Signorile challenges FRC's Perkins to a debate

Mike Signorile:

The FRC has distributed a pamphlet that shows gay men and lesbians, falsely, as physically and mentally ill pedophiles who can be cured, and another that begins by likening same-sex marriage to man-horse marriage (and uses a horse graphic). Robert Knight, FRC director of cultural studies, said in 1999, "Gaining access to children has been a long-term goal of the homosexual movement," and an FRC pamphlet from that year, titled "Homosexual Activists Work to Normalize Sex with Boys," states, "One of the primary goals of the homosexual rights movement is to abolish all age of consent laws and to eventually recognize pedophiles as the 'prophets' of a new sexual order." In 2002 Timothy Dailey, FRC senior research fellow, wrote a paper titled "Homosexuality and Child Sexual Abuse," in which he claimed, "The evidence indicates that disproportionate numbers of gay men seek adolescent males or boys as sexual partners."

These claims are reckless, Mr. Perkins, because they defame an entire group. All the claims about child abuse have been thoroughly discredited by scholars, law enforcement officials, social scientists, and reputable medical and mental health associations. This is what got you designated as a hate group, not your opposition to same-sex marriage.

But maybe we are misunderstanding you. Maybe you have incontrovertible proof behind these and many other claims. Maybe you can convince me that the hate group label is unfair, or maybe I can convince you that some or all of these claims are erroneous. Or perhaps we will each realize that we've misunderstood one another in some ways. So I'm asking you here and now to engage with me in a civil public discussion to debate these and other claims and to talk about hate. We can do it here on HuffPost, or on my radio program on SiriusXM.