Lyn Duff
Encyclopedia
Lyn Duff is an American journalist with the Pacific News Service
and KPFA
radio's "Flashpoints", an evening drive-time public affairs show heard daily on Pacifica Radio
.
in 1976, Duff began her journalistic career as the founder of an underground school newspaper, The Tiger Club, while an 8th grader at South Pasadena
Junior High School in 1989. After five published issues, she was suspended from school by the principal for refusing to stop disseminating the newspaper.
After seeking help from the American Civil Liberties Union
(ACLU), the South Pasadena Unified School District agreed to allow her to return to school. She completed her 8th grade year and was then accepted as an early entrance student to California State University, Los Angeles (CSULA), which she attended for a year and a half.
While at CSULA Duff was on staff of an alternative newspaper published by Los Angeles
art-critic Mat Gleason who, at the time, was a graduate student in the school of journalism and president of an alternative Greek organization, Omega Omega Omega, and later went on to publish Coagula Art Journal
.
publicly as lesbian
. Reportedly concerned about her daughter's sexual orientation
, Duff's mother had her transported against her will to Rivendell Psychiatric Center in West Jordan, Utah
. During the drive from California to Utah, Duff covertly called journalist Bruce Mirken, a friend who then wrote for both the Los Angeles Weekly
and The Advocate
. The two had had plans to meet for dinner prior to her forced detention and upon hearing of her situation, Mirken phoned Public Council, a public interest legal aid society
which secured pro bono
services of corporate attorney Gina M. Calabrese of the Los Angeles firm Adams, Duque & Hazeltine. Duff was admitted to Rivendell Psychiatric Center on December 19, 1991, at age fifteen.
Although Rivendell was not officially affiliated with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Duff later said that she was visited by Mormon missionaries
during her six months at the Utah
facility and that the treatment she received was heavily influenced by religion. Duff says that Rivendell therapists told her that a gay
and lesbian
orientation was caused by negative experiences with people of the opposite gender and that having a lesbian sexual identity
would lead to sexually abusing other people or engaging in bestiality. Duff was diagnosed with Gender Identity Disorder
(GID) and clinical depression
.
Duff was subjected to a regimen of conversion therapy. This involved aversion therapy
, which consisted of being forced to watch same-sex pornography while smelling ammonia
. She was also subjected to hypnosis
, psychotropic drugs, solitary confinement
, and therapeutic messages linking lesbian sex with "the pits of hell
." Behavior modification
techniques were also used including: requiring girls to wear dresses, unreasonable forms of punishment for small infractions similar to hazing
like having to cut the lawn with small scissors and scrubbing floors with a toothbrush and "positive peer pressure
" group sessions in which patients demeaned and belittled each other for both real and perceived inadequacies.
On May 19, 1992, after 168 days of incarceration, Duff escaped from Rivendell and traveled to San Francisco, where she lived on the streets and in safe houses.
, and with legal assistance provided by the National Center for Youth Law, Duff petitioned the courts to have her mother's parental rights terminated. She was one of a handful of children who divorced their parents that year; an issue that gained national attention when reporters revealed that first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton
had completed her master's thesis on the legal right of children to divorce their parents. In October 1992, a lesbian couple in San Francisco adopted Duff. She lived with them until the age of eighteen, when she began living independently and returned to college.
, ABC
's 20/20, and numerous print, radio and television media outlets. She also spoke at a number of human rights, civil rights, mental health and youth services conferences about her experiences and the rights of young people to live free of discrimination and oppression on the basis of their sexual orientation. During these years she also served on the board of several national organizations including the National Center for Youth Law (board member from 1994–2001) and the National Child Rights Alliance (board member from 1992–1993, board chairperson from 1994–1999). In 1996, Duff was honored as a keynote speaker and given a human rights award at the international conference of the Metropolitan Community Church
.
During these same years, Duff was emerging as a journalist in her own right, writing for Youth Outlook, a column in the San Francisco Examiner, and the Pacific News Service. She joined the staff of Flashpoints, a daily hour-long drive-time show broadcast on Pacifica Radio's KPFA in 1994. Her writings have appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle
, the San Francisco Examiner, Salon
online, the Utne Reader
, Sassy Magazine
, the Washington Post, Seventeen
, the Miami Herald and the National Catholic Reporter
.
