Perkins: Gay Community Causing Suicides

Update: Read Sirdeaner Walker's response to Perkins in Wednesday's Post. Walker's son killed himself after being subjected to antigay bullying.

Family Research Council president Tony Perkins recognized National Coming Out Day by blaming recent youth suicides on the gay community in an online column for The Washington Post.

In the Post'sOn Faith blog, Perkins wrote that the "homosexual movement" was responsible for creating a sense of despair that drives some gay people to suicide.

"Some homosexuals may recognize intuitively that their same-sex attractions are abnormal -- yet they have been told by the homosexual movement, and their allies in the media and the educational establishment, that they are 'born gay' and can never change," he wrote. "This -- and not society's disapproval -- may create a sense of despair that can lead to suicide."

Watchdog group Media Matters criticized the Post for giving the antigay Perkins a platform, in what appears to be a tendency for the publication.