Former 'Ex-Gay' Lears Denounce 'Conversn Therapy' In A New Documentary : NPR

Contents:

• 5 THGS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT GAY CONVERSN THERAPY
• GAY CONVERSN THERAPY’S DISTURBG 19TH-CENTURY ORIGS
• TERRIFYG PHOTOS RECREATE THE HORRORS OF GAY 'CONVERSN THERAPY' CENTERS
• 'I WAS A RELIG ZEALOT THAT HURT PEOPLE.' AFTER COMG OUT AS GAY, A FORMER CONVERSN THERAPY LEAR IS APOLOGIZG TO THE LGBTQ COMMUNY
• GAY MOSW MOSW CY GUI
• FORMER 'EX-GAY' LEARS DENOUNCE 'CONVERSN THERAPY' IN A NEW DOCUMENTARY
• NOT THE ONN: MOSW BANS GAY PRI FOR NEXT 100 YEARS
• 5 SURPRISG FACTS ABOUT GAY CONVERSN THERAPY

5 THGS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT GAY CONVERSN THERAPY

A therapy that claims to nvert gay people to heterosexuals is beg tted urt wh two new s, one of which seeks to sue unselors offerg the therapy and the other seekg to fend nversn therapy, as is known, supposedly helps gay people overe same-sex attractns. [7 Absolutely Evil Medil Experiments]More recently, people who have been through nversn therapy report talk therapy that emphasiz psdoscientific theori, such as the ia that an overbearg mother and a distant father make a child gay. His therapist blamed his parents for Arana's homosexualy, and urged him to distance himself om his female bt Lev, one of the men sug Jonah for ceptive practic, says that he qu nversn therapy after his therapist had him strip down and touch himself to "rennect wh his masculy, " acrdg to the New York Tim.

Why psychologists say nversn therapy don't workHomosexualy is not nsired a mental disorr, so the Amerin Psychologil Associatn (APA) do not remend "curg" same-sex attractn any se.

GAY CONVERSN THERAPY’S DISTURBG 19TH-CENTURY ORIGS

Instead, societal ignorance, prejudice and prsure to nform to heterosexual sir are the real dangers to gay people's mental health, acrdg to a 1997 statement on "nversn" or "reparative" therapy by the APA. In 1935, Frd went even further, wrg to a woman who wanted her homosexual son nverted that homosexualy "is nothg to be ashamed of, no vice, no gradatn; nnot be classified as an illns. One of the stranger attempts was an effort by Vienne endocrologist Eugen Steach to transplant tticl om straight men to the scrotums of gay men an attempt to rid them of same-sex sir.

It didn’t of the most proment advot of nversn therapy the 1940s and 50s was Edmund Bergler, who saw homosexualy as a perversn and believed he uld "cure" gay people wh a punishment-based, nontatnal therapy the Amerin Psychiatric Associatn stopped classifyg homosexualy as a mental disorr 1973, nversn therapi lost support. A small group of psychologists, spltg wh their peers, ntue to promote the therapi, foundg the nversn therapy anizatn NARTH, or the Natnal Associatn for Rearch & Therapy of Homosexualy. In 2003, famed psychiatrist Robert Spzer, who spearhead the removal of homosexualy om the Amerin Psychiatric Associatn's mental disorr list 1973, reported the journal Archiv of Sexual Behavr that terviews wh nversn therapy patients suggted that some people uld change their sexual paper was cendiary and highly cricized, given that relied on terviews wh patients stead of measurable benchmarks of same-sex sir.

Conservative groups were lighted to have support om Spzer, who wasn't tated wh relig bias or anti-gay iology; gay anizatns felt the end, however, Spzer me to agree wh his crics.

