You can purchase an autographed copy of Anything But Straight by sending a $35 check or money order to:
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Wayne Besen
PO Box 25491
Brooklyn, NY 11202
First, I want to thank the American Counseling Association for supporting ethical standards in its work with gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans. Your organization has helped many people and allowed them to live openly and honestly with dignity and respect. The ACA has been a model for proper treatment and I applaud you for your commitment to assuring a superb standard of care for all people.
Unfortunately, it has come to my attention that a group of politically motivated right wing counselors are working to undermine the ACA's effective guidelines for dealing with GLBT clients. This group recently filed a formal complaint falsely claming that the ACA has violated its own polices. It's real goal, however, is to bully the ACA into allowing unscrupulous practitioners to harm clients, while shielding its damage in the cloak of religious liberty.
As the leader of an organization that represents victims of ex-gay therapy, I urge you to soundly reject this stealth attempt to inject bad policies and biased practices into ACA guidelines. My organization, TruthWinsOut.org, offers its support and would gladly supply you with testimonials - video or in person - of people who have been severely damaged as a result of so-called ex-gay therapy. These survivors represent the psychological carnage that often accompanies attempts to either change or repress one's natural sexual orientation.
Wayne, you have produced a terrific letter, but I guess it's difficult not to seem eloquent when you are asserting the facts with such obvious clarity and moral force. Of course, many of us had hoped that the days of thinking that all a gay man needed was "a good woman" were gone, but yes, it stumbles on amongst this remnant of practitioners who, as you say most powerfully, are the problem, not the solution. Good therapists and practitioners are well aware of the power of delusion, and religious delusion often criples people who could otherwise have been effective intellectuals in our world. Perhaps one day those with deeply-held religious beliefs will open their eyes to reality as it really is, not as they hope it to be.
posted by Chris L., at
2/21/2008 1:28 PM
Science-based counseling/psychology = reality
"Ex-gay psychology" = child's play quack "psychology", promoted by reactionary retards with no more than a 5th grade education (who think they know everything because they own a Wal-Mart bible). It's about as "scientific" as kids making mud pies. For that matter, mud pies are more scientific than "ex-gay therapy". And kids are definitely much smarter than those guys LOL
posted by Scott, at
2/21/2008 3:15 PM
so are mud pies-- and much less harmful
posted by ben in Oakland, at
2/21/2008 4:02 PM
I'd rather eat a mud pie than go into "ex-gay therapy"! LOL ;)
posted by Scott, at
2/21/2008 5:47 PM
LOL Ben. -- Excellent letter Wayne. -- From the letter of complaint: "Despite the fact that the AGLBIC and APA guidelines do not address religion, the ECO states: "These treatments are gay affirmative and help a client reconcile his/her same-sex attractions with religious beliefs." [...] [T]his is a very clear statement of preference for one religious belief regarding homosexuality over another. In making this preferential statement, the ACA ECO violates Policy 301.7 by mandating a religious consensus regarding homosexuality that does not exist in the world or in the profession. Furthermore, it indirectly stigmatizes such beliefs and the clients and counselors who hold them." -- Besides the bald hypocrisy of their claim of religious discrimination (as the goal of many of the signees of that letter is to have us imprisoned and/or put to death), is the absurdity of even claiming it!
Sexuality is an intrinsic part of HUMANITY. How dumb do you have to be to consider the ACA's recognition of homosexual persons as being fully human, as an attempt to give "preference for one religious belief regarding homosexuality over another?"
To claim a "religious belief" regarding homosexuality, is to claim a religious belief regarding the humanity of homosexuals. A belief that should rightfully be stigmatized - especially in the medical community!
posted by Emproph, at
2/22/2008 12:17 AM
