Possible Ban on Gender Conversion Therapy in New South Wales Raises Concerns

A sign for unisex toilet on Jan. 21, 2022. Victoria Jones/PA Media

Planned legislation in New South Wales (NSW) to ban people seeking assistance for unwanted same-sex attractions or gender confusion has raised concerns from the community.

Conversion therapy, which is usually defined as methods used to change a person’s sexual preferences to being heterosexual, or in the case of gender dysphoria, to align with their biological sex, is set to be banned in NSW, the most populous state in Australia.

This follows bans implemented in Queensland, Victoria, and the Australian Capital Territory, with the legislation in Victoria being the strictest, forbidding conversion therapy for both adults and minors, a first in the world.

During the state election this year, Labor leader Chris Minns promised to ban conversion therapy if elected.

“We should not have a situation where children are being told something is wrong with them and that they need to be fixed,” Minns, then opposition leader and now NSW premier, said in February 2023.

Different Opinions About Conversion Therapy’s Effect

Conversion therapy has long been considered a contentious issue.

Religion-based conversion therapy is most common, including counselling, prayer, scripture reading, fasting, retreats, and “spiritual healing”. However, some churches are accused of enforcing unwanted conversion therapy in evangelical churches and ministries, often taking the form of prayer groups, counselling disguised as pastoral care or so-called exorcisms.

The Australian Medical Association (AMA) has called for laws banning coercive conversion therapy. Both the Australian Psychological Society (APS) and the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists have stated that sexual or gender orientation change efforts of any kind are harmful.

“Conversion practices are a blatant example of the discrimination faced by LGBTQIA+ people in Australia and have no place in our society,” AMA President Dr Omar Khorshid said in a 2021 statement. “Many people who are LGBTQIA+ in Australia live happy and healthy lives.”

According to the American Psychological Association, which reviewed the results of 83 studies carried out between 1960 and 2007 on the controversial topic, there is no sound scientific evidence that sexual orientation can be changed.

However, survey results of 78 ex-LGBT people by Free to Change, an organisation campaigning to “push back to governments outlawing people leaving their LGBTQ Lives,” shows that certain conversion therapy can be a long-lasting and effective treatment that has, according to the organisation helped people to avert suicides and includes both professional and religious counselling.

“These results are stunning, to say the least. They show that despite what the community has been told, people do leave their LGBT lives and live better-quality lives as a result,” reads a statement of the group.

Forbidding People Seeking Help Even if They Want It

Critics of the legislation are concerned that despite good intentions, it may impact those who want to get help with “unwanted same-sex attractions or gender confusion.”

“So basically in Victoria, anybody who wants to get help with unwanted same-sex attractions or gender dysphoria cannot get help, even if they want it, even if they consent to the therapy,” said Dr. Con Kafataris, a registered doctor and independent examiner based in NSW.

Parents protest outside the Davis Joint Unified School District offices over a talk featuring Rachel Pepper, co-author of “The Transgender Child,” in Davis, Calif., on Jan. 11, 2023. Courtesy of Our Duty

“In Victoria, if you have a problem with alcohol use, you can get help; If you have problems with unwanted drug addiction or porn addiction, you can get help, but if you have a problem with unwanted same-sex attraction, or your child has a problem with gender dysphoria that they don’t want, you don’t want, you can’t get help, other than to affirm it.

“Your alternative is either to embrace the lifestyle or suffer inside.”

He stressed that his comments only referred only to those with “unwanted” same-sex attraction or gender confusion, while people who were content with themselves had the opportunity to just be “happy gay.”

In Conflict With Parental Rights?

The possible legislation also raises doubt that if it will be in conflict with parental rights.

In Australia, it is the legal right of parents to bring up their children according to their own values and beliefs.

The NSW government, in this case, states that parents have the right to decide the child’s “religion, education, discipline, and medical treatment and where the child lives will not be interfered with unless there are good reasons or the child’s well-being is at risk.”

Courtesy of Praying for Jude Sullivan Peters

“No one should be injured or treated in any sort of violent or threatening way because of these issues. We’re not against the parts of the law, which, for example, would go against someone being physically abused or going through harmful practices with this issue,” Dr. Ali Ismaiel from Parental Rights Committee Australia (PRCA) told The Epoch Times on June 26.

“But we do have a major objection to where these laws are very broad and include things like counselling, parents speaking to their children if they are confused about gender identity or sexual orientation.

“We’re very, very concerned that parents who really should have first rights and the utmost rights aren’t able to speak to their children and discuss these things with them in the privacy of their own home.”

Ismaiel said the committee is very concerned that New South Wales will pass laws similar to Victoria, where “the Liberals are quite authoritarian.”

“They’re very scary because they seem to include any kind of counselling… for anybody. That’s not really well defined what is and isn’t [as conversion therapy].”

Potential For Doctors to Be Silenced

In the United States, which has progressed further along with implementing transgender policies than Australia, doctors and therapists can have their licenses cancelled in some states, such as California, for helping people seeking conversion therapy.

“I had to go out of state to find a psychiatrist who was willing to look at the causality of my daughter’s new gender identity. We keep these doctors secret because if they get found out, they might lose their license,” Erin Friday, a licensed California attorney and co-lead of the U.S. branch of Our Duty, a parent group dedicated to protecting children from gender ideology, said in the latest Epoch Times docudrama “Gender Transformation: The Untold Realities.”

Newly donated LGBT books are displayed in the library at Nystrom Elementary School in Richmond, Calif., on May 17, 2022. Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

The situation is better in Australia, according to Kafataris.

“There have been complaints made against doctors, but when they cited the evidence… nothing’s gone any further,” he told The Epoch Times on June 26.

Kafataris has personal experience with this issue after he was referred to authorities over a statement he made during the same-sex marriage campaign.

“My response was that my report was based on my medical opinion and that my own personal political or philosophical views had nothing to do with it… and they never went any further.”

“I think that’s what doctors have to do, to stand on the evidence and not get bullied.”

However, the doctor is not that sure about what will happen if the legislation comes into law.

“At this point, if conversion therapy bans come in, that might change everything,” Kafataris said.

The Epoch Times has reached out to the NSW government and Premier Chris Minns for comment.