Mixed reactions to Exodus group leaving 'gay therapy'

Phelan M. Ebenhack / AP, file

Alan Chambers, left, president of Exodus International, sits with his wife, Leslie, in their home in Winter Park, Fla. on May 11, 2006

By Miranda Leitsinger, Staff Writer, NBC News

Former participants in a controversial program aimed at ridding people of their homosexuality congratulated its leader for deciding to shut down its ministry, but other groups said there was a role for the ?reparative therapy? used in the ?ex-gay movement.?

The Christian ministry, Exodus International, was founded in 1976 and claims more than 200 branches, churches and counselors in the United States and Canada. It insisted that people could overcome same-sex attraction through prayer and therapy.

But mainstream psychiatric and medical groups have said that program, also known as ?reparative therapy,? is not founded in science and can be harmful. The American Psychiatric Association said 15 years ago that it could cause depression, anxiety and self-depressive behavior in patients.

Such was the case for Bobby Painter, 45, who paid at least $48,000 to attend Exodus' ?Love in Action? program over two years from 1999 to 2000.

The program's use of a 12-step program ? akin to that popularized by Alcoholics Anonymous ? led him to once beat himself up when he got to the amends stage because he was so ?disgusted? with who he was.

?I actually just almost went insane. I was thoroughly depressed,? said Painter, of Columbus, Ohio, who came out as gay in 2003. ?You just become very hate-filled toward yourself.?

The premise itself ? that he could be cured of being gay ? was something the program promised in advertising, he said. But on his first day in the program, he was told there was no cure.

?It was all just a mind game and so you felt completely taken advantage of,? he said. ?I left my job, I left my church, I sold my home? to be in the program.

In an apology posted on the Exodus website, President Alan Chambers said he was ?sorry for the pain and hurt many of you have experienced.?

?I am sorry that some of you spent years working through the shame and guilt you felt when your attractions didn?t change,? he wrote.

In a statement, Exodus International, which describes itself as the oldest and largest group of its kind, said that its board of directors had decided to close down after a year of talking and praying about its place in a changing culture.

Polls show that a narrow majority of Americans, a steadily growing share, support gay marriage, which has been legalized in 12 states and the District of Columbia. The Supreme Court is preparing to rule on two landmark gay-rights cases.

Chambers, over the past year, had caused turmoil in the ex-gay movement by saying that reparative therapy could hurt gays and that there was no cure for same-sex attraction.

Restored Hope Network, a coalition of ministries that aims to help gays and lesbians overcome being homosexuals, formed ? in part ? last year due to that change in course.

?We don't reject reparative therapy out of hand as the Exodus leadership is doing. Neither is it the main platform that we use,? said Rob Gagnon, a board member and a professor at Pittsburgh Theological Seminar.

He said they felt reparative therapy would work for some but not all.

?People will even, without therapeutic intervention, go through shifts,? he added. ?For us then to say well the therapy can't assist that process in any way when we know it's going to happen anyway for many people, at least in a limited way, seems to me to be a little bit absurd, unreasonable.?

He also questioned whether Chambers ? who wrote in the letter that he had ?conveniently omitted my ongoing same-sex attractions? ? was acting out of ?guilt and shame? for not being transparent about that.

?It's out of that guilt and that shame that he's taken a ?throw the baby out with the bathwater? kind of decision,? he said.

California last year became the first state in the nation to ban reparative therapy for teens under 18 years of age. New Jersey's state legislature is weighing similar legislation.

Christopher Rosik, president of the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality, a group of therapists who believe sexual orientation can be changed through various approaches including reparative therapy, said he wasn't surprised by the decision.

But he didn't think it would mean the end of the practice, either.

?Reparative therapy ... does capitalize on certain insights that I think can be applicable for some men, maybe not every man or woman, but are applicable to some,? Rosik told NBC News. ?And these men and women would attest to that.?

