The SearchVoat Forum

Fri Feb 11, 2022 - 2:32 pm EST

Politico reported that Sam Brinton has been chosen as deputy assistant secretary of Spent Fuel and Waste Disposition for the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Nuclear Energy (ONE).

...he holds a dual Master’s degree from MIT in engineering systems and nuclear science and engineering, is the founder of “Core Solutions Consulting that provides technical expertise on topics ranging from nuclear waste management to advanced nuclear reactor innovation and nuclear non-proliferation policy to advanced nuclear companies,” and has advised Congress on related issues.

..the biography also details Brinton’s work as an adviser to the Obama administration on LGBT issues and an activist for campaigns to ban talk therapy for unwanted same-sex attraction, such as the BornPerfect Campaign and 50 Bills 50 States

“He shows young men and women everywhere he goes that they can be who they are and gives them courage,” the bio reads. “Once, while he was walking around Disney World in 6 inch stilettos with his boyfriend, a young gay boy saw Sam with his boyfriend and started crying. He told his mother, ‘t’s [sic] true, Mom. WE can be our own princess here.’”

The National Pulse reported that Brinton, who uses the drag handle “Sister Ray Dee O’Active,” is the self-described “slutty one” in the D.C.-based drag queen group Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, and discussed his experience as a “handler” in “puppy play,” a fetish that involves pretending to be dogs. Photos in the interview and on (WARNING: graphic) social media depict him standing over kneeling men in leather dog masks, one of whom is wearing a leash Brinton is holding.

“One of the hardest things about being a handler is that I’ve honestly had people ask, ‘Wait, you have sex with animals?’” Britton says. “They believe it’s abusive, that it’s taking advantage of someone who may not be acting up to a level of human responsibility…. The other misperception is that I have some really messed up background, like, did I have some horrible childhood trauma that made me like to have sex with animals.”

In an interview with the Ruth Institute’s Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse, behavioral analyst Susan Constantine questioned the veracity of his conversion therapy horror stories, which include claims of being tortured with heat coils, electric shocks, and pinpricks.

Pup Gryphn – Photo: Todd Franson

It’s Thursday night at The DC Eagle, and Pup Gryphn is in his element. He bats a neon green football with his red paws..

Gryphn, 28, the current Mid-Atlantic Puppy 2016 titleholder and a member of the Mid-Atlantic Kennel Korps, is one of a growing number of people taking part in puppy play. It’s a scene that, while not leather-centric, grew out of the leather and BDSM communities..

Pup Domino (black singlet), Bragi (Blue Singlet), Pup Indigo (red) – Photo: Todd Franson

While gear, such as a harness, collar and tail enhance the puppy play experience, Gryphn stresses it’s not essential to participate, save a pair of mitts and knee pads...

Sir Haydn and Pup Stitch – Photo: Todd Franson

Enter the Handler

IN THE PUP COMMUNITY, handlers function the same way dog owners do, keeping a watchful eye on their charge and reining in the pups if needed. It’s the handlers who train the pups and teach them discipline, doling out rewards or punishments based on good or bad behavior...

When folks in Manhattan, Kansas, remember the exhilaration of their first Pride celebration in April 2010, around the same time as they were getting pummeled trying to pass an anti-discrimination ordinance at City Hall, they talk about a kid named Samuel Brinton like proud parents or professors...

Brinton was among a group of students who took Kansas State University by storm in those days.

So no one in Manhattan would have been surprised to see Brinton’s recent byline in the opinion pages of the New York Times, where Brinton recounted the trauma they experienced as a middle schooler whose Southern Baptist missionary parents sent them to gay conversion therapy... blah blah blah..

As the child of Southern Baptist missionaries, Samuel Brinton from Perry, Ia., grew up in a conservative mission community. One day, a forbidden Playboy magazine made the rounds among the boys, but Sam proudly told his dad later that it didn’t affect him the way it did others. He got excited instead, he said, being around a certain male friend.

It did not go over well.. blah blah blah..

..Petitioners called for a law to ban conversion therapy, naming it after 17-year-old Leelah Alcorn, a transgender teen from Ohio who took her own life after being forced to go through therapy...

President Obama supports "Leelah's Law," which would require Congressional approval to ban conversion therapy, but a quicker strategy relies on getting states to pass their own measures...

As the son of conservative Southern Baptist missionaries, he moved 26 times during his childhood, experiencing life in far-flung places like Bolivia and Singapore as well as small towns in Kansas, Iowa and Florida...

It wasn't until that road trip in Kansas, when a female friend invited him to try vegan food with her girlfriend, that Brinton began to understand that he had been brainwashed.

He now lives in Washington, D.C., where he works at an energy policy think tank and uses his story to raise awareness of the controversial psychiatric practices.

He says he rarely sees his family, but his mom attended his graduation last spring when he finished his master's degree at MIT.

