Conversion therapy to be banned - Sunak

[BeetleDeuce]

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/19/rishi-sunak-ban-gay-and-trans-conversion-practices

Apparently Sunak to add this to the King’s Speech, banning conversion therapies for trans and gay people.

This is a potential nightmare for counsellors/psychotherapists/NHS services who want to explore trans people’s experiences of trauma and other sources of gender dysphoria. It basically means “affirming only” as far as I can tell. This is exactly why this was always a bad idea.

Yes. But now I'm wondering if it should be the Tories that pass legislation with an absolute reference to Cass etc. This law could be as watertight as possible to not criminalise watchful waiting. Starmer would not want to return to that.

But leave legislation to the likes of Rayner, we know what the outcome will be.

The TRA lobby have potentially shot themselves in the foot a bit with this one.

If "conversion therapy" is banned with a loose definition then TRAs have to stop converting people to being trans, have to stop telling kids "pick a jelly baby, that one means you're trans" have to stop going into schools and evangelizing about how amazing it is to be trans and how girls with short hair and boys who wear dresses MUST be trans, have to stop "converting" lesbians to accept "girl cock", have to stop trying to wipe out TERFs (telling us what to think is conversion therapy after all) or threatening to punch us (surely the most clear-cut case of attempted conversion therapy in existence).

I look forward to TRAs being reported for it so they start getting arrested. Their attempt at conversion therapy on the entire world is frankly abhorrent and needs to be stopped.

(I know, in reality it will be enacted in some way that makes it utterly one-sided).

Paul Brand's husband is not a 'senior civil servant without Downing Street'. He used to be a civil servant, but not in Downing Street and not with any function relating to LGBT+ issues.

What power, specifically, do you think the Civil Service has that would force a politician to enact a policy they don't want to?

What power, specifically, do you think the Civil Service has that would force a politician to enact a policy they don't want to?

I think the Times article talking about the pressure on Tory MPs from constituents is far more likely to be where the pressure that Sunak responds to comes from.

Dont forget he isn't secure in his position.

And a we know from other occassions when the TRAs want to mobolise letter writing and tweets, their supporters are alwayt out in numbers.

And also, which he could have done something about, letting Braverman have free rein to say what she likes (to appeal to the extreme little englander) the not so unexpected consequences of more "liberal" tories thinking that are going to be rebranded as anti gay (section 28 again) probably means that many are just lobbying about gay conversion. But (to repeat myself) the T is getting the best free ride and promotion by hanging onto the coat tails of same sex attraction as though what they want is in any way similar.

I am not so sure Sunak is so weak. I think he is determined to survive and will happily switch between policies to keep popular, or at least acceptable.

A thread on the alleged connections between the press and the Cabinet Office.

x.com/eurollout/status/1635965651763298307?s=46&t=WHoOZ_3Kv5G6-FyQuvE0LQ

And

x.com/eurollout/status/1635965656062459913?s=46&t=WHoOZ_3Kv5G6-FyQuvE0LQ

Well, thats an interesting possibility.

Affirmation-only therapy could well be seen as gay conversion therapy- clinicians at Tavistock said as much.

I'm torn on this one.

If someone has gender dysphoria, trying to deny or suppress it can be a very bad idea. I know because that was my strategy for very many years and it got me to a bad place. So you can understand why I want to protect trans people from therapy that seeks to encourage, or force, them to do so. In that sense, it's analogous to trying to "cure" people of being gay.

I'm very worried, however, about the implications for free speech and the risk to anyone offering neutral counselling to support someone who is unsure as to whether they have gender dysphoria or whether transition is the right approach.

Any proposed ban would therefore need to be very strictly defined, maybe to the extent that it only really covers abusive practices which would already be illegal. Hence a waste of time.

My focus would be on reinforcing the protected characteristic of gender reassignment to prevent trans people, including children, having anything done to suppress their gender identity (for example forcing a male born trans girl to wear the male uniform to school).

