It added that there is limited research on conversion therapy for minors, but none of the research available proves that such interventions can alter a child’s gender identity or sexual orientation.
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Sometimes referred to as “reparative therapy”, conversion therapy aims to change sexual orientation or gender identity. Four states and the District of Columbia have banned its use on minors. If passed, Lieu’s bill would also ban all advertising that claims the therapy can successfully change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity.
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s report denounces the use of the discredited practice, which supporters allege can change sexual orientation or gender identity. “Most importantly, it may put young people at risk of serious harm”.
“We could not be more grateful to SAMHSA, [Health and Human Services], and the entire Obama administration for producing such an in-depth and lifesaving report, and to the APA for inviting us to the table with such high caliber experts to observe the process”, said National Center for Lesbian Rights #BornPerfect campaign coordinator and staff attorney Samantha Ames, speaking at the Utah LGBT Summit, part of the National LGBT Rural Summit Series, hosted by the White House and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Efforts to ban parents from subjecting their lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) children to “conversion therapy” got a boost on Thursday from a US government report that said the practice was unsafe and must stop.
Conversion therapy can include anything from Bible study to forced heterosexual dating to aversion therapy, in which patients are shown homosexual erotica and shocked every time they display arousal.
Many practitioners of conversion therapy are unlicensed, and many have religious training rather than medical training, said Dr. Jack Drescher, an expert on LGBT mental health and a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst in New York City who was not involved with the report.
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The SAMHSA authors stressed that eliminating conversion therapy is only one step in helping LGBTQ youth lead happy, productive lives. “Supportive families, peers, and school and community environments are associated with improved psychosocial outcomes for sexual minority youth”, the report said. “We do strongly believe that young people should be valued for who they are, no matter what they look like, where they’re from, the gender with which they identify or who they love”. What is new about this report, said Brian Altman, director of the division of policy innovation at SAMHSA, is that the psychologists and other experts convened for it also came to a consensus about the best ways to help children who may be grappling with gender identity or expression, meaning they may be trans.
