The Supreme Court verdict in?Obergefell v. Hodges?is rapidly approaching, culminating in what will hopefully be a victory for LGBTQ Americans and a breakthrough in American civil rights. Even if the verdict is as expected, there are still a host of other walls that need to be demolished for LGBTQ Americans to enjoy full equality with the rest of America.
One such breakthrough is in the abolition of “conversion therapy,” a practice that claims to change a person’s sexual orientation from homosexual to heterosexual, widely demonized as being ethically reprehensible, dangerous, based on outdated practices, and scientifically discredited. In New Jersey, jury selections have been made in Michael Ferguson, et. al., v. JONAH, et al., a consumer fraud case that could spell the end for “conversion therapy” in the United States.
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) consumer fraud lawsuit, Jews Offering New Alternatives for Healing (JONAH), an international institution that claims to be “dedicated to educating the world-wide Jewish community about the social, cultural and emotional factors which lead to same-sex attractions,” fraudulently claimed to provide services that could change an individual’s sexual orientation, violating New Jersey’s Consumer Fraud Act.
The violation was affirmed in February 2015, when New Jersey Superior Court Judge Peter F. Bariso, Jr. ruled that the central philosophy of “conversion therapy” — homosexuality is a disorder and can be cured — is outdated and scientifically discredited, “like the notion the Earth is flat and the sun revolves around it.”
Opening arguments are expected to begin either today, June 2, or tomorrow, June 3, 2015.
Detractors of the SPLC consumer fraud lawsuit have been few, but vocal. Notably, Christopher Doyle, director of the Maryland-based International Healing Foundation, thinks the SPLC is perpetrating a “hate crime” with the lawsuit and it is “completely ridiculous that the trial has even gotten to this stage.” Maggie Gallagher of the Freedom of Conscience Defense Fund said the SPLC is declaring “war on Christianity.”
Unfortunately for these critics, and others like them, headline-grabbing vacuous rhetoric about “hate crimes” and “wars” doesn’t mean a damn thing.?”Conversion therapy” has been discredited or highly criticized by every major psychiatric, psychological, medical, and professional counseling organization in America, as well as many around the world.
Techniques used for “conversion therapy” have further been criticized and discredited. From the SPLC consumer fraud lawsuit docket:
“Customers of JONAH’s services typically paid a minimum of $100 for weekly individual counseling sessions and another $60 for group therapy sessions. The lawsuit describes sessions that involved clients undressing in front of a mirror and even a group session where young men were instructed to remove their clothing and stand naked in a circle with the counselor, [Alan] Downing, who was also undressed. Another session involved a subject attempting to wrestle away two oranges ? used to represent testicles ? from another individual.
Downing and other JONAH counselors also used techniques that left clients alienated from their families. These techniques encouraged clients to blame their parents for being gay, going so far as to have clients participate in violent role play exercises where they beat effigies of their mothers.”
Beyond the discrediting of the practice from a medical and psychological perspective, “conversion therapy” also promotes the idea that sexual orientation is consciously chosen and can be changed at will, contributing to anti-LGBTQ bigotry in the United States and standing in defiance of human biology itself. “Conversion therapy” has also been known to cause physical and psychological damage to those who had participated in it, including declines in sexual responsiveness, long-term sexual dysfunction, increased anxiety, and in some cases, self-mutilation and suicide.
If the SPLC is successful in its consumer fraud lawsuit against JONAH, the ramifications could extend far outside of New Jersey. The American public has currently made up its mind about the validity of the practice (only 8% believe it works), three states and the District of Columbia restrict or ban the practice, the White House has formally come out in opposition, and legislation has been introduced in Congress that would label “conversion therapy” as consumer fraud nationwide.
