In Beijing A Court Ruled for A Gay Man Vs. Electric Shock for Conversion to Straight
BEIJING — In a victory for gay rights advocates in China, a Beijing court ruled on Friday that a Chinese clinic must pay compensation to a gay man who sued it for giving him electric shocks intended to change his sexual orientation.
Stating that homosexuality is not a mental illness, the Haidian District People’s Court ordered the Xinyupiaoxiang Counseling Center in the southwestern city of Chongqing to pay 3,400 renminbi, or $560, for costs incurred by the plaintiff, Yang Teng. It also ordered Baidu, China’s leading search engine, which was also named in the lawsuit, to remove the advertisement that Mr. Yang said led him to the clinic.
Reached by telephone after the verdict was announced, Mr. Yang said he thought the verdict “has inspired a lot of gay people.” He added, “It shows them that we don’t need to be cured, and when things like this happen and we look to protect our rights from being violated, we can get a fair result.”
Mr. Yang filed the lawsuit against the clinic in March with the assistance of the Beijing L.G.B.T. Center, a nonprofit organization representing gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. He visited the clinic in February, after his parents found out about his sexuality and pressured him to become straight.
Though China decriminalized homosexuality in 1997 and stopped classifying it as a mental illness in 2001, discrimination remains common. An industry of clinics has sprung up promising to “cure” gay people through hypnosis and electric shocks.
Such treatments have been dismissed as cruel and harmful by mainstream medical practitioners in the West, with bans on so-called gay conversion therapy signed into law in California and New Jersey.
Mr. Yang’s lawsuit, which alleged that the clinic had claimed that electric shock treatment was safe and effective, asked for compensation of more than 14,000 renminbi, or $2,300, to cover his costs for the therapy, travel and lost earnings, in addition to damages for psychological and physical harm. The court did not award damages or find fault with Baidu, which has removed ads promoting such therapy, said Kaiser Kuo, a company spokesman.
Mr. Kuo said Baidu supported the verdict. “We’ll be very vigilant in the future about advertisements for false treatments for ‘gay therapy,’ ” he said. “We sincerely hope Yang Teng finds some solace in the court’s decision.”
Wei Xiaogang, executive director of the Beijing Gender Health Education Institute, hailed the verdict as critically important for gays and lesbians in China.
“The court said homosexuality is not a disease,” he said. “This is the first case really talking about homosexuality, so it’s really going to give people the legal support they need to fight back against these clinics.”
Chen Jiehao contributed research.
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