In 1995, Duff traveled to Haiti
where she established Radyo Timoun ("Children's Radio"), that country's first radio station run entirely by children under the age of seventeen. She reportedly worked closely with Haitian President Jean Bertrand Aristide.
In 1998, Duff graduated with a BA in International Affairs and Labor Law from Skidmore College
in Saratoga Springs, New York
.
, Croatia
, several African countries, and Vietnam
. After the United States
invaded Afghanistan
, she traveled to the front lines as one of the few non-embedded
Western journalists.
In early 2000 she began to cover religious affairs from her posting in Jerusalem, writing widely on the problems and conflicts between Christians, Jews and Muslims. In 2002, Duff earned an MA in Theology.
In February 2004, Duff, who was then living six months out of every year in Jerusalem, was home in the United States
on a brief visit when a group of ex-soldiers overthrew the democratically elected government of Haiti
. She quickly traveled to Haiti, arriving in Port-au-Prince
when the coup was only days old and reporting on the situation extensively for several national media outlets.
From 2004-2006, Duff regularly covered the situation in Haiti for the San Francisco Bay View
, Pacifica Radio's Flashpoints, and Pacific News Service. Her reporting is a blend of in-depth investigative reports and "as told to" first person commentaries by Haitian nationals. Subjects have included politically motivated mass rape, the United Nations
mission in Haiti, killings by American Marines in Port-au-Prince, civilians taking over the neighborhood of Bel Air and murders of street children by police and ex-soldiers.
Pacific News Service
Pacific News Service is a nonprofit media organization founded in 1969 by Franz Schurmann, the historian, and Orville Schell, a noted author, journalist and Dean of the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of California, Berkeley...
and KPFA
KPFA
KPFA is a listener-funded progressive talk radio and music radio station located in Berkeley, California, broadcasting to the San Francisco Bay Area. KPFA airs public news, public affairs, talk, and music programming. The station signed on-the-air April 15 1949, as the first Pacifica Station...
radio's "Flashpoints", an evening drive-time public affairs show heard daily on Pacifica Radio
Pacifica Radio
Pacifica Radio is the oldest public radio network in the United States. It is a group of five independently operated, non-commercial, listener-supported radio stations that is known for its progressive/liberal political orientation. It is also a program service supplying over 100 affiliated...
.
Early years
Born in CaliforniaCalifornia
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
in 1976, Duff began her journalistic career as the founder of an underground school newspaper, The Tiger Club, while an 8th grader at South Pasadena
South Pasadena, California
South Pasadena is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. As of the 2010 census, it had a population of 25,619, up from 24,292 at the 2000 census. It is located in in the West San Gabriel Valley...
Junior High School in 1989. After five published issues, she was suspended from school by the principal for refusing to stop disseminating the newspaper.
After seeking help from the American Civil Liberties Union
American Civil Liberties Union
The American Civil Liberties Union is a U.S. non-profit organization whose stated mission is "to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to every person in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States." It works through litigation, legislation, and...
(ACLU), the South Pasadena Unified School District agreed to allow her to return to school. She completed her 8th grade year and was then accepted as an early entrance student to California State University, Los Angeles (CSULA), which she attended for a year and a half.
While at CSULA Duff was on staff of an alternative newspaper published by Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
art-critic Mat Gleason who, at the time, was a graduate student in the school of journalism and president of an alternative Greek organization, Omega Omega Omega, and later went on to publish Coagula Art Journal
Coagula Art Journal
Coagula Art Journal was founded in 1992 by Mat Gleason as a freely distributed contemporary art magazine. Since its inception, the publication remains free as a PDF download, however readers may still obtain a hard copy via "print on demand"....
.
Involuntary conversion therapy
In 1991 Duff, then fourteen, came outComing out
Coming out is a figure of speech for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people's disclosure of their sexual orientation and/or gender identity....
publicly as lesbian
Lesbian
Lesbian is a term most widely used in the English language to describe sexual and romantic desire between females. The word may be used as a noun, to refer to women who identify themselves or who are characterized by others as having the primary attribute of female homosexuality, or as an...
. Reportedly concerned about her daughter's sexual orientation
Sexual orientation
Sexual orientation describes a pattern of emotional, romantic, or sexual attractions to the opposite sex, the same sex, both, or neither, and the genders that accompany them. By the convention of organized researchers, these attractions are subsumed under heterosexuality, homosexuality,...
