Conversion therapy, also called reparative therapy, has been widely denounced by medical professional organizations as traumatizing and harmful to minors. But despite the consensus that conversion therapy was unsound, it has remained fairly common, said Mathew Shurka, who underwent conversion therapy and works as an activist fighting against it. adults in the United States have received conversion therapy, according to research by the Williams Institute at the U.C.L.A. About half of them underwent conversion therapy as teenagers. Conversion therapy assumes that everyone is a heterosexual, Mr. Shurka said, and that same-sex attraction is caused by childhood trauma.

Source: New York Times January 21, 2019 09:56 UTC