He said Exodus' decision wouldn't impact his association's mission to help individuals experiencing unwanted same-sex attraction and behavior, but he felt it could help make clear the difference between the work being done by religious groups and that by professional therapeutic organizations.

Even as they celebrated the shutdown of Exodus, some, like Painter, said it had ultimately, and ironically, served as a bridge to coming to terms with their sexuality. He said there was a need for some kind of ministry to serve as such a gateway for conservative gay Christians.

?One of the things they said (at Exodus) was that God loved you regardless of all of that,? he said, noting it was ?liberating? and a ?turning point? in his struggle. ?All I had to think about was, 'Well, maybe God's not pleased with this part of my life but he's not going to destroy me anymore.'?

?I needed that experience,? he added, ?because I believe if I had just stayed home I would probably have ended my life.?

Source: http://feeds.nbcnews.com/c/35002/f/653381/s/2d98af43/l/0Lusnews0Bnbcnews0N0C0Inews0C20A130C0A60C210C190A632920Emixed0Ereactions0Eto0Eexodus0Egroup0Eleaving0Egay0Etherapy0Dlite/story01.htm

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Police: Body believed to be missing Iowa girl, 15

BOONE, Iowa (AP) ? Authorities announced early Saturday that they have recovered a body believed to be a 15-year-old Iowa girl who was kidnapped by a registered sex offender while walking home from school.

High school freshman Kathlynn Shepard has been missing since May 20, when she and a 12-year-old friend were lured into a pickup truck that police believe was driven by Michael J. Klunder. The younger girl was able to escape after he took them to a hog confinement facility, but Kathlynn was never found.

Gerard Meyers, assistant director of field operators of the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation, said fisherman found the body Friday night in the Des Moines River near Boone, concealed by debris.

Boone County sheriff's deputies then recovered the body. An autopsy is scheduled for Saturday morning.

"We're fairly confident the unfortunate circumstance this evening was the recovery of Kathlynn," Meyers said at a news conference in Boone.

Hundreds of officers and volunteers had searched for Kathlynn, but hopes of finding her alive were dampened when testing confirmed that blood found on Klunder's truck and at the hog building was Kathlynn's.

The girls had just stepped off their school bus and were near their homes in Dayton, a small town about 60 miles north of Des Moines, when Klunder asked whether they wanted to make money mowing lawns, police said. He promised he would take them for a ride to ask their parents, but instead drove them several miles away to a hog confinement building where he worked.

Klunder ? who spent two decades in prison on kidnapping convictions ? took the girls to an office, where he tied their hands with zip ties, authorities said. The 12-year-old told investigators she was able to free her hands when Klunder took Kathlynn to a different part of the property, and that she ran through the wooded area to safety. She eventually found farmers and called 911.

Authorities found Klunder dead hours later, after the 42-year-old committed suicide by hanging himself at another rural property.

Meyers said zip ties found on the body recovered Friday were consistent with those Klunder used on the 12-year-old, and the clothing on the body matched what Kathlynn had been wearing the day she was abducted.

Klunder had been released from prison in 2011, after serving 20 years for convictions in two separate kidnappings in Iowa, on back-to-back days in December 1991.

In the first, police said he lured a woman on a highway near Mason City out of her vehicle by claiming she was missing a taillight, and then forced her into his car and tried to assault her. In the second, he snatched two 3-year-old toddlers from a Charles City apartment complex, put them in a trunk and left them 50 miles away at a secluded garbage bin, where they were found alive hours later.

Police are also looking into whether Klunder is responsible for the kidnapping and slaying of two cousins who vanished while riding bikes in Evansdale, about 90 miles from Dayton. The bodies of the girls, ages 10 and 8 when they vanished, were found in December in a wooded area in Bremer County, where Klunder once lived in a home for emotionally troubled youth.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/police-body-believed-missing-iowa-girl-15-051417342.html

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Stranded orcas hold critical clues for scientists

June 7, 2013 ? The development of a standardized killer-whale necropsy system has boosted the collection of complete data from killer-whale strandings from 2 percent to about 33 percent, according to a recent study from a team of scientists, including a University of California, Davis wildlife veterinarian.