, Duff's mother had her transported against her will to Rivendell Psychiatric Center in West Jordan, Utah
West Jordan, Utah
West Jordan is a city in Salt Lake County, Utah, United States. West Jordan is a rapidly growing suburb of Salt Lake City and has a mixed economy. According to the 2010 Census, the city had a population of 103,712, placing it as the fourth most populated in the state. The city occupies the...
. During the drive from California to Utah, Duff covertly called journalist Bruce Mirken, a friend who then wrote for both the Los Angeles Weekly
LA Weekly
LA Weekly is a free weekly tabloid-sized "alternative weekly" in Los Angeles, California. It was founded in 1978 by Editor/Publisher Jay Levin and a board of directors that included actor-producer Michael Douglas...
and The Advocate
The Advocate
The Advocate is an American LGBT-interest magazine, printed monthly and available by subscription. The Advocate brand also includes a web site. Both magazine and web site have an editorial focus on news, politics, opinion, and arts and entertainment of interest to LGBT people...
. The two had had plans to meet for dinner prior to her forced detention and upon hearing of her situation, Mirken phoned Public Council, a public interest legal aid society
Legal Aid Society
The Legal Aid Society in New York City is the United States' oldest and largest provider of legal services to the indigent. It operates both traditional civil and criminal law cases.-History:...
which secured pro bono
Pro bono
Pro bono publico is a Latin phrase generally used to describe professional work undertaken voluntarily and without payment or at a reduced fee as a public service. It is common in the legal profession and is increasingly seen in marketing, technology, and strategy consulting firms...
services of corporate attorney Gina M. Calabrese of the Los Angeles firm Adams, Duque & Hazeltine. Duff was admitted to Rivendell Psychiatric Center on December 19, 1991, at age fifteen.
Although Rivendell was not officially affiliated with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Duff later said that she was visited by Mormon missionaries
Missionary (LDS Church)
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is one of the most active modern practitioners of missionary work, with over 52,000 full-time missionaries worldwide, as of the end of 2010...
during her six months at the Utah
Utah
Utah is a state in the Western United States. It was the 45th state to join the Union, on January 4, 1896. Approximately 80% of Utah's 2,763,885 people live along the Wasatch Front, centering on Salt Lake City. This leaves vast expanses of the state nearly uninhabited, making the population the...
facility and that the treatment she received was heavily influenced by religion. Duff says that Rivendell therapists told her that a gay
Gay
Gay is a word that refers to a homosexual person, especially a homosexual male. For homosexual women the specific term is "lesbian"....
and lesbian
Lesbian
Lesbian is a term most widely used in the English language to describe sexual and romantic desire between females. The word may be used as a noun, to refer to women who identify themselves or who are characterized by others as having the primary attribute of female homosexuality, or as an...
orientation was caused by negative experiences with people of the opposite gender and that having a lesbian sexual identity
Sexual identity
Sexual identity is a term that, like sex, has two distinctively different meanings. One describes an identity roughly based on sexual orientation, the other an identity based on sexual characteristics, which is not socially based but based on biology, a concept related to, but different from,...
would lead to sexually abusing other people or engaging in bestiality. Duff was diagnosed with Gender Identity Disorder
Gender identity disorder
Gender identity disorder is the formal diagnosis used by psychologists and physicians to describe persons who experience significant gender dysphoria . It describes the symptoms related to transsexualism, as well as less severe manifestations of gender dysphoria...
(GID) and clinical depression
Clinical depression
Major depressive disorder is a mental disorder characterized by an all-encompassing low mood accompanied by low self-esteem, and by loss of interest or pleasure in normally enjoyable activities...
.
Duff was subjected to a regimen of conversion therapy. This involved aversion therapy
Aversion therapy
Aversion therapy is a form of psychological treatment in which the patient is exposed to a stimulus while simultaneously being subjected to some form of discomfort...
, which consisted of being forced to watch same-sex pornography while smelling ammonia
Ammonia
Ammonia is a compound of nitrogen and hydrogen with the formula . It is a colourless gas with a characteristic pungent odour. Ammonia contributes significantly to the nutritional needs of terrestrial organisms by serving as a precursor to food and fertilizers. Ammonia, either directly or...
. She was also subjected to hypnosis
Hypnosis
Hypnosis is "a trance state characterized by extreme suggestibility, relaxation and heightened imagination."It is a mental state or imaginative role-enactment . It is usually induced by a procedure known as a hypnotic induction, which is commonly composed of a long series of preliminary...
