Mormon Church Cuts Deal: Now Exempt from Conversion Therapy Ban

Utah Governor Gary Herbert has announced that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS or Mormon) will now support the state’s ‘conversion therapy’ ban it had opposed earlier this year.

“Conversion therapy” is a loosely defined term used by media, politicians, and LGBTQ activists to discredit any therapy that claims to modify or change a person’s sexual behavior, i.e., from homosexuality to heterosexuality.

“These ‘therapy ban’ laws effectively kick the clients out of the driver’s seat of their own therapy and put politicians in the driver’s seat, instead. The government shouldn’t be deciding what people should do with their sexuality. Politicians have no business telling people their therapy goals are illegal. Nor do they have any business telling people that they, the politicians, know “who the client really is” and that the client’s legitimate identity must inevitably be ‘gay.'” — Dr. Joseph Nicolosi Jr.

Mormon leaders decided to support the ban after Herbert and Utah’s legislators “carefully tailored” the rule exempting LDS mental health therapists from it.

The newer version of the regulatory rule exempts LDS “clergy members or religious counselors acting in a religious capacity, or…parents or grandparents who happen to be a mental health therapist if they are talking to children or grandchildren.”

“If radical LGBT activists were so concerned about unethical practices in therapy, they would seek to ban therapeutic methods, like any method that uses shame, pain or coercion to try to change someone’s sexuality. … But that’s not what they’re doing. They’re actually outlawing treatment goals … to decrease one’s unwanted same-sex attractions in the privacy of one’s own therapy.” — Dr. Joseph Nicolosi Jr., clinical director, Breakthrough clinic

Although the Mormon Church opposes “same-sex marriage” and teaches that homosexuality is a sin, it denounces conversion therapy as abusive and supports banning the practice.

“The media and politicians have been using the term “conversion therapy” for any therapy that claims to modify sexuality from homosexuality to heterosexuality. But they’re not telling the full story. The term “conversion therapy” is broad, ill-defined, there’s no ethics code, no governing organization. And it’s generally practiced by unlicensed individuals.” — Dr. Joseph Nicolosi Jr., clinical director, Breakthrough clinic

The rule would ban Utah’s non-Mormon therapists from practicing conversion therapy on LGBTQ minors.

“[E]veryone has the right to walk away from sexual practices that don’t work for them. [However,] if those feelings are homosexual in nature, then it’s not OK to walk away. That it’s somehow “anti-gay” to want to walk away from homosexuality and to have help to do so.” — Dr. Joseph Nicolosi Jr., clinical director, Breakthrough clinic

People have the right to leave the homosexual lifestyle for any reason. America’s politicians, media, and LGBT advocates don’t understand or respect that desire for self-determination and individualism, the values that built this nation.

“Many hard-left proponents of identity politics hate the truth that sexuality isn’t set in stone. They approach the topic of sexuality from the political, non-scientific premise that it can’t change, that is to say, if you have these attractions, you are forever part of an oppressed minority group and it’s now your permanent identity, so all you can do is accept it. It’s very hard for them to acknowledge the reality that sexuality is something that can actually change and doesn’t comprise everyone’s core identity.” — Dr. Joseph Nicolosi Jr., clinical director, Breakthrough clinic

LGBTQ advocates, who’ve tried for years to ban what they call conversion therapy in Utah, praised the leaders of the Mormon Church for their crucial support of the ban.

The Church’s support was essential because the state’s governor, its majority of lawmakers, all six members of its congressional delegation, its two U.S. Senators, and nearly two-thirds of its population are Mormon.

“I’m grateful that we have found a way forward that will ban conversion therapy forever in our state.” Gary Herbert, Republican Governor of Utah

Utah’s conversion therapy ban will undergo a 30-day public comment period beginning Dec. 15 and will take effect January 22, 2020.

“Therapy bans take away the rights of clients and put politicians in control of the client’s own therapy. They’re often based on the outrageous unscientific notion that biological sex can change but an individual’s thoughts and feelings cannot. Nothing could be further from the truth.” — Dr. Joseph Nicolosi Jr., clinical director, Breakthrough clinic

Based on the American Psychological Association’s false claims that reparative therapy aka conversion therapy is unscientific and harmful to mental health, eighteen states, plus Washington, D.C., have now banned the therapy for minors.

What most people don’t know is the American Psychological Association (APA) stopped relying on science as the foundation for mental health diagnoses in 1973 when homosexual activists began pressuring and attacking APA committee members to change what disorders appear in the organization’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM).

For more on the story, see Utah set to become 19th US state to ban ‘conversion therapy,’ Utah banning ‘conversion therapy’ with Mormon church backing, and Legacy Continues for Pioneer in Reparative Therapy.

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“Unbiased, Open Research [on Homosexuality] Was Never Done”

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FORMER APA PRESIDENT REVEALS HOW HOMOSEXUAL ACTIVISTS BULLIED APA INTO REMOVING HOMOSEXUALITY FROM LIST OF DISORDERS

Former APA President Reveals How Homosexual Activists Bullied APA into Removing Homosexuality from List of Disorders

By Jerry A. Kane

In 1970 homosexual activists began a program of intimidation aimed at the American Psychiatric Association (APA):

“It was never a medical decision—and that’s why I think the action came so fast…It was a political move…That’s how far we’ve come in ten years. Now we even have the American Psychiatric Association running scared.” Barbara Gittings, Homosexual Activist

The following year, 1971, homosexual activist Dr. Franklin Kameny wrote an open letter to the Psychiatric News threatening the APA with more and even worse disruptions:

“Our presence there was only the beginning of an increasingly intensive campaign by homosexuals to change the approach of psychiatry toward homosexuality or, failing that, to discredit psychiatry.” Franklin Kameny

Members of the “National Gay Task Force” managed to get the addresses of APA members, and with-out identifying themselves, sent out harassing letters to all members demanding they vote to remove homosexuality from the list of mental illnesses in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM), the APA’s classification guide for mental disorders.

No new fact, set of facts, or scientific breakthrough triggered the removal of homosexuality from the list of mental illnesses in the 1974 seventh edition of DSM-II. It was dishonesty and intimidation by homosexual activists that moved 32.7 percent of APA’s total membership to approve the change and normalize homosexuality.

Against the wishes of two-thirds of the organization’s members, homosexuals were “cured” overnight by a vote. A psychiatric disorder that had been classified as a mental illness for 25 years (1948-1973) was suddenly banished by vote, by fiat, but not by valid science or by evaluating the pathology or lack of pathology surrounding homosexuality.

In the youtube clip below, Dr. Nicholas Cummings is interviewed by a representative from the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH). Dr. Cummings is a former President of the American Psychological Association (APA). He introduced the motion to declassify homosexuality as a mental illness to APA’s Council of Representatives.

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