美国国家公共电台 NPR Activists And Suicide Prevention Groups Seek Bans On Conversion Therapy For Minors

 

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

There are now 16 American states that have banned conversion¹ therapy. Its practitioners² aim to change a person's sexual orientation³ or gender⁴ identity. For the people who are supposed to be changed, conversion therapy is linked to higher rates of depression and suicide, which helps to explain why more than a dozen states are considering legislation to outlaw⁵ it on top of the states that already have done so. One of those states is Georgia, and NPR's Leila Fadel went there.

LEILA FADEL, BYLINE⁶: Peter Nunn lives just outside Atlanta.

PETER NUNN: Hi, I'm Peter.

FADEL: Hi, Peter.

NUNN: Nice to meet you. This is Amelie. She's just...

FADEL: Hi.

NUNN: ...Excited.

FADEL: He and his husband Monte have a dog named Amelie and a cat, Hollow. Peter's dining room is adorned⁷ with smiling pictures of his family.

NUNN: I love photos.

FADEL: Is this your mom?

NUNN: That's my mom and Monte dancing at our wedding.

FADEL: But it took a lot of work and time to get to this happy place.

NUNN: When I was 15, my parents found a men's workout magazine that I had and drew their own conclusions. They didn't talk to me about it. My dad told me we were going to go on a trip. He didn't tell me where we were going.

FADEL: On the way there, his father turned to him.

NUNN: He said he was going to take me to a therapy center to deal with whatever weird⁸ sexual stuff I had going on and that if it didn't work, he was going to send me to military school to make a man out of me.

FADEL: Every day for two weeks, licensed⁹ mental health professionals told him that what he was feeling was sinful, and he was broken.

NUNN: The whole thing was focused on, you know, my eternal soul was at danger here. So at this point, I would do anything they asked me to do or believe anything they asked me to believe so that I could be fixed¹⁰.

FADEL: Did you believe that?

NUNN: A hundred percent.

FADEL: Did you want to be fixed?

NUNN: I wanted to be fixed 100%.

FADEL: Back home, he told his parents it worked. But it didn't, and he felt like a failure. When he was 16, he tried to take his own life while at a friend's house.

NUNN: I took a bunch of pills in the woods behind their house with a note in my pocket.

FADEL: The note said, God, forgive me. Peter Nunn's suicide attempt after conversion therapy is all too common. Already LGBT youth are more likely to attempt suicide than their peers. That nearly triples among those who've been through some type of counselling to change their sexual orientation. That's why Georgia state representative Matthew Wilson is trying to pass legislation to ban it. As in more than a dozen other states, if passed, the law would stop licensed mental health professionals from trying to change the sexual orientation or gender identity of minors¹².

MATTHEW WILSON: I specifically asked just for a hearing this year - no vote - so that we could use this year as an educational moment to really raise awareness¹³ about the need for this.

FADEL: He says it's about saving vulnerable children.

WILSON: There's been an outcry - not just from the victims and the LGBTQ community but from the medical professionals who say this is not medicine. And not only is it not medicine, but the harm is very real and lasts a lifetime.

FADEL: Many medical associations say the practice does not work and is harmful. National organizations like the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention and the advocacy group The Trevor Project are trying to get this legislation passed in all 50 states. But Liberty Counsel, a conservative Christian¹⁴ group that opposes LGBTQ rights, wants to stop the bans. Mat Staver heads Liberty Counsel.

MAT STAVER: The counselors¹⁶ that we work with - they try to respect the wishes of the client. And the client is that minor¹¹. It's not the parents. It's the client.

FADEL: Staver says it's about an individual patient's autonomy, even if they're minors, and that a ban on conversion therapy violates the free speech of counselors.

STAVER: There's no other area of counseling where the government has barged into the private counseling room, and this should be no exception.

FADEL: Recently, the Supreme¹⁷ Court declined to take a case that would have challenged the conversion therapy ban in New Jersey¹⁸. And advocates of the ban say if a practice is deemed harmful or abusive to children in other cases, the state does intervene. The depth of that harm is something Greg and Lynn McDonald say they didn't understand when they found out their son, Greg Jr., was gay. They describe themselves as conservative Christians¹⁹ and were worried that their son was committing a sin.

LYNN MCDONALD: We thought that Greg somehow missed something along the way and that if he had someone to walk with and talk with in regards to it, he'd see and desire, you know, to be heterosexual.

FADEL: So they met with a counselor¹⁵ about conversion therapy, which is legal. But Greg Sr. said if there'd been a ban...

GREG MCDONALD: It would have made me really pause to know that it's illegal to do that to a minor.

FADEL: It took years, but Greg and Lynn say they realized they couldn't change their son. The Bible, they say, teaches them to love.

L MCDONALD: Before anybody even thinks about sending their son or daughter to one of these places, they have to be so educated in understanding what this can do to...

G MCDONALD: Yeah.

