Gay aversion therapy! What rot! Teenagers thinking they might be gay when they are probably not! What rot! Politicians sticking their noses in! What rot! A fundamentalist medicine man writing an article about it! What rot! About 10% of the population is probably homosexual. All the other prats are just trendies who will grow up one day. The more talk about it; the more attention the prats are given, the longer it will take to rid ourselves of this 'gay', attention-seeking crap.

You can't Pray the Gay away. Given the authors obsession with this topic I think it might be healthy for the author to explore his sexuality a bit more perhaps he is suppressing feelings, because of his believe in a god that isn't there?

As soon as I read the title of this article, I thought yep this is written by an old religious bloke who wants to save the gays from a life in hell. I looked up one of the specialists noted by the author - Savin-Williams, and Wikipedia stated :
"Savin-Williams earned his Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from the University of Missouri in 1971. He later earned an MA in Religious Studies in 1973...". Exactly.

Mind you, I do agree with the fact that some teenagers are confused about their sexual feelings about either gender at times, because they have such strong friendships with both genders during these difficult years.

However, I think we all know of some kids we went to school with that everyone knew would have to be gay, whether they liked it or not. They had two choices. Either they formed attachments with their own gender and just lived as they were born to, or they tried to suppress these feelings and forced themselves to have relationships with the opposite gender in order to please their family, friends, church and the wider society...but live a lie, and lie about their attraction to their spouses. How awful.

They could of course have 'counseling' to try to 'cure' them of their sexual disease, as has been tried and failed for hundreds of years. These whack-job doctors gave them electric shock therapy to their brains and genitals, and various other forms of mental and physical torture.
The government is right to deny funding for this form of exorcism.
It doesn't work in the long term, and is a huge waste of money.

As it was reported, the real objection of the American Psychological Association was not that the gay conversion therapy was harmful, but that there was no evidence of effectiveness. In other words, it is fraudulent to claim that you can change people's sexual orientation, even if they are willing to give you money to do so. There might also be issues of abuse if minors are subjected to gay conversion therapy against their will.

Gay conversion therapy is about as effective as homeopathy. There will always be a few quacks and gullible idiots who believe in such nonsense, but no responsible GP should be promoting treatments that are not efficacious. Physicians who place their political and religious beliefs above medical science should be tarred and feathered.

'About 10% of the population is probably homosexual. '

Does that include Saudi Arabia and Iran ttbn or just where the choice of this lifestyle is promoted and even encouraged by perverted minds.

Divergence, your post reminds me of the old joke:

Q: How many psychiatrists does it take to change a light bulb?

A: Just the one, but the light bulb has to want to change!

It should be obvious to everyone that you can't change people's sexual orientation against their will. And indeed it would be abusive to try to. But that shouldn't preclude helping people to become more attracted to people of the opposite sex if that's what they want.

Well Victoria is known for its draconian laws, well and beyond even the rest of Australia.
This is what matters, rather than the benign and private question whether people ought to be heterosexual or homosexual.

It is disturbing that people are legally prevented from seeking and providing each other with guidance and assistance in whatever area they like. What they consensually do between them on the couch is nobody else's business.

The point of therapy is to help people understand what they really want and why, and banning therapy for those that are confused is political opportunism of the worst kind.

Similarly, while I support efforts to enhance tolerance, I consider those encouraging tweens to "come out" as wantonly reckless. The reality is that young teens are desperate to conform, and that about 95% of their peers are going to be straight. Even for those that are absolutely sure of their sexuality coming out is traumatic, and for those who are not so sure, it could be even worse.

If it is true that your sexuality is determined at birth then why is it that so many homosexual teenagers have to go through such torment trying to ‘discover’ their sexuality?

How do we know it is ‘determined’ at birth? Where is the evidence for this and if there is some then why not look for that evidence before puberty and tell a young person what their sexuality is? This would eliminate all the angst and doubt, reduce the suicides that are attributed to this struggle and generally make the whole thing much easier to manage.

Why do we know that sexuality is determined at birth? Why did we need to go looking for such evidence? We do not need to look for evidence that heterosexuality is determined at birth. What evidence should we use to determine homosexuality? Should we use the empirical evidence or should we use the fact that some people find those of the same-sex attractive? If the latter is sufficient then why talk of the former or vice-versa?

Why is it that we only hear about the struggle of homosexual young people as if heterosexual people just sail through their teen years without any problems? If it is about acceptance in society then that is not a sexual issue. Teens struggle for acceptance in lots of areas – it is all part of growing up. There is no good reason why homosexual kids should have any more problems than fat kids or shy kids or pimply kids. If homosexuality is no more unnatural than those other things that growing people have to deal with then why is so much fuss made about having to ‘deal’ with homosexuality?

I think the author is grasping at straws and or false positives?

As for science unable to alter one's natural attraction/desire?

I'm not sure that's so, but may be possible using tiny electrodes to burn out the inappropriately firing control centres for the gender, and given the tiny current needed to achieve the task, nothing at all like shock or aversion therapy, which is rather like using a sledge hammer to drive a tack?

Studies have shown that the brain is plastic!