, psychotropic drugs, solitary confinement
Solitary confinement
Solitary confinement is a special form of imprisonment in which a prisoner is isolated from any human contact, though often with the exception of members of prison staff. It is sometimes employed as a form of punishment beyond incarceration for a prisoner, and has been cited as an additional...
, and therapeutic messages linking lesbian sex with "the pits of hell
Hell
In many religious traditions, a hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hells as endless. Religions with a cyclic history often depict a hell as an intermediary period between incarnations...
." Behavior modification
Behavior modification
Behavior modification is the use of empirically demonstrated behavior change techniques to increase or decrease the frequency of behaviors, such as altering an individual's behaviors and reactions to stimuli through positive and negative reinforcement of adaptive behavior and/or the reduction of...
techniques were also used including: requiring girls to wear dresses, unreasonable forms of punishment for small infractions similar to hazing
Hazing
Hazing is a term used to describe various ritual and other activities involving harassment, abuse or humiliation used as a way of initiating a person into a group....
like having to cut the lawn with small scissors and scrubbing floors with a toothbrush and "positive peer pressure
Peer pressure
Peer pressure refers to the influence exerted by a peer group in encouraging a person to change his or her attitudes, values, or behavior in order to conform to group norms. Social groups affected include membership groups, when the individual is "formally" a member , or a social clique...
" group sessions in which patients demeaned and belittled each other for both real and perceived inadequacies.
On May 19, 1992, after 168 days of incarceration, Duff escaped from Rivendell and traveled to San Francisco, where she lived on the streets and in safe houses.
Emancipation and adoption
In late 1992, with the help of Legal Services for Children and the National Center for Lesbian RightsNational Center for Lesbian Rights
The National Center for Lesbian Rights is a national non-profit, public interest law firm that advocates for equitable public policies affecting the LGBT community, provides free legal assistance to LGBT clients and their legal advocates, and conducts community education on LGBT legal issues. It...
, and with legal assistance provided by the National Center for Youth Law, Duff petitioned the courts to have her mother's parental rights terminated. She was one of a handful of children who divorced their parents that year; an issue that gained national attention when reporters revealed that first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton
Hillary Rodham Clinton
Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton is the 67th United States Secretary of State, serving in the administration of President Barack Obama. She was a United States Senator for New York from 2001 to 2009. As the wife of the 42nd President of the United States, Bill Clinton, she was the First Lady of the...
had completed her master's thesis on the legal right of children to divorce their parents. In October 1992, a lesbian couple in San Francisco adopted Duff. She lived with them until the age of eighteen, when she began living independently and returned to college.
Youth rights activism
From 1992 through 1998, Duff was an outspoken critic of the mental health system, appearing on CNNCNN
Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...
, ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
's 20/20, and numerous print, radio and television media outlets. She also spoke at a number of human rights, civil rights, mental health and youth services conferences about her experiences and the rights of young people to live free of discrimination and oppression on the basis of their sexual orientation. During these years she also served on the board of several national organizations including the National Center for Youth Law (board member from 1994–2001) and the National Child Rights Alliance (board member from 1992–1993, board chairperson from 1994–1999). In 1996, Duff was honored as a keynote speaker and given a human rights award at the international conference of the Metropolitan Community Church
Metropolitan Community Church
The Metropolitan Community Church or The Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches is an international Protestant Christian denomination...
.
During these same years, Duff was emerging as a journalist in her own right, writing for Youth Outlook, a column in the San Francisco Examiner, and the Pacific News Service. She joined the staff of Flashpoints, a daily hour-long drive-time show broadcast on Pacifica Radio's KPFA in 1994. Her writings have appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco Chronicle
thumb|right|upright|The Chronicle Building following the [[1906 San Francisco earthquake|1906 earthquake]] and fireThe San Francisco Chronicle is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, but distributed throughout Northern and Central California,...
, the San Francisco Examiner, Salon
Salon.com
Salon.com, part of Salon Media Group , often just called Salon, is an online liberal magazine, with content updated each weekday. Salon was founded by David Talbot and launched on November 20, 1995. It was the internet's first online-only commercial publication. The magazine focuses on U.S...
online, the Utne Reader
Utne Reader
Utne Reader is an American bimonthly magazine. The magazine collects and reprints articles on politics, culture, and the environment from generally alternative media sources, including journals, newsletters, weeklies, zines, music and DVDs...
