Lavender Magazine, in one of its rare moments of political investigative reporting, outed the Rev.Tom Brock, a Lutheran with a penchant for slamming gays and lesbians. It turns out, Brock had been attending Courage, a Catholic support group for gays and lesbians who want to be straight. But critics say Lavender violated the group’s confidentiality in writing the article, prompting some to call the ethics employed by the magazine and its reporter, John Townsend, “suspect.”

MinnPost’s David Brauer spoke with Stephen Rocheford, president of Lavender who admitted sending Townsend into the confidential Courage meeting undercover. The magazine also admitted that it knew the meeting was confidential, but published statements from the meeting anyway.

Michael Triplett of the National Gay and Lesbian Journalist Association said the breach of confidentiality was not ethical.

Personally, I find the ethics of the reporting suspect. If someone disclosed during a Narcotic Anonymous/Alcoholics Anonymous meeting that they had sexual encounters with men while being openly hostile to gays, would it be OK to report that?

I think the story of how Courage works is an interesting one and the group has been very secretive–obviously–which means there has been little coverage even in Catholic press circles. While many people disagree with their approach–which focuses on working steps, remaining chaste, prayer, and little contact with openly gay people–the question is whether the practice, itself, is so dangerous that people’s expectation of anonymity should be violated in order to expose it.

Triplett continued in another blog post on the issue:

The other side of the ethics question is whether the story was so important it justified violating the confidentiality of the meeting and participants’ expectations. In other words, was this the only way to get the story and is the story important enough to breach this ethical line.

To me, the answer is no. While you may not like what Brock says and stands for–and you may feel the same about what Courage stands for and does–there probably isn’t a compelling enough reason to agree to confidentiality and then breach it.

Brauer interviewed Karl Reichert, who says that Lavender could be creating a chilling effect gays who go to confidential meetings.

“In Minneapolis-St. Paul, we’re the land of 10,000 treatment programs; people go to these programs and trust they are truly anonymous,” Reichert says. “As someone who’s participated in a support group, it’s not fair to anyone in the group.”

Rocheford defended his article.

“I personally, and Lavender Magazine as a matter of policy, do not believe in outing anyone. People are allowed to be crazy and dysfunctional in their lives. There’s one exception: a public figure who says one thing and does another. This is not the first homosexual minister who denounces homosexuality in public and engages in it in private.”

University of Minnesota Prof. PZ Myers, a ScienceBlogger said:

If I were to be interviewed by John Townsend, the author of the piece, I wouldn’t trust any promise he might make to me, which is one lesson — he has sacrificed his integrity to make this story. I can’t be too irate, though; it sounds like no innocents were harmed by the revelation, and if the effectiveness of the program is diminished, that’s no loss.

New York’s popular gossip blog, Gawker, was even more unrestrained in its criticism:

Who’s shamed here? Tom Brock, superficially. But reporter John Townsend and his editors, even more. Twelve step meetings—whether for alcoholics, drug addicts, gamblers, sex addicts, or, yes, “gay men struggling with chastity”—are based on anonymity. They don’t work if the participants think that a reporter could spill their secrets. And since these meetings save lives, their anonymity should be honored by the press. Just as a magazine wouldn’t print troop movements that would get soldiers killed, or print the names of confidential police informants that might get them assassinated, they shouldn’t presume to have the right to fuck with another person’s recovery.

Jane Kirtley, the Silha Professor of Media Ethics and Law at the University of Minnesota, told the Star Tribune that Lavender crossed the line.

“I’m a believer that the use of undercover reporting should be reserved only for the most important stories that you can’t get any other way,” she said. “Whenever you go undercover, you raise the question with the public: If you were prepared to misrepresent yourself to get the story, how can we be sure that the story is accurate?”

Rocheford again defended the article and his magazine.

“We have a policy here that we don’t ‘out’ people, with one exception: public figures who make [anti-gay] pronouncements and then turn out to be homosexuals,” he said.

He added that the ex-gay group Courage “is not a real therapy session.”

“It’s a Catholic perversion of an honest 12-step program,” he said.

Christian author and gay rights supporter, Tony Jones, condemned Lavender’s actions:

Well, Lavender Magazine, the GLBT magazine of the Twin Cities, snuck a reporter into a Catholic support group for men struggling with the “sin” of homosexuality, and lo and behold, Brock was in attendance, talking openly about his struggles. The article, by John Townsend, is not well written or researched. He mistakenly refers to Brock as an “associate pastor,” for instance, and he writes that Brock’s church broke with the ELCA over the vote last summer to ordain openly practicing homosexual clergy, when in fact Hope Lutheran left the ELCA (over similar issues) in 2001.

My advocacy of gays’ full inclusion in the life of the church is established. And I’m happy to see another bigot removed from the pulpit and the radio for a few days. But sneaking into a confidential support group is way over the line.

IMO: Lavender Magazine owes Tom Brock an apology and a retraction. But, of course, the damage to his soul has been done.

Correction: Brock was originally identified as a Catholic. He is a Lutheran attending a Catholic anti-gay support group.