Latest / The Lila Rose Show / E229: Can Therapy Change Who You’re Attracted To? w/Dr Nicolosi Jr | Lila Rose Show

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E229: Can Therapy Change Who You’re Attracted To? w/Dr Nicolosi Jr | Lila Rose Show · The Lila Rose Show

0:00
The notion that the brain can spontaneously rewire itself
0:03
without any ideology at all is a major, major threat to people
0:07
who look to their sexual feelings as the foundation of
0:10
their entire identity. Why is academia not embracing
0:14
this study I. Didn't even plan to say this
0:15
publicly. And this is going to bring up a
0:17
big emotional reaction to me that I'm going to try to be very
0:19
professional about Lila. This is why people come to see
0:21
me. It's not societal homophobia,
0:23
It's not dogma. It's people who come to me and
0:25
they said I found the same thing that these authors found and I
0:27
want out. I don't want this anymore
0:30
transactional it feels. Hi everyone, welcome back to the
0:33
Lila Ro Show. Today I'm sitting down with
0:35
Doctor Joseph Nicolosi Junior. Doctor Joseph Nicolosi Junior is
0:39
a licensed clinical psychologist, a researcher, and
0:42
the author of several peer reviewed articles studying same
0:45
sex attraction and sexuality. In this conversation, we will
0:47
discuss myths about conversion therapy.
0:50
We will discuss therapeutic methods to deal with same sex
0:53
attraction that is unwanted. We'll deal with.
0:55
The topic of human sexuality at large and bust a lot of myths
0:58
about it and so much more. My goal here at the Lila Rose
1:01
show is that we canmore deeply understand ourselves and each
1:04
other so we can live in harmony with one another and God and so
1:07
that we can be free and flourished.
1:09
Quick note, did you know that 76% of the people that.
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Watch. Videos on the Lila Rose Show
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YouTube channel. Are not yet.
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Subscribed to the show, you might not even know that you're
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not subscribed right now and you're watching.
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So do me a big favor, hit that subscribe button, ring that
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notification bell and make sure you are subscribed so you don't
1:26
miss future episodes. Doctor Joseph Nicolosi, welcome
1:28
to the podcast. Thrilled that you're here.
1:31
I would have loved the opportunity to speak with your
1:33
late father, who's just an incredible person, but really
1:36
glad that I have the opportunity to sit down with you.
1:39
Your work's really groundbreaking and I think that
1:41
you're doing a real service to many people, so thanks for for
1:44
making the time. Thank you.
1:46
People who aren't familiar with you yet, give us a little bit
1:49
about your background. I'm a clinical psychologist and
1:52
I work with individuals with unwanted sexual attractions.
1:55
That's, that's one of the things I do and I run the Reintegrative
1:57
Therapy Association A501-C3 nonprofit and we we release
2:03
research studies and this is what we're doing.
2:05
We're taking part in an upcoming Supreme Court case next year
2:09
about government interventions and whether or not the
2:13
government can limit people's right to pick their own therapy
2:16
goals, if that if that sometimes means moving toward monogamous
2:20
heterosexuality. So that will be in, in in court
2:24
next year and I that's what I do.
2:27
I look forward to getting into this.
2:28
This is going to be really fascinating.
2:30
I know people listening are going to be very interested in
2:32
that court case and in your work adjacent to that.
2:35
But your dad is a very famous psychologist, Dr. you're doctor
2:39
Joseph Nicolosi Junior. That's right.
2:41
So you are, you know, it keeps it simple.
2:43
It keeps it simple that both Joseph Nicolosi's.
2:46
I'd love to hear about why you got involved in the therapeutic
2:51
approach that you use and just therapy in general.
2:53
What inspired you become a psychologist?
2:55
I'm sure elements of this is going to include your dad's
2:58
story, so would love to hear any perspective you have on that
3:00
too. So I, I am a little biased, but
3:03
I consider my father, I consider him a, a pioneer and a brave
3:08
psychologist. He was a he was a warrior for
3:10
truth and he worked as a psychologist for 40 years and he
3:15
treated more men with unwanted sexual attractions, unwanted
3:19
same sex attractions than anyone, I think in the history
3:21
of the world. And he never got training in
3:25
this in Graduate School, never. They never really talked about
3:29
this. But many men would come to him
3:32
with unwanted same sex attractions.
3:33
And he really started with, with two observations.
3:37
He built basically his life, life's work, starting with the
3:40
two observations when a man would come to him and the first
3:46
time ever meeting him. Open the door.
3:47
Hi, Doctor Nicholas. You would you like me to sit
3:50
here? Is this OK?
3:50
Can I OK? What should I call you?
3:53
Like there's like an anxiousness.
3:55
He realized immediately that those were men with the men who
3:59
had that kind of guarded posture were more likely to be men who
4:02
had later on disclosed to him that they had unwanted same sex
4:05
attractions versus the guy who opens the door and thoughtlessly
4:08
plops down on the couch and and starts complaining about his
4:11
life. And like that was usually a guy
4:12
without same sex attraction. So my father began listening to
4:15
the stories of these men and hearing that the same defensive
4:18
detachment posture they had toward him, they were exhibiting
4:21
toward other men in their life. So these men just had a a
4:25
guarded ilities posture toward men.
4:28
That was observation #1 observation #2 was that these
4:31
men were all describing basically the same childhood.
4:34
They were describing the same childhood experiences.
4:36
He was hearing it again and again and again.
4:38
And so he started with these two observations and he started
4:40
looking in the psychological literature and he discovered an
4:43
entire body of literature that was being completely covered
4:47
over. The psychological establishment
4:48
was not talking about this, but there's this, this, this wealth
4:51
of information in the psychoanalytic literature,
4:55
delving into this. So by looking at the literature
4:57
and, and, and talking with these men, he developed a theory, a
5:00
basic theory. And the theory is that as kids
5:05
grow up, they go through different, they go through
5:07
different developmental stages, right?
5:08
So a six year old and a three-year old are going through
5:11
different things and, and you know, we're talking about boys
5:14
in this instance. So as, as kids grow up, they got
5:17
these stages, but 2 1/2 years of age, This is what we
5:20
psychologists call the gender identity phase of development.
5:23
This is the first time a little boy is trying to figure out what
5:28
it means to be a boy or a girl and, and he's making his gender
5:32
a part of his identity. He's looking around and, and at
5:35
this age, and this could be seen in cultures around the world.
5:37
You can go to a tribe in Zimbabwe or a daycare up the
5:40
street from here. Boys around 2 1/2 give a few
5:44
months, give or take. They are interested in that.
5:47
They often idealize other men. They imitate their fathers.
5:51
They they want to reach out to other guys and be just like
5:53
them. This is a gender identity phase
5:55
and it is thought, according to the site this theory that the
6:00
boy at this age will try to reach out to the father.
6:03
But if his attempts are not reciprocated, if the boy
6:07
experiences a hurt and maybe that the boy experiences the dad
6:11
is detached, critical or distant.
6:13
Or he experienced and he experiences his mother as over
6:16
involved, highly anxious or intrusive.
6:18
And if the boy is temperamentally sensitive, these
6:20
factors say they make it difficult as the boy's reaching
6:22
out to the father, they'll try. But if the if the attempts
6:25
aren't reciprocated, the boy experiences a hurt, he retreats
6:29
back to the mother for emotional comfort and doesn't make that
6:32
gender identity shift. He he doesn't.
6:35
It makes the factors together make it harder for him to
6:38
connect to a sense of male identity within himself.
6:42
In addition, if there's a bullying older brother, this too
6:45
can can add to the boy's difficulty.
6:47
So you put these factors together and, and for these guys
6:53
as they grow up, girls are girls are safe, girls are familiar
6:57
girl he. These boys feel more comfortable
7:00
with girls and they're as close as friends and his other male
7:04
counterparts as male peers, meanwhile, are roughhousing and
7:07
playing sports. And those boys are getting their
7:10
emotional needs met primarily from their male relationships,
7:14
namely male attention, male affection, and male approval,
7:17
while this boy misses out. And as years go on, you know
7:22
this, this boy is often feeling timid, lonely, having trouble
7:27
with sports, having difficulty in this male relationships.
7:30
I'm generalizing here, but this is a general pattern.
7:33
Of course, every case is unique and there are variations in
7:36
every case. But boys at this age, they're
7:39
they're getting their their their emotional needs met
7:41
primarily from girls. And eventually early adolescence
7:47
begins. And where does this boy's, where
7:50
is this boy's sexual attractions going to gravitate to?
7:52
Not toward females who he sees as safe and familiar, but toward
7:56
males who this boy sees as mysterious and intriguing and
8:01
exciting. And they represent unfamiliar
8:05
territory, exotic. The male is kind of like, it's
8:08
like dangerous and scary. But I want to connect.
8:11
And for these boys, it's it's not a moment of decision whether
8:17
to be gay, but it's more of a process of a process of
8:21
discovery. What usually starts as a sense
8:24
of excitement toward good looking guys gradually become
8:28
sexualized. And so we're talking around
8:31
roughly 14, give or take a few years.
8:33
And around this age boys in this time period they are hearing and
8:38
I say time period because previous generations were not
8:40
all like this time period. A boy in this situation is going
8:43
to be very different experience than than than earlier in human
8:46
history. Now, a boy in in this situation
8:49
is told that if you have attractions toward men, that
8:52
must mean you are gay. And the gay label often brings
8:56
relief because it's like, oh, like there's a, there's a, a
9:00
name for these feelings I've been having and an explanation
9:03
for why I've been feeling different for so long.
9:06
But the gay label also reinforces the boy's notion that
9:09
he really is different from other guys around him.
9:11
He's a different type of guy than most other guys.
9:14
So it reinforces that sense of separateness.
