I’m delighted to be welcoming the lovely and talented Violet Grey (she/her) back to Coffee & Kink with another guest post. This one, all about conversion therapy’s dangers and the rebranding of this hateful pseudoscience, is really important and also really challenging.
If you’re a straight, cis person, please take the time to read and absorb this one. If you’re queer, trans, or a conversion therapy survivor, please take care of yourself if you decide to engage with this topic <3
Amy x
Conversion Therapy Has Rebranded and It’s Just as Dangerous
TW for conversion therapy, spiritual abuse, trauma, torture, suicide
Note: This post was first published in 2021 but as of a 2025 update, conversion therapy is still legal in the UK. In the US, as of 2025, 27 states and the District of Columbia have banned conversion therapy for minors but D.C. is the only jurisdiction whose ban includes adults. However, this practice is still widespread even in areas where it is illegal.
If you’ve seen the news recently, you’ll know that conversion therapy and its dangers are back in discussion. Despite promises by the UK government to ban it back in 2018, conversion therapy is sadly still legal, with no swift action being taken to criminalise the practice. Following wider awareness and an outpouring of horrific survivor accounts, it has undergone a rebranding in recent years. But don’t be fooled: conversion therapy is as prevalent and damaging as ever.
What is Conversion Therapy and What Are Its Dangers?
Conversion therapy (sometimes known as “gay cure therapy” or “reparative therapy”) is a pseudoscientific practice designed to change an LGBTQ+ person’s sexual orientation to heterosexual or their gender identity to cisgender. Most victims of conversion therapy are children, teenagers, and young adults.
It is usually undertaken by religious communities, and in this post I’ll be talking about Christianity as that’s my faith background and context. Sadly, conversion therapy is also occasionally carried out by medical professionals. It stems from the belief that being anything other than heterosexual and cisgender is wrong, and therefore something to be be treated.
The medical community has denounced conversion therapy as a dangerous pseudoscience that not only doesn’t work, but also leads to PTSD, depression, anxiety, and even suicide. There are now numerous studies whose findings all point to the same conclusion: conversion therapy doesn’t work. You can’t make a queer person straight any more than you can make a straight person gay.
Being LGBTQ+ it is not a choice. It doesn’t harm children or families, and it is not caused by childhood trauma. Us queer folks just are who we are.
What Happens in Conversion Therapy?
Programmes designed to “cure” or “repair” someone of their homosexuality or bisexuality (often referred to as SSA or “Same Sex Attraction”) or their trans identity have included, but are not limited to:
- Biblical “counselling“: Psychotherapy-style sessions with spiritual advice. These practitioners often have no qualifications in counselling and participants (or their parents) may have to sign a waiver acknowledging this.
- Praying and scripture study: Also known as “pray the gay away,” or asking God to take away the person’s Same Sex Attraction. This reinforces shame and self-loathing.
- Physical torture, including starvation, beatings, and electric shocks
- Exorcism
- Forced sterilisation and similar surgeries
- Chemical castration: The use of anaphrodisiac drugs to reduce a person’s libido or sexual activity, thereby “reducing homosexual urges.” Perhaps the most well-known victim of chemical castration was Alan Turing, the brilliant computer scientist who helped crack the Nazi Enigma code during World War 2. He died by suicide two years later, aged just 41.
New Branding, Same Harm: Hate the Sin, Not the Sinner
Being a bi person of faith (Christianity and Quaker teachings,) I know that not all Christians support conversion therapy. In fact, most of the religious folks I know are vehemently against it. However, it is a large, systemic problem that the church desperately needs to confront.
The rebranding of conversion therapy has been happening in the last fifteen years or so, primarily since the legalisation of same-sex marriage in many parts of the world. In that time, I have seen a noticeable shift in religious homophobic rhetoric: people have shifted from saying “being gay is a choice” to saying “God may have made you gay, but the act of homosexuality is still a sin”. They hope this will make them come across as more accepting and less hateful.
This form of conversion therapy is just as bad and has just as many dangers.
First: Love (and sex) is not a sin.
Second: It uses spiritual abuse to instill self-hatred.
Third: It leaves already vulnerable LGBTQ+ people with two equally bleak choices: a lifetime of celibacy (no romantic love, no sex, no masturbation, nothing,) or a heterosexual marriage with someone we might not even love.
Either way the options are clear: a lifetime of misery, or a lifetime of misery. But hey, God loves you! Right?
Conversion Therapy Under the Guise of Care is Still Hateful
In the wake of this so-called progressive new view, Biblical counselling and prayer are being championed as alternatives to the physical abuse that characterises more traditional forms of conversion therapy. However, this toxic doctrine still harms LGBTQ+ people even when it comes from the very people claiming to help them. This can include well-meaning Christians who genuinely believe they are acting out of love.
With such messages being preached from the pulpit each Sunday or taken from mistranslated Bible verses (fun fact: there are 450 English translations of the Bible!), these views will be all some Christians know. For those who come from very conservative backgrounds, they might even be considered liberal takes!
These people’s views, though I utterly condemn them, do not usually come from malice. They genuinely feel they are doing the right thing. They think they are helping. But conversion therapy doesn’t help. And its dangers are no less when it it done under the guise of love and care.
The Road to Hell is Paved with Good Intentions
This section is for those well-meaning folks who believe in “hating the sin and not the sinner.” I’m not trying to attack you or your faith. But from a fellow Christian, and a queer one at that, this approach often still amounts to conversion therapy and has the same dangers. It is still hurting people. We need to acknowledge this. Only then can we enact positive change.
Sadly, this doctrine of “tolerance, but not really” further reinforces self-hatred in the name of love. It reinforces distress that shouldn’t be there in the first place. It is not justifiable with any of Jesus’ teachings.
We are called to love our neighbour and consider the fruit we bear. If the fruit we produce leads to trauma, self-loathing, or even suicide, we can’t dig our heels in with, “But the Bible says…!” There is no Biblical justification for the torture we as a community have, and continue to, put LGBTQ+ people through. Who are we as Christians to condemn consenting adults to a life of misery for who they love?
Breaking Up with Toxic Doctrine
The Biblical passages most often used to justify homophobia – Leviticus, Romans 1, 1 Corinthians, and the story of Sodom and Gomorrah – were never about queerness. They are about sexual violence and abuse of power.
We are using the Bible as a weapon when it was never meant to be. The Bible is a document with a rich history, full of context and nuance, as well as a religious text. Biblical literalism is killing people. If we want to try to be more Christ-like, we need to focus on what Jesus was about: love.
Despite this rebranded conversion therapy rhetoric and its dangers, it’s not all bad news. There is a shift towards some churches becoming LGBTQ+ affirming. Progressives, both clergy members and parishioners, are leading the way. However, of course, there is also a backlash against this progress. So while we are making positive baby steps as Christians, we’ve still got a long way to go.
About the Writer
Violet Grey is 20-something lady who loves to write. She writes erotic fiction, along with real-life sex stories and thoughts on sexuality, kink, BDSM, and whatever else is on her mind. Check out her blog!
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