TERRIFYG PHOTOS RECREATE THE HORRORS OF GAY 'CONVERSN THERAPY' CENTERS

"I believe I owe the gay muny an apology for my study makg unproven claims of the efficy of reparative therapy, " Spzer Stephanie Pappas on Twter @sipappas or LiveScience @livcience. But provirs, ually unlicensed, n often disguise the terms they e to avoid beg terms clu:Sexual attractn fluidy exploratn therapy (SAFE-T)Elimatg, rcg, or creasg equency or tensy of unwanted same-sex attractn (SSA)Reparative therapySexual reorientatn effortsEx-gay mistryPromotg healthy sexualyAddrsg sexual addictns and disorrsSexualy unselgEnuragg relatnal and sexual wholensHealg sexual brokennsConversn therapy techniqu n lead to feelg “ls than” or “damaged, ” impactg self-teem. A number of medil and mental health anizatns have issued public statements rejectg the e of nversn therapy bee of many provirs who claim to be qualified to provi nversn therapy are often not licensed mental health practners or medil study found that LGBTQ (lbian, gay, bisexual, transgenr, or qutng) people who are rejected or discrimated agast are:8 tim more likely to report havg attempted suiciAlmost 6 tim more likely to report high levels of prsnMore than 3 tim as likely to e illegal dgs3 tim more likely to be at high risk of HIV and other STDsAcrdg to rearch, nearly 700, 000 LGBTQ adults the U.

Acrdg to the Brish Psychologil Society (BPS), nversn therapy - sometim lled "reparative therapy" or "gay cure therapy" - tri to change someone's sexual orientatn or genr inty.

'I WAS A RELIG ZEALOT THAT HURT PEOPLE.' AFTER COMG OUT AS GAY, A FORMER CONVERSN THERAPY LEAR IS APOLOGIZG TO THE LGBTQ COMMUNY

Robert Galbrah Heath, a psychiatrist New Orleans who pneered the technique, ed this form of bra stimulatn, along wh hired prostut and heterosexual pornography, to “change” the sexual orientatn of gay men. An offshoot of the techniqu was “aversn therapy, ” which was found on the premise that if LGBTQ people beme disgted by homosexualy, they would no longer experience same-sex sire. ” LGBTQ people had long protted the cel and scientifilly dub forms of “treatment, ” but the ncept that homosexualy was a disease was accepted by the majory of the medil tablishment.

This clud the Amerin Psychiatric Associatn, which nsired homosexualy to be a psychiatric the 1960s and 1970s, as a vol gay rights movement took to the streets to mand equaly, the profsn began to turn s back on the ncept that people uld be “nverted” to heterosexualy. In 1973, the APA removed homosexualy om the DSM, s fluential manual of psychiatric disorrs, and medil profsnals began to distance themselv om techniqu they had once embraced.

Their methods varied, and clud everythg om talk therapy to “gay nversn” mps and nferenc, LGBTQ people were isolated om fay and iends, hypnotized, told to pray until their homosexualy subsid, stcted to beat effigi of their parents, mocked, ached on “proper” genr rol, and told their sexualy was unnatural and And Anne Plk, both “formerly gay” pose wh their son, Timothy, a mpaign for Gay Conversn to Heterosexualy. “I read books and listened to dtap about how to have a ‘rrective and healg relatnship wh J Christ, ’” wr Jam Guay, a gay man who attend weekly therapy and nversn semars as a teen. And Exod Internatnal, an umbrella group that nnected var nversn therapy groups and gay mistry anizatns, closed down 2013 after nearly 40 years of operatns after s print, Alan Chambers, cid ’s impossible to change someone’s sexual orientatn.

GAY MOSW MOSW CY GUI

“The practic have no basis science or medice and they will now be relegated to the dtb of quackery, ” said California ernor Jerry Brown as he signed a bill banng gay-to-straight therapy the state 2012. After pletg a project lled “Unveiled” that documented her own g out procs ― cludg filmg herself wh three meras as she me out to her parents ― Pares cid the foc of her next work would be on the gay “nversn therapy” clics. ”Check out more imag om “Until You Change” throughout this article and learn more about the photographer’s relatnship wh the victims of the gay “nversn therapy” clics and what she hop the impact of this project will be by readg our terview wh Pares Pares PhotographyHuffPost: What spired the project?