, Sassy Magazine
Sassy Magazine
Sassy magazine is a defunct teen magazine, aimed at teenage female fans of alternative and indie rock music. It was founded in March 1988 by an Australian feminist, Sandra Yates, CEO of Matilda Publications, who based it on the teen magazine Dolly, which is still in publication in...
, the Washington Post, Seventeen
Seventeen (magazine)
Seventeen is an American magazine for teenagers. It was first published in September 1944 by Walter Annenberg's Triangle Publications. News Corporation bought Triangle in 1988, and sold Seventeen to K-III Communications in 1991. Primedia sold the magazine to Hearst in 2003. It is still in the...
, the Miami Herald and the National Catholic Reporter
National Catholic Reporter
The National Catholic Reporter is the second largest Catholic newspaper in the United States; its circulation reaches ninety-seven countries on six continents. Based in midtown Kansas City, Missouri, NCR was founded by Robert Hoyt in 1964 as an independent newspaper focusing on the Catholic Church...
.
In 1995, Duff traveled to Haiti
Haiti
Haiti , officially the Republic of Haiti , is a Caribbean country. It occupies the western, smaller portion of the island of Hispaniola, in the Greater Antillean archipelago, which it shares with the Dominican Republic. Ayiti was the indigenous Taíno or Amerindian name for the island...
where she established Radyo Timoun ("Children's Radio"), that country's first radio station run entirely by children under the age of seventeen. She reportedly worked closely with Haitian President Jean Bertrand Aristide.
In 1998, Duff graduated with a BA in International Affairs and Labor Law from Skidmore College
Skidmore College
Skidmore College is a private, independent, liberal arts college with an enrollment of approximately 2,500 students. The college is located in the town of Saratoga Springs, New York State....
in Saratoga Springs, New York
Saratoga Springs, New York
Saratoga Springs, also known as simply Saratoga, is a city in Saratoga County, New York, United States. The population was 26,586 at the 2010 census. The name reflects the presence of mineral springs in the area. While the word "Saratoga" is known to be a corruption of a Native American name, ...
.
International journalism
By the late 1990s, Duff was a well-established international journalist with postings in Haiti, IsraelIsrael
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
, Croatia
Croatia
Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...
, several African countries, and Vietnam
Vietnam
Vietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...
. After the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
invaded Afghanistan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...
, she traveled to the front lines as one of the few non-embedded
Embedded journalist
Embedded journalism refers to news reporters being attached to military units involved in armed conflicts. While the term could be applied to many historical interactions between journalists and military personnel, it first came to be used in the media coverage of the 2003 invasion of Iraq...
Western journalists.
In early 2000 she began to cover religious affairs from her posting in Jerusalem, writing widely on the problems and conflicts between Christians, Jews and Muslims. In 2002, Duff earned an MA in Theology.
In February 2004, Duff, who was then living six months out of every year in Jerusalem, was home in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
on a brief visit when a group of ex-soldiers overthrew the democratically elected government of Haiti
Haiti
Haiti , officially the Republic of Haiti , is a Caribbean country. It occupies the western, smaller portion of the island of Hispaniola, in the Greater Antillean archipelago, which it shares with the Dominican Republic. Ayiti was the indigenous Taíno or Amerindian name for the island...
. She quickly traveled to Haiti, arriving in Port-au-Prince
Port-au-Prince
Port-au-Prince is the capital and largest city of the Caribbean nation of Haiti. The city's population was 704,776 as of the 2003 census, and was officially estimated to have reached 897,859 in 2009....
when the coup was only days old and reporting on the situation extensively for several national media outlets.
From 2004-2006, Duff regularly covered the situation in Haiti for the San Francisco Bay View
San Francisco Bay View
San Francisco Bay View National Black Newspaper is an online newspaper, and former print newspaper, published in San Francisco, California. It covers events from an African American perspective, with a focus on Black liberation and coverage of worldwide racial inequality and political repression...
, Pacifica Radio's Flashpoints, and Pacific News Service. Her reporting is a blend of in-depth investigative reports and "as told to" first person commentaries by Haitian nationals. Subjects have included politically motivated mass rape, the United Nations
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
mission in Haiti, killings by American Marines in Port-au-Prince, civilians taking over the neighborhood of Bel Air and murders of street children by police and ex-soldiers.