Indiana University News Release

News Bureau 306 North Union St. Bloomington, Indiana 47405-3801 812/855-3911

Date: Sept. 6, 1995
BANCROFT RESPONDS TO ALLEGATIONS
FROM FAMILY RESEARCH COUNCIL

(Editor's Note: The following is from John Bancroft, director of The Kinsey Institute, in response to the Sept. 6, 1995 news release from the Family Research Council regarding its video, "The Children of Table 34.")

The Kinsey Institute has never carried out sexual experiments on children, either during Alfred Kinsey's time as director or since. As stated clearly in the first Kinsey volume, [Sexual Behavior in the Human Male], published in 1948, the information about children's sexuality responses was obtained from older subjects recalling their own childhoods, parents observing their children, and a small number of adult men who had engaged in sexual contacts with children and who were interviewed by Dr. Kinsey and his staff. The Kinsey Institute did not employ or train these men, or pay them for this information. The large majority of such information, including all that was reported in Table 34, was gathered by one individual, between 1917 and 1948, and documented by him. He died before Kinsey. No knowledge of the identities of the children involved or their parents has ever been available to The Kinsey Institute.

Allegations against Kinsey concerning this information about children's sexual responses were first made in 1981 by Judith A. Reisman. She subsequently enlarged on these ideas in a book written jointly with Edward Eichel and published in 1990 [Kinsey, Sex, and Fraud]. When The Kinsey Institute responded, Reisman filed suit in 1991 against The Kinsey Institute, then director June Reinisch, and Indiana University, alleging defamation of character and slander. In September 1993, Reisman's lawyer withdrew from the case, and in June 1994 the court dismissed Reisman's case with prejudice [which means that Reisman is prohibited from refiling the suit].

The same allegations about Dr. Kinsey's work were made in a video, entitled "Dr. Kinsey and the Children of Table 34," released by the Family Research Council in November 1994, and again in May, and most recently in September this year.

It is relevant to ask why these people continue to raise this issue. Clearly they have concerns about the effects of sex education, and they assert that this original information about children's sexual responses, obtained from a few adult pedophiles, forms the basis for modern sex education. They apparently hope that if Dr. Kinsey and his work, carried out more than 50 years ago, can be discredited, modern sex education will lose its credibility also.

Dr. Kinsey believed that the evaluation of human behavior could not be based on scientific inquiry alone, but that evidence of how people actually behaved should be taken into account. He strove for objectivity in his inquiries by insuring his informants of anonymity and by avoiding any value judgments of their behavior. Dr. Kinsey's pioneering work has contributed to more open discussion of sexual issues. In several respects his original conclusions have needed to be revised, but his commitment to a more honest appraisal of the sexual aspects of the human condition remains.

[Controversy Over Alfred Kinsey's Research].