MCLC: conversion therapy case

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: kirk (denton.2 at osu.edu)
Subject: conversion therapy case
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Source: SCMP (7/31/14):
http://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1563425/beijing-court-hears-gay-man-
traumatised-clinics-electro-shock-conversion

Beijing court hears gay man traumatised by clinic’s electro-shock
‘conversion therapy’
Plaintiff says clinic in Chongqing administered shocks after he was told
to have sexual thoughts involving men
By Agence France-Presse in Beijing

A Beijing court began hearing a landmark case on “gay conversion”
treatment on Thursday, as an activist in a nurse’s uniform knelt over a
patient, wielding a giant needle, outside.

“Homosexuality doesn’t need to be cured!” chanted about a dozen
supporters. “Haidian Court, oppose conversion therapy!”
Homosexuality was declassified as a mental disorder in China in 2001 but
widespread intolerance toward gays and lesbians remains, and activists
hailed the unprecedented case as a significant step forward.

The plaintiff, who is gay and has given his name only as Xiao Zhen, says
the Xinyu Piaoxiang clinic in Chongqing traumatised him when he was
electro-shocked after being told to have sexual thoughts involving men.

He is also taking action against China’s top internet search engine,
Baidu, for running advertisements by the facility.
Those who come out to friends and family in China often face significant
pressure to undergo sexuality “treatment” or marry a partner of the
opposite sex.

“It’s the first case about anti-conversion therapy in China,” said Xiao
Tie, 28, executive director of the Beijing LGBT Centre, which is backing
the legal action.

“In China, most people who undergo ‘conversion therapy’ do so because they
are pressured by their family. Parents, once they realise their child is
gay, urge him or her to go to a psychiatric hospital or undergo
treatment,” she said.

Most people who claim that they have been successfully “converted” by the
therapy only say so in order to stop the distressing treatments, she added.

Conversion therapy has more than a century of history around the world,
but has fallen out of favour with medical authorities.

Nonetheless the lucrative industry persists in countries from Singapore to
Britain and the United States – where reports of electro-shock use have
added to momentum for a ban.

Zhang Rui, 21, who is in charge of the Beijing LGBT Centre’s psychological
counselling programme, said advocates hope the case will help change
Chinese public perceptions of gays as suffering from mental illness.

“We’re here to tell even more people that conversion therapy is not
scientific,” she said. “Homosexuality can’t be ‘cured.’”