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SAN FRANCISCO, August 26, 2002 (LSN.ca) – A new study claims that the rate of suicide attempts among homosexuals is three times higher than that of normal males: 12 percent compared to 3 or 4 percent—and that those killing themselves are getting younger. But predictably, the study’s University of California in San Francisco (UCSF) authors blame “anti-gay harassment.”  Bill Maier, a psychologist with Focus on the Family, rejects the “anti-gay” explanation. “If you look at the attempted suicide rate in San Francisco, it’s extremely high among gays, as is the rate of substance abuse, alcoholism and homosexual ‘domestic’ violence,” Maier said. “It seems quite a stretch to blame the attempted suicide rate on anti-gay bias,”—particularly since the study was done in cities where homosexuality is not only condoned but widely endorsed, and often promoted by civic authorities.

Dr. Mark Goulston, who sits on the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, said homosexuals are more likely to be lonely, particularly when their families reject them. By extension, it has been argued that painfully conscious of their weirdness and desperate for acceptance of their proclivity, homosexuals develop manic depressive fluctuations, including euphoria during a homosexual relationship and deep troughs when they are alone.  To read UCSF coverage with links to the study see:  https://pub.ucsf.edu/today/cache/news/200208053.html