HUFFINGTON
07.14.13
STRAIGHT TALK
theory and a little bit of anecdotal stuff,” John explained at the
cafe, “so I thought, okay, maybe
if there are folks who have samesex attractions and don’t want
them, there are things we can do
to help them.”
Through the writings of Nicolosi and others, John was persuaded
that some men unconsciously develop same-sex attractions as a
way to compensate for failed relationships with their fathers, or
in response to childhood molestation. By learning to connect with
other men in non-sexual ways,
they could supposedly repair their
damaged psyches, causing their
homosexual feelings to spontaneously dissipate.
None of the papers guaranteed
change — most subscribed to the
idea that around a third of all
patients could be cured, a third
could learn to manage their desires without acting on them, and
a third would never succeed, John
said. In those instances when the
efforts did fail, blame was usually
laid on the patient. “Some clients
agree with the premises of reparative therapy but do not have the
ego strength to see it through,”
Nicolosi wrote in his 1991 book,
in which he coined the phrase
“reparative therapy,” a variation
on “sexual conversion therapy.”
“Such men usually drop out within the first few months in spite of
their apparent commitment. Lack
of ego-strength leaves a client vulnerable to the attractions of the
gay lifestyle.”
As John delved deeper into the
literature, he joined an informal
network of several hundred therapists who practiced various forms
of reparative therapy, and NARTH
and JONAH began referring patients to him. In the early 2000s,
after The Boston Globe published
a groundbreaking investigation
into widespread sex abuse in the
Catholic Church, he began seeing
patients who were referred to him
through his church connections,
including a number of young men
who had been abused. Even now,
John maintains that his work with
those patients “affirmed for me
that this is a complex and challenging issue from any angle.”
Around the same time, conversion therapists received a major
credibility boost. In 2003, Dr.
Robert Spitzer, a towering figure
in psychiatric circles, published a
study that purportedly validated
the idea that sexuality can be
changed. Spitzer had asked 200
men and women to describe their