Gay Campaigner Strudwick Calls For End To Abusive "Conversion" Therapy

LONDON, UK. Monday 14th November.

Journalist and campaigner Patrick Strudwick condemned the role of religious groups in their promotion of "conversion therapy", during a speech at the annual fundraising lunch of the Gay and Lesbian Humanist Association (GALHA) in Central London on Saturday. Mr Strudwick shocked his attentive audience with a chilling account of the way in which therapists had tried to undermine his sexual identity by their insistence that homosexuality was an illness which they could cure and "pray for". In the course of his "under cover" investigation it had become clear that vulnerable LGBT people were being undermined by therapy which had in fact no credible theoretical base. 

Referring to the recent attacks made on Strudwick and other LGBT campaigners by the leader of the Christian Peoples Alliance, who had referred to them as "members of the Gaystapo". Strudwick commented that members of religious organisations were stirring up hatred against gay people and often justifying this with religious and therapeutic rhetoric. He also described his long struggle to get the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy and British Medical Council to condemn “conversion therapy”. Mr Strudwick was presented with an award by GALHA for his campaigning on these issues.

A spokesperson for GALHA said that some of its members had experienced aversion therapy and other repressive techniques in the 1950s and 1960s, and that the organisation was committed to exposing "conversion therapies" to the wider public, and to ensuring that bodies such as the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy and the General Medical Council were made fully aware that these "dreadful homophobic practices are unacceptable to our community".

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For over 30 years GALHA has promoted Humanism as a free-thinking, rational, ethical worldview. It campaigns for equality and diversity, particularly relating to sexual orientation and identity - both in the UK and internationally. It is an independent voluntary organisation funded by supporter donations.

GALHA Campaign co-ordinator: 0792 1188329

http://www.galha.org/

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