It's instructive that Johnson was all for this with Carrie pushing, and then people explained the issues and what mess would have to be got out and examined, and he kicked it in to the long grass.

It will be a mess. It is a huge mess. But there are increasingly open voices in the HoC and HoL spelling this out and the more everyone writes to their MPs the more they know all the issues and not just the carefully spun marketed bits. This may be where it is properly dragged out and examined: can TQ+ and LGB be combined and viewed as having the same needs under one set of legislation or does the one cancel out the other? Are we talking about a united group of people who all feel the exact same way and want the same thing when we say 'LGBT+' or are we talking about a range of voices who passionately disagree on what they think is right, and how they're affected by this? And a group where one side has a lot more funding and excludes/demonises those whose voices are inconvenient to their political agenda, with the majority of that group being the homosexual people whose historical abuse is being weaponised as useful to those who exclude them and are actually homophobic?

How is this going to work in practice when the law is wanted to stop people talking about anything but yay affirmation but the political lobby wanting it also wants to tell homosexual people to 'learn to cope' and 'overcome genital prejudices' or face exclusion and let's face it, 'hate' and threats if they say they want to be homosexual on the basis of sex and not on someone's gender identity, and that the TQ+ political movement absolutely refuses to permit this kind of homosexuality to exist peacefully alongside their preferred semantically adapted version ?

How is this going to safeguard children who need, as increasingly shown in the accounts of detransitioners, the Keira Bell case, the Cass review, careful, objective and open minded exploration of all needs instead of a blind gallop towards affirmation in every case? Particularly as the political pressure is on with many professionals trained, as the OU case demonstrates, that objectivity is transphobic? How is this going to potentially criminalise therapists and parents? What is the impact of putting a bland umbrella phrase (that gets bigger daily) of 'gender identity' in law that can then be used to leverage absolutely everything and anything, and is already currently seriously clashing with the equalities and rights of others, again due to the political movement's absolute intolerance and refusal to exist peacefully alongside other people's beliefs and lives?

Let's get it all out. And examine this unholy mess, and look at the connections to other unholy messes, and do a lot of dot joining up for people still at the 'be kind' stage.

i largely agree with you.

I’ve come across quite a few patients (a few years ago) who felt that the NHS affirmed their gender dysphoria as a medical condition to which surgery was the correct clinical pathway, and then after surgery still felt traumatised, and that their original underlying trauma had not been explored first.

It needs very careful handling but banning discussion of potential underlying causes isn’t going to help.

It's not popular but I disagree with banning conversion therapy. I do not think it's the government's place to outlaw alternative or disapproved-of treatments.

If same-sex attracted adults want to try to be straight, that's their prerogative. The same people shrieking for a ban wouldn't bat an eyelid at a straight person trying to "explore their sexuality", so why can't LGBs do the same?

Conversion therapy should be for consenting adults only, and they should sign a disclaimer that it's unproven, and not accepted by authorities etc. And they should be signposted to LGB support groups, and therapies aimed at acceptance.

If they still want to do it with informed consent, that's entirely up to them as autonomous adults.

So what am I supposed to do if I am a therapist and a fourteen year old girl is referred to me? She is gender non-comforming but is also same-sex attracted. How do I help without being guilty of conversion therapy?

I am not a therapist and have never received therapy so I don't know how it works.

I think the key thing would be to help give her the insights and thinking tools she needs to make up her own mind. Not having a "desirable" outcome for her in terms of her gender identity and/or sexuality and how she expresses these things is crucial.

Having said this, I have no idea how "good" and "bad" talking therapy could possibly be distinguished in criminal law and still less policed effectively. I'm not sure it is feasible and - like you - I'm worried about counsellors and therapists trying to take a neutral and objective approach being caught in the crossfire.

I am a therapist (and GC). In my opinion, if I talk to someone about their gender identity and what led them down that pathway, that is an exploration of their thoughts and feelings, not a conversion. But it really depends how this policy is worded and also how it is to be implemented and policed. Some of the accrediting bodies for therapists, psychologists and counsellors are already very much captured by the T lobby.
So it could be very worrying or may be not at all. The devil will be in the detail.

