Presidential hopeful and Minnesota
Representative Michele Bachmann and her husband, Marcus Bachmann,
have previously endorsed “pray away the gay” therapy.
The Bachmanns, married 30 years,
publicly object to giving gay and lesbian couples the right to marry.
But a recently surfaced audio recording
from 2010 of Marcus Bachmann calling gay people “barbarians” has
thrown the couple's anti-gay views into the headlines.
“We have to understand: barbarians
[gay people] need to be educated,” he said during an appearance on
the Point of View radio talk show. “They need to be
disciplined. Just because someone feels it or thinks it doesn’t
mean that we are supposed to go down that road. That’s what is
called the sinful nature. We have a responsibility as parents and as
authority figures not to encourage such thoughts and feelings from
moving into the action steps.”
“And let's face it: what is our
culture, what is our public education system doing today? They are
giving full, wide-open doors to children, not only giving
encouragement to think it but to encourage action steps. That's why
when we understand what truly is the percentage of homosexuals in
this country, it is small. But by these open doors, I can see and we
are experiencing, that it is starting to increase.”
A
Washington
Post
profile published Tuesday revealed the couple also supports so
called “reparative therapy,” which attempts to alter the sexual
orientation of gay men and lesbians.
Marcus Bachmann has denied reports that
his Christian counseling center has dabbled in “reparative
therapy,” but in 2005 he delivered a presentation at the Grace
Church in Eden Prairie titled The Truth About the Homosexual
Agenda during which he “introduced three people as 'former
homosexuals' as proof that sexual orientation is a choice.”
The
progressive blog ThinkProgress.org adds that in 2004
then-Minnesota State Senator Michele Bachmann, who had previously
sponsored a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, welcomed a
Love Won Out conference in Minneapolis. Love Won Out believes that
the sexual orientation of gay people can – and should – be
altered through prayer.
“I know that Love Won Out will
present the truth about homosexuality,” Michele Bachmann was quoted
as saying in a Love Won Out press release, “and present it in a
compassionate and loving manner. Those of us working to safeguard
marriage from redefinition by radical judges must inform our efforts
with an understanding of the deep emotional wounds that many in the
homosexual community carry. I look forward to welcoming Minnesotans
and residents of surrounding states to hear the message of healing
that is possible.”