9:17
And many of these men will, and they're now, you know, they're
9:21
becoming young men. They will, they will try to make
9:24
themselves attracted to girls. They will try to pray that these
9:27
feelings will change or they'll just shut the thoughts out of
9:29
their mind all together and just hope that they just kind of go
9:32
away. But these feelings don't
9:34
disappear. And so many of these men come to
9:39
therapists and, and many of the therapists these days are
9:42
saying, look, you have no choice.
9:43
You have no choice. This is who you are and you have
9:45
to embrace this. You have to create an identity
9:47
around these feelings. And if you do anything other
9:50
than that, then that's a recipe for suppressing who you really
9:52
are. And it's going to be a life of
9:54
misery. And many of these individuals
9:57
come to me for therapy. They feel, they feel
9:59
misunderstood by these other therapists.
10:02
And when we talk, when we explore these attractions, what
10:06
these men will often say is that they are attracted to the very
10:10
features and other men that they would like to have for
10:12
themselves in this, This is a normal occurrence in my work.
10:16
A guy comes in, he's not even familiar with, with, with this
10:19
kind of work that I do, but I'll say, tell me about your ideal
10:22
sexually attractive guy. You know, just be blunt with me.
10:25
And, and I'll, I'll usually get a piece of paper.
10:27
I'll draw a line right down the center of the page, will create
10:29
2 columns and give me details. Is he, is he hairy or not hairy?
10:33
How tall is he? Is he, what's his ethnicity?
10:37
OK, what's his persona, his energy and how does he dress?
10:41
And we'll get a good complete description and then I'll say,
10:43
OK, great. Tell me about the kind of man
10:46
you would like to be, your completely ideal self.
10:49
And these men will describe men who are virtually identical, if
10:53
not identical. And it's, you know, it's like,
10:55
well, what do we do with this? You know, I mean, one
10:58
explanation is that you were genetically Born This Way, and
11:01
it's predetermined or there might be something else going
11:04
on. And what many of these men
11:06
discover is that the kind of guy they're attracted to represents
11:10
who they would like to be. As one man said to me, the kind
11:15
of guy I'm attracted to represents the shocking reminder
11:18
to me of all that I believe I am not OK.
11:21
Or one man, another man said to me, the kind of man I'm
11:24
attracted to represents the kind of guy my father wished he'd had
11:29
as a son. OK, so there's a lot here.
11:32
The the psychoanalyst called this eroticized envy.
11:35
They didn't call it gay. It's eroticized envy.
11:37
You have envy. And then erotization came on top
11:40
of it. That was what they talked about.
11:43
So what we do is we this is a reintegrative therapy, is a
11:46
trauma therapy. We treat traumatic memories as a
11:49
by product. The sexual attractions often
11:51
shift as their own, on their own.
11:53
And this is what the scientific literature is now beginning to
11:56
show. So many places to take this
11:59
conversation and so much to talk about here.
12:02
It's very, very, I think, interesting perspective that you
12:06
rarely hear in any kind of mainstream conversations about
12:11
the gay identity or LGBTQ identities.
12:15
So very excited to dive in. And there's also a lot of
12:17
controversy and criticism, which we're going to get to.
12:19
I'm looking forward to that as well.
12:21
But you know, you just kind of described what your father
12:25
noticed, you know, his his, the approach that he began and how
12:28
to understand this, an approach that you've adopted.
12:31
Certainly elements of you've also developed some of your own
12:32
approach. I'm curious why you chose to
12:36
pick up this profession. Clearly your dad is an
12:39
inspiration to you, and he was. He's done really, I think,
12:43
groundbreaking work. Is it more a sense of calling
12:46
for you? You just like, hey, I'm, I'm, I
12:48
have an aptitude for this. What kind of drew you to the
12:50
profession? I feel an empathy for these
12:54
individuals because many of my clients are people whose goal is
12:58
to live a life consistent with their deeply held values,
13:03
including as it pertains to their sexuality.
13:06
And I believe no one should deny these people their right to live
13:10
in accordance with their deeply held values.
13:12
And these individuals are not being supported.
13:14
They're not being told they have options.
13:16
And there's a entire story here that they're, they're not.
13:20
I feel like they're, they're, they're, they're falling through
13:22
the cracks and they're not being told information that would be
13:25
helpful to them. And so I feel an empathy for
13:28
these men. It really isn't.
13:30
It really isn't so much I want to change my sexuality, it's I
13:34
want to live in accordance with my values.
13:36
I and therapy can be a part of that.
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14:45
Do you believe that sexuality? So there's, you know, there's
14:48
the kind of famous born, this gay born, Born This Way gay
14:53
identity or these different identities.
14:55
Then there's obviously the, the viewpoint of like, well,
14:57
sexuality can be fluid, gender can be fluid, but ultimately
15:00
there are predispositions that we have.
15:02
It's not really nurture, it's really how we are.
15:05
And so for someone to come in and say, well, you can shape
15:09
shift a bit or adjust or you can develop a different attraction
15:13
even, or, you know, shift your attractions, I think is highly
15:17
controversial. What's your perspective on that?
15:20
So it's, it's highly controversial because we're
15:23
tapping into world view and some of your Catholic listeners and
15:28
evangelical listeners would, would know the term ontological.
15:31
This is an ontological argument. What is the human person?
15:34
And, and in world views, there's, there's a, there's a
15:36
clash right now in modern society.
15:39
Some would believe that the boy is genetically predetermined to
15:43
be homosexual. That's his core nature.
15:44
And, and you know, you can try to make a couple modifications
15:47
here, but you're not going to change the core.
15:48
That's ontologically who the person is.
15:51
You know, we as a clinician, I'm looking at the scientific
15:54
literature on this, and I want to clarify a couple things.
15:58
At the outset. When we're talking about changes
16:01
in sexuality, we're not talking about flipping a light switch
16:05
one category to another category, gay to straight.
16:08
Think in terms of rotating a light dimmer, turning a light
16:11
dimmer, meaning gradual shifts of varying degrees.
16:14
And it's important that we don't oversimplify or overstate these
16:17
results. Everyone responds differently.
16:19
No one can guarantee an outcome, but but many people have have
16:25
very. I mean, this is true of all
16:26
psychotherapy. I mean, there's no psychotherapy
16:28
that consistently leads to 180° change.
16:31
OK, That's that's true for all therapies.
16:33
For any issue or any unwanted desire or any challenge.
16:37
Exactly. Marital therapy.
16:39
Anger management. OCD depressive episode.
16:42
Whatever. Yeah, exactly right.
16:44
So let me give you 2 case illustrations of clients of mine
16:49
who said I'm not looking for 180° change, I just want some
16:52
some mild shifts and I'm satisfied.
16:54
One man who came to me had both same sex and opposite sex
16:58
attractions. He was married and his goal was
17:01
that he wanted to be more consistently attracted to his
17:04
wife and the wife knew about the attractions and she said,
17:08
honestly, I don't really care that much if you have, if you
17:10
find other men attractive. What I am interested in is are
17:13
you consistently attracted to me?
17:15
That's what I need. That's fundamental if we're
17:17
going to stay in this marriage. And so the therapy helped him
17:20
with that to be more consistently attracted to his
17:22
wife. Another man said, I'm not
17:24
looking to to get married or to have kids.
17:27
I am currently engaging in self-destructive behaviors,
17:30
sexual behaviors that are dangerous and I want to not do
17:33
that. And for him, a few degrees of
17:35
shifts was satisfying for him because he's now living in
17:38
accordance with his conscience. And so it's it's different for
17:41
each person. The bottom line is it's always
17:43
on a case by case basis. So I have to ask about the DSM,
17:48
the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.
17:51
And in 1973, ironically that was the year of Roe V Wade too,
17:55
which thank God is over a year. What a year, right?
17:57
But in, and I know you know this, in 1973, homosexuality was
18:01
removed from the DSM. Prior to that, it was listed as
18:04
a mental disorder in DSM one. DSM 2 called in the past
18:08
sociopathic personality disturbance, sexual orientation
18:11
disturbance. Anyways, this was considered
18:14
highly offensive and harmful by many people, not all, but some
18:20
people, I should say at the time.
18:21
And so the APA, again, not by vote.
18:23
It wasn't like they took a vote of all the psychiatrists or
18:26
psychiatrists or psychologists. They kind of did this top down
18:29
and it was like a small team of decision makers, but they
18:31
decided we're going to remove it from the DSM.
18:33
And so I think this is a core controversy point of, OK, well,
18:38
this is not some sort of like OCD, depression.
18:42
These are clinical issues, illnesses, narcissism of
18:46
personality disorder, very hard to treat, if you can treat at
18:48
all. But certainly you can treat
18:49
mental illnesses or conditions. But that's homosexuality is not
18:54
that according to the DSM. So you're, you're not doing real
18:57
therapy. I mean, again, this is the
19:00
contrarian point of view here that I want to represent and get
19:02
your thoughts on. As one man said, homosexuality
19:06
is not a problem for the American Psychological
19:08
Association, but it is for me, and that's what's most
19:11
important. We don't need the establishment
19:14
class telling us what what is in accordance with our values and
19:18
what is not. Everybody should be free to find
19:20
therapy and and support to help them live the lives that they
19:24
want, especially in accordance with their own conscience.
19:27
And no one should be interfering with an individual, especially
19:30
not an adult's individual. An individual's access to talk
19:34
therapy, to discuss ideas, that's what people should should
19:38
be able to do. And by the way, multiple studies
19:40
show that when people live in accordance with their own
19:43
values, their sense of psychological well-being
19:46
increases. Multiple studies have shown
19:47
this. So again, kind of playing
19:50
devil's advocates, you could say there is the the position that,
19:55
well, not all values are equal, so you can have a bad value and.
20:00
And you don't want people to be at war with themselves.
