Gay Conversn Therapy's Disturbg 19th-Century Origs | HISTORY

Contents:

• SOME GAYS CAN GO STRAIGHT, STUDY SAYS
• GAY CONVERSN THERAPY’S DISTURBG 19TH-CENTURY ORIGS
• MILO YIANNOPOULOS SAYS HE IS ‘EX-GAY,’ WANTS TO REHABILATE ‘NVERSN THERAPY’
• GAY CONVERSN: I SLEPT WH OVER 200 MEN, NOW I'M A HAPPILY MARRIED HETEROSEXUAL DAD
• CAN SCTN MAKE STRAIGHT MEN GAY?
• 'THE MISTN OF CAMERON POST' SHOWS THE DANGERS OF "GAY CONVERSN" CAMPS
• 5 SURPRISG FACTS ABOUT GAY CONVERSN THERAPY

SOME GAYS CAN GO STRAIGHT, STUDY SAYS

Crics, though, say the study's subjects may be ludg themselv and that the subject group was scientifilly valid bee many of them were referred by anti-gay relig Robert Spzer, a psychiatry profsor at Columbia Universy, said he began his study as a skeptic — believg, as major mental health anizatns do, that sexual orientatn nnot be changed, and attempts to do so n even e Spzer's study, which has not yet been published or reviewed, seems to dite otherwise. Spzer says he spoke to 143 men and 57 women who say they changed their orientatn om gay to straight, and nclud that 66 percent of the men and 44 percent of women reached what he lled good heterosexual functng — a staed, lovg heterosexual relatnship wh the past year and gettg enough emotnal satisfactn to rate at least a seven on a 10-pot said those who changed their orientatn had satisfyg heterosexual sex at least monthly and never or rarely thought of someone of the same sex durg also found that 89 percent of men and 95 percent of women were bothered not at all or only slightly by unwanted homosexual feelgs.

Spzer argu that highly motivated gays n fact change that preference — wh a lot of Study, Old DebateBut crics have challenged the study, even before was formally unveiled at today's ssn of the Amerin Psychiatric Associatn's annual meetg New Orleans, which was jammed wh televisn meras reportg on the prentatn. Ariel Shidlo and Michael Shroer, two psychologists private practice New York Cy, found that of 215 homosexual subjects who received therapy to change their sexual orientatn, the majory failed to do so.

"There's no doubt that many homosexuals who have been unsuccsful and, attemptg to change, bee prsed and their life be worse, " he said. "In fact, he said, many of his subjects had been sponnt and even suicidal themselv, for the oppose reason — "precisely bee they had prevly thought there was no hope for them, and they had been told by many mental health profsnals that there was no hope for them, they had to jt learn to live wh their homosexual feelgs.

GAY CONVERSN THERAPY’S DISTURBG 19TH-CENTURY ORIGS

"He said some velop such tremendo strs that they bee chronilly prsed, socially whdrawn or even Spzer says his study shows that some homosexuals makg some effort, ually for a few years, make the change. Another 23 percent were referred by the Natnal Associatn for Rearch and Therapy of Homosexualy, which says most of s members nsir homosexualy a velopmental disorr. "The sample is terrible, totally tated, totally unreprentative of the gay and lbian muny, " said David Ellt, a spokman for the Natnal Gay and Lbian Task Force Spzer says while the people his sample were unual — more relig than the general populatn — don't mean their experienc n be dismissed.

Rick McKnon, who is openly gay and works as an edor at the weekly Seattle Gay News, is ncerned the study rults n be ed to forward an anti-gay agenda. "Conservative, anti-gay, anti-diversy folks are gog to embrace and they're gonna e for their own agenda to ph their pot of view that, y, you don't need equaly Amerin society for gay people bee they n change, " he said.

MILO YIANNOPOULOS SAYS HE IS ‘EX-GAY,’ WANTS TO REHABILATE ‘NVERSN THERAPY’

"But Spzer — who scribed himself as a "Jewish, atheist, secular humanist" wh no axe to grd — says maybe there are gays who are happy beg gay and ex-gays who are happy beg straight, and that both sis serve more rpect. In the early 1970s, he spearhead the effort to get homosexualy removed om the Amerin Psychiatric Associatn's list of mental disorrs.

In 1899, a German psychiatrist electrified the dience at a nference on hypnosis wh a bold claim: He had turned a gay man straight.

GAY CONVERSN: I SLEPT WH OVER 200 MEN, NOW I'M A HAPPILY MARRIED HETEROSEXUAL DAD

This theory led to tticle transplantatn experiments the 1920s durg which gay men were strated, then given “heterosexual” tticl. 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.

But though Heath ntend he was able to actually turn gay men straight, his work has sce been challenged and cricized for s methodology. 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.

CAN SCTN MAKE STRAIGHT MEN GAY?

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.

'THE MISTN OF CAMERON POST' SHOWS THE DANGERS OF "GAY CONVERSN" CAMPS

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.

5 SURPRISG FACTS ABOUT GAY CONVERSN THERAPY

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. “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. Right-wg provotr Milo Yiannopoulos has e out as “ex-gay” – announcg that he “would like to help rehabilate what the media lls “nversn therapy” over the next , acrdg to a report.

The 36-year-old Brish polil mentator, whose speech and wrgs often ridicule polil rrectns, social jtice and femism, clared himself no longer gay and “sodomy ee, ” he told LifeSe an terview.