1./ What's the truth about "Conversion Therapy"? This week the entire regiment of LGBTQ+ activists wailed as one, "Ban Conversion Therapy!". But what do they mean by Conversion Therapy exactly? Here's activist @JayneOzanne describing the horrors she says a ban would prevent.👇
2./ She says beatings, corrective rape, and locking people in cupboards are being used in the UK to try to change people's sexual orientation. Really? Doesn't this evangelical Christian realise these are all criminal offences? So what is it a conversion therapy ban WOULD stop?
3./ The campaign obsesses so much about religion you'd think gays were crowding into churches. One of the campaign's poster boys is @thatmattyh who says he managed to "escape conversion therapy" when his religious congregation discovered he was gay.👇independent.co.uk/voices/lgbt-co…
4./ The irony is he was working as a missionary at the time. Isn't that line of work all about conversion? Matthew was apparently told to "undergo therapy and publicly, in front of my 400 fellow missionaries, confess and repent." Terrible I'm sure. But is this a job for the law?
5./ If someone is deluded enough to join a nutjob church my heart goes out to them. But the logical conclusion of this approach is that cops should patrol churches and mosques listening for homophobia and bigoted verses in "Holy Books" should be redacted. Good luck sunshine!
6./ The focus on religion is only one way those demanding a ban scatter confusion. They avoid defining "conversion therapy" at all costs which makes it all the more ridiculous when politicians pontificate. Here's Keir Starmer saying he would ban it. Ban WHAT exactly Keir?👇
7./ The woeful inability to define this subject clearly extends to the ridiculous National Survey of LGBT opinion commissioned by Theresa May (who else?). 2% of LGBT people claimed they'd undergone conversion therapy. You'll be relieved 8% of Wiccans had only been offered it. 🙄 
8./ Last year the campaign's language was clearer. In this letter from July 2020 supporting a ban sent to @trussliz by musicians like @eltonofficial they declare conversion therapy is a form of torture and link to sites that describe appalling practises. 👇banconversiontherapy.com/the-letter
9./ One link takes you to an @IRCT site that describes conversion therapy with a litany of blood-curdling techniques from electro-shock, forced nudity, and vomit-inducing poisons to corrective violence and confinement. At the risk of repeating myself these are ALL illegal. 👇
10./ Press releases sent out last year also used a quote from the Trevor Project which campaigns against suicide, which said conversion therapists use a "variety of shaming, emotionally traumatic or physically painful stimuli”. Ok, that's clear! 👇independent.co.uk/life-style/con…
11./ The problem for the campaign was that in the Western world today it's unthinkable a licensed therapist would use "shaming, emotionally traumatic or physically painful stimuli” to try to change someone's gender identity or sexual orientation. So is there a need for a ban?
12./ When they realised their mistake the campaign shifted ground. So did the Trevor Project. That definition about trauma was dropped. Instead their site now talks about stopping "dangerous" talk therapies, including "gender-critical therapy". Mmm. 👇thetrevorproject.org/get-involved/t…
13./ The thing is all the leading therapy organisations in Britain are signatories to a Memorandum of Understanding published by @BACP which makes clear any attempt to change or suppress someone's sexual orientation or gender identity is prohibited. 👇bacp.co.uk/media/6526/mem…
14./ So if all licensed therapists are prevented by their own professional organisations from conducting what we all think of as "conversion therapy" why is a ban necessary? Finally, we've reached the crux of what this campaign is really about: gender identity affirmation.
15./ In the UK therapists should neither affirm nor deny someone's identity or orientation. They listen and guide you towards understanding what's going on in your head. They're neutral. But for the gender identity lobby this isn't enough. It must be affirmation or nothing.
16./ For years the likes of Dr Norman Spack have promoted the "affimation model" that says every child knows for sure if they're trans and must have that identity affirmed ASAP. If they don't get that (and puberty blockers) they'll suffer depression and suicide. 👇
17./ In Britain, self-styled genius Jolyon Maugham claims there's a "strong correlation between affirming the gender of trans young adults and reducing their risk of committing suicide". He even claims Kiera Bell's victory will put lives at risk. Duhh?👇vice.com/en/article/qjp…
18./ The gender identity lobby has fought for years to get the affirmation model accepted. Therapists have resisted this, not because they're anti-trans but because they know many teens who present as trans also have other issues that need addressed. Many are gay.
19./ These kids inevitably imbibe the residual homophobia that's rife around them. So it's plain weird that LGBQT+ organisations on the one hand claim Britain's full of homophobes desperate to brutally convert gays but don't accept some teens might be scared to be seen as gay.
20./ Isn't it at least possible that some troubled teens view a trans identity as preferable to a gay one? Apart from anything else trans isn't an identity built on sexual attraction and most teens -of all sorts- are confused and even scared about their burgeoning sexuality.
21./ These kids need space and time to consider. Some will conclude they are trans and good luck to them. They need all the support and care society can extend. But many may not. They'll go through puberty and change their mind. Affirmation of gender identity may prevent that.
22./ That's why enforcing gender identity affirmation as the ban aims to do is really it's own type of conversion therapy. But in the darkest and strangest of ironies it is gays in the main, and lesbians in particular, who will be be fast-tracked to medicalisation.
23./ I'm not in favour of trying to change anyone's gender identity or sexual orientation. By any means. Who is? Apart from the odd nutjob. And as far as I can see hardly anyone is trying to do it either. There's certainly no epidemic of it among therapists or anywhere else.
24./ If a ban on conversion therapy was only about stopping that, I'd support it. But it isn't. The only significant difference the proposed bill would make is that humane, well-meaning therapists would be forced to affirm gender identity on pain of being jailed.
25./ What's worse their fear of falling foul of the law will leave the field open to gender identity evangelists and the pace of unthinking gender identity affirmation will increase. If you're gay and support this type of ill-defined ban you're voting for your own extinction.
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