Berry, Kenneth K. & Berry, Jason, The Congressional censure of a research paper: Return to the Inquisition?

From: Skeptical Inquirer Electronic Digest, Commentary in the issue dated December 10, 1999 

 We have taken the first large and frightening step away from scientific freedom and toward totalitarianism in control of scientific endeavours.

Ferguson, Bob, Youthful Sexual Experience and Well-being

Koinos Magazine #21 (1999/1

Important Conference in Rotterdam; about the Rind et al. research

Gieles, F.E.J., Mister President...,

Ipce Newsletter E6, July 1999

The USA is shocked by the research of Rind, Bauserman & Tromovitch; chronological overview of the critical reactions

Gieles, F.E.J., Science and Morality or The Rind et al. Controversy, The counter arguments replied 

Ipce Newsletter E7, December 1999

In this article, we will take a look at the counter arguments against the Meta-Analysis.
For an honest scientific debate, one has to put counter arguments in the form of a question, not in the form of a proposition. Most of the opponents have spoken in propositions, mostly with strong emotional loading and much rhetoric. In this article, I translate these propositions into questions and supply answers.

Gieles, F., The struggles about the free will, facts and morality, The debate about the publications of Rind, Bauserman & Tromovitch goes on – a bird’s eye view, 1997 - 2002

Ipce Newsletter E 13, June 2002

In this article, I have tried to give an overview of the debate on the Rind et al. publication in 1998 and earlier. It appeared that the debate was hot and that it had several phases. People began to attack without even reading the meta-analysis, and even politicians mixed the discourse about facts and the discourse about morals.  Gradually, the meta-analysis was seriously studied and the debate concentrated on the science and the facts. The science is still in debate, but some facts are acknowledged, and the author and their publications are taken as serious.

G. G., Radical Reconsideration of the Concept of Child Sexual Abuse

Koinos Magazine #20 (1998/4)

New Findings by Bauserman, Rind and Tromovitch

Mirkin, Harris, Sex, Science and Sin: The Rind Report, Sexual Politics and American Scholarship

Manuscript submitted to Sexuality and Culture, Special Issue on Rind-Tromovitch-Bauserman

Many social scientists and psychologists disagreed with the article, but one would have expected them to fight back with other articles rather than with a call for censorship. In fact, the problem with the article wasn't that it was methodologically weak, but that it was strong. It broke the rules of sexual politics. [...]
The Rind report attacked the empirical foundation of the moral claims that were being made, and like the Kinsey Reports it was vehemently attacked and seen as undermining the moral tradition. The anger was generated against the two reports not because they were unconvincing but because they, each in their own way, were too convincing. If their analyses were right it would shake the foundations of the moral claims that were commonly made and largely accepted. To admit Rind type arguments into the debate, and to argue shades of gray and issues of definition, was to lose the major battle. The Rind argument didn't overtly challenge the moral premise about adult/youth sex, but it did threaten to change the type of argument. That was the danger.

Oellerich, Thomas D., Rind, Tromovitch, and Bauserman: Politically Incorrect - Scientifically Correct

Sexuality & Culture, 4(2), 67-81 (2000)

The Rind, Tromovitch, and Bauserman study of the impact of CSA among college students is politically incorrect but scientifically correct. It has a number of important implications for the research and practice communities. Among the more important is the need to stop exaggerating the negative impact of adult/nonadult sexual behavior, as suggested earlier by both Browne and Finkelhor, and Seligman. Another important implication is for conducting research that does not approach the issue of adult/nonadult sexual behavior with a political ideology as often has been the case thus far. And finally it is time to stop the common practices of 1)assuming that CSA causes psychological harm, and 2) routinely recommending psychotherapeutic intervention.

Rainer, Paul, Strident Attack

Der Spiegel, 2 Aug 1999

Translated from Der Spiegel: USA's reaction to the Rind et al. research, with Comment

Rind, Bruce, PhD., Gay and Bisexual Adolescent Boys' Sexual Experiences With Men:  An Empirical Examination of Psychological Correlates in a Nonclinical Sample

Archives of Sexual Behavior, Vol. 30, No.4, 2001

Over the last quarter century the incest model, with its image of helpless victims exploited and traumatized by powerful perpetrators, has come to dominate perceptions of virtually all forms of adult-minor sex. Thus, even willing sexual relations between gay or bisexual adolescent boys and adult men, which differ from father-daughter incest in many important ways, are generally seen by the lay public and professionals as traumatizing and psychologically injurious. This study assessed this common perception by examining a nonclinical, mostly college sample of gay and bisexual men. 

Rind, B., Bauserman, R. & Tromotitch, Ph.,
An Examination of Assumed Properties of Child Sexual Abuse Based on Nonclinical Samples

Paper presented to the symposium sponsored by the Paulus Kerk, Rotterdam, The Netherlands, on the 18th of December 1998.

"The results of our reviews clearly show that the assumptions of most mental health professionals, legislators, law enforcement personnel, media workers, and the lay public that sexual relations defined as CSA cause intense harm pervasively for both boys and girls are vastly exaggerated."

Rind, B., Bauserman, R. & Tromovitch, Ph., The Condemned Meta-Analysis on Child Sexual Abuse; Good Science and Long-Overdue Skepticism

Skeptical Inquirer July/August 20001, 68-72

In July 1999, the prestigious journal Psychological Bulletin published our review of fifty-nine studies that had examined psychological correlates of child sexual abuse (CSA) [...] We soon achieved an unexpected honor: our paper was unanimously condemned by Congress.
In the aftermath, SKEPTICAL INQUIRER has published two commentaries, one denouncing Congress [...] and the other denouncing our study (Hagen 2001). We would like to offer our own thoughts about this astonishing story of politics, pressure, and social hysteria - the antitheses of critical and skeptical thought.
We conducted our research in the spirit of scientific skepticism, an attitude sadly missing in the CSA panic that arose throughout much of the 1980s and early 1990s.

Zuriff, G.E., Pedophilia and the culture wars

Public Interest, Winter 2000

The article gives a short summary of the research of the Rind et al. team. Then, it will explain why the results of this research have upset many groups in the US society, including the Congress, so that these groups will deny the results of the research. 
The author analyses the remarkable reaction of the APA, who turned 180 degrees and who published paradoxes. The author analyses the ideological combat that's going on behind the scene.