Marcus Bachmann, left, didn’t deny his clinic counseled gays to change their sexual orientation. | AP PhotoClose
Marcus Bachmann’s attempt to put to rest questions about his Christian counseling practice has only served to draw more attention to his views on homosexuality.
And for Michele Bachmann, who’s trying to focus her presidential run on opposing government spending and other economic issues instead of the culture war, the firestorm over her husband is full of political peril — even as Christian groups say the episode is reaffirming their connection to the Minnesota congresswoman.
After weeks of increased attention in the blogs and mainstream press, Marcus Bachmann made his first public comments on the subject in an interview with the Minneapolis Star Tribune published Friday. He didn’t deny that his clinic has counseled gays to change their sexual orientation. But he said such therapy is only conducted at patients’ request and is not the focus of the practice.
Bachmann also sought to explain a widely circulated audio clip in which he seems to refer to gays as barbarians by suggesting that the tape was altered.
He said it was a “myth that I have ever called a homosexual a barbarian.”
“I was talking in reference to children. Nothing, nothing to do with homosexuality,” he told the newspaper. “That’s not my mindset. That’s not my belief system. That’s not the way I would talk.”
The “barbarian” comment was made in a May 2010 interview on the Christian radio show “Point of View.” It comes in the midst of an extended discussion of homosexuality and adolescent sexual questioning.
The questioner, host Penna Dexter, brings up the “culture wars” and asks Bachmann how Christian parents should respond to a teenager who claims to be gay.
“I think you clearly say, ‘What is the understanding of God’s word on homosexuality?’” Bachmann answers. “I think that this is no mystery, that a child or preadolescent — particularly adolescents — will question and wonder about sexuality. That’s nothing new under the sun, since the beginning of time. I don’t think we should take that, because we wonder or we think or we question, does that take us down the road of homosexuality.”
“Could you add the word ‘experiment’ to that?” Dexter asks.
“Certainly there’s that curiosity. But again, we have to understand, barbarians need to be educated. They need to be disciplined. And just because someone feels it or thinks it doesn’t mean that we are supposed to go down that road. That’s what’s called the sinful nature, and we have a responsibility as parents and as authority figures not to encourage such thoughts and feelings to move into the action steps.
“And let’s face it: What’s our culture, what is our public school system doing today? They are giving full, wide-open doors to children, not only giving encouragement to think it but to actually encourage action steps. That’s why when we understand what truly is the percentage of homosexuals in this country, it’s small. But by these open doors, I can see and we are experiencing that it is starting to increase.”
Partial audio of the interview was posted at the time it aired by an anti-Michele Bachmann blog, DumpBachmann.com, that also provided a link, no longer functioning, to the full interview.
Host Dexter told POLITICO in an email that it was clear to her that Bachmann “used the word ‘barbarians’ to refer to children.”
She added, “I got it completely. It was an endearing term, in a way, that made sense to me and to our audience. We believe that children are born with a nature that inclines them to challenge and break rules, and that it is thus the parents’ responsibility to guide their children along good and productive paths.”
Dump Bachmann blogger Ken Avidor said the clip on the site was edited for length — the edits are clearly marked with sound effects and do not affect the exchange in question — but not altered in any way.
“If Mr. Bachmann is claiming I falsified the audio, he really needs to provide proof,” Avidor told POLITICO.
Michele Bachmann’s campaign declined to make Marcus Bachmann available or to clarify his remarks Friday.
The charge that the Bachmann & Associates clinic practices “reparative therapy” to turn gays straight has been alleged for years. It received new life in the past week with the release of an undercover video in which a gay activist pretends to be seeking to change his orientation. A counselor tries to help him become straight, largely at the patient’s urging.
Marcus Bachmann defended the action, citing the man’s claimed desire to change his sexuality. This is consistent with Bachmann’s other statements over the years, such as a 2006 Minneapolis City Pages article in which he was quoted saying, “If someone is interested in talking to us about their homosexuality, we are open to talking about that. But if someone comes in a homosexual and they want to stay homosexual, I don’t have a problem with that.”
Peter Sprigg of the Family Research Council said despite the official disapproval of major medical organizations of reparative therapy, “there is actually a lot of evidence” that it can work if the patient wants to change.
“The political goal here, from critics of Michele Bachmann and her husband, is to make them look like kooks who believe things no serious person believes and engage in practices no respectable therapist practices,” Sprigg said. “Those attacks are misguided and incorrect, and among Christians it will only help her campaign to see that she and her husband are very serious and sincere about their faith.”
Nonetheless, when confronted with the topic in recent days, Michele Bachmann has quickly sought to change the subject.
In Iowa on Monday, she answered a local television reporter’s question about the clinic by saying, “We’re very proud of our business, and we’re proud of all job creators in the United States. That’s what people really care about.”