20:02
And if they themselves, if you know, homosexuality is innate,
20:06
it's not a mental illness that needs to be cured in any way,
20:09
then even if they have a deeply held value that they don't want
20:13
to be homosexual, let's say still using therapeutic
20:16
approaches to remove or to shift, I should say that strong
20:20
attraction is unethical. Again, this would be the
20:24
argument of people that would criticize and, and to the point
20:27
even where, as you know, in the state of California, they want
20:30
to make it illegal, illegal for you to even have a different
20:34
perspective of, oh, you know, if you have unwanted home sex, same
20:37
sex attraction. Let's talk through about why
20:38
that might be and how we can how we might be able to shift that.
20:41
That's. Right.
20:42
And I would say that that argument is in and of itself a
20:46
form of imposing one's values on the individual.
20:49
The the client should be in the driver's seat, not the
20:52
psychological establishment. Clients should be able to pick
20:54
their own therapy goals and they should be able to have access to
20:57
talk therapy. This is this is their right to
21:00
pursue if they choose, and no one should have the right to
21:03
take that freedom away from them.
21:05
Do you think that that decision in 1973 by the APA was the right
21:09
or the wrong decision? I can say it was the political
21:11
one. It was a political decision
21:13
there. They didn't even there were no
21:14
new research studies that had come out on this.
21:16
They just said no, there was no new, they didn't cite some new
21:19
revelation in 1973 to make this decision.
21:22
And this was a top down decision.
21:24
And either way, it's it's not working for my clients.
21:28
OK, so this book is called The Male Couple.
21:31
It was an It's a classic. There's a classic book endorsed
21:34
by the former president of the American Psychiatric
21:37
Association. It was written by two gay
21:39
researchers named Mcwhorter and Madison.
21:42
The authors themselves were a gay couple.
21:44
They were in a gay relationship together, one a psychiatrist,
21:48
the other psychologist, And they undertook a study to disprove
21:53
stereotypes about gay relationships, one of those
21:56
stereotypes being that gay relationships do not last.
22:00
Lila. They studied 156 male couples.
22:03
Of those 156 couples, how many how many would you guess were
22:07
found to be monogamous after five years?
22:11
How many of these gay couples, they said, were found to be
22:13
monogamous? Five years and we're tracking
22:17
156 gay couples. I would say probably a very
22:21
small number. Take a guess, I'll.
22:23
I'll do 20. 20 close zero OK, it was 0.
22:28
They couldn't find a single. They couldn't find a single.
22:31
Copy a couple. Listen if there's ever so.
22:34
You're saying monogamy is not a hallmark?
22:35
It is. It is actually non existent,
22:37
largely in same sex male relationships.
22:41
This is yes, and well, I would say this.
22:44
Let's let's be specific about this.
22:46
The higher quality studies, this one and other ones that came
22:49
after like another one called the gay couple study which had
22:52
556 couples. The higher quality studies are
22:56
showing that monogamy is certainly not a hallmark and and
22:59
I just want to read to you an excerpt because this will really
23:01
cut to the core of why people come see me.
23:03
I'm sorry, To be clear, this is a book.
23:05
Yeah. From people promoting gay
23:07
relationships. They're saying gay relationships
23:09
are good, they're healthy, they're normal.
23:11
Let's normalize them. Let's mainstream them.
23:12
And this is from their own. Yes, type their own.
23:16
There couldn't be a if any study were to be biased in the
23:20
opposite direction, it'd be this one.
23:21
I mean, they're both gay. They're both in a gay
23:23
relationship. And they admitted they want to,
23:24
they want to overcome stereotypes.
23:27
So yes. And even they said the
23:28
expectation of outside sexual activity was the rule for male
23:33
couples and the exception for heterosexuals.
23:36
Heterosexual couples live with at least with live with some
23:39
expectation that their relationships were to last until
23:41
death do us part, whereas gay couples wondered if their
23:45
relationships could survive after all of this.
23:48
They say this that the authors conclude with this they say.
23:52
As a result of this study, we believe that the single most
23:56
important factor that keeps gay couples together past the tenure
24:00
mark is the lack of possessiveness they feel.
24:03
Many couples learn very early in their relationship that
24:07
ownership of each other sexually can become the greatest internal
24:11
threat to their staying together.
24:13
OK, that's this whole study. That's their conclusion.
24:15
That's they, they say the biggest and they learned Lila,
24:18
This is why people come to see me.
24:20
This is why it's not societal homophobia.
24:23
It's not dogma. It's people who come to me.
24:25
And they said, I found the same thing that these authors found.
24:27
And I want out. I don't want this anymore.
24:29
It feels transactional. It feels unstable.
24:33
I want to try traditional monogamy.
24:35
Those people should have the right to have access to therapy
24:38
as long as the therapist isn't, isn't promising a goal?
24:41
Of course, but the therapist should be able to say, yes,
24:44
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25:51
So what you're saying is that homosexuality is inherently a
25:55
male homosexuality is inherently non monogamous.
25:59
I mean, it's it's it's nearly impossible, it sounds like
26:01
according to these authors and other researchers.
26:04
And so there are people that come to you that say I want
26:06
monogamy, I want till death do us part and therefore I want a
26:09
woman. Is that really the logical
26:11
conclusion there? Along with maybe some other
26:13
values that they possess, but they want this lifelong love
26:16
that's in with one other person. That's right, I want one other
26:19
person and this stuff is is not working for me.
26:21
I want to try something different.
26:23
I want to try something different and maybe it works for
26:26
other people. OK, it works for other people,
26:28
but it's not working for me. I should have the right to
26:30
choose my own path. The American Psychological
26:33
Association and the politician should not be choosing my path
26:36
for me. I should be able to have open
26:38
and free conversations and be able to explore a path that
26:41
works for me. Well, and especially when the
26:43
path that has been chosen by the American Psychological
26:46
Association isn't based on some preponderance of evidence or
26:50
research, as you said, like the 1973 decision to remove
26:52
homosexuality from the DSM. And so you can't like
26:55
therapeutic therapeuticize in any way homosexuality on, you
26:58
know, same sex attraction. That's not based on it's not
27:02
based on a whole body of research that is conclusive.
27:05
It's more based on you, in your view politics.
27:08
Yes, it was very it was a political decision.
27:11
And I'm curious to get into a little bit of the maybe a
27:15
psychoanalysis if you feel comfortable going here.
27:17
I'm curious back to what something you said earlier
27:20
about, you know, working with clients who identified the ideal
27:24
erotic partner, so to speak, you know, same sex attracted male
27:27
clients and they basically describe this man.
27:29
Then you ask them, well, what do you want to be?
27:31
And they describe something very similar.
27:32
And I am curious if you have any other thoughts on this in terms
27:36
of back to the monogamy question with same sex male couples, it
27:40
sounds like they're, you know, and, and the act of, you know,
27:43
masturbation itself, right? It's very self, they, they call
27:48
it self abuse, you know, historically, but it's really
27:50
about your own self. You're not, it's not
27:53
procreative, it's not life giving.
27:54
It's really about you having a sexual arousal and response,
27:58
right? And so with same sex male
28:01
activity, it doesn't procreate obviously and it has a lot to do
28:06
with their own sexual arousal, right?
28:09
Not that they're the other persons involved doesn't have
28:11
sexual arousal too, but they're really trying to achieve sexual
28:14
arousal. I guess where I'm going here is
28:16
how much of it is to where the act of sex for these clients who
28:22
come to you, they don't want it to just be about my sexual
28:24
arousal. They want it to be about a life
28:27
project, a partner that can maybe lead to future children.
28:31
Is there something ontological here?
28:33
I guess I'm trying to get to it this question.
28:35
Is there something ontological here, like beneath the surface
28:37
on a very core foundational level about the nature of sexual
28:41
acts that are different for same sex attracted people that are
28:45
living the gay lifestyle versus those that are saying I don't
28:48
want that anymore, I'm seeking a different path.
28:51
Yeah, I think that's. That makes sense.
28:53
It does make sense. The question I think speaks more
28:55
to general philosophy and anthropology more than
28:59
specifically to psychology. That's I think it's a more
29:01
general anthropological insight that you're bringing.
29:04
But yes. And I have to ask another
29:06
question. Based on what we're seeing, the
29:08
phenomenon of transgenderism today, and there's
29:11
autogenophilia, I believe it's called, is there any kind of
29:14
connection here, would you say? Yeah, because in to varying
29:17
degrees, the person is being attracted to who they would
29:21
like, ideally like to be. So yes, yes, I, I have I, I, I
29:26
mean, if we're going to go, we're going to start to go down
29:28
the rabbit hole here, Lila, so. We're all about rabbit holes on
29:32
the show. Let's go explore everything so.
29:34
Good. I have two clients in my
29:36
practice right now whose ideal, most powerful sexual fantasy is
29:40
to literally just be another guy.
29:42
Just be. What would you do if you were
29:44
him? I would just walk around, they
29:45
say. And I go.
29:46
You would just walk around. Yeah, and these are men want to
29:48
be another guy? Yeah.
29:49
Yeah, I have two men in my practice right now.
29:51
The most powerful sexual fantasy is not to have sex with another
29:54
person. It's to look at an ideal guy
29:57
with the ideal body and and a guy who is that ideal
30:00
characteristic of being able to be comfortable in his own self
30:04
and confident and masculine and, and they just want to be that
30:07
guy. And for them, that is the most.
30:09
There's actually a name for this erotic target identity inversion
30:13
in the research, but that's what it is.
30:15
And there there is certainly some overlap with
30:17
autogynophilia. And is the overlap potential
30:20
with autogenophilia is that the people that you know struggle
30:23
with gender identity and they want to be this opposite gender
30:26
identity. It's like they are sexually
30:28
attracted to the idea of themselves as the opposite sex
30:31
because that opposite sex ideal person is unattainable for them.
30:36
Well, OK, we're going to really go psychoanalytic here.
30:38
So you're, you're, you're asking about the potential cause for a,
30:42
a, a subtype of transgender, which is autogynophilia.
30:46
OK, so it's not exactly my area of focus, but I can tell you
30:48
this. The early psychoanalyst believe
30:50
that the creation that one potential creator of transgender
30:55
identity was an intermittently available primary attachment
30:59
figure, meaning the mom and the mom in we're talking zero to 1,
31:03
zero to two. The mother is the kids life.
