WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO UNDERGO ‘REPARATIVE THERAPY’?
Source: GMagazine 2007
If you were attracted to others of the same sex, and you weren’t happy about it, could you
change? Putting aside for the moment the issue of whether it might be a good idea to try
to change your core identity or sexuality to conform to social or religious norms, the
question is still one worth asking. It is one, of course, answered in ringing affirmatives
by the supporters of ‘reparative therapy’ in the ‘ex-gay’ movement in the US and
amongst other fundamentalist Christian groups elsewhere. These claim that anywhere
between 40 and 90% of people can, with sufficient prayer, support and faith in God,
change the direction of their sexual attraction. These claims have always been
unsubstantiated, so in 2000 the American psychiatrist, Robert L Spitzer, set out to
investigate them. Spitzer is renowned for spearheading the successful drive to remove
homosexuality from the American Psychiatric Association’s list of disorders in 1973-4.
In 2001, Spitzer presented the results of his study, which created a furore as they seemed
to show that, in some case, change is possible.
This should not, perhaps, have surprised anyone. Since Kinsey’s work in the 1940s, it
has been clear that not only does there naturally exist a spectrum of sexual orientation
and behaviour across the community (ie that difference is indeed the ‘norm’) but that in
some (a small minority) of individuals change occurs during the course of a life. No one,
Spitzer included, has been able to say why this change occurs, least of all attribute it to
will power or religious belief, but change there no doubt is.
So, if you are a person attracted to those of your own sex, and would prefer, for
religious or social reasons, to change this attraction, there are perhaps grounds for hope.
What degree of hope does Spitzer’s study give? Firstly, it has to be said that Spitzer’s
study has been so widely criticised for its un-scientific methodology that it may be
unwise to rely on it at all. Spitzer conducted his research using 200 American men and
women who claimed to ‘have sustained some change in sexual orientation for at least five
yeasr’ and who were for the most part participants found through the religious ‘ex-gay’
ministries or therapists who had conducted the ‘therapy’ that had led to this reported
change. Finding even this number was, despite the claims made by the ‘therapists’ that
there exist massive numbers of successful’ ex-gays’, difficult. These were clearly the
most shining examples that the ‘therapists’ could come up with, and Spitzer himself
stated that ‘This suggests that the marked change in sexual orientation reported by almost
all the study subjects may be a rare or uncommon outcome of reparative therapy.’
96% of Spitzer’s subjects were Christians, 3% Jewish, and 96% stated that religion
was ‘extremely’ or ‘very’ important in their lives. A full 19% were paid employees of the
‘ex-gay’ ministries or sympathetic therapists. The study was based solely on what this
group of people said had happened to them. That this pool had a vested interest in
proving the success of their ‘therapy’ is clear and is the major criticism made of the
validity of the study. A further problem in Spitzer’s pool was the apparent inclusion of
bisexuals and even heterosexuals who had some homosexual feelings. 47% of male and
67% of female subjects had enjoyed sex with a member of the opposite sex before their
therapy and 13% of the male and 4% of the female subjects had never had homosexual
sex at all.
But even ignoring all this, what did Spitzer find this group of committed and sexually
diverse people told him? He found firstly that it seems to have taken them a huge amount
of effort and time to effect any change at all. The average length of time that his subjects
had been involved in therapy was 4.7 years, and 21 percent of them had been in therapy
for 15 years and were still undergoing it. Secondly, he found that only 11 % of the males
and 37% of the females claimed that therapy had completely altered not only their
behaviour but also their sexual orientation so that they never felt attraction to members of
the same sex. 28% of the male and 24% of the female subjects reported that their
attraction to the opposite sex was limited to one person (ie they could only feel attraction
for their marital partner). 66% of the male and 44% of the female subjects claimed to
satisfy Spitzer’s conditions for ‘Good Heterosexual Functioning’, which included having
heterosexual sex with a partner ‘at least a few times a month’ and ‘during no more than
15% of these occasions thinking of homosexual sex’. This is in itself a particularly
strange definition; persuading oneself not to think of a member of the same sex more than
15% of the time is scarcely a proof of change of sexual orientation.
Spitzer’s study does not prove that sexual orientation is a matter of choice. It actually
proves that even amongst the tiny number of the most committed and partial partisans of
‘reparative therapy’, 89% of males and 63% or females, who in many cases have
undergone 15 years of ‘therapy’ , have been unable to change their sexual orientation.
These figures are sufficient to give pause to anyone thinking of submitting themselves to
this kind of ‘therapy’. It is very unlikely to make any difference at all no matter how
much effort and commitment put into it.
Whether one believes the 11 % of men and 37% of women whom Spitzer found to claim
to have altered their sexual orientation is a question to be addressed separately, bearing as
it does on the widely recorded untruthfulness and lack of ethics displayed by the ‘ex-gay’
industry. But we should perhaps let Spitzer himself have the final word on what he thinks
should be done about his findings. He wrote on 24 September 2001:
I am disturbed (although not surprised) that the results of my study are being
misused by those who are against anti-discrimination laws and civil union laws
for gays and lesbians …. It would be a serious mistake to conclude from my study
that any highly motivated homosexual can change his or her sexual orientation, or
that my study shows that homosexuality is a ‘choice.’ …. I personally favor antidiscrimination
laws and civil union laws for homosexuals. ‘
Nigel A Collett
