Federal Complaint calls Conversion Therapy a Fraud
The controversial group People Can Change claims its two-day retreat “Journey Into Manhood” can curb unwanted homosexual desires through counseling, journaling, and a “safe healing touch.” But the site doesn’t warn consumers who may opt to spend hundreds of dollars on the retreat that there's no evidence gay conversion therapy is effective—and that it has been much criticized. A group of human rights organizations believe this omission constitutes false advertising.
Human Rights Campaign, the Southern Poverty Law Center, and the National Center for Lesbian Rights filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission on Wednesday alleging fraud and calling on federal regulators to bar gay conversion retreats from advertising an ability to make gay people straight.
As a governmental agency designed to protect consumers from unfair, deceptive, or fraudulent practices, the Federal Trade Commission has recently opened investigations against beauty products that pretend they can turn back the clock or online courses that say they’ll make you smarter without offering credible research to back it up. Beyond reining in companies that make false claims, the commission also has the power to establish advertising regulations for an entire industry.
“If [the Federal Trade Commission] were to investigate and bring an enforcement action and create a rule that said, ‘You can’t advertise that you can change someone’s sexual orientation,’ that would apply nationally across the board, to the entire industry,” Scott McCoy, a senior staff attorney for the Southern Poverty Law Center, told TakePart. With the focus on consumer fraud, the ruling goes beyond the handful of state laws that only seek to block care for minors by prohibiting licensed professionals from offering such therapies at all.
Proponents of gay conversion therapy—often referred to as reparative therapy—claim that they can subdue or eliminate homosexual attraction through counseling and behavioral cognitive therapies.
“We hold no animosity whatsoever toward LGBT communities and individuals. We simply choose to walk a different path, and to respond to our same-sex attractions in ways that are consistent with our faith and personal life goals rather than anyone’s political agenda,” Rich Wyler, founder and executive director of People Can Change, wrote in an email to TakePart. Wyler cofounded People Can Change in 2000 and asserts that he overcame his addiction to “homosexual encounters” through therapy in the 1990s.
“Their attack on us is an attack on our First Amendment rights to free speech, free assembly, and free exercise of our faith,” Wyler added. “We deserve as much respect as anyone who is ‘out and proud,’ and frankly, we deserve to be left alone to live our lives as we see fit.”
The First Amendment protects speech and religion, but federal regulators draw the line at deceptive speech used to sell products. Along with its weekend retreats, People Can Change sells reading materials and over-the-phone coaching sessions. These services are bolstered by a website filled with testimonials from men who say the program helped them eliminate their same-sex attraction.
The Southern Poverty Law Center has successfully shuttered one gay conversion organization by flagging it for false advertising. A New Jersey court found that organization Jews Offering New Alternatives for Healing violated the state’s consumer fraud regulations in June.
Nearly every major American health organization—including the American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association, and the American Medical Association—has called for an end to the practice and raised concerns about its harmful effects on young people. President Barack Obama pledged his support to ban the use of conversion therapy in April following the suicide of transgender teen Leelah Alcorn.
While the 36-page complaint states that there is no evidence conversion therapy is successful, it also argues that conversion therapy advertisements are fraudulent because they are “based on the false premise that being LGBT is a mental illness or disorder caused by a developmental deficiency, trauma, and/or unmet emotional needs.” The American Psychiatric Association delisted homosexuality as a mental illness in 1973.
If successful, McCoy and his colleagues believe that advertisement regulation would help reinforce this message to both LGBT children and their parents.
“The premise of conversion therapy is that there’s something wrong with you, that you’re broken in some way, that you’re ill, and that you need to be cured or fixed. If the FTC says that is a false statement, that is a misrepresentation, that will have a positive effect on young gay and lesbian people who are just coming out,” McCoy said. “It also says to parents, ‘You don’t need to fix your child. There’s nothing wrong with your child.’ ”
Comments