31:07
I mean, if you're an infant in a crib, you're just staring up at
31:10
the ceiling. Suddenly your mother's there and
31:12
is, is taking caring for you and you feel fused to your mother.
31:15
And then you're back in the crib for the for the mother who's
31:18
chaotic, she picks up the baby, drops the bit picks up the baby
31:21
connects to the bed and it's like for the kid, it's like,
31:23
whoa, like this is like chaotic and the kid is looking for
31:26
safety and security and what the boy will or or the child will
31:30
do. In this case, because we're
31:30
talking about gonophilia, let's make it a male infant.
31:34
The infant would grab an item of clothing of mommies.
31:36
I'll grab her blouse, I'll grab her pearls, I'll grab and these
31:40
things become, it's almost like a teddy bear for the infant.
31:44
There I have mommy close to me and they'll grip something of
31:47
mommy to psychologically handle the intermittent experience
31:52
they're having with the mother. And in some cases the child will
31:55
put on mommy's clothes. I feel calm now.
31:58
I feel relaxed. I feel and many of these adult
32:01
men with auto gyneophilia, which I'm not saying is all forms of
32:04
transgenderism, but there there is certainly evidence that
32:07
that's a subtype. When they put on women's
32:09
clothing, their feeling is aw, I don't know why, but I need an
32:13
external article of clothing to finally feel comfortable in my
32:16
own skin. So this is not new stuff.
32:19
The psychoanalyst said look at zero to 1.
32:22
And it's getting to the point now where it's like we can't
32:24
even talk about this stuff as possibilities.
32:27
Yeah, you're not allowed to. Yeah, you're a hater.
32:29
Yeah, look, I'm not and I'm not even saying that's that's the
32:31
case all the time, but the analysts said this and they had
32:34
many case examples to substantiate this.
32:36
What is wild to me is that we have whole like departments at
32:39
universities to explore queer theory.
32:41
We had Naomi Best on the show recently and she just like was
32:44
experiencing a therapy student at Santa Clara University.
32:47
Master. Oh yeah, she was in the Wall
32:49
Street Journal recently. Oh yes, that's right.
32:51
I remember. And and her story's crazy, what
32:53
she they made her do like insane stuff, you know, as part of
32:56
their therapy training. And so I just think about the
32:59
Wild West that has become our therapy departments, even at
33:02
some like Christian schools, supposedly.
33:04
And but you saying what you just said is so controversial, but
33:09
like making therapy students like, you know, dwell on, you
33:13
know, I don't know, lesbian porn and whatever, like crazy thing.
33:18
Like that's not controversial. So it is just crazy how
33:21
everything has been been so flipped on its head.
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34:22
Now, as I know, you know, it gets very controversial to talk
34:25
about the causes of same sex attraction because as we were
34:29
kind of touching on earlier, there is a whole, you know,
34:32
world of folks who say it is innate.
34:35
You can't change same sex attraction.
34:37
It is what it is. We are Born This Way, right?
34:39
And recently, you know, we did an interview with Becca Cook,
34:42
who I know, you know, and he, you know, phenomenal guy,
34:45
amazing story. And, you know, we got some
34:47
interesting feedback from the episode, largely positive.
34:49
People were really inspired, encouraged by his story.
34:52
But and his story is about, of course, living the gay lifestyle
34:55
for many years and then having this conversion and him saying
34:58
I'm not going to live the gay lifestyle anymore.
35:00
He still may experience same sex attraction.
35:02
That's, you know, his story to tell, but he's not acting out on
35:05
them, right, because it's against his values anyways.
35:08
And he says against nature is what he says as well.
35:11
So there were some really interesting comments back.
35:14
I want to share one comment we got because I want to hear your
35:17
take on this. And this is from someone who is,
35:21
you know, I think identifies as Christian.
35:23
They want to, you know, Christianity is important part
35:26
of their life. And they said, and this is in
35:30
response to Beckett saying that if you want to shore up this
35:35
identity, the masculine identity of a of a young boy, it is very
35:40
important for him to have a powerful and not a powerful, but
35:43
a strong relationship with his father.
35:45
And like you were describing earlier, at a young age, for him
35:48
to feel this connection and this nurture at that key points of 2
35:52
1/2 like you're describing. Beckett, of course, shared how
35:55
he didn't have that as a kid. And you know, that kind of
35:57
helped to at least exacerbate maybe his same sex attraction
36:01
anyway. So this was a response from from
36:03
from a comment we got. This is harmful information and
36:07
contrary to church teaching, starting with the Catholic
36:09
Church. The Catechism states that the
36:11
causes of same sex attraction are quote, largely unexplained.
36:15
To claim that upbringing contributes to homosexuality has
36:18
been repeatedly disproven by studies.
36:20
This is not in line with Catholic social teaching and
36:23
this video should be taken down for promoting falsehoods.
36:27
Now I have to know, what does the Catechism actually say on
36:29
this? I think that's important.
36:30
This is from the 1992 Catholic Catechism of the Catholic
36:33
Catholic Church. The Catholic Church acknowledges
36:35
that the quote UN quote, psychological genesis of same
36:38
sex attraction remains quote UN quote, largely unexplained.
36:41
The Catechism, and this is from Catechism of the Catholic
36:44
Church, 2357. Now it has a lot more to say
36:47
about it, but it's saying as of 1992, the psychological genesis
36:50
of same sex attraction remains largely unexplained, right?
36:55
Do you agree, disagree. What are your thoughts?
36:57
I disagree with everything that person said that commenter
37:00
except for the first sentence. I actually agree the the
37:02
commenter said this is harmful information.
37:04
I agree it is harmful. It's it's harmful to people who
37:08
have a radical gender ideology. Stories like Beckett's personal
37:13
testimonies are extremely threatening to radical gender
37:17
ideology and they absolutely can't.
37:20
They they they are, they constitute a threat.
37:23
So that is the only thing I can agree with in the whole comment.
37:26
As to the scientific literature, yes, let's talk about the
37:28
scientific literature on this. You were talking about
37:32
transgender earlier. If you want to look at the
37:34
transgender individuals who are transgender in their early
37:37
relationship with their parents. I mean, there's a whole body of
37:39
literature on this. I mean, one study found that
37:43
like men who were transgender, 52% of them had a mother with
37:49
full blown borderline personality disorder.
37:51
That's in a published study. It's a lot.
37:53
It's a lot that's exponentially beyond what we would see in a
37:56
random sampling from A. Random sampling.
37:58
Probably like 2 to 3%, OK, we're talking 5056.
38:02
It makes me want to cry honestly, because I've seen
38:04
those kids that are being trans and often the mother, like
38:08
there's just something off. Not every time, but often 52% of
38:12
the time according to the study. And it's just that.
38:15
I mean, that's child abuse. In my view, 100% is child abuse.
38:18
Yes, there there is so much evidence here having one study,
38:24
it was like I think it was a meta analysis that found that
38:25
45% of the the people who were transgender males who wanted to
38:29
be women or thought that they actually were women, 45% of them
38:32
had a disorganized attachment style.
38:34
Okay, to create a disorganized attachment style, you it's,
38:37
we're talking severe, severe early experiences.
38:40
So that's not my area of focus. But for individuals who are
38:43
interested, they can look into the, the psychological
38:45
literature. It's going to be covered over
38:48
the psychological establishment. You know, maybe doesn't want
38:50
people to look into this, but the data is there, especially if
38:53
you look up attachment style, attachment style and
38:56
disorganized attachment style and transgender.
38:59
But to go to the, the, the person who was talking about
39:02
this about same sex attractions, let's talk about the, the
39:04
scientific evidence at play here.
39:06
So the the scientific literature is pretty clear that gay
39:10
identified men commonly report strained distant relationships
39:15
with their fathers. OK, it's pretty clear.
39:17
The only question is why. And right now there are two
39:19
competing theories. 1 theory is has been posited by the LGBT
39:25
theorists and the theory that their explanation for the
39:28
distance between the gay identified son and and the
39:31
father, that emotional distance they would say is because the
39:36
the boy is is on we've used ontological the boy is
39:39
ontologically gay. In other words, he's
39:40
biologically predetermined to be gay and the father is
39:44
consciously or unconsciously picking up on that.
39:48
And so because of society's homophobia, the father will
39:51
withdraw either due to conscious or unconscious homophobic
39:55
values. He he pulls himself away.
39:57
OK, so that's one explanation. The other explanation is that
40:00
there's a causative relationship here that the distant critical.
40:03
Actions of the father caused the son with the more sensitive
40:07
temperament to turn away. So a A researcher named Doctor
40:11
Sherry Golden devoted her doctoral dissertation to
40:14
exploring which of these two arguments has a stronger
40:18
scientific basis. So she measured 70 fathers of
40:22
gay identified men, 70 fathers of gay identified men with three
40:26
well established psychological assessments.
40:29
These fathers were shown to exhibit indirect non nurturing
40:34
or low engagement types of father involvement activities
40:38
with their with their gay sons, gay identified sons and as
40:42
opposed to direct high nurturance or high engagement.
40:46
Doctor Golden also examined the relation those fathers.
40:49
She examined their relationships with their own fathers, and
40:53
those fathers reported receiving similar fathering from their
40:57
fathers. OK, so generational.
41:00
That's, that's it. So Golden's work indicates that
41:03
there may be an intergenerational transmission
41:06
of attachment patterns through the male line that may set the
41:10
stage for male homosexuality. It's not so much genetics, but
41:14
if people want to view this from Golden's perspective and from
41:17
the, the, the perspectives of the psychoanalysts and others,
41:21
we're talking about an attachment lens, viewing the
41:23
whole topic from an attachment lens.