The study, published recently in the journal Marine Mammal Science, suggests that the data can help scientists better understand the life history of the orca species.

The killer-whale necropsy system was co-developed by Joe Gaydos, director of the SeaDoc Society -- a program of the UC Davis Wildlife Health Center within the School of Veterinary Medicine -- and Stephen Raverty, veterinary pathologist with the British Columbia Ministry of Agriculture.

"Because killer whales are apex predators and flagship conservation species, strandings are sad events," said Gaydos. "But this study confirms that if we make every effort to understand why the strandings occurred, we will ultimately improve the fate of the species."

Gaydos and Raverty developed the standardized killer-whale necropsy system in 2004. The analysis of strandings since then has shown that the protocol, along with increased funding for southern resident killer-whale recovery, has increased the collection of complete data from killer-whale strandings. Traditionally, only one in 50 stranded whale cadavers would be analyzed; now one in three get a full examination.

The increased recovery funding was provided by the U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service and Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

For the study, researchers analyzed North Pacific killer-whale strandings dating back to 1925. The report noted that while orcas are some of the most widely distributed whales on Earth, very few dead ones are ever found. Over the last two decades, an average of just 10 a year have been discovered stranded across the entire North Pacific Ocean.

"Each stranded orca should be viewed as a unique opportunity to enhance our understanding of this magnificent species," said co-author Raverty.

The study found that 88 percent of all reported killer-whale strandings are fatal, while only 12 percent of the stranded killer whales make it off the beach alive. The dead whales can provide critical clues to the species' overall life history, genetics, and health, as well as the causes of death. With such limited opportunity to do comprehensive sampling and studies, the authors noted the disturbing fact that, until recently, less than 2 percent of dead killer whales were thoroughly examined.

While the study was designed to look at stranding trends and did not evaluate the causes, necropsies on beached orcas have shown that they absorb extremely high loads of humanmade toxins, suffer from infectious diseases and, in the case of fish-eating populations, depend primarily on severely depleted salmon stocks. With the standardized protocol now in place -- providing much more complete data on strandings -- researchers are getting a clearer picture of killer-whale life and death.

"This was a herculean effort to learn more about one of the ocean's top predators," said lead author Michelle Barbieri, a former SeaDoc Society scientist and UC Davis graduate who is currently the lead veterinarian for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Hawaiian Monk Seal Research Program.

"We could not have done this without the collaboration of dozens of killer-whale scientists from around the world, who provided stranding and population data from Washington, Oregon, California, Alaska, Hawaii, British Columbia, Mexico, Japan and Russia," she said.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_environment/~3/nQPQmRr-CD8/130607131012.htm

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Tropical Storm Andrea bearing down on Fla. coast

Mike McKinney rides a wave generated by Tropical Storm Andrea in Panama City Beach, Fla. on Thursday, June 6, 2013. Heavy rain poured down on much of Florida Thursday as the first tropical storm of the Atlantic hurricane season headed toward the state's western coast, while a new tropical storm warning was issued for a swath of the U.S. East Coast. (AP Photo/The News Herald, Andrew Wardlow)

Mike McKinney rides a wave generated by Tropical Storm Andrea in Panama City Beach, Fla. on Thursday, June 6, 2013. Heavy rain poured down on much of Florida Thursday as the first tropical storm of the Atlantic hurricane season headed toward the state's western coast, while a new tropical storm warning was issued for a swath of the U.S. East Coast. (AP Photo/The News Herald, Andrew Wardlow)

