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LAST WORD: China Gets to Grips with Sexuality Reversal Therapy
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China Gets to Grips with Sexuality Reversal Therapy

By Tracy Hall


BT 201503 02 Last word 2012 02 01 FamilyPortrait 2Being gay is easier in some countries, cultures, families and communities than it is in others. China certainly doesn't have a reputation for not being the most tolerant of places, but thankfully things have changed dramatically in recent years. Homosexuality was illegal here until 1997 and it wasn't removed from the list of officially recognised mental illnesses until 2001. Although gay people still face a significant amount of discrimination in the workplace and are considered shameful by some families, reports indicate that Chinese society on the whole is becoming more tolerant towards the LGBT community. Public events like the Shanghai Pride are now allowed to take place. Social groups that promote gay rights are also increasingly being given more opportunities to voice themselves.


However, not everyone is convinced that accepting homosexuality as a legitimate lifestyle choice is the way to go. Following a spate of high profile news stories, it has become apparent that some people in China still consider it to be a disease of the mind. Having an opinion, however irrational or unscientific it may be, is everyone's prerogative. The problems and the pain arise when an individual tries to force their dogmatic irrationality upon other. Revealing ones sexuality is a risky move in this regard. Not only do some families resent and ostracise their gay relatives, some still consider it to be a treatable disease that requires specialist medical attention. If you are unfortunate enough to have parents who hold such beliefs then life is nothing short of a complete nightmare.


BT 201503 03 Last word 7057 1dec8 15995 cOn rare occasions parents will take extreme measures to 'cure' their precious offspring's shameful psychological ailment. Last year we heard about the horrifying story of Yang Teng, a middle aged man from Beijing whose parents forced him to undergo 'gay conversation therapy'. According to the reports, Mr. Yang went to visit a quack psychologist who attempted to 'correct' his sexual orientation by putting him through a series of incredibly uncomfortable and even painful therapy sessions. The most disturbing method used by the psychologist involved asking Yang to imagine a homosexual encounter then immediately administering electric shock treatment. These shock treatment session (which involved shocking treatment in more than one sense of the phrase) were sometimes accompanied by hypnosis session, from he claims to have never recovered from.


BT 201503 01 Last word hlNot surprisingly Yang came to his senses and filed a lawsuit against the sadistic psychologist. Yang told AFP that "someone needed to step up because someone must stop such severe transgressions". He added that he was going to take this verdict and show it to my parents so they can see a Chinese court said "homosexuality isn't a mental illness". Ultimately the Beijing court ruled in favour of Yang and declared that the Xinyu Piaoxiang Clinic must pay him a sum of 3500 CNY as compensation for their malpractice. This might not be a lot of money but at least it showed that the Chinese legal system is taking gay rights at least somewhat seriously.



While Teng's case is extreme it isn't unique. My research into this topic area, which admittedly only scratched the surface of what is a very complex issue, lead me to a prominent Chinese blogger who frequently writes about his and his friends' experiences as a gay person in the Middle Kingdom. In kindly responding to my email, he explained how his parents "went into a state of complete denial that lasted for several weeks after I told them about my sexuality". Then after confronting them about the issue they "sat down and told me they were worried about my psychological health but it was just a phrase some people go through when they are growing and it will most likely fade over time". When he finally managed to convince his parents that this was his genuine sexual orientation, and not just a temporary fad, they apparently "suggested that I seek medical help, go to a group that discusses those kinds of problems, or something like that". In this case the young man had the courage to stand firm and not bow down to parental pressure, but many others like him are not so lucky. The blogger also explained in his email how a number of his gay friends, both male and female, succumbed to their family's demands to seek some sort of medical attention for their 'condition'.



BT 201503 04 Last word o GAY MEN STEREOTYPES facebookThe issue of homosexuality may be much more of a taboo in China than it is in many other countries, but this whole sexuality reversal craze is not only a Chinese problem. Indeed it is prevalent in many other parts of the world. Certain elements of the Evangelical Christian communities in the United States in particular have earned an unsavoury reputation for condoning highly controversial 'pray away the gay' schemes. There are tonnes of shocking stories about pastors who have built an entire business out of saving people from their homosexual lusts. Some of them, according to news reports, may even have become millionaires by running these gay cure camps.


Now nobody is saying that these attempts to cure homosexuality by reciting biblical passages and so on are as degrading or downright painful as the electric shock treatments performed by the crazy clinic in Beijing. The underlying premise though and the inherent absurdity of it are akin to one another. It doesn't matter whether it is through intervention from God or 30 volts of electricity every time you think about Brad Pitt, the point is that we are still living in a world whereby irrationality towards something that is, as far as we know, an unchangeable biological phenomenon is leading to some pretty barbaric behaviour. Not only China but the rest of the world as whole, including the ten or so countries where homosexuality may still be punished by death, need to tackle this incredibly important social issue so that we can all move towards a more sensible way of thinking about the world. After all, this is the wellbeing of 8-10 percent of the global population we are talking about!


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