41:25
And this intergenerational transmission may set the stage
41:29
for the, for the, the boy who has the more sensitive
41:31
temperament. You know, you get a sequence
41:34
like that and then you get a boy with a sensitive temperament.
41:36
Well, that boy may be more likely to perceive the father's
41:39
reactions as rejection. He interprets it that way.
41:42
He turns away, disidentifies from the father, and then it
41:45
sets him on a course in which he has these unmet needs for male
41:48
attention, affection, approval, which eventually becomes
41:50
sexualized. So in conclusion, Golden's work
41:53
found that there's a constellation of factors, but
41:55
that early relationship with the father appears to play a
41:58
causative role. Now, there are two objections,
42:01
which I'm sure you're going to get in the comments.
42:03
So let me address that the objections right away.
42:06
One objection is, well, why didn't the fathers identify as
42:09
gay? I mean, they were fathered the
42:10
same way, so why not? That's a good question and this
42:14
is speculation, but there there are several reasons why the the
42:17
father had a different life experience.
42:19
One is the father himself may have had a different
42:22
temperament. 2 is his relationship with his the
42:25
father's relationship with his mother may have been different.
42:28
There could have been different peer relationships or the father
42:32
does have same sex attractions but he's suppressing it.
42:35
And the last time I spoke to an audience, one guy with same sex
42:37
attraction raised his hand. He said there's another option,
42:40
the dad's suppressing it and and because he said that was his
42:42
case. So that can also play a role.
42:45
Again, it's speculation and we'd have to do further research into
42:47
this. Some people will say, well wait
42:49
a second, but I had a distant detached father and an over
42:53
involved mother. You should have seen my mother.
42:54
She was terrible. You know, you wouldn't believe
42:57
it. And how come I'm not gay, you
42:59
know? And so.
43:00
But when I talk to these people, and that's a legitimate
43:02
objection, when I talk to these people, I say, well, tell me
43:05
about your child to tell me about.
43:06
And as we begin speaking, it turns out, yeah, actually, I had
43:10
a surrogate male figure. I have another male.
43:13
Usually it is a grandfather, an uncle or a mentor.
43:17
But most often it's a grandfather in the family who
43:19
sees the family dynamic, sees the limitations of the father
43:23
and decides it's time for me to step in.
43:25
And he can you can counterbalance some of the
43:27
parenting from the father. So this is what people say to
43:30
me. Frequently, what does that look
43:32
like then for the grandfather stepping into this kind of
43:35
family system where the father has more maybe withdrawn and not
43:37
connecting with this very young boy?
43:39
Is the, is the grandfather like roughhousing with that little
43:42
boy? You're like taking him to go
43:45
hunting or you know, I mean, he's three years old.
43:46
What would he take him to the park?
43:47
I don't know. What is he doing?
43:49
What's Activities? So if so many, many times, what
43:53
happens in these situations is if the father is strong, long
43:56
but not warm. OK, So he's kind of like, you
43:59
know, a drill Sergeant. Authoritarian.
44:01
Authoritarian then the grandfather comes in and gives
44:03
the warmth if the father's warm, but not if the father's warm but
44:07
not strong, then the grandfather comes in and gives the kid, you
44:10
know, more structure in his life.
44:12
So it's that kind of it's usually along those those two
44:15
variables to counterbalance. So I think one element that I'd
44:20
like to explore more is this idea of like a temperament that
44:23
what you're seeing across the board, it sounds like, and what
44:25
this researcher saw across the board was a temperamental, A
44:31
temperament that these boys had that regardless of the father
44:35
figure, they had it. So that that is nature, not
44:38
nurture because we all are born with certain temperaments.
44:41
You see it very young. I mean, I have 3 kids and like
44:43
you can see it within six months, even the fiery
44:45
temperament versus the like passive temperament.
44:48
And there's not nature, it's not nurture, although nurture can
44:51
kind of develop something more. But it definitely there's nature
44:54
there or nurture can develop it, but there's definitely nature
44:56
there. So I'm curious, is it your view
44:58
then, and what does the data say with regard to same sex
45:01
attracted men about the temperament piece?
45:06
Are all of them, is it like 99% of them, largely speaking, have
45:10
this consolation of temperaments that are pretty set from a young
45:14
age? Or do you have, you know,
45:15
because there's like the there's sort of the, you know, the in
45:18
kind of conversation, there's like, oh, there's the the gay
45:20
man who's like comes across as straight.
45:22
He looks like a man's man. He likes to be macho, whatever,
45:26
right. And then there's the
45:27
stereotypical gay man who's like, no, he's more artistic
45:29
and, you know, inter, like, you know, very emotional
45:32
interrelation, you know, relational.
45:34
Maybe we use the word effeminate even.
45:37
How does that fit with this idea that temperaments are pretty?
45:41
There's a pretty set grouping of temperaments that these boys
45:43
would have that would not predetermine same sex activity,
45:46
but might indicate later. Yeah, indicate later same sex
45:50
attraction. And that's important to see
45:51
because, yeah, it's not necessarily predetermined, but
45:53
it could pre none. Of it's predeterminative because
45:56
people have make their own choices in the end, That's
45:57
right. That's right.
45:59
So we don't know exactly there was a study by Ghana at all that
46:02
looked at the genome study. And actually when when you had
46:05
Michael Gasparo on your show, he was speaking about this, there
46:08
was a very, very small percentage.
46:09
They couldn't find a gay gene after all this work, but they
46:13
found a constellation of genetic factors that that had some very
46:17
weak similarities among them with same sex attractions.
46:19
And so that constellation of factors might be genetics that
46:23
is responsible for the more sensitive temperament that we're
46:25
talking about. But it's not a robust study yet.
46:29
It's not enough robust data for us to look at being able to
46:32
divide it in terms of percentage.
46:33
Which percentage is it? What percentage is temperament A
46:37
causative factor? We don't know that exactly yet.
46:39
Because I'm going back to this, you know, two different cases
46:44
for why same sex attracted men will have these more distant
46:49
fathers. Stereotypically, like you said,
46:50
the research is about, you know, there's a preponderance of
46:52
evidence that shows this. There's a ton of research that
46:54
shows this. And you're saying, well, the
46:55
LGBT theory approach would say, well, that's because the
46:58
father's kind of knew instinctively, this is like a
47:01
same sex, this is like a gay son even very, very young.
47:04
And so they kind of built this distance.
47:05
And then, you know, the other researcher said, well, no, these
47:07
fathers just all were like that, regardless of whether the son,
47:10
you know, it seemed different. But what if the, you know, what
47:14
I'm curious about is if the if the son in all of these cases
47:17
largely has this temperament, wouldn't the LGBT theorist say,
47:23
well, that temperament is the gay element?
47:26
You know that that is. Yeah.
47:28
And so yes, you're right about these fathers all being similar,
47:32
but the reality is they're all similar because the kid had this
47:36
temper, you're calling it temperament, but that
47:37
temperament thing is actually their gay identity.
47:40
You're. Right.
47:40
And then there are two problems with that.
47:42
One is why do we have heterosexual men with that same
47:44
temperament? And two is the relationship with
47:46
the father. We saw it was traced from their
47:48
fathers. So there's a causative component
47:50
here that might be that might be interacting.
47:53
So there. I hope that was an answer to
47:56
that. I think it, I think it makes
47:57
sense. Thank you for exploring it
47:59
because I think these are the and then I've got to also ask.
48:01
I know your expertise is in same sex attracted men.
48:04
I'm sure people listening like what about same sex attracted
48:07
women? What about lesbianism?
48:08
Do you have any thoughts on that before we go down into the court
48:11
case stuff and your other research?
48:14
I it's not really my area of focus.
48:16
However, the people I really respect in this field often say
48:19
to me, you got to read this book called The Heart of Female Same
48:22
sex Attractions by Janelle Hallman The Heart of Female Same
48:26
Sex Attractions by Janelle Hallman.
48:28
So I'm not an expert on it, but many of the people I respect say
48:31
it was a the best book they've ever read on this topic.
48:34
What's the working theory there if you feel comfortable
48:37
presenting it? Basically, early relationship
48:39
with the mother, early relationship with the mother.
48:41
And Janelle Hallman looks at different causative models, not
48:47
just one. She thinks that multiple models
48:49
could explain and it would if she would look at it on a case
48:52
by case basis. And if anybody is interested or
48:54
has questions or objections to the the scientific claims I'm
48:57
making, go to reintegrativetherapy.com.
48:59
Click on science. We have a drop down menu and all
49:02
the citations are there except for the transgender stuff that
49:04
we spoke of only kind of indirectly.
49:06
Fair enough, Fair enough. I've been wanting to ask this as
49:10
well. And now maybe is the moment this
49:12
term unwanted, this idea of unwanted, you use that term
49:15
several times and you know, people's deeply held beliefs or
49:18
values. And I think there is, you know,
49:22
certainly using the sort of language or worldview of, let's
49:26
say you could say the left or even the LGBTQ, you know,
49:31
community or ideology ideologues would be you have to go with
49:35
what's your truth, your feelings, your beliefs, Like
49:39
don't let other people tell you who you are.
49:41
You decide, et cetera, right? And so you're kind of saying, if
49:44
that's true, then if somebody has a feeling or belief that
49:48
they don't want to be this, then shouldn't you be able to explore
49:50
that at minimum? Makes sense to me, right?
49:53
But then there's sort of the other perspective or world do,
49:55
which is that there is truth, big T truth.
49:57
And you may have a million feelings or your own beliefs and
49:59
they could be true. They could be true or false.
50:01
Your beliefs could be true or false, and your feelings might
50:04
not represent reality or the deepest reality of who you are.
50:07
So even if somebody has wanted same sex sexual attraction, I'm
50:13
thinking about Beckett before his conversion.
50:15
And he was like, I was just living it.
50:17
Like I first felt really deep shame, he said.
50:19
And then I like washed over that shame.
50:21
I was a Trevor Project advocate. I was like, this is, you know,
50:24
I, this is who I am. Those, you know, those bigots
50:26
out there, you know, I'm just going to have fun.
