UK conversion therapy ban sparks global row

Should gay conversion therapy be classed as torture? Pride Month begins today, kicking off celebrations in cities across the world. But LGBT people still face persecution everywhere. In the early hours of Saturday 28 June 1969, police raided the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in ManhattanAn island formed by three rivers which is the centre of New York City.. Its patrons fought back, throwing cans and bricks, the violence finally spilling over into six days of rioting. Many now consider the Stonewall Riots to be the starting point of the modern LGBTQ+ rights movement. Every June since, LGBTQ+ people have staged a march in New York. Today, there are annual Pride parades in hundreds of cities around the world. In 1969, same-sex relations were still criminalised in every US state except Illinois, as well as in much of Europe. In the UK, the law against them had been lifted only two years before. Today, same-sex marriage is legal in 29 countries. But in many of these countries and around the world, LGBTQ+ people still face discrimination from the law and society at large. In 2013, Russia banned so-called "gay propaganda" - a law that has been used to intimidate LGBTQ+ groups into silence. In the same year, Uganda started to impose life sentences for same-sex relations. Some US states have passed laws to control which bathrooms transgender people can use - and what sporting events they can participate in. Now, the UK is tackling what many see as a new frontier in LGBTQ+ rights: conversion therapy. This term refers to a variety of different pseudoscientific "treatments" that practitioners claim can alter people's sexuality or gender. In the past, psychiatrists would often torture LGBTQ+ people in an attempt to "cure" them of their sexuality, using electric shocks or drugs to create feelings of aversion towards people of their own sex or to make them conform to the gender they were assigned at birth. These brutal techniques are still used in some parts of the world, but in the West, gay conversion now mostly takes other forms. Therapists try to identify the 'trauma' that makes people gay, non-binary or transgender. They encourage LGBTQ+ people to seek more role models of their own sex and to inhabit traditional gender roles. In some cases, LGBTQ+ people have been forced into heterosexual relationships in an effort to "cure" them. Most governments recognise that LGBTQ+ conversion therapy is both cruel and unfounded in any science, and have laws discouraging it. Some regions in the USA, Canada, Australia and Spain have legal bans, while there are indirect bans in Argentina, Uruguay, Samoa, Fiji and Nauru. But the UK would be joining only four countries that have so far completely banned the practice: Brazil, Ecuador, Germany and Malta. Some have criticised Prime Minister Boris Johnson for suggesting that religious leaders could be exempt from the law. This would allow groups to continue teaching LGBTQ+ people that homosexuality is wrong, and to pray to change their sexuality. Critics argue that this is just as repressive as other forms of conversion therapy. Should gay conversion therapy be classed as torture? Along for the Pride Yes, say some. The International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims classifies conversion therapy as a form of torture, on grounds that it causes enormous psychological damage to those on whom it is practised. Even if savage methods like electric shocks are not used, conversion therapy is linked with depression and suicidal thoughts. It amounts to a kind of psychological torture. No, say others. Conversion therapy is extremely cruel, but banning it and calling it a kind of torture raises complicated legal questions. For example, some religious leaders have argued that it would prevent them from teaching young people that they should avoid sexual relationships before marriage, and as such would be a threat to their religious freedom. KeywordsManhattan - An island formed by three rivers which is the centre of New York City.