It’s Time to Make a Barbaric Practice Illegal

Hello, heterosexual person! We love you! We just hate your sin. Look, we know you’re very strongly attracted to people of the opposite sex, and many of your kind say there’s nothing wrong with it, but as you know, it’s an abomination unto Glod for a man to lie with a woman. Interestingly, the Big Holy Book™ doesn’t say anything about women lying with men… but we here at (Make You) Fit the Mold Therapy Group figure it goes both ways.

Besides, heterosexual attraction leads to horrible societal problems. Did you know it causes unplanned pregnancies? Horrible. You don’t want to be judged for having an out-of-wedlock child, do you? No, you’d better stay away from that *shudder* hetero sex for the sake of the children! Also, children should only be raised by one parent of one sex. It’s too confusing to them to have mixed-sex parents. We here at (MY)FtMTG know that juvenile delinquency, hetero-curiosity, and *gulp* toleration of other sexualities result from such homes. Won’t you think of the children?!

Heterosexuality also leads to: date rape; STDs; sexual dissatisfaction arising from one partner not understanding how the other partner’s bits work; mismatches in size, strength, and recreational interests; marriage-wrecking arguments over toilet seats; infidelity; depression, anxiety, and homicide; and many more horrible things, up to and including a complete breakdown of the social order and random smitings from Glod. You can see how awful heterosexuality is! You don’t want to be a heterosexual, do you?

You say you can’t help your attraction to people of the same sex? Actually, you can! We have (un)proven therapies (not)guaranteed to take care of that pesky opposite-sex attraction. Why, all we have to do is spend an hour or two each week for the next few years telling you how awful your attraction to the opposite sex is, how shameful it is, how un-Glodly such feelings are, and discuss how sexy asexuality should be to you. If that doesn’t do the trick, we’ll teach you how to masturbate to your own reflection, even though masturbation is also a sin in the BHB. We think Glod will overlook a little self-sex as long as it keeps you from sticking Tab A into Slot B, where it doesn’t belong! Better to have hairy palms than swim in a lake of fire!

Image is Buddy Jesus. Caption says, "Don't forget: I'm watching you masturbate!"

But you say your heterosexual nature can’t be changed by these techniques? Why, that’s no problem! Our advanced therapy includes hooking your naughty bits to electrodes and giving you a nasty shock whenever you’re aroused by heterosexual porn! Yes, we know that porn is also a sin that makes the baby Cheezus cry, but it’s sort of like capital punishment – it’s okay to break a commandment as long as it’s for Reasons! Don’t worry about a thing, except that zap you’ll get if your naughty bits start getting naughty! We also have the option to merely induce vomiting at the sight of naked opposite-sex bodies engaged in sinful, sensual acts against Glodly nature. This is the reaction you should be having whenever you think of two hot, sweaty bodies doing a horizontal tango! Or writhing in a shower, or bent over a table, or…

Excuse us, we need to go lie down in some ice water.

Anyway, you can see how this therapy is Necessary and Good and Will Totally Work. All of your problems stem from your attraction. No, it’s not because of society’s condemnation of your attraction. It’s not because you’re relentlessly bullied, ostracized, disowned by family, kicked out to live on the streets in your teens, told you will burn in Heck, beaten, abused, and in some cases killed for being heterosexual. Whyever would that cause depression and anxiety, or even lead to suicide?! No, these things are definitely caused by being heterosexual, not our behavior based on a personal sense of ick and our interpretation of the BHB written by heterophobic goat herders in rather barbaric times.

So, step into our office, and let’s get those electrodes hooked right up for you! You’ll be swearing off the hetero sex in no time. (not)Guaranteed!

Image shows Michele Bachmann spinning a young boy as if they're dancing. Caption says, "Then, we turn you around, and just like that, you're not gay!"

***

Ridiculous, isn’t it? Over-the-top hyperbole, you may be thinking. But this is the sort of shit endured by the LGBTQ folk who have the terrible bad luck to be born into devout families. There are people out there who think it’s appropriate to force a person to see a counselor who will shame them for their orientation or gender identity, who won’t try to help them accept who they are and treat the depression, anxiety and other issues that arise when you’re struggling with harmless natural inclinations and the condemnation parents, friends, teachers, acquaintances, strangers, and preachers heap on you. There are actually “therapists” who think it’s perfectly fine to shock people’s genitals to get them to stop being attracted to unapproved genders, or that it’s good medical practice to deny a trans person’s gender identity.

It’s time for that to stop.

It’s time to stop allowing it to be legal. No, we’re probably not going to be able to convince evangelical people, who think LGBTQ’s people’s problem is that they’re LGBTQ, not that society treats them like utter shit, that being LGBTQ is perfectly fine, and that their bloody stupid conversion therapy doesn’t work. They don’t care about actual reality, they’ve got their own version of it. The only way to help the kids who fall victim to their prejudices and pseudoscience is to make that sort of abuse illegal.

And no, it doesn’t help to just tell kids to hang in there, endure the crap, cuz it gets better. We need to stop doing that and thinking it’s enough, because that sort of platitude doesn’t work for people like Leelah Alcorn.

Parents should not be given the power to force their children into harmful pseudo-therapy, a therapy that aims to destroy a fundamental part of their identity, one that’s only considered harmful for religious reasons.

There’s a Change.org petition you can sign, for a start. Let’s get the orgs to pay attention to this and start fighting on that front, shall we?

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It’s Time to Make a Barbaric Practice Illegal
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3 thoughts on “It’s Time to Make a Barbaric Practice Illegal

  1. 2

    Minor correction: In the paragraph just above the picture,

    You say you can’t help your attraction to people of the same sex?

    Should be

    You say you can’t help your attraction to people of the opposite sex?

    Oh, and well said!

  2. 3

    Simply brilliant, Dana, though for full therapeutic effect we would also need the victim sinner to completely go detox from all the harmful influences of mass culture. All of those movies, books, TV shows, and music videos showing that icky heterosexual man-woman romance and stuff, all of it has to go into the bin. (Conversion therapy usually insists that any material possession of the person that is a crutch for them has to be destroyed – for instance, I know of assholes like the psychiatrist Ken Zucker insisting to the parents of a trans girl that all of her toys, mainly dolls, should be destroyed. Inhuman, unethical, and unscientific.)

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