50:28
This is my life. And he definitely didn't have
50:31
unwanted same sex attraction during that time.
50:34
It was very much wanted. He was happy with it.
50:37
What do you say to that person? Is that person harming
50:40
themselves? Is that person, should they look
50:42
a little deeper under the, under the, you know, trunk, so to
50:45
speak, you know, in terms of what's actually going on with
50:47
themselves? Or should we just let them let
50:49
them be into what they want? I am a clinical psychologist,
50:52
not a moral arbiter, so I'd say the client.
50:54
What do you want to work on? The the foundation of therapy is
50:57
the therapeutic goals, which should be articulated by the
51:00
client and agreed upon by the client and therapist.
51:02
Now, maybe the client has therapeutic goals that I don't
51:05
agree with. And in my practice, I cannot
51:08
really think of any time that's ever happened but theoretically.
51:10
Why would they come to you? Why?
51:11
Would they come to me? Right, Exactly right.
51:13
If you have a Jewish therapist and the guy says I want to be a
51:16
more committed neo Nazi, does the Jewish therapist have to by
51:19
law treat that person with those goals?
51:21
No, it's goals that are that are articulated by the client and
51:24
agreed upon by the client and the therapist.
51:26
That's the therapeutic basis, the therapeutic alliance.
51:29
So I would say in that case, for somebody like Beckett at that
51:32
time in his life, I'd say fine, what do you want to work on?
51:35
Let's see if we can have an agreement here to work on
51:37
something. You're anxious, you're
51:38
depressed, fine, we can work on that.
51:40
The notion that the brain can spontaneously rewire itself
51:44
without any ideology at all is a is a major, major threat to
51:48
people who look to their sexual feelings as the foundation of
51:52
their entire identity. That last point you just made
51:56
that it that there are people that look to their sexual
51:59
feelings as a foundation of their entire sexual identity.
52:01
I think that's sort of the core thing we're dealing with is like
52:05
people say, well, my, I am my feelings, my feelings determine
52:08
who I am. That's right.
52:09
And and then it's interesting because often you don't even get
52:12
curious about, well, why do I feel this way?
52:15
How am I feeling this way? It's more just if I feel this
52:17
way, I go this way. It's a very modern idea in in
52:20
many ways, I think about the kind of very.
52:23
Postmodern. Very postmodern.
52:24
You're right, it's postmodern. That's exactly right.
52:27
I think about this idea even of homosexuality as an identity is
52:32
a modern idea. Yes, yes.
52:36
We're creating an identity around how we feel.
52:39
And, and like the person who mentioned earlier, you brought
52:42
up that comment, the first thing he said was that that it was it
52:45
was harmful. It's threatening.
52:46
Yeah, it's, yeah, it is. It is threatening.
52:49
It is. It's harmful to a worldview.
52:51
It is harmful to a worldview. This says you're this way and
52:55
you'll always be this way and you can never change.
52:56
And it's the foundation of who you are.
52:58
Yeah, it is a it is a definite threat.
53:00
And I can see why they want to suppress this information.
53:02
The establishment, the, the cycle, American psychological
53:06
establishment, the American psychiatric establishment,
53:09
they'll make these, these sweeping statements that are not
53:12
really grounded in empiricism. They cherry pick them and they
53:15
they pick the studies that relate to their own world view.
53:17
So the Golden study came out after this that.
53:20
You mentioned earlier that. Afterwards the the randomized,
53:23
placebo-controlled trial and other studies that have come
53:26
out, here's another one. The American Psychological
53:29
Association has concluded that childhood sexual abuse has
53:36
associative and potentially causal associations with same
53:42
sex partnering later in life. Wow.
53:44
Potentially causal over and over when I do these podcasts and I
53:48
say, yeah, there's psych, there's evidence that sexual
53:50
abuse can lead to same sex attractions.
53:52
There's no evidence that's homophobia.
53:54
The APA has admitted it. The APA is ignorant of their own
53:59
statement because I've, I've met with representatives of the APA
54:02
and they'll say there's no evidence that sexual abuse has
54:05
any link to same sex partnering in it.
54:07
It's like it's in your own handbook.
54:09
I have to show it's, it's the APA Handbook of Psychology and
54:13
Sexuality, Volume 1, pages six O 9 to 610.
54:15
I mean, I haven't memorized because so often I'm having to
54:18
say this is, you know, you guys didn't know this.
54:20
It's they're not even aware. They're so ideologically driven.
54:23
My sort of sense of it is as I research it and look into it
54:26
more and more is people that really feel strongly like I have
54:29
this gay identity, this bi identity, this, you know,
54:32
whatever identity it is that there's a mysticism to the
54:37
identity that they they they possess.
54:40
That's sort of like, like the, like the, the 2 spirit or the,
54:44
you know, there's literally a spirituality to it that you
54:47
could point to different research elements to say, well,
54:49
this just shows that by people exist and always have because of
54:52
this sort of like goddess or, you know, this sort of
54:54
historical example or whatever. But there is certainly like a
54:57
spirituality and a mysticism to it where on the one hand they're
55:00
saying it has to be science based, research based, it has to
55:02
be concrete, empirical evidence, whatever.
55:04
And then on the other hand, it is a spirituality is a
55:06
mysticism. But then the Christianity,
55:08
mysticism and spirituality with its values and its system is
55:13
broken, perverse, you know, shame, shame, you know, shaming
55:16
all of these negative things. So it's, it's almost a religion,
55:20
you know, it becomes a religion really.
55:22
LGBTQ ideologies have a religious adherence that it
55:27
demands of its followers. Yeah, it's basically I will
55:31
define who I really am. I no one sets parameters on who
55:35
I am. It's almost, you know, some
55:38
Catholic philosophers would say that.
55:40
I mean, they said all sin comes down to the, the person's
55:44
rejection of his own creatureliness.
55:46
That no, I'm going to, I'm going to set my own parameters.
55:49
I'm not a creature. I'm not, I'm going to be the
55:50
creator in some ways. I'm going to, I'm going to
55:52
define myself. I'm going to determine what's
55:54
good or bad for me. There are two different ways
55:57
fundamentally of looking at gender.
55:59
Either gender is grounded in biological reality, which is
56:02
preset and we didn't get to determine that, or gender is
56:05
simply a societal construct and those questions have major
56:10
worldview implications. Are you a modernist or are you a
56:13
postmodernist? Because postmodernism can easily
56:16
become a a quasi religion to your point.
56:20
I meant to follow up on this earlier when we're discussing
56:22
the Catholic Church's Catechism, where it talked about how it's
56:24
largely, I don't really get the right language here.
56:26
So the psychological genesis of same sex attraction remains
56:29
largely unexplained from 1992, so over 30 years ago.
56:32
And I have to make the important point because a lot of people,
56:34
especially if they're not Catholic and even if they're
56:36
Catholic, may not understand this.
56:37
Like the Catechism is a very powerful, useful, beautiful
56:40
guidebook to understand the Magisterium.
56:43
People might take this one little line from the Catechism.
56:46
We're like, well, we don't know about all the evidence of why
56:47
this happens, but we still know it's disordered.
56:50
You shouldn't act out on same sex attractions.
56:51
These people deserve special love and care.
56:53
We shouldn't be judging or hating them.
56:55
We should love them. But we have to judge the sexual
56:57
activity as wrong. Like that's all the church's
57:00
teaching. And I think that's an important
57:01
point. I just wanted.
57:03
To. Back to what you're saying
57:04
though, about sexual abuse patterns in the lives of your
57:08
clients, really, I mean, you are an expert in that you have done
57:11
all this research and you also are dealing every day with
57:14
clients who experience same sex attraction.
57:16
You know, based on just my personal experience with friends
57:20
and you know, acquaintances in the past who have had same sex
57:23
attraction, especially men, sexual abuse seems to be the
57:27
rule. Not not at the exception.
57:30
It's meaning experience of sexual abuse, I should say, as
57:33
children. These are boys that were
57:36
sexually abused as kids. Again, not blaming the parents,
57:39
not blaming anyone, except of course the abuser, but they had
57:42
this in their in their experience.
57:44
Again, not every single man who has same sex attraction was
57:47
sexually abused. That's not what we're saying
57:49
here. There are exceptions, but it is
57:51
largely a rule. Would you agree with that in
57:53
your clinical experience and research?
57:54
And is there research that shows that?
57:57
The the 2 empirical sources I can cite 1 is the American
58:03
Psychological Association saying that childhood sexual abuse has
58:06
associative and potentially causal links to same sex
58:09
partnering later in life. That's in their Handbook of
58:12
Sexuality Psychology and Psychology volume 1 pages six O
58:16
9 to 610. Because there are people who
58:17
will say that's not true, but I'm citing it chapter and verse
58:20
so people can look that up. And the other empirical source I
58:24
can look to is my own clinical practice.
58:25
I would say 1/3 of my clients were sexually abused when they
58:28
were young and they would say it was that event resulted in
58:33
conflict, confusion, and unwanted sexual attractions they
58:36
wish to resolve as adults. Of course these people should be
58:40
able to. They should have that right to.
58:41
We're going to take away their right to to pick their own
58:43
therapy goals. They're saying I didn't have
58:46
these attractions or they weren't quite like this.
58:48
I had an event when I was a child.
58:50
After that day, my sexual trajectory started changing.
58:54
These people, of course, should have access to trauma treatment.
58:57
So, so when my father passed away, you know, talk about a
59:01
random sample like we were not foreseeing that I took on his
59:04
clients and 1/3 again, 1/3 of my clients and 1/3 of his clients
59:08
were also sexually abused. So it's a significant. 3rd of
59:12
same sex attracted. In my practice, yeah, 1/3.
59:16
So that's not, that's not a majority even though.