Cory Dunbar, a Neptune Beach Lifeguard, checks the surf outside the station at the end of Atlantic Blvd. in Neptune Beach, Fla. Thursday, June 6, 2013. Tropical Storm Andrea, the first named storm of the Atlantic season, hammered Florida with rain, heavy winds, and tornadoes Thursday as it moved toward the coast of Georgia and the Carolinas, promising sloppy commutes and waterlogged vacation getaways through the beginning of the weekend. (AP Photo/The Florida Times-Union, Bob Mack)

Grand Park resident Roosevelt Knight makes his way past a bright and cheery mural on the 8th street side of a building at the intersection of Myrtle Avenue in Jacksonville, Fla. Thursday morning, June 6, 2013 as he makes his way to visit a friend despite the day's tropical storm rains. Tropical Storm Andrea, the first named storm of the Atlantic season, hammered Florida with rain, heavy winds, and tornadoes Thursday as it moved toward the coast of Georgia and the Carolinas, promising sloppy commutes and waterlogged vacation getaways through the beginning of the weekend. (AP Photo/The Florida Times-Union, Bob Self)

The High Hazard surf warning flag flies in front of the Atlantic Beach, Fla., Ocean Rescue station was nearly blown away by the winds. Wind, rain and heavy surf hit the area as Tropical Storm Andrea moved into Florida. (AP Photo/The Florida Times-Union, Bob Mack)

Beach residents Sherry Fix, left, and her son James, 11, hold their hoods as they venture out on Neptune Beach, Fla. to check out the waves Thursday, June 6, 2013. "This is what you are supposed to do on the last day of school, come to the beach," Sherry said. Tropical Storm Andrea, the first named storm of the Atlantic season, hammered Florida with rain, heavy winds, and tornadoes Thursday as it moved toward the coast of Georgia and the Carolinas, promising sloppy commutes and waterlogged vacation getaways through the beginning of the weekend. (AP Photo/The Florida Times-Union, Bob Mack)

MIAMI (AP) ? The first named storm of the Atlantic season hammered Florida with rain, heavy winds, and tornadoes Thursday as it moved over land toward the coast of Georgia and the Carolinas, promising sloppy commutes and waterlogged vacation getaways through the beginning of the weekend.

Tropical Storm Andrea was not expected to strengthen into a hurricane but forecasters warned it could spawn tornadoes and cause isolated flooding and storm surge before it loses steam over the next two days.

Tropical storm warnings were in effect for a large section of Florida's west coast from Boca Grande to the Steinhatchee River and for the East Coast from Flagler Beach, Fla., all the way to Cape Charles Light in Virginia, and the lower Chesapeake Bay south of New Point Comfort. A tropical storm warning means that tropical storm conditions are expected somewhere inside the warning area within a day and a half.

As of 8 p.m. EDT on Thursday, Andrea was about 45 miles (72 kilometers) west of Gainesville after making landfall hours earlier in Florida's Big Bend area. Its maximum sustained winds had fallen to 50 mph (80 kph) and it was moving northeast at 15 mph (24 kph).

Rains and winds from the storm were forecast to sweep northward along the Southeastern U.S. coast Thursday night and Friday. The storm was expected to lose steam by Saturday as it moves through the eastern United States, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott said one of the biggest risks associated with the storm for Florida was the chance of tornadoes, eight of which had been confirmed Thursday across the state. Scott urged residents to remain vigilant.

"This one fortunately is a fast-moving storm," he said. Slower-moving storms can pose a greater flood risk because they have more time to linger and dump rain.

Another threat to Florida's coast was storm surge, said Eric Blake, a specialist at the Hurricane Center. The center said coastal areas from Tampa Bay north to the Aucilla River could see storm surge of 2 to 4 feet, if the peak surge coincides with high tide.

Gulf Islands National Seashore closed its campgrounds and the road that runs through the popular beach-front park Wednesday. The national seashore abuts Pensacola Beach and the park road frequently floods during heavy rains.

Altogether, 30 state parks closed their campgrounds in Florida.

Meanwhile, south Georgia residents were bracing for high winds and heavy rains that could lead to flooding.

