# The "gay fix" is out

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-gay-fix-is-out/620253>\
**Category:** Great Debates\
**Created:** [April 28, 2012, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-gay-fix-is-out/620253 "2012-04-28T18:30:42Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 27

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**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\
**Post date:** [May 5, 2012, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-gay-fix-is-out/620253/27 "2012-05-05T20:43:09Z")

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> [@BigT](#):
>
> I was under the impression that the reason it is unethical for a psychologist to attempt a conversion of sexuality in a willing participant was precisely because such therapies don’t work. I’m also pretty sure the doctor in the OP or those clinics mentioned later in the thread wouldn’t be giving up on it unless it had to happen.

IANAP, but I can see how it might be considered unethical to use therapy to “treat” something that isn’t considered a mental health problem in the first place. However, I believe you’re right that the real ethical issues with ex-gay therapy are that it 1) doesn’t work and 2) is likely to cause psychological harm to the patient. Here are some figures I looked up for [a previous thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=12041179&postcount=104):

> [@Sexuality: Choice or not, and does it matter?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sexuality-choice-or-not-and-does-it-matter/526190/104):
>
> Ariel Shidlo and Michael Schroeder’s 2002 study “Changing Sexual Orientation: A Consumers’ Report”\*\* seems to be the best study on how successful “ex-gay” therapies actually are. This study involved interviewing 202 people who had undergone sexual orientation conversion intervention. 13% (26 people) of these people considered themselves to be success stories, but nearly half of these still experienced repeated “slips” into homosexual behavior. Of the remaining 14 people, 6 reported having successfully stopped engaging in homosexual behavior but still experienced some same-sex desire and did not self-identify as heterosexual. Only 8 people (4%) self-identified as heterosexual and reported exclusively engaging in heterosexual behavior with little or no same-sex desire.
> 
> [snip]
> 
> The majority (77%) of the participants in Shidlo and Schroeder’s study indicated not only that the therapy hadn’t changed their sexual orientation, but that it had done them significant long-term damage. (Another 10% reported experiencing neither change in orientation nor any long-term psychological harm.) 11 participants reported attempting suicide after undergoing “ex-gay” therapy. Only 3 of these had previously attempted suicide. So it looks to me like “ex-gay” therapy is at least as likely to make people want to kill themselves as it is to result in a successful conversion to heterosexuality.
> 
> [snip]
> 
> \*\*_Professional Psychology: Research and Practice_, 2002, Vol. 33, No. 3, 249–259

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