59:18
No, it's not a majority. I am not talking about people
59:21
who are shown pornography when they were young and I'm not
59:24
talking about people who had a sexual experience with a
59:27
slightly older peer. I'm talking right now about
59:31
sexual abuse as in this is reportable to to the police.
59:34
OK, OK, Now I then we take it to that level 1/3.
59:37
And when you're talking about a peer, slightly older peer, that
59:41
could be a 5 year old and an 11 year old, yeah, they're both
59:44
under the age of consent as. Your point exactly.
59:46
Could that be a 15 year old and a nine year old?
59:49
I think consent. I literally have a chart at my
59:52
office to look at. 1414 but you know it.
59:55
But the point is you're that's still a significant could be a
59:59
significant trauma and I think people would call that a trauma
1:00:03
if there's an older child abuse sexually, you know, dealing with
1:00:07
them, touching them or whatever. Yeah.
1:00:09
And again, I'm not speaking for every person, of course, but
1:00:12
these is, you know, we're talking kind of in, in different
1:00:14
general, some generalizations. And then in some cases it'll,
1:00:18
it'll be specific. And, you know, I know someone,
1:00:20
you know, in my life who was groomed horribly from like 3 or
1:00:23
4 years old. And the sexual molester would
1:00:26
say, oh, they enjoyed it, you know, because they groomed this
1:00:29
little child. I mean, it's, it's sick abuse,
1:00:32
right? But this is of course, you know,
1:00:34
and, and by the way, there's a, there's a whole ideology around
1:00:36
this which is pretty sick that children are sexual.
1:00:38
Children can have, you know, pleasurable sexual experiences.
1:00:41
Why do we judge them? So, you know, judge them as if
1:00:44
we're judging them or we're actually judging the adult
1:00:46
abuser who's engaging the child in any way and in sexual
1:00:50
activity. So.
1:00:51
Child is groomed. In that case we have the
1:00:54
disturbance, but we also have a pleasure that's unwanted.
1:00:57
And so this typically occurs in a case where a child is being
1:01:00
abused by a trusted caregiver who pairs an emotion that the
1:01:04
child needs with sex, attention, usually attention, affection,
1:01:09
approval, something that that child needed.
1:01:11
And they, they, they provide that for the child, but they're
1:01:13
paired together. And so the child associates
1:01:16
sexual arousal with that unmet emotional need.
1:01:20
I had a guy who got married a month ago and he was sexually
1:01:24
abused by his Muslim imam. He's the equivalent of like a
1:01:29
priest, basically, if you're Muslim.
1:01:31
He was sexually abused by one or two of those imams.
1:01:34
And we work as a child. As a child, Yeah, as a, as a
1:01:37
young child. And we reprocess those memories
1:01:40
and he feels much more stable and connected in himself.
1:01:43
And when he gets fears that he's not going to be adequate for the
1:01:47
woman that he's that he was with, you know, he had to talk
1:01:50
through the fears and give her an opportunity to listen to him
1:01:54
and accept him. And that was terrifying and
1:01:56
vulnerable for him. I have deep fears that these
1:02:00
experiences when I was a child are going to forever ruin this
1:02:02
marriage. I'm afraid the core, core fear
1:02:05
is that you're going to you're going to marry me and you're
1:02:08
going to be completely disappointed.
1:02:09
And you're going to say, oh, that's who you are.
1:02:11
That's like crushing. She was understanding.
1:02:14
She was she was accepting. And it was a challenge for him.
1:02:17
But he had to let that into his heart to not be superficial.
1:02:21
No, you'd like to connect to the possibility that you really are
1:02:24
loved and acceptable and there's a person who's really going to
1:02:27
work through this with you. And he got married.
1:02:30
He he called me from the honeymoon.
1:02:32
Hey, things were great. Checking in with the therapist.
1:02:35
That's right. That's right.
1:02:36
Have you had cases that someone who their heart is in it, they
1:02:40
want to be healed, they want to be, let's say get specific with
1:02:43
free from same sex attraction, but they're it's just not
1:02:46
working. Some people do not respond as
1:02:49
well and we don't exactly know why, but we think it has to do
1:02:51
with something called trait anxiety.
1:02:53
Trait anxiety is, you know, severe depression, severe social
1:03:00
anxiety and severe OCD for example.
1:03:03
These pathologies may be downstream from something called
1:03:07
trait anxiety where the person is always like revved up and
1:03:11
they cannot calm down. People with high trade anxiety
1:03:13
do not do as well individuals with I would say with severe
1:03:18
OCD. There are some people who do not
1:03:20
respond as well and further research I would love to to
1:03:24
examine why do some people do well and some people not.
1:03:28
And I do not believe it's in relationship to degree of
1:03:32
homosexuality at baseline. I don't think that's it.
1:03:34
I think there are other factors at play.
1:03:37
I just don't know exactly what they are yet.
1:03:39
So there's, and what you're saying is they need other
1:03:42
potential therapeutic support that's totally separate from
1:03:47
their sexual attraction, that's underpinning their resistance to
1:03:51
other kind of healing approaches.
1:03:53
And, and that's something that is its own research project, its
1:03:57
own therapeutic project. There's other dynamics going on
1:04:00
there. I am curious too, just in that
1:04:03
whole field. I mean, that would just be
1:04:04
fascinating to explore because I, I do know OCD is its own
1:04:09
tough nut to crack, you know, and, and, and there's some
1:04:12
elements, you know, off branches of OCD, like what is it called?
1:04:16
Trickle, trickle. Trichilomania.
1:04:18
Yeah, there's some off branches of OCD trichilomania that are
1:04:22
just some people say, oh, it's incurable.
1:04:24
Even some of the research says it's incurable.
1:04:27
Now, I'm not saying it is sure, but it is.
1:04:30
It's a, it's a whole world. It's a whole.
1:04:31
World OCD can be very difficult to treat.
1:04:34
It really, really can. I have some people with very
1:04:37
treatment resistant OCD and we give them everything that we
1:04:40
can. It's evidence based but they
1:04:41
don't respond as well. One man's girlfriend broke up
1:04:46
with him a month ago because of his OC.
1:04:48
Really. Because of his OCD.
1:04:50
He couldn't commit. He couldn't he?
1:04:52
Couldn't commit to her. Yeah, he had.
1:04:54
He had. So this is another rabbit hole,
1:04:57
but called a whole world called HOCD, Homosexual obsessive
1:05:01
compulsive people nicknamed this HOCD.
1:05:03
It's OCD about homosexuality. He's constantly saying the
1:05:07
constantly, do I was that a gay thought?
1:05:08
Was that not a gay thought? Am I more attracted to him?
1:05:10
Am I more attracted to her and my girlfriend?
1:05:12
And he was like in this state of paralysis and couldn't move
1:05:16
forward with the relationship. And she eventually had to move
1:05:18
on. And sure enough, after they
1:05:20
break up, now his OCD has picked a new topic.
1:05:23
So, you know, it's funny because somebody like might say to that,
1:05:26
like the Trevor Project people might say to that.
1:05:29
Case in point, he's suppressed the guys a gay guy, he's trying
1:05:33
to be a straight guy. You're making him OCD, you're
1:05:35
making him go crazy. He's living a life of pain.
1:05:37
He can't hold down a heterosexual relationship.
1:05:40
But your response would be, I want you to share it, but it's
1:05:43
basically the guy has flaming OCD that's not taken care of.
1:05:46
And even if he becomes a gay, lives the gay lifestyle, he's
1:05:49
still going to have OCD, still going to come out another way.
1:05:51
Exactly. And we use an evidence based
1:05:54
treatment intervention. We use a treatment intervention.
1:05:56
We have two psychological assessments for OCD that we that
1:05:59
we administer at baseline and then we and then we track the
1:06:02
client's progress. This is a guy clearly with OCD,
1:06:05
yeah. Yeah, it's interesting because
1:06:07
OCD can kind of like get captivated by any number of
1:06:11
things, and then if one thing is removed from the picture, it
1:06:14
picks something new. Exactly.
1:06:15
That's exactly. Right.
1:06:16
So interesting I mentioned the Trevor Project.
1:06:18
I got to ask you about this and then I'm going to talk about the
1:06:20
Supreme Court case. Thank you for your time.
1:06:22
By the way, this is this is phenomenal Trevor Project, an
1:06:24
American nonprofit that's focused on suicide prevention
1:06:27
efforts for a lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and
1:06:29
questioning youth toll free telephone number.
1:06:32
There was a big news story recently where the Trump
1:06:34
administration kind of I think it's Health and Human services
1:06:36
website. I don't know, they have a
1:06:37
suicide hotline. They took off the like link
1:06:39
through to Trevor Noah, Trevor Noah to the Trevor Project.
1:06:43
I remember talking to an old acquaintance back in the day and
1:06:45
he was saying Trevor Project proves that it is people like
1:06:49
you myself who is, you know, practicing Christian, who
1:06:52
believes that same sex behavior activity is disordered.
1:06:56
You are the reason that young people are committing suicide.
1:06:59
How dare you? So what is your response as a
1:07:01
clinician to that? That's a total ad hominem attack
1:07:04
they use against you. My only response is to say, look
1:07:09
at the former spokesman. I didn't even plan to say this
1:07:13
publicly because, and this is going to bring up a big
1:07:15
emotional reaction to me that I'm going to try to be very
1:07:17
professional about. But I would say look at the
1:07:22
former spokesman of the Trevor Project.
1:07:24
His name is Sam Brinton. He posted pictures of himself
1:07:28
engaging in simulated bestiality with possibly underage boys.
1:07:32
He bragged about it for a year while he was working at the
1:07:36
Trevor Project. I personally wrote a letter to
1:07:39
the Trevor Project. I wrote to every single member
1:07:41
of their board. I printed out pictures.
1:07:44
I said this is your individual who you have put in charge of
1:07:48
this national campaign, that his job is to teach children about
1:07:52
healthy sexuality. Do you know what they did?
1:07:55
Nothing. And they kept him on.
1:07:57
And it wasn't they. They wrote nothing.
