

01:26 PM on 02/13/2012

People here are confused. I understand. It's a complicated world.

The norm for sexuality in species homo sapiens is male/female. I know this scientific postulate is difficult to comprehend, but biology states it to be true. Therefore, anything else is not the norm for sexuality in species homo sapiens. Behavior does not change biology, and "occurrence" does not equate with "normalcy." Cannibalism occurs, incest occurs, etc.

What people choose to do in their homes is of no interest to me. When they demand the government endorse their behavior, they are in essence begging me to become involved in their lives. Don't want my input? Don't demand governmental approval. If you do I must become involved at your bequest.

I am the government.

[Michele Belin Beulah]

10:16 PM on 02/14/2012

Love this statement!!!!!!!! YES!!!

[cjmms324]

12:43 PM on 02/16/2012

Demand the government endorses what???? AYE.
As a citizen of The United States we ALL have (SHOULD have) the SAME rights. PERIOD. It's not asking for permission. It's expecting and deserving ones rights. Simple actually.
And if you don't care what goes on in anyone's homes why should it then matter so much that it remains that I don't have the right to the same protection heterosexuals have?
I am NOT ASKING for the right to marry, or have certain benefits, etc, etc and ETC.
What I ask is for you "The Government" to acknowledge I already HAVE the right. SO THERE!

[Melissa Irlandez]

12:08 PM on 02/13/2012

We have not discovered the gene yet. When they do all hell will break loose. Then we can genetically eradicate the gay gene. Do I want this, hell no. My point is its there, people are born gay.

[iknowscottyknows]

10:57 AM on 02/13/2012

So speakers can come in under the guise of Bullying Awareness and attempt to indoctrinate children as young as Kindergarten that homosexuality is normal, but no one can say anything approaching reality?

Sounds like Liberalism 101. Why are you afraid of the debate?

[Anna Nicole Dahmer]

11:44 AM on 02/13/2012

"reality" is that gays are everywhere, always have been, always will be.
if christian rednecks don't like gay sex, then they shouldn't have and "get over it".

[iknowscottyknows]

01:16 PM on 02/13/2012

Seems like you didn't address the issue, which is equality of information.

But that's the left's mantra: Indoctrinate, don't inform.

[latinguytony]

03:02 AM on 02/15/2012

You again ? Leave your rhetoric at the door. Your nowhere NEAR normal. Your comments are baseless and lack education of 'reality'

[Djay0252]

04:45 PM on 02/12/2012

If these parents want to embrace homosexuality as just another form of culture, that is their business; but it is not their business to tell others: You Have to Think Like US!!

[oscarp]

01:11 PM on 02/08/2012

Ex Gay= closeted gay. Those are the worst. Those really deserve the worst adjectives. You r gay and stay gay proves just one thing: it's not a choice, like choosing what to wear or not. It also means you might have never been gay to begin with, you just did it to try it out and it didn't work. But most of the times, you will become in a closeted gay. And that is really disgusting

[iknowscottyknows]

01:18 PM on 02/13/2012

It certainly goes against the indoctrination you've had.

[jackjon]

10:44 PM on 02/07/2012

of course it's a choice, it's not a skin color, nationality, or gender. Having sex, or being intimate with someone is a conscious choice, they could also choose not to do those things.

[Acert]

10:57 PM on 02/07/2012

Sexual orientation is about desire for sex, not sex itself.

[ItsThe Dashiell]

11:19 PM on 02/07/2012

JackJon is speaking from personal experience. Despite much preferring the feel of having another mans throbbing member in his rectum, he instead *chooses* to have consentual sex in the missionary position with his wife.

[goose121]

11:19 PM on 02/07/2012

Speaking as a lesbian I cannot help who I am attracted to. To say its a choice is a little ridiculous and to insinuate that it is a "better" or "normal" choice to be heterosexual is unnecessary. Yes, we choose to have sex, however we are ruled by our attractions. While I choose to have sex is a fact--I would never choose to have sex with a man because that is undesirable to myself. I assume you are heterosexual--would you like people telling you you should just choose not to have sex??

[Michele Belin Beulah]

10:51 PM on 02/14/2012

Sweetie, your attractions don't rule you. You have control over those things just as you do over your emotions. Feelings, they come upon you, but you have the power to accept them or reject them. It's when we give into how we feel that that feeling gains power thus overtaking us, but that is a choice. I can go through a bad situation and keep feeling bad about it or decide to move on and be happy. It's the same with your sexual attraction. Just as you choose which partner to have you can choose which type of partner to have. It's your choice.

[rachydee]

08:48 PM on 02/07/2012

I think our outrage is missing the point.These flyers and the group are unbearably offensive because they want to "convert" folks, not in making claims about why we're attracted to whom...