"They're not happy I'm talking about what happened," he said, though he knows they still love him and says he has forgiven them.

Photo: Professor Bjork lays his hand amongst the prints of graduates from 1997.

A room plastered with handprints marks the end of a longstanding tradition. For over a decade each graduating senior in the computer science major placed a painted handprint on the lab’s brightly colored walls, signifying many hours of study and research.

The lab housed in MacDonald Hall was home base to the computer science major for over 25 years. But over Christmas break the computer science major closed shop in MacDonald Hall and relocated to Gordon’s newest academic building—the Ken Olsen Science Center.

Steve Brinton and Russ Bjork, two of Gordon’s computer science faculty, reminisce over the years spent in their uniquely decorated lab. “It wasn’t unusual to find our students huddled in the corner of the MacDonald lab with the glow of computer screens lighting their faces,” says Brinton. “It was small, but it unified our students. The new space, though, will create a lot of opportunity.”

The move will centralize the computer science major, placing it in closer proximity to many other science disciplines such as physics, chemistry and engineering.

Bjork, one of the first computer science professors at Gordon 30 years ago, is excited for the new collaborative opportunities for his students. “Forging links between majors is of utmost importance,” said Bjork. “That same interdisciplinary collaboration will also show students outside our program the value of computer science today.”

“We’ll miss the handprints of our past students,” said Brinton. “But we’re trying to get an actual piece of the wall brought over to our new space. We’re also using an LCD screen that shows pictures of the handprints.”

The first handprints made their mark on the computer science lab nearly 14 years ago. The prints, under a sign for the Class of 1997, are centered on the back wall of the lab.

The Mathematics and Computer Science
Department welcomes Mr. Stephen
Brinton to Union as Assistant Professor
of Computer Science. Stephen holds a
Masters in Computer Science from the
University of North Carolina, Charlotte, a
Bachelors in Computer Science and
Psychology from Gardner-Webb
University, and a Master of Divinity from
Asbury Theological Seminary. He is
currently serving as the pastor of Girad
Charge, United Methodist Church in
Girad, GA. and will be joining the
computer science faculty in August '98

Stephen Brinton
Bioinformatics Manager
Stephen Brinton serves as the Bioinformatics Manager at Mercy BioAnalytics. He received his B.S. from Gardner-Webb University with a double major in Psychology and Computer Science. His original goal was to assist people in the area of mental health, but that goal quickly shifted to the field of computer science when he realized he had aptitude for all things digital and an interest in the promises that computer technology held. After graduation, Stephen decided to study physics and electrical engineering – but was quickly drawn back into the creative world of computers and completed a M.S. in Computer Science from the University of North Carolina, Charlotte.

After completing his Masters degree, Stephen took a job as a Senior Systems Analyst at Unisys Corporation. The work dealt with programming machine language for large federal reserve machines. It was financially rewarding but lacked purpose, so after two years Stephen left (taking a huge pay cut) and began to teach computer science at Gordon College in Georgia.

The need for purpose stemmed from Stephen’s growing Christian faith, which exhibited itself in his new work with Gordon College’s Baptist Student Union. This drive for purpose ultimately led to 3 years of study at Asbury Theological Seminary, which culminated in a Master of Divinity degree, and was followed by several years of ordained pastoral ministry through the Southern Georgia United Methodist Conference.

This call to ministry, plus a renewed drive to exercise his gifts in both computer science and education, continued to serve as the catalyst for Stephen’s next career moves: first accepting a position as assistant professor at Union University (Tennessee), then later a position as a full stack web manager at SIM (Serving in Mission, South Carolina), and finally accepting an associate professorship at Gordon College in Wenham, Massachusetts. After eight productive years at Gordon College (which included completing Ph.D. coursework and candidacy at the University of Massachusetts Lowell), Stephen found himself called to pursue a new line of work: biotech computing.

This launched almost 9 years of challenging and fruitful work with Cell Signaling Technology (Danvers, MA). While at CST, Stephen met a variety of needs critical to the company’s goals in developing the highest quality antibodies, serving as a computer scientist, a bioinformatics programmer/analyst, a business analyst, and a bioinformatics manager. During these years, he built lab information systems, completed pipeline systems, data visualization software, and helped usher in the use of innovative technologies such as cloud computing, containers, and Kubernetes.

A common theme weaves itself throughout Stephen’s professional and personal life – using his gifts, abilities, and interests toward a purposeful, meaning-filled transformation in the world. It is this theme that drives Stephen’s priorities at home (where he is blessed with a wonderful wife and five terrific kids), and it is this theme that motivates all he does in the workplace. Stephen is thrilled, therefore, to be part of the shared mission at Mercy BioAnalytics and looks forward with hope and anticipation to the realization of Mercy’s goal: early-stage cancer detection.