# When did homosexuality stop being classified as a mental disorder? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 4, 2005, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050 "2005-01-04T17:01:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![mrsface](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a9adbd/32.png) [@mrsface](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mrsface)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2005, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/1 "2005-01-04T17:01:33Z")
I understand that homosexuality used to be seen as a form of mental illness or maladjustment that could be ‘cured’ by psychiatrists. As such it was listed as a disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of psychiatric disorders. Does anyone know how long it was included for, and when exactly the authorities responsible for the DSM (who are they, by the way? The American Psychological Association?) decided that it should no longer be included? A related question - is it possible to read the DSM online? ---
**Author:** ![cher3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/da6949/32.png) [@cher3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cher3)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2005, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/2 "2005-01-04T17:13:52Z")
It was removed from the DSM in 1973. Here is an online version: [http://allpsych.com/disorders/](http://allpsych.com/disorders/) ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2005, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/3 "2005-01-04T17:16:41Z")
The change was made in the early 1970s. There was agitiation for a number of years, and the Board of Trustees of the American Psychiatric Association voted in late 1973 to remover “homosexuality” from the DSM and replace it with a new term, “sexual orientation disturbance.” You can read more about it in [this article](http://www.psych.org/pnews/98-07-17/dsm.html). ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2005, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/4 "2005-01-04T17:16:52Z")
I find the group I am about to link to objectionable but for purposes of answering at least part of your question I suspect this will do it: > [@](#): > > Dr. Bieber was one of the key participants in the historical debate which culminated in the 1973 decision to remove homosexuality from the psychiatric manual. > SOURCE: [http://www.narth.com/docs/normalization.html](http://www.narth.com/docs/normalization.html) > > The tragic consequences of the politicizing of the sexual area of diagnosis have already occurred, as homosexuality has been deleted as a psychiatric disorder from the latest printing (July 1974) of the DSM II, even from its bracketed position beside “sexual orientation disorder.” > SOURCE: [http://www.narth.com/docs/annals.html](http://www.narth.com/docs/annals.html) ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Griffin-Kentzel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/larry_griffin-kentzel/32/14787_2.png) [@Larry\_Griffin-Kentzel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Griffin-Kentzel)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2005, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/5 "2005-01-04T18:05:33Z")
[**December 15, 1973**](http://www.365gay.com/lifestylechannel/intime/months/12-december/december.htm) > [@](#): > > In Washington, DC the American Psychiatric Association removes homosexuality from its official list of mental disorders, following three years of pressure from gay liberation movement. ---
**Author:** ![CC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f1d935/32.png) [@CC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CC)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2005, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/6 "2005-01-04T19:16:28Z")
Very interesting link, Cher, but it raises a significant question for me. Most of the sexual disorders listed tell us that “To be considered diagnosable, the fantasies, urges, or behaviors must cause significant distress in the individual or be disruptive to his or her everyday functioning.” I’m just wondering why a person’s disorders can’t be diagnosed by their effects on others. Frotteurism (sp?) for example, is a behavior that involves rubbing up against strangers. If the rubber’s life is not disrupted but the rubbee’s is, that means no diagnosis? What’s up with that? ---
**Author:** ![cher3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/da6949/32.png) [@cher3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cher3)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2005, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/7 "2005-01-04T20:00:22Z")
I think that site is paraphrasing. At this site, for example, it indicates that a diagnosis can be made if the person has acted on the impulse: [http://mysite.verizon.net/res7oqx1/id13.html#Frott](http://mysite.verizon.net/res7oqx1/id13.html#Frott) ---
**Author:** ![CC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f1d935/32.png) [@CC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CC)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2005, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/8 "2005-01-04T21:17:47Z")
See, that’s one of the reasons that this is still one of the finest bbs’s on the net. Ask, and you will receive - something. Incidentally, I note on the home page that even for the citation you found, “[t]he criteria are a simplified version that I wrote for use by mental health professionals as well as patients, relatives, and other lay people. The criteria are taken directly from my book, DSM-IV Made Easy, published by Guilford Press.” But the distillation that you found makes the distinction that I had though should be present. SDMB - ya gotta love it. xo C. ---
**Author:** ![Quercus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/7ab992/32.png) [@Quercus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quercus)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2005, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/9 "2005-01-04T21:27:46Z")
IANA Mental Health Professional, but it seems to me that a behaviour that bothers someone else, but doesn’t hurt you, is just garden-variety ‘being a jerk’-ism, whether it’s rubbing against them, grabbing their hiney, stealing their lunch from the fridge, not tipping them, or strange things like telling them your fantasies involving them, you, eels, and your mother in a latex outfit. Now when it does impact you, because you’re getting slapped, sued, and/or arrested, and yet you can’t stop yourself from doing it again, then it’s a mental illness. Works for me as a distinction. Which is not so say that garden variety jerks shouldn’t be slapped, sued, arrested or otherwise discouraged from their behaviour, of course. Just that they’re not crazy unless they get the message but still can’t stop despite the harm it brings them. ---
**Author:** ![mrsface](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a9adbd/32.png) [@mrsface](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mrsface)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2005, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/10 "2005-01-05T01:52:42Z")
Thanks a lot for prompt replies and links - 1973 was later than I’d thought, though I don’t know why I should be surprised since homosexuality was only legalised in the UK in 1967. ---
