Today’s Wall Street Journal article by Stephanie Simon begins:

The men who seek help from evangelical counselor Warren Throckmorton often are deeply distressed. They have prayed, read Scripture, even married, but they haven’t been able to shake sexual attractions to other men — impulses they believe to be immoral.

Dr. Throckmorton is a psychology professor at a Christian college in Pennsylvania and past president of the American Mental Health Counselors Association. He specializes in working with clients conflicted about their sexual identity.

The first thing he tells them is this: Your attractions aren’t a sign of mental illness or a punishment for insufficient faith. He tells them that he cannot turn them straight.

But he also tells them they don’t have to be gay.

The article delves into more detail about Throckmorton’s therapy:

For many years, Dr. Throckmorton felt he was breaking a professional taboo by telling his clients they could construct satisfying lives by, in effect, shunting their sexuality to the side, even if that meant living celibately. That ran against the trend in counseling toward “gay affirming” therapy — encouraging clients to embrace their sexuality.

Later in the WSJ article, I comment on the section of the APA’s guidelines that seem to say that Throckmorton’s type of therapy may fall within its new guidelines:

“It’s incredibly misguided,” said Wayne Besen, who runs a group called Truth Wins Out, which fights conversion therapy. He says trying to fight their same-sex attractions can cause immense suffering. “People have their lives destroyed,” Mr. Besen said.

My Thoughts:

I want to clarify that I am supportive of the overall APA report. I think they did a terrific job stating how therapists should handle clients who are struggling to accept their sexual orientation. Most important, they directly challenged “ex-gay” therapists who mislead clients about gay life.

And, the APA made it crystal clear that such charlatans should not be selling snake oil by claiming they can magically turn clients from gay-to-straight. In my view, any therapist who makes such a pitch is a con artist. Any organization that offers such bogus and far-fetched promises is guilty of consumer fraud.

Additionally, the APA should be commended for tackling the affects of religious faith on people working through this issue. Their landmark report explicitly tells religious therapists that clients should be given room to explore who they truly are, without the therapist burdening them with excessive faith-based guilt. This is a step forward, considering that nearly every “reparative therapist” uses shame-based methods to pressure vulnerable and desperate clients into suppressing their natural sexual orientation.

However, (although I am not a psychologist) I remain largely skeptical of the therapy offered by Throckmorton and other conservatives. Throckmorton tells The Wall Street Journal that he starts his sessions by helping clients prioritize their values.

This is where it can get tricky.

Religious therapists (I am not referring specifically to Throckmorton) can manipulate the framing of priorities. For example they may ask clients what they find more important to their value system: “ephemeral hedonism” or “eternal life in heaven”. Given this loaded option, clients may feel they have no “choice” but to live a life of hell on earth in order to get the keys to the Kingdom when they die. This is quite a mental burden for clients to carry and surely can’t be conducive to optimum mental health.

Clients can also be easily manipulated by therapists who induce guilt by saying, “it is fine if you choose to exercise your options in a selfish manner by choosing your sexuality over Scripture.” Such diabolical therapists may be within the new guidelines (barely) by ostensibly offering a troubled client the “choice” and “freedom” to be a “bad” person. But, we all know this is just a tricky form of psychological abuse. While the APA guidelines are helpful, the group may need to address in the future how unsavory counselors use loopholes to continue tormenting the fragile minds of clients.

The WSJ article also mentioned how the APA report considers celibacy a viable “option”:

But if the client still believes that affirming his same-sex attractions would be sinful or destructive to his faith, psychologists can help him construct an identity that rejects the power of those attractions, the APA says. That might require living celibately, learning to deflect sexual impulses or framing a life of struggle as an opportunity to grow closer to God.

“We’re not trying to encourage people to become ‘ex-gay,’” said Judith Glassgold, who chaired the APA’s task force on the issue. “But we have to acknowledge that, for some people, religious identity is such an important part of their lives, it may transcend everything else.”

The APA has long endorsed the right of clients to determine their own identities. But it also warned that “lesbians and gay men who feel they must conceal their sexual orientation report more frequent mental health concerns.”