On Cumberland Island off the Georgia cost, the National Park Service was evacuating campers as the storm approached.

"My main concern is the winds," said chief park ranger Bridget Bohnet. "We're subject to trees falling and limbs breaking, and I don't want anybody getting hurt."

Forecasters were predicting the storm would pass through Georgia overnight, and the island would likely re-open to tourists Friday.

"It looks like it's picking up speed and that's a good thing because it won't sit and rain on us so long," said Jan Chamberlain, whose family runs the Blue Heron Inn Bed & Breakfast near the Sapelo Island Ferry station on Georgia's coast.

In the Carolinas, Andrea's biggest threat was heavy rain, with as much as 6 inches expected, the National Weather Service said.

Forecasters didn't expect major problems, however, along the most vulnerable parts of the coast such as the Outer Banks, a popular tourist destination.

John Elardo, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Newport, N.C., said the storm would push major waves to the north and northeast, away from the Outer Banks, where a series of storms in the fall and winter wore away dunes and washed out portions of N.C. Highway 12, the only road connecting the barrier island to the mainland of North Carolina.

Andrea could bring up to a foot of flooding on the sound side of the Outer Banks, Elardo said.

The rain threatened to ruin a beach day Friday for Angela Hursh, 41, of Cincinnati, who had rented a house in Frisco, N.C. Hursh was planning to soak in the hot tub and watch movies with her 9-year-old and 13-year-old daughters.

"I think we're just going to hunker down and eat junk food," Hursh said.

Doug Brindley, who owns a vacation lodging rental service on the northern end of the Outer Banks near Virginia, said he expects all outdoor activities to be washed out Friday, driving tens of thousands of early-summer vacationers toward unexpected shopping sprees.

"We're going to have rain and wind," said Brindley, who owns Brindley Beach Vacations and Sales. "Retailers are going to love it."

He expects new visitors streaming south from their homes across the U.S. Northeast to arrive tired and grumpy.

"They're going to be driving through that mess," Brindley said.

In Cuba, heavy rains associated with the storm system have soaked the western part of the island for the past several days, overflowing rivers and damaging crops. At least 30 towns were cut off by flooding, and more than 2,600 people sought refuge from the rising waters at relatives' homes or state-run shelters, the Communist Party newspaper Granma reported Thursday.

___

Contributing to this report were Associated Press writers Jeff Martin in Atlanta; Russ Bynum in Savannah, Ga.; Gary Fineout and Brent Kallestad in Tallahassee, Fla.; Peter Orsi in Havana; and Emery P. Dalesio in Raleigh, N.C.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2013-06-06-Tropical%20Weather/id-bdead3e8037f452b9dd5f171a7bc6ae7

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Hearing Aids Can Serve a Second Purpose?As Wireless Speakers

?Never in my audiology career has something so simple helped so many people at so little cost.?

?I can?t stop smiling.?. . . I could understand every word. . . .? What an overwhelming experience.?

?I am not exaggerating when I tell you that at EVERY [theatrical] performance we get big thank you?s.? We have subscribers who are returning and telling their friends.?

These reports?from an audiologist, a person with hearing loss, and the business manager of an 882-seat Chicago theatre?aptly describe my response when first experiencing the hearing assistance technology to which they each refer.? As I sat, unable to understand the words reverberating off the ancient stone walls of Scotland?s Iona Abbey, my wife noticed a hearing assistance sign with a ?T? and nudged me to turn on the ?telecoils? in my new aids.? The instant result was a stunningly clear voice, speaking from the center of my head.? I was on the verge of tears.