” When he returned to the Catholic Church at age 36, his experience wh nversn therapy Pate said his Catholic therapist, like many who attempt to help patients change their sexual orientatn, believed that homosexualy was ed by childhood sexual abe or alienatn om one’s parents: what Mr. Brothers Road scrib self as “a non-prof, multi-fah, ternatnal fellowship primarily of men om bisexual or same-sex-attracted backgrounds who—for our own, eply personal reasons—typilly do not accept or intify wh the label ‘gay’ and prefer stead to explore and addrs unrlyg issu and embrace our thentic masculy.

Another Catholic, Joseph Nilosi, who died 2017, was a -founr of the Natnal Associatn for the Rearch and Therapy of Homosexualy, a secular group formed 1992 that is now lled the Alliance for Theraptic Choice and Scientific Integry. Nilosi said of young people experiencg same-sex attractn: “So when a 15-year-old boy go to a prit and says, ‘Father, I have the feelgs, I have the temptatns, ’ that prit should say, ‘You have a choice; if you don’t want to be gay, there are thgs that you n do.

FORMER 'EX-GAY' LEARS DENOUNCE 'CONVERSN THERAPY' IN A NEW DOCUMENTARY

” A group prottg the nference hung a banner on archdcan property that featured a quote attributed to the Dert Stream/Livg Waters founr, Andrew Comiskey, and that read part, “There is no such thg as a ‘gay’ is a popular myth. The people I terviewed said Catholic stutns may not wily promote nversn therapy, but the msag gay believers hear Catholic spac help promote the ia that nversn is possible. Many gay Catholics have heard, over and over, that nobody is “born gay”; that homosexualy is typilly ed by trma; that beg gay is a purely negative experience om which they have nothg to learn, and om which the broar church has nothg to learn.

The specific theori and practic of nversn therapy draw on a ep well of silence and shame that affects all gay Catholics, cludg those who never step si a therapist’s office.

NOT THE ONN: MOSW BANS GAY PRI FOR NEXT 100 YEARS

Tristan did not thk of her sexualy as the only issue she was alg wh, but when she raised other ncerns, she said, her therapist seemed to thk beg gay was the central problem. Bob, as we all lovgly ll him” as “an amazg, lovg man, ” who nohels nvced him of what he now se as “misrmatn” about the nature and orig of homosexualy, attributg a “homosexual clatn” to problems fay relatnships, sexual trma cludg e of pornography, the lack of a proper velopment of masculy and other “wounds”—ias he later heard om prits the Schuchts, thor of the upg book Be Rtored: Healg Our Sexual Wounds Through J’ Merciful Love, disagreed wh the labelg of his work as of “misrmatn, ” statg that all of the materials om the John Pl II Healg Center have approval om the lol bishop and his books have obtaed an imprimatur.

”As he began to leave nversn therapy behd, Kent read gay narrativ like The Velvet Rage: Overg the Pa of Growg Up Gay a Straight Man’s World, by the psychologist Alan Downs.

5 SURPRISG FACTS ABOUT GAY CONVERSN THERAPY

Like mental health erng bodi the Uned Stat and Atralia, those the Uned Kgdom, such as the UK Council for Psychotherapy, have long rejected the ia of nversn therapi for homosexualy.

A 2009 UK survey found that while only 4% of therapists reported they would attempt to change a client’s sexual orientatn if one nsulted askg for such therapy, 17% reported havg assisted at least one client/patient to rce or change his or her homosexual or lbian feelgs. This document was an important step the history of psychiatric engagement wh lbian, gay and bisexuali; was (rather belatedly) le wh the removal of homosexualy om the Diagnostic and Statistil Manual of the Amerin Psychiatric Associatn 1973, and the Internatnal Classifitn of Diseas of the World Health Organisatn 1992. But June 2014, Mike Davidson, director of the Core Issu Tst, the same Brish registered chary that unsuccsfully attempted to advertise “cur” for homosexualy on London b 2013, said:.