It is true that in extreme cases, a lifetime of celibacy may lead to a happier existence than coming out of the closet. These rare people, unfortunately, are often so damaged by fundamentalism that they are unable to express their sexuality in healthy ways. Indeed, they are stricken by excessive guilt if they enjoy any form of pleasure that is not sanctioned by their church.

In such instances of irreparable damage to victims of faith-based oppression, celibacy may work (sort of) as a last ditch effort to help these people find a small measure of peace. There are also individuals with low sex drives who may not have an inordinate amount of trouble conforming to onerous religious strictures.

However, celibacy is not a serious option for healthy individuals with normal desires. If a therapist tells a teenager that he or she will have to live the next 50 or so years sexually frustrated and without the possibility of love, you are not going to convince me that this is in the best psychological interest of that conflicted youth.

Imagine being that young person with raging hormones, yet having to suppress powerful urges every minute of the day. On weekends, you stay home playing video games while your friends are dating. At lunchtime in the cafeteria, you have to hear about their sexual exploration, while you bitterly nurse longings that will never be fulfilled. On the way home from school, love songs play on the car radio that are meant for everyone but you. And then you settle on the couch and watch television shows brimming with a sensuality that you will never discover.

Living in such a way would, in the vast majority of cases, make an otherwise healthy person neurotic, depressed and even suicidal. Celibacy, for the most part, is a fantasy concocted by conservative therapists who so despise homosexuality that they would rather see a person loveless and lonely than openly gay.

I also worry that suppression of sexuality will lead to increased mental and sexual abuse in society. The ex-gay ministries (and the Catholic Church) are rife with examples of supposedly celibate or “healed” leaders taking advantage of young people in their care. Youth are easier to manipulate (see TWO video below)and the path of least resistance for the tortured and troubled souls who swear off sexuality (heterosexual and homosexual), only to find that it is not possible over the course of a lifetime. Celibacy is not realistic, nor advisable for most people, and can have deleterious side effects. The idea of the “satisfied celibate” is largely a misguided myth perpetuated by therapists who can’t overcome their own anti-gay leanings.

Ultimately, the more ex-gay ministries and counselors are forced to move away from stigmatizing homosexuality, promising fake miracles and selling false hope, the better off clients will be. If these groups can’t sell the proverbial “heterosexual light at the end of the tunnel”, the vast majority of young gay people will leave the traumatic tunnel behind and come out into the light of freedom and honesty.

Everyone deserves the chance to love and be loved – and conservative therapists will have an increasingly difficult time telling gay clients that they are exceptions to this rule. By calling for more accountability among anti-gay therapists and demanding they be truthful and adhere to modern science, the APA has made a worthy contribution with its report.

In days of old, “conservative” (within the American context) once described someone who favored small government, minimal government intrusion into people’s lives, and relatively unfettered freedom of speech, religion, and commerce.

A coalition of ex-gay activists apparently hopes to change that.

Exodus Youth activist Mike Ensley, pundit Warren Throckmorton, former Exodus board member Tom Cole, ex-gay activist Stephen Black, and 30 others have formed the Conservative Education Project on Facebook. (Read More)

(Cry Baby: Throckmorton, Whines To Right Wing Rags)

Still fuming from the American Psychiatric Association’s cancellation of the “Quack Panel” he was scheduled to appear on this week, notorious “ex-gay” therapist Warren Throckmorton continued on his vindictive warpath. All week, he has done the rounds, whining and playing victim, with fawning right wing rags – apparently the only media that will listen to his bizarre ideas.

Throckmorton’s latest stop on his “Sour Grapes Media Tour” is an interview with World Net Daily – a publication best known for publishing a kooky article that claims that eating soy products might turn children gay.

“‘Weird Nut Daily’ and Warren Throckmorton are two peas in a pod, so it was entirely expected that they would join hands to do a hatchet job on TruthWinsOut.org,” said Besen. “It is time for Throckmorton to preserve his remaining dignity by ending his ‘Sour Grapes Tour’ and moving on. The Quack panel did not happen because the more people learned about Throckmorton, the more uneasy they became with giving him a platform that might appear to legitimize his outlandish and archaic views on sexuality” (Read More)

Former ex-gay Peterson Toscano made the following observation recently:

In a recent Christianity Today article, Warren Throckmorton waded into the gender waters by discounting the transgender experience. Where did he look for his authority? Not science, but the word of God (or at least select portions while overlooking whole Biblical accounts that actually affirm trans folks).

