Over
the last 200 years or so, there has been ongoing debate about the relative role
of psychology and biology in a range of human behaviours. Autism and homosexuality are two good
examples that research has placed firmly on the side of biology. For many years professionals tried talking
therapies to help people with autism and homosexuality overcome their
‘afflictions’. In both cases all they served
to do was increase the distress of the patient, and their families, by making
them feel responsible for their behaviour.
With
respect to homosexuality, the psychiatric profession for many years held it to
be an illness. This is no longer the
case. Although the causes of
homosexuality are still debated in nuance, there is increasing consensus that
it is biology that determines a person’s sexuality, not psychology, upbringing
or indeed, personal choice.
Interestingly there are different biological reasons for male
homosexuality and female homosexuality, rather than a unified reason that
accounts for both.
Furthermore,
a survey of all published research about therapies that have tried to change a
person’s sexuality has shown that it has always failed to do so, and often
causes harm. This has recently led to
the American Psychological Society issuing a declaration that therapy to change
a person’s sexuality does not work, with the implication that it is unethical
to try to do so. Pressure is being put
on the British Psychological Society and the Royal College of Psychiatry to issue
a similar statement.
Given
this backdrop it is alarming that a recent study in MBC Psychiatry found that as many as 1 in 6 therapists have
attempted to change at least one person’s sexual orientation in their professional career. On the face of it this seems to go against
the evidence. I wonder, though, if
something more subtle is going on – namely a difficulty knowing how to deal
with gay clients who are unhappy about their sexuality.
In the
life history of most gay men there is likely to be a period when they couldn’t
accept their sexuality, and therefore really didn’t want to be gay. The pressures of family and society to
conform to a heterosexual norm seem insurmountable for many men. It is clear that many gay clients have a lot
of soul searching to do before they form an acceptance of their sexuality. Indeed, it could be argued that many gay men,
though superficially accepting and adopting a gay lifestyle, still suffer from
a hangover of ‘internalised homophobia’ that continues to impact on their
emotional wellbeing and ability to form meaningful relationships.
Given
the very real unhappiness that finding oneself gay can bring to a person, it
seems understandable, if ill advised, to try and help the person to lead a
straight lifestyle. I suspect this,
rather than a real belief in its possibility, that has led so many of my
colleagues to try and change a persons sexuality.
It is
within this backdrop, however, that the real danger to gay men’s well-being
lies – namely in those religious organisations that still offer ‘treatments’
for homosexuality. Against the grain of science but in the name of God, such
organisations can only serve to enhance gay men’s unhappiness with their
sexuality, and not in fact offer any real solution to it. At best all they can hope to achieve is an
asexual life where sex and relationships are sacrificed for a supposed ‘greater’
ideal of ‘what God wants’. I can’t see
this being beneficial to the individual, or, indeed, society.
Homosexuality
will continue to be a contentious issue, not least because it raises tensions
between individual behaviour and social and religious mores. All I can do as a
therapist is help everybody, gay or straight alike, to be more accepting of
homosexuality. It is in accepting others
how they really are, that we are best able to learn to accept ourselves as we really
are. Psychological health, after all,
starts by seeing the world as it really is, rather than how we think it should
be.
Dr Phil Tyson is a Men's Psychotherapist based in Manchester in the UK. He offers counselling in Manchester, psychotherapy in Manchester, cognitive behavioural therapy in Manchester and telephone counselling nationally and internationally.