I completely agree. We'll have to see exactly what is proposed.

I'm also a bit nervous about the possibility that trans rights advocates might be targeted under this law for giving positive messages about the lives of transgender people. This might be seen as a form of "conversion", eg encouraging people to become trans.

Radical acceptance of a child's or vulnerable person's gender declaration is conversion therapy. What is needed it proper definitions.

That thread is a load of nonsense and the author seems to have absolutely no idea how government works.

Take the claim that Paul Brands husband was a senior civil servant in the Cabinet Office. He must be a source, right? Except he’s a deputy director at the geospatial commission. An organisation that would have next to no routine contact with No 10. Of course there are bits of the Cabinet Office that are close to the centre of power - but the vast majority of the Cabinet Office is concentrated on administration of the civil service. It’s utter nonsense to think Paul Brand’s husband had any particular vantage point to be a source on eg partygate.

It’s even more nonsense to suggest that a former deputy director in the Geospatial commission somehow forced the governments hand on conversion therapy.

and I was this close to voting Tory

if Tory and Labour are on the same delusional side of the gender wars then i suppose Labour wins overall when it comes to taking care of the population in general.

Aren't the dates of any move to a new job part of the information? This (4 Sept 23) states that the commission was part of the cabinet office

www.ukri.org/people/joe-cuddeford/

Also that there are links to the uk statistics authority, which hasn't really done much about the ONS debacle.

This (14 Feb 23) sets out links between Rachel Reeves and the cabinet office. And Pippa Crerar and the cabinet office. And the Home Office and The Times. And the treasury and political parties. The list goes on

www.politico.eu/article/britain-united-kingdom-political-power-couples-2023-ranking/

I'm not sure what you think your links prove about Paul Brand and his husband.

Of course he worked for the Cabinet Office. No one claimed he didn't.

BUT I was responding to a poster who claimed he worked in Downing Street (he didn't) and implied that Brand's husband's role meant he was a probable source of Brand's stories and had exerted pressure for the ban on conversion therapy.

All of that is nonsense.

The Geospatial Commission was part of the Cabinet Office. But that doesn't put it particularly close to No 10, nor giving its officials any role or influence on LGBT+ issues.

So a man who works inside government has no links to any other person who works in government?

It has been said before that Brand's husband wasn't the direct source of Partygate, doesn't mean that his connections weren't the source though.

Have you not followed politics for the past few years? Civil servants openly revolt against the politicians and many have been forced out due to the civil servants.

A Stonewalled civil service can easily force ministers into these decisions.

A Stonewalled civil service might not be able to force ministers but it could easily omit information, leading to government actions happening or not happening by way of not having all the information you need. Or information that's wrongly weighted being given to you. Eg this on the conversion therapy data

x.com/twisterfilm/status/1372667709746470912?s=46&t=WHoOZ_3Kv5G6-FyQuvE0LQ

Stephen Nolan's series on Stonewall stated how Stonewall had power over the civil service.

And even though ministers started to pull out of Stonewall schemes, there were still schemes that civil servants could sign up to so that they could be Stonewall champions within their industry.

We've heard that civil servants were putting up gender neutral toilet signs in direct opposition to ministers and they've had open hostility to other ministerial proposals.

There is deliberate naivety around this.

You have Paul Brand, an ITV journalist who is patron of LGBT charities, who seems to be allowed by ITV to feature excessive coverage of this issue.
He has a partner, who has worked for the civil service, and will have close ties with others inside the civil service. If you work in the civil service and you know someone in another department who had a journalist for a husband, you'd clearly get in contact with him to leak stuff, wouldn't you?

I don't know how many times we talk about husbands and wives of ministers getting good deals for their friends.

A Stonewalled civil service who will exert pressure on ministers.

Lobbying by activists to local MPs.

It's very easy to see how this has happened.