If you selectively burn out a tiny part of the basal ganglia. Other parts (spares) will take over and assume the duties of former control centres?

And there seems to be cases, where this has occurred due to accidental damage?

Alpha male to gay hairdresser?

Some folks can get just a little pedantic, and are reminiscent of the huge body of professional medical opinion that simply pooh poohed the idea that ulcers were caused by bacteria.

And only due to quite pathetic ignorance and a refusal to look at a growing body of evidence?

I think that specialist neurosurgeons, especially those trained in Scotland, where this procedure is just not new; may at some future date be able to offer a minor surgical procedure in a day clinic, for folk who are struggling with the religious certainty of others, whose opinion they value?

And should be completely volutary, except for convicted pedoephiles, who simply have no control whatsoever over their particular aberration?

If a single minor procedure can progressively adjust their desires to that of normal for their gender and consequently save little children from perverted and uncontrollable desires, why ever not? Given it's just not the future victims that are rescued?

And no, it's nothing like a lobotomy, or thoroughly disgraced shock therapy, given in either case the cerebral cortex is the target. That isn't the area controlling your basic NATURAL desires!

As for psychiatrists? Anyone who thinks they need a psychiatrist, ought to have their head examined!
Rhrosty.

For interest sake, the journal "New Science" states :
"No studies have found specific "gay genes" that reliably make someone gay. But some genes may make being gay likelier. For instance, a 2014 study in the journal Psychological Medicine showed that a gene on the X chromosome (one of the sex chromosomes) called Xq28 and a gene on chromosome 8 seem to be found in higher prevalence in men who are gay. That study, involving more than 400 pairs of gay brothers, followed the 1993 report by geneticist Dean Hamer suggesting the existence of a "gay gene." Other research has found that being gay or lesbian tends to run in families. It's also more likely for two identical twins, who share all of their genes, to both be gay than it is for two fraternal twins, who share just half of their genes, to both be homosexual. Those studies also suggest that genes seemed to have a greater influence on the sexual orientation of male versus female identical twins."

I seems that scientists believe there is a 'gay gene' but just haven't fully identified it yet.
I believe it is only a matter of time.

Careful Susie if the ' scientist ' find a ' gay ' gene then they might find a gene that makes men attracted to boys. Now that would not fit your idiotic narrative would it?

Well if we do not know then we as a society should behave like we do not know until such time as we do know for sure. This is why we have science. It seems that many people want to act like it is already confirmed.

Why go looking for such a gene, though? If people are sexually attracted to each other then is that not enough? Heterosexuals just have sex because they feel like it. They don’t need to prove anything to themselves or anyone else. It is perfectly natural for them to have sex based on how they feel. If the gene can’t be found will homosexuals stop having sex? If it is not going to change their behaviour either way then why bother with all that research?

Suse, I follow a few geneticists on Twitter, Razib Khan among them, he reckons in another five years they'll be well on the way to explaining the genetic components of behaviour, intelligence, temperament etc.

Runner, when have I ever said I don't think paedophilia could possibly be because of a gene in those people?

Another lie then?

It certainly wouldn't suit your warped narrative if there was a homosexuality gene though would it? If that were the case, then any of your Gods who made heterosexuals would also have created homosexuals too aye? Lol!

Jay of Melbourne, I absolutely agree with you.
I think gene technology is fascinating and it will answer a lot of questions about medical problems too, and hopefully lead to some cures.

The reason why they may be more likely to question their sexuality in the first place because of all the constant queer agenda that is being pushed down everyone's throats.
If it wasn't for that. the kids wouldn't be questioning their sexual identity in the first place.

It'd be good if we can identify the shirt-lifter gene because then we can start to breed it out of the gene-pool. It clearly serves no real benefit.

But somehow I suspect it more a social phenomena than a genetic one.

'Runner, when have I ever said I don't think paedophilia could possibly be because of a gene in those people? '

as usual Susie totally incapable of thinking rationally. Maybe their is a gene bestiality gene. Try thinking for one minute before sprouting your nonsense.

runner writes: "as usual Susie totally incapable of thinking rationally. Maybe their is a gene bestiality gene. Try thinking for one minute before sprouting your nonsense."

Firstly, "Maybe THERE is a gene...".

On several occasions lately runner you have given me pause to wonder whether you are to be taken seriously. Your irate fundamentalist demeanour has the whiff of a melodramatic attention-seeking thespian reading a script.

Let me be the first to observe that the only nonsense I have read in your exchanges with Suze is your pretension to some expertise in rational thinking. I'm beginning to find more humour than substance in said pretension.

A gene for a tendancy toward bestiality? Toward hebephilia? Do you presume to know with certainty the answer to such a question? What grotesque mindset brings you to trust in 2000-year-old "science" in preference to the mainstream science of today? How do you rationalise that demonstration of intellectual spasticity?

But rather than face the issue that you may be forced to accommodate the gene theory in your dogma you resort to the shameful device of trying to direct the topic into hyperbole, thus assuming the role of the dunce in this group. For this you did provoke me to a modest chuckle at your naivete.

I'm waiting for the day that genes for philately and lawn bowls attract your blistering rational attention