1:08:00
But we can't say that they don't know.
1:08:01
It was so clear. I wrote them handwritten
1:08:04
letters. They knew what he was up to.
1:08:06
And there's more information beyond the pictures that he
1:08:08
posted, which I won't even get into, but let's just say
1:08:12
completely vile. And the and it was only when Sam
1:08:15
Brinton got caught stealing luggage that they finally
1:08:19
quietly removed him. I could.
1:08:21
Oh, this was the Biden appointee.
1:08:23
That's exactly right. Yes, he was.
1:08:25
He was. Sold the picture of Sam Brin.
1:08:27
But I I know he's Speaking of Yeah, the argument from the
1:08:29
Trevor Project is that the reason that gay young people
1:08:33
commit suicide is because of people like us.
1:08:36
That that's their that's their argument.
1:08:38
That it's not, it's not, it's not that homosexual activity, or
1:08:43
I should say attraction. There's no such thing as
1:08:46
unwanted. If you if you feel you don't
1:08:48
want it, that's because you hate yourself and you're being taught
1:08:51
to hate yourself by. Christians, that's their
1:08:52
argument. That's for another way of saying
1:08:54
that is shut up Lila. That's their argument.
1:08:56
Shut up Lila. Just don't.
1:08:57
They're going to kill themselves.
1:08:58
That's really a horrible. And this is, by the way, what
1:09:01
parents of transgender kids are being told that they're saying
1:09:04
they're transgender. If you don't do these
1:09:05
transgender surgeries, you're going to be responsible for
1:09:08
their suicides if they commit death if they do that.
1:09:10
That's emotional blackmail. The data, the newer data on
1:09:15
trans and kids is that post surgery their suicide rates are
1:09:19
virtually identical than pre surgery.
1:09:22
I mean they were giving them the the irreversible surgeries they
1:09:24
want. The suicide rate doesn't seem to
1:09:26
be changing. And if we're going to talk about
1:09:28
psychological well-being, the Peel and Sutton study shows that
1:09:32
the reintegrated protocol is associated with increases in in
1:09:36
psychological well-being and decreases in psychological
1:09:38
distress. The increases were so great that
1:09:41
it was a what's called a large effect size.
1:09:44
And we use the most well established instrument,
1:09:47
psychological instrument in the probably in the entire United
1:09:49
States. And that was the instrument that
1:09:51
was used that showed significant increases, even better than
1:09:53
general psychotherapy. So, you know, there are
1:09:57
individuals who will opportunize and politicize the tragedy of
1:10:01
others, opportunize, politicize and sometimes monetize the
1:10:06
tragedies of others who commit suicide, and they actually
1:10:10
enrich themselves. And there are some such
1:10:13
organizations that are doing this.
1:10:15
If you can speak to though this idea that suicidality goes up
1:10:18
among youth to identify as same sex attracted or gay because of
1:10:25
social bias bias against them. A lot of these claims, people
1:10:29
are relying on information that was put forth by the by the, I
1:10:34
think it's called the Williams Institute from UCLA is the
1:10:38
supposedly the largest data set on this topic.
1:10:41
And they said the individuals who went through so-called
1:10:43
conversion therapy had higher rates of suicidality.
1:10:46
And they published this. Well, a researcher from the
1:10:49
Catholic University of America, Father Doctor Paul Sullens, he's
1:10:52
a, he's a, he's a doctorate and he's a Catholic priest.
1:10:55
So Father Doctor Paul Sullens requested the data set, the
1:10:58
original data set from the Williams Institute.
1:11:00
And he said, let me see that. And after adjusting for
1:11:02
pre-existing suicidality, it turned out the suicidality was
1:11:05
slightly lower. So the Williams Institute is
1:11:08
using a data set. They were so they perhaps they
1:11:11
were so confident that that that so-called conversion there
1:11:13
because suicidality that they didn't even check the data set.
1:11:16
And so, published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior is a
1:11:20
total expose of what's going on with the Williams.
1:11:22
Institute so you're saying their own data set that the Trevor
1:11:25
Project references and all these others who say, oh, it's the gay
1:11:27
bigots, you know, the Christians who doesn't don't approve of gay
1:11:30
activity that are making young people commit suicide or gay.
1:11:33
I mean that's the argument, right.
1:11:34
It's really horrible. Like it's like you don't want
1:11:36
to, you want to help these people who love them, right?
1:11:39
You know, we have family members or you know, people everyone
1:11:41
knows someone who has a struggle with some sort of same sex
1:11:44
attraction. I mean, it's a common, it's
1:11:45
becoming so common anyways. And you're saying that the study
1:11:48
that they reference, when you look at the data set, the
1:11:51
suicidality actually goes down after the so-called conversion
1:11:55
therapies that they're saying is the big bad boogeyman?
1:11:57
That's right. That's right.
1:11:58
Incredible. They completely forgot to assess
1:12:00
for preexisting suicidality. It would be like saying this.
1:12:03
It would be like saying, Lila, did you know that people who get
1:12:06
open heart surgery are more likely to have heart attacks and
1:12:09
you go, really? That's incredible.
1:12:11
Well, yeah, that's incredible. But it's because that's not a
1:12:14
meaningful comparison. You have to examine, do people
1:12:17
who have a likely of getting heart attacks, are they more
1:12:21
likely to get a heart attack after their triple bypass?
1:12:24
Like you have to correct for the heart problem before the
1:12:26
surgery. We're not taking random people
1:12:28
here and giving them heart surgeries.
1:12:30
It's a little complicated. We may have to no.
1:12:32
No, no, I think it makes a lot of sense.
1:12:35
Just to close the loop, in case anyone is interested in this,
1:12:38
it's the Archives of Sexual Behavior, a highly, highly
1:12:40
respected peer review journal journal, and they've been going
1:12:42
back and forth with with Paul Sullins.
1:12:45
There's two or three articles on this and the original authors,
1:12:48
they're just not. They will not issue an apology
1:12:53
and they will not issue a correction, but Paul Sullins has
1:12:58
taken them to task. There is an argument from,
1:13:01
again, the Trevor Project types that say that there's this, you
1:13:05
know, very bad conversion therapy.
1:13:07
And we've already gone through reintegrative therapy, which you
1:13:09
use, which is not the big bad conversion therapy that they
1:13:12
might claim. But they would say, well, what
1:13:14
you're doing is conversion therapy.
1:13:16
And then they would also say that conversion therapy has
1:13:19
included things like making young boys look at certain kinds
1:13:22
of and like really abusive behaviors and it's just totally
1:13:26
whack science, pseudoscience, etcetera.
1:13:28
I'm not sure what instances they're referring to, but if
1:13:31
there's anything that they want to bring up as examples, that's
1:13:34
fine. All I know is I'm doing
1:13:36
reintegrative therapy. We do evidence based work, the
1:13:38
clients in the driver's seat. Multiple psychological studies
1:13:41
are showing this and we're training therapists in different
1:13:44
parts of the world and we are we are producing data that that
1:13:49
these types of organizations may be feeling threatened by.
1:13:51
That's the part that is so sick here, I think, in my view, that
1:13:55
people are so eager to shut it down.
1:13:59
Like, how dare you say what you're saying?
1:14:00
How dare you do what you do? And this brings me to Charles
1:14:03
versus Salivar, the Supreme Court case that's ongoing.
1:14:05
And you just filed an amicus brief to the to the court.
1:14:10
Here it is. Brief of Joseph Nicolosi,
1:14:15
Junior, PhD in the Reintegrative Therapy Association, in support
1:14:18
of petitioner. Tell us about this case.
1:14:20
Tell us what's happening and why it matters.
1:14:21
So there are these so-called conversion therapy bans that are
1:14:24
going on in different States and in different in in different
1:14:27
cities. And it usually starts banning
1:14:29
so-called conversion therapy for people who are under 18, and
1:14:34
then they start going for people over 18.
1:14:37
And so the, the, the question is, does the government have the
1:14:43
right to interfere with talk in talk therapy?
1:14:46
Can clients pick their own therapy goals?
1:14:49
And so that's going to be going to the US Supreme Court.
1:14:51
They've already decided to take the case.
1:14:53
It'll probably be ruled in June of 2026.
1:14:56
And it could have implications for the entire nation.
1:14:59
It's possible that they could overturn all of these, all of
1:15:01
these bans. This is a First Amendment case.
1:15:04
It's it's making it so the therapist cannot say certain
1:15:07
things because they're afraid of what the government will say.
1:15:10
So. You have a 15 year old who is I
1:15:13
mean we're talking to Beckett cook.
1:15:14
He's going to gay bars at 14, right.
1:15:17
The parents in a in a state that bans this yes would not be able
1:15:20
to take Beckett to the protection or like you to
1:15:22
explore. Why are you feeling this same
1:15:25
sex attraction? What is you know, getting you to
1:15:27
go to the the gay bar? What's going on here that would
1:15:30
not be allowed? These laws are, I suspect,
1:15:33
deliberately broad, vague, and they create a chilling effect
1:15:37
for therapists. So for your practice, can you
1:15:41
say you're here in California or you're in Los Angeles?
1:15:43
Do you hesitate to see people under the age of 18?
1:15:47
So I don't even work with people under 18.
1:15:50
I know it's only adults. And is that because of
1:15:52
California law and just the chilling effect?
1:15:55
Yeah, I think so. I think so.
1:15:56
I, you know, I really, it doesn't even come in like it's
1:15:59
the people just happen to be coming to me are adults.
1:16:02
But I'd have to decide if a person were under 18, would it
1:16:04
be? I would still say no, but how
1:16:06
much is that is the law? I don't.
1:16:09
Know it's just devastating. It's devastating.
1:16:11
It's devastating, especially when you have a whole cohort of
1:16:14
these clinical, you know, these therapists who are transing the
1:16:19
kids like, like endless affirmation of whatever sort of
1:16:23
idea idea or gender identity the kid