L MCDONALD: ...Your child for the rest of their lives - what kind of pain that could bring.

FADEL: Today they say they're ashamed that they ever considered conversion therapy. And they want to be a resource for other conservative Christians who feel alone as parents of LGBTQ kids.

Leila Fadel, NPR News, Atlanta.

1 conversion   

n.转化，转换，转变

参考例句：

• He underwent quite a conversion.他彻底变了。
• Waste conversion is a part of the production process.废物处理是生产过程的一个组成部分。

2 practitioners   

n.习艺者，实习者( practitioner的名词复数 )；从业者（尤指医师）

参考例句：

• one of the greatest practitioners of science fiction 最了不起的科幻小说家之一
• The technique is experimental, but the list of its practitioners is growing. 这种技术是试验性的，但是采用它的人正在增加。 来自辞典例句

3 orientation   

n.方向，目标；熟悉，适应，情况介绍

参考例句：

• Children need some orientation when they go to school.小孩子上学时需要适应。
• The traveller found his orientation with the aid of a good map.旅行者借助一幅好地图得知自己的方向。

4 gender   

n.（生理上的）性，（名词、代词等的）性

参考例句：

• French differs from English in having gender for all nouns.法语不同于英语，所有的名词都有性。
• Women are sometimes denied opportunities solely because of their gender.妇女有时仅仅因为性别而无法获得种种机会。

5 outlaw   

n.歹徒，亡命之徒；vt.宣布…为不合法

参考例句：

• The outlaw hid out in the hills for several months.逃犯在山里隐藏了几个月。
• The outlaw has been caught.歹徒已被抓住了。

6 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

7 adorned   

[计]被修饰的

参考例句：

• The walls were adorned with paintings. 墙上装饰了绘画。
• And his coat was adorned with a flamboyant bunch of flowers. 他的外套上面装饰着一束艳丽刺目的鲜花。

8 weird   

adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的

参考例句：

• From his weird behaviour,he seems a bit of an oddity.从他不寻常的行为看来，他好像有点怪。
• His weird clothes really gas me.他的怪衣裳简直笑死人。

9 licensed   

adj.得到许可的v.许可，颁发执照(license的过去式和过去分词)

参考例句：

• The new drug has not yet been licensed in the US. 这种新药尚未在美国获得许可。
• Is that gun licensed? 那支枪有持枪执照吗？

10 fixed   

adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的

参考例句：

• Have you two fixed on a date for the wedding yet?你们俩选定婚期了吗？
• Once the aim is fixed,we should not change it arbitrarily.目标一旦确定，我们就不应该随意改变。

11 minor   

adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修

参考例句：

• The young actor was given a minor part in the new play.年轻的男演员在这出新戏里被分派担任一个小角色。
• I gave him a minor share of my wealth.我把小部分财产给了他。

12 minors   

n.未成年人( minor的名词复数 )；副修科目；小公司；[逻辑学]小前提v.[主美国英语]副修，选修，兼修( minor的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• The law forbids shops to sell alcohol to minors. 法律禁止商店向未成年者出售含酒精的饮料。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He had three minors this semester. 这学期他有三门副修科目。 来自《简明英汉词典》

13 awareness   

n.意识，觉悟，懂事，明智

参考例句：

• There is a general awareness that smoking is harmful.人们普遍认识到吸烟有害健康。
• Environmental awareness has increased over the years.这些年来人们的环境意识增强了。

14 Christian   

adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒

参考例句：

• They always addressed each other by their Christian name.他们总是以教名互相称呼。
• His mother is a sincere Christian.他母亲是个虔诚的基督教徒。

15 counselor   

n.顾问，法律顾问

参考例句：

• The counselor gave us some disinterested advice.顾问给了我们一些无私的忠告。
• Chinese commercial counselor's office in foreign countries.中国驻国外商务参赞处。

16 counselors   

n.顾问( counselor的名词复数 )；律师；（使馆等的）参赞；（协助学生解决问题的）指导老师

参考例句：

• Counselors began an inquiry into industrial needs. 顾问们开始调查工业方面的需要。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• We have experienced counselors available day and night. ) 这里有经验的法律顾问全天候值班。） 来自超越目标英语 第4册

17 supreme   

adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的

参考例句：

• It was the supreme moment in his life.那是他一生中最重要的时刻。
• He handed up the indictment to the supreme court.他把起诉书送交最高法院。

18 jersey   

n.运动衫

参考例句：

• He wears a cotton jersey when he plays football.他穿运动衫踢足球。
• They were dressed alike in blue jersey and knickers.他们穿着一致，都是蓝色的运动衫和灯笼短裤。

19 Christians   

n.基督教徒( Christian的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Christians of all denominations attended the conference. 基督教所有教派的人都出席了这次会议。
• His novel about Jesus caused a furore among Christians. 他关于耶稣的小说激起了基督教徒的公愤。