Conservatives push back on gay conversion bill

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Conservatives push back on gay conversion bill

10/04/2012

By WeHo News staff, West Hollywood, California

Conservative religious organizations have filed law suits to stop enforcement of the ban on "gay cures" signed into law on Sunday by CA Gov. Jerry Brown. Photo by WeHo News.

Pacific Justice Institute, a non-profit legal defense organization specializing in the defense of religious freedom, parental rights, and other civil liberties, filed a civil suit on Monday to block California from enforcing the recently signed ban on gay conversion therapy for minors.

Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law a Sen. Ted W. Lieu (who will represent West Hollywood during the one-year interregnum between senate representatives caused by redistricting, and if re-elected, as the city’s senator in 2014) bill that makes California the first state to end now-discredited attempts to change a minor’s sexual orientation.

Effective Jan. 1, 2013, SB 1172 will prohibit children under 18 from undergoing sexual orientation-change efforts.

“No one should stand idly by while children are being psychological abused, and anyone who forces a child to try to change their sexual orientation must understand this is unacceptable,” Lieu, D-Torrance, said about Senate Bill 1172.

“Governor Brown should be commended for protecting LGBT youth by ending this type of quackery.”

Pacific Justice Institute president Brad Dacus said his organization has “led the fight against SB 1172 since its introduction in the spring by Sen. Ted Lieu (D-Torrance).”

In a press release, he said, “PJI attorneys attended all of the bill’s policy committee hearings and warned legislators that it was an unconstitutional restriction on the First Amendment, privacy, and parental rights. PJI attorneys anticipated yesterday's enactment of the bill and will be filing a federal lawsuit on Monday, October 1, in Sacramento.

“Of all the freedom-killing bills we have seen in our legislature the last several years, this is among the worst,” said Mr. Dacus.

State Senator Ted Lieu's bill goes into effect on January 1, 2013. Photo by WeHo News.

“This outrageous bill makes no exceptions for young victims of sexual abuse who are plagued with unwanted same-sex attraction, nor does it respect the consciences of mental health professionals who work in a church.

“We are filing suit to defend families, children, and religious freedom. This unprecedented bill is outrageously unconstitutional.”

“I read the lawsuit and, as a matter of fiction, it is a good read but from any reasonable legal standard, the lawsuit is frivolous,” said Senator Lieu.

"Under the plaintiffs' argument, the First Amendment would shield therapists and psychiatrists from medical malpractice and psychological abuse claims simply because they use speech in practicing their medicine. That is a novel and frivolous view of the First Amendment.”

State Senator Lieu characterized reparative therapy designed to change a youth’s sexual orientation as “quackery” and said even the movement’s foremost supporter had retreated from supporting the treatments.

“Even the person who brought any legitimacy to this kind of psychological technique, Dr. Robert Spitzer, renounced his study and apologized to the LGBT community… professionals agree that this quackery needs to stop,” he said.

How many gay people reading this have tried to pray their gay away, to no avail? The thought "Oh God, please let me be straight," has crossed virtually every gay person's mind.

Dr. Spitzer, the psychiatrist who published a controversial 2001 study proclaiming that "highly motivated" gay and lesbian people could change their sexual orientation, retracted those initial claims in April, while addressing several of the ample criticisms against its findings.

"In retrospect, I have to admit I think the critiques are largely correct," said the 80-year-old Spitzer, who is now retired and suffering from Parkinson's disease, told American Prospect earlier this year.

“The findings can be considered evidence for what those who have undergone ex-gay therapy say about it, but nothing more,” he said.

Liberty Counsel, a Florida conservative advocacy group focusing on religious issues, released a statement saying that it “has been preparing a lawsuit on behalf of counselors, parents and their minor children and the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH).

In response to that second lawsuit Senator Lieu, D-Torrance, a former prosecutor and graduate of Georgetown University’s Law School, said, “The view that the US Constitution contains a ‘right’ to practice baseless and harmful medical therapies is itself legal quackery."

“Since the founding of this country, it has been understood that government has a duty to protect children from abuse.”

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