Throckmorton, past president of the American Mental Health Counselors Association, says he has advised transgendered people who are in absolute agony over their state.Typically, such individuals are desperately in search of hope and acceptance, he says. It may be uncomfortable to tell transgendered individuals that their desires don’t align with the Bible, Throckmorton says, but pastors must do so. “Even if science does determine differentiation in the brain at birth,” Throckmorton says, “even if there are prenatal influences, we can’t set aside teachings of the Bible because of research findings.”Warren Throckmorton has suggested that his words were misrepresented by CT, but he didn’t do too much to correct the flawed logic by referring to another article where he sought to give a straight answer to the trans question:

While transgender children can only be assessed on a case-by-case basis, Throckmorton recommends seeking not only medical or psychological specialists, but also theological ones. And even if it may seem impossible to draw one resolution when bringing all three opinions together, Throckmorton advises parents to try to find some common ground.

“What an evangelical Christian basically wants to do is order his entire life around his faith,” he said. “You can’t make decisions unless … the circumstance you’re in is evaluated from a theological point of view.”Hmm, looks like he may need to adjust his gender lenses before he reads the good book. I mean from a theological point of view, the transgender folks turn out to be some of the most vital players in the most important Bible stories. (See Transfigurations‚ÄîTransgressing Gender in the Bible)

After Toscano wrote that item, Throckmorton tried again to dig himself out of a hole but only dug in deeper with a redefinition of religion and a ludicrous mischaracterization of those who adhere to the traditional definition of religion: (Read More)

The Washington Times was among the news media that were quick to blame unspecified “gay activists” today for the failure of a symposium on religion and ex-gay conversion therapy that was to be held at the Washington Convention Center at the same time as an American Psychiatric Association convention.

But from the start, the planners of the symposium doomed the forum through political and clinical biases:

• None of the panelists demonstrated professional knowledge of the myths perpetrated and the harm done by so-called conversion therapies
• Former ex-gays — those injured by conversion therapies that are promoted by two of the would-be panelists — were excluded from the discussion
• The symposium was promoted, and important facts distorted, by Focus on the Family
• Symposium publicity exaggerated the forum’s level of official APA support

Political distortion and exploitation of the symposium by Focus on the Family emerged weeks ago. The symposium’s lead planner — Dr. David Scasta, former Association of Gay and Lesbian Psychiatrists president — seemed stubbornly ignorant of the damage being done to legitimate science and to the victims of the ex-gay industry, as well as the unearned credibility being conferred upon would-be panelists who have misused religion as a political weapon to promote bigotry and emotional harm among unpopular demographics.

Scasta was quoted by the Times (with erroneous credentials):

“It was a way to have a balanced discussion about religion and how it influences therapy,” said David Scasta, a former APA president and a gay psychiatrist in charge of assembling the panel. “We wanted to talk rationally, calmly and respectfully to each other, but the external forces made it into a divisive debate it never intended to be.”

In criticizing Bishop Gene Robinson for dropping out of the symposium and precipitating its failure, Scasta shows that he naively ignored the ultimate basis for Robinson’s decision:

“I got one e-mail from him [Bishop Gene Robinson] saying he thought I was being used by the other side, such as Focus on the Family,” Mr. Scasta said, calling the reaction from gay groups over-the-top and self-defeating.

“This was supposed to reduce polarization, which has hurt the gay community. They are blocked into this bitchy battle and they are not progressing. They are not willing to do missionary work and talk to the enemy. They have to be willing to listen and change themselves.”

Calm, rational, and respectful discussion is an essential element of sound discussion about psychiatry. But when that tone of discussion is achieved through half-truth, exclusion of essential facts, naivete, and political bias among the planners, such discussion is bound to harm professionalism in the mental-health fields.

Instead of resolving obvious and potentially fatal flaws in his plans, Scasta appears to have shut out early gay-media inquiries about the flaws in his program, ignored Robinson’s warning about antigay activists, scapegoated Robinson, and finally wasted time whining about gay activists. (Read More)

(Warren Throckmorton, Left)

Sources have informed TruthWinsOut.org that Monday’s symposium featuring infamous “ex-gay” therapist Dr. Warren Throckmorton has been cancelled. The forum, “A Pastoral Approach for Gay & Lesbian People Troubled by Homosexuality,” suffered a major blow when panelist, Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson, pulled out of the event. Robinson expressed concern that the symposium, scheduled to take place the same week as the APA’s annual meeting in Washington, would be used as a public relations gimmick for Focus on the Family.

“The cancellation of this forum is welcome news because it gave the wrong impression that the American Psychiatric Association endorsed ‘ex-gay’ therapy, when, in fact, the organization soundly rejects such therapies,” said TWO Executive Director Wayne Besen.

Predictably, on his blog, Throckmorton claimed that the APA is “apparently afraid of a conversation.” What he conveniently failed to mention was that this discussion ended three decades ago and his side was defeated because they lacked scientific credibility. They have yet to provide a shred of evidence supporting the efficacy of ex-gay therapy, while there is evidence that such methods cause a great deal of harm.

“Throckmorton ‘counsels’ vulnerable gay people to either live a lifetime of loneliness or a lifetime of lies. This is neither healthy nor therapeutic and it’s a diagnosis for disaster,” said Besen.

David Scasta, the openly gay psychiatrist who shamelessly promoted the seminar, has not publicly commented on the events cancellation.

Sources have told TruthWinsOut.org today that Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson has pulled out of a controversial symposium featuring an infamous “ex-gay” therapist. The May 5 symposium, at the APA’ 2008 convention in Washington, was dealt a major blow with the news of Robinson’s decision. TruthWinsOut.org opposed the panel because it featured Dr. Warren Throckmorton, an unlicensed psychologist who compares “leaving” homosexuality to quitting smoking.

“We are pleased that Bishop Robinson has not lent his credibility to a political right wing platform disguised as a scientific symposium,” said TWO Executive Director Wayne Besen. “The debate over whether homosexuality is a curable metal illness was settled decades ago and is not debatable. This forum is nothing more than an underhanded way for anti-gay activists to make their outdated and intolerant views look respectable.”

On May 5, at APA’s 2008 convention in Washington, the group will host a symposium, at which one of the two mental health practitioner-panelists is Dr. Warren Throckmorton, a psychologist without state board certification and an advocate for “Sexual Identity Therapy,” which he says he has successfully applied to help patients “alter homosexual feelings or behaviors” and live their lives “heterosexually” with “only very few weak instances of homosexual attraction.”

The symposium, moderated by Harvard psychiatrist Dr. John Peteet, who chairs APA’s Corresponding Committee on Psychiatry, Religion and Spirituality, is titled “Homosexuality and Therapy: The Religious Dimension.” Indeed, the panel includes two prominent religious figures from radically different perspectives – New Hampshire Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson and the Reverend Dr. Albert Mohler. Robinson came to nationwide attention in 2003 when he became the first non-celibate, out gay person elected an American Episcopal Church bishop, for the Diocese of New Hampshire.

Mohler is the president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, a nationally syndicated radio host, and a board member of James Dobson’s stridently anti-gay Focus on the Family. The symposium’s primary booster has noted that Mohler has distinguished himself among Christian right evangelicals in acknowledging that homosexuality may not be a choice. Left unmentioned, however, was Mohler’s statement that “if a biological basis is found, and if a prenatal test is then developed, and if a successful treatment to reverse the sexual orientation to heterosexual is ever developed, we would support its use.”

Robinson’s wisdom in appearing with Mohler – and the broader debate about LGBT advocates engaging those on the other side – are not what make this story intriguing, and indeed troubling. Instead it is the embrace by a scientifically-based organization, APA, of an unlicensed practitioner who espouses controversial professional opinions about homosexuality but can point to no peer-reviewed findings that his clinical approach has merit.

Perhaps most unsettling is the fact that the same defender of the symposium who credited Mohler with some degree of enlightenment on gay issues, Dr. David Scasta – a former president and newsletter editor of the Association of Gay and Lesbian Psychiatrists (AGLP) – has circulated a press release for the event dubbing it “a ‘balanced’ discussion,” the sort of characterization one might expect from intelligent design proponents demanding a seat on a panel of evolution experts.