So what if some of us feel that we choose who we love? Or don't think the gender binary--ei­ther how we identify or who like--is pre-progra­mmed in our DNA? My question is: what do we lose when we depend on biological determinis­m to justify our rights? I know complexity isn't politicall­y expedient, but to force something as fluid as sexuality and gender into such old-fashioned categories will ultimately destroy us.

Sex isn't gender and gender comes in all shapes...

[mddunnington]

10:29 PM on 02/07/2012

If you say being Gay is a Sexual Choice, than being a Hetrosexual is Sexual Choice also.

[wildcardmusic]

12:55 AM on 02/08/2012

Being Heterosexual is a NATURAL existence. Nature designed things that way. As an example,one man craving another man's butt is NOT normal by any natural or anatomic standards except by what you Gays try to shovel at the rest of us. It's quite sick actually!

[Blaze Burton]

10:43 AM on 02/08/2012

54% of the public support marriage equality, WE are the mainstream now, there is no choice over who you love, sex or no sex. Get out of the road if you cant lend a hand.

[wildcardmusic]

05:16 PM on 02/08/2012

Your figures are dead wrong and the former slight majority of Americans polled that said Gay marriage was okay nosedived over the past 3 years well into NEGATIVE territory. And further proof of this is that even in Liberal California,the Voters turned out against Gay marriage repeatedly so Gays had to do the usual "back door" approach because they couldn't convince the Voters in the end,..so-to-speak! It always goes to the 9th Circuit Court Activist Gay Judges,doesn't it? And they have been overturned more than they have been upheld by the Supreme Court. And your precious Gay polls can be twisted depending upon the wording or can be push-polled so they have little credibility either. Your propoganda is simply that,...more lies and propoganda! And you will NEVER be in the Mainstream regardless of what you claim,it is a sexual practice and has NEVER been officially proven with any credibility other than Gay-promoted theory and conjecture that anyone is born Gay. It is speculation and goes directly against nature's design and natural law. So no,I won't get out of the road,as you call it.anymore than you will. A man craving another man's butt is not now nor ever will be normal! It is SICK!!

[benne841]

08:08 PM on 02/07/2012

I do not believe a homosexual can become heterosexual, or a heterosexual can become homosexual. I do believe a bisexual can live a completely heterosexual or homosexual life. I believe "ex-gays" or either homosexuals who have retreated deep into the closet or bisexuals who have simply decided to repress all homosexual impulses and allow only heterosexual impulses to manifest themselves. If these "ex-gays are serious, why not simply declare that they are bisexuals who have decided to embrass a completely heterosexual life?

[mddunnington]

10:29 PM on 02/07/2012

Like you?

[oscarp]

01:15 PM on 02/08/2012

are u a mental freak of nature? I know that we use 5% of our brain, u only use 0.1 % though

[dbrockskk]

07:50 PM on 02/07/2012

so what about our drop out rate?

[lavmiragerye]

07:46 PM on 02/07/2012

HAHA! People just do what they want and go with who they want or even who they don’t want to go with (in America). If someone is attracted to the same sex then they can decide to go with that person. I don’t think Babies are born straight or gay. Babies should not have any sexual orientation. If you are gay and? If you are straight and? Just don’t deceive the people you go with. Live your freaking life, make your own choices, and just make sure they don’t harm other people. I don’t like when people say they are born anything. Because babies have innocent eyes I do not think they have knowledge of sexual orientation. Adults are influencing children with this disgrace. Let children be children and keep that mess out of school leave in respect. When did straight and gay become a hot topic? Oh yeah it’s America. All “gay” people are not feminine by the way. Some people are just not attracted to the opposite sex so instead they go with the ones they feel they connect with on an intimate level. It’s the same with people who prefer the opposite sex.

[Daniel Velasquez]

07:17 PM on 02/07/2012

Why are things like this in schools? There was never anything like that a few years ago. Next thing we know the KKK have the right to pass fliers and so do anti gay and who knows what else.

[iknowscottyknows]

10:59 AM on 02/13/2012

You do know that the Bullying Awareness agenda is really indoctrination of children that ho.m.osexuality is normal, right?

[Daniel Velasquez]

02:23 AM on 02/14/2012

I do not get why instead of having people watching out for bullying, we have to teach it like it was a class.

[latinguytony]

03:07 AM on 02/15/2012

You wouldn't KNOW normal if it bit you on the brain ( which you DONT have ) you'd rather have children DIE than be aware ( seems prob YOU were a bully too )

[bajingobells]

07:02 PM on 02/07/2012

Congenial?

[napolis]

09:57 PM on 02/07/2012

I've no problem with a school board policy that gays are nice people. Very open-minded of them.

[bajingobells]

10:16 PM on 02/08/2012

lol, good one!