A TV room hearing loop

In our subsequent UK sojourns, I have experienced the spread of this ?hearing loop??technology?to auditoriums, churches and cathedrals, and to tens of thousands of transient venues, including ticket and post office windows, and all London taxis.? Although specific applications need professional design, the gist of the technology is simple:? an amplifier picks up sound from a PA system and transforms it into a magnetic signal sent by a wire loop surrounding an audience.? The telecoil?an inexpensive magnetic sensor in most of today?s new hearing aids and all new cochlear implants?receives this signal, enabling the hearing instrument to become an in-the-ear speaker that broadcasts sound appropriate to each user?s needs.? And I bet you didn?t know this:? all U.S. landline phones, and select mobile phones (including my new iPhone5), also are ?hearing aid compatible.? That means they can similarly transmit improved sound via magnetic communication with telecoil-equipped hearing instruments.

Back home, I installed hearing loops in my home and office.? Voila!, my TV and phone now broadcast wonderfully clear sound through my aids (and binaural phone listening is vastly superior to one-eared listening).

Other modern wireless technologies also connect hearing aid wearers to their TVs and phones.? When connected to a TV or stereo, a transmitter can ?stream?? audio directly to one?s hearing aids.? When synced with one?s phone, conversation can be broadcast to both hearing aids.? Bluetooth-enabled hearing aids can receive sound from a host of Bluetooth devices, including phone and computer.

So, people often wonder, might Bluetooth or other streaming wireless technologies enable assistive listening in public venues?and without the expense of a running a loop wire?

Grand Rapids Airport has looped both its concourses and all individual gate areas. This enables hearing instruments to serve as wireless, in-the-ear speakers that broadcast announcements.

Alas, each hearing aid company offers a different proprietary wireless technology.? The one universal wireless receiver?which anyone can use, no matter what their hearing aid brand or what country they are in?is the humble telecoil (a part that costs hearing aid companies about $2).? Moreover, unlike Bluetooth?s battery-sucking demands, the telecoil requires zero power. With today?s popular ?open-fitting? hearing aids, a person may hear both immediate sound from a TV and slightly delayed Bluetooth sound, creating an annoying echo.? And unlike Bluetooth and other wireless technologies that serve only small areas, hearing loops work in places both small and big.

Indeed, the accelerating move to hearing loops in the USA?sparked by local and national hearing loss associations and now supported by a new cottage industry of hearing loop vendors and installers?has led to thousands of newly looped venues.? Some venues are small, such as New York City?s 450 subway booths and all its future taxis.? Some are bigger, such as auditoriums and worship places.? And some are huge, such as airports and Michigan State University?s basketball arena.

Are hearing loops the final word in assistive listening?? Likely not.? But the challenge for hearing technologists is to make any alternative technology similarly

• simple for people of all ages to operate (without needing to pair and charge special equipment),
• affordable, without adding to the cost of already-expensive hearing instruments,
• available with nearly all hearing instruments,
• energy efficient,
• scalable, with applications in public spaces both small and vast, and
• universal, with the same signal serving everyone, no matter their location or hearing instrument manufacturer.

Given a future with a universal wireless receiver (for now, a telecoil) in virtually every hearing instrument, and given the continuing spread of hearing aid compatible assistive listening, we can envision a better future for Americans with hearing loss?a future in which hearing aids will serve as customized, wireless speakers in all sorts of public venues.? That, methinks, would be a future where doubly useful hearing aids for challenged ears would be as commonplace as glasses for challenged eyes.

?

Source: http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2013/06/06/hearing-aids-can-serve-a-second-purposeas-wireless-speakers/

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Amazon Reportedly Looking To Expand Grocery Business, Roll Out AmazonFresh Beyond Seattle

Amazon has had an ongoing experiment for the past half-decade called AmazonFresh, which offers grocery service and delivery of fresh produce to customers in its home base of Seattle. That program is on the verge of a significant expansion, according to a new report from Reuters today. Amazon is looking to offer AmazonFresh-type services in markets outside of Seattle later this year, including LA and San Francisco, with 20 other new markets on the roadmap for 2014, including some beyond U.S. shores.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/vtAMhkdhomM/

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Obama to nominate Anthony Foxx as transportation secretary (reuters)

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