In response, President Obama
is calling for an end to such therapies aimed at “repairing” gay,
lesbian and transgender youth. His decision on the issue is the latest
example of his continuing embrace of gay rights.
In a statement that was posted on Wednesday evening alongside a WhiteHouse.gov petition
begun in honor of Ms. Alcorn, Mr. Obama condemned the practice,
sometimes called “conversion” or “reparative” therapy, which is
supported by some socially conservative organizations and religious
doctors.
The petition has received more than 120,000 signatures in three months.
“We
share your concern about its potentially devastating effects on the
lives of transgender as well as gay, lesbian, bisexual and queer youth,”
the statement, written by Valerie Jarrett, a senior adviser to Mr.
Obama, says. “As part of our dedication to protecting America’s youth,
this administration supports efforts to ban the use of conversion
therapy for minors.”
In
an interview on Wednesday, Ms. Jarrett said Mr. Obama had been moved by
the story of Ms. Alcorn’s suicide. But she said the problem went far
beyond Ms. Alcorn.
It
was tragic, but I will tell you, unfortunately, she has a lot of
company,” Ms. Jarrett said. “It’s not the story of one young person. It
is the story of countless young people who have been subjected to this.”
Mr.
Obama will not explicitly call for a federal law banning therapists
from using such therapies on their patients, but he is open to
conversations with lawmakers in both parties, White House officials said
on Wednesday. Instead, he will throw his support behind the efforts to
ban the practice at the state level.
Mr.
Obama began his political life opposed to gay marriage and accepting of
limits on gays’ serving in the military. But he now supports same-sex marriage
and has sought greater equality of treatment for gay men and lesbians
in the government and the private work force. In his first term, he
pushed the Pentagon to end the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that had kept gay service members from serving openly.
On
Wednesday, Mr. Obama’s top aides also heralded new protections for gay
federal workers that went into effect this week. Last summer, Mr. Obama
issued executive orders to ban discrimination on the basis of gender by
federal contractors.
Officials
also announced the creation of an “all-gender restroom” in the
Eisenhower Executive Office Building, where many of the White House
staff members work, to provide an additional option for transgender
individuals who are not comfortable using either the men’s or women’s
restrooms.
Therapists
who advocate the use of the gender identity therapies promote them as a
way of helping gay people change their sexual orientation. Those
therapists reject claims that sexual orientation or identity is
unchangeable and argue that gay or transgender identities should be
reversed so that people can embrace their “authentic” heterosexual
selves.
The Narth Institute, an organization that advocates the therapies, says on its website
that “numerous examples exist of people who have successfully modified
their sexual behavior, identity, and arousal or fantasies.”
The fight against such therapies has become more urgent in recent years
as gay rights organizations have sought to discredit the practice.
California, New Jersey and the District of Columbia have banned
therapists from offering the treatment to minors. Similar legislation
was introduced in 18 states this year, according to the Human Rights
Campaign, a gay rights group that tracks legislation on the issue.
Challenges to the laws in New Jersey and California were rejected by
federal appeals court judges in 2013 and 2014, officials at the Human
Rights Campaign said.
“So-called
‘conversion therapy’ is a range of dangerous and discredited practices
that falsely claim to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender
identity or expression,” the group said in a statement.
In Ms. Jarrett’s letter, which was posted on WhiteHouse.gov,
the White House says that stopping the gender identity therapies will
help make the United States a more welcoming place for gay people.
“Tonight,
somewhere in America, a young person, let’s say a young man, will
struggle to fall to sleep, wrestling alone with a secret he’s held as
long as he can remember,” the statement says. “Soon, perhaps, he will
decide it’s time to let that secret out. What happens next depends on
him, his family, as well as his friends and his teachers and his
community. But it also depends on us — on the kind of society we
engender, the kind of future we build.”
David
Pickup, a licensed family therapist in California and Texas, said in an
interview on Wednesday that the president and gay rights advocates were
purposely misconstruing the work that he and others do. He said that
minors should never be forced into therapy, but he insisted that being
gay was often brought about by serious emotional problems or sexual
abuse.
“We
believe that change is still possible. People go to therapy because
they can change, because it really does work,” Mr. Pickup said. “We help
people grow into their authentic selves.”
Mr.
Pickup said he and others were actively lobbying against the proposed
state bans, and he urged Mr. Obama to “wake up and understand the rights
of people who he doesn’t know anything about and need his help and need
his compassion.”
Credit: Nytimes
No comments:
Post a Comment