**Author:** ![CC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f1d935/32.png) [@CC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CC)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2005, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/11 "2005-01-05T03:17:01Z")
I see Quercus’ point, and raise it one. What about the guy who enjoys whacking off while looking into his next door neighbor’s window? She doesn’t know about it, he’s getting his jollies, no one is complaining, so where’s the illness? I suppose there are those who say she’s being violated but if she doesn’t know about it, I don’t know that that’s so. Assuming his behavior doesn’t interfere with his ability to get to work, be a productive member of society, etc. it’s sort of a no harm, no foul sort of situation, isn’t it? Here, I’m not sure there’s a case to be made for a sexual disorder. I guess the person has, in fact, acted on his desires, but it’s hard to make a case for a problem here. (I think I can anticipate some flak here). ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2005, 5:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/12 "2005-01-05T05:31:14Z")
The guy who glances out his window, notices that his neighbor has not taken all reasonable precautions for privacy, and engages in some fantasies is crude (and open to legal charges if she catches him), but is simply opportunistic. The guy who is compelled to wander around the neighborhood looking in windows, spends hundreds of dollars on a telescope to survey surrounding apartments with clarity, or engages in similar behaviors that have a negative effect on his life is sick. ---
**Author:** ![CC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f1d935/32.png) [@CC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CC)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2005, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/13 "2005-01-05T14:44:18Z")
I’m ok with “is compelled to,” because that indicates that despite his own efforts to inhibit this behavior, he is unable to control it. If that is the fact, then to me it sounds like some sort of disorder. The word, sick, has some powerful undertones, and I think the way it’s used in this post should be avoided. On the other hand, the amount spent on his telescope is totally irrelevant, isn’t it? And how does that have a negative effect on his life? I fear we’re now doing a little dance around the judgements that the Diagnostic Manual is supposed to help us avoid. ---
**Author:** ![rmelles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ecb155/32.png) [@rmelles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rmelles)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2010, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/14 "2010-08-07T18:25:09Z")
> [@CC](#): > > I’m ok with “is compelled to,” because that indicates that despite his own efforts to inhibit this behavior, he is unable to control it. If that is the fact, then to me it sounds like some sort of disorder. The word, sick, has some powerful undertones, and I think the way it’s used in this post should be avoided. On the other hand, the amount spent on his telescope is totally irrelevant, isn’t it? And how does that have a negative effect on his life? I fear we’re now doing a little dance around the judgements that the Diagnostic Manual is supposed to help us avoid. How do we get past the stigma associated with having a mental illness if there is still overt and not so overt judgements ? I do not have a sexual mental illness but I do suffer with other aspects of mental illness and I have to agree, there’s a fine line between defining a person neutrally and calling them a name that actually is prejudiced? I may not like what a person with a sexual addiction or issue does, but does that mean that guy or gal is not worthy of my sympathy? Does that mean that guy or gal is not worthy of my help or anyone else’s help for that matter? I admit, I used to be of the mind that if a man or a woman sexually abused a small child, let em burn. Lately, however, I have come to realize that that person that did that thing to a child is someones son; someone’s daughter; someones mom or dad. I was convicting them in my mind before they even had a chance to seek counseling and see if they were able to be helped. I was denying them the same rights I expect for treating my illness and that was simply not fair. ---
**Author:** ![Kiyoshi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e19adc/32.png) [@Kiyoshi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kiyoshi)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2010, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/15 "2010-08-07T19:07:18Z")
> [@mrsface](#): > > Thanks a lot for prompt replies and links - 1973 was later than I’d thought, though I don’t know why I should be surprised since homosexuality was only legalised in the UK in 1967. Only in England and Wales. It wasn’t decriminalised in Scotland until 1980 and Northern Ireland until 1982! :eek: ---
**Author:** ![chorpler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chorpler/32/2888_2.png) [@chorpler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chorpler)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2010, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/16 "2010-08-07T19:08:29Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > The guy who glances out his window, notices that his neighbor has not taken all reasonable precautions for privacy, and engages in some fantasies is crude (and open to legal charges if she catches him), but is simply opportunistic. Wait, really? Somebody can be charged for looking at something from their own house? I mean, if they were using fancy spy equipment to see through curtains or walls, sure, but just for looking from their house into somebody else’s uncurtained window? ---
**Author:** ![Kyla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/eada6e/32.png) [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/17 "2010-08-08T03:55:30Z")
There’s a very interesting hour-long episode of This American Life on precisely this topic. You can listen to it [here](http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/204/81-Words). (You can also pay 99 cents to download it, but it’s free streaming.) It’s a fascinating story; the journalist who does the piece is the granddaughter of the guy who was the president of the APA when it made the change. ---
**Author:** ![Markxxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/18 "2010-08-08T16:03:56Z")
As a person with her own psychiatry booth I’m sure [Lucy has something to say about this](http://a.imageshack.us/img84/246/peanuts013.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Sablicious](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bbce88/32.png) [@Sablicious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sablicious)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/19 "2010-08-08T16:40:55Z")
> [@mrsface](#): > > When did homosexuality stop being classified as a mental disorder? Don’t know the official date (if there’s such a thing), but methinks around the same time people started to accept the fact that more than few of [history’s more notable figures](http://www.gay-art-history.org/) were either outright gay or, as with all men, had homosexual tendencies. Oral sex (fellatio) being anecdotally the most watch aspect of porn films and the sharp spike in transsexual related web searches since the middle of the last decade (Google Zeitgeist) speaks volumes for how much men like to see this particular part of the male anatomy in action and how much more accepting they are of this fact. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050/20 "2010-08-08T16:53:37Z")
> [@Sablicious](#): > > Don’t know the official date (if there’s such a thing), but methinks around the same time people started to accept the fact that more than few of [history’s more notable figures](http://www.gay-art-history.org/) were either outright gay or, as with all men, had homosexual tendencies. While it’s certainly possible that all men have homosexual tendencies, I don’t believe that we can say that is a factual statement given our limited knowledge of the subject. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-homosexuality-stop-being-classified-as-a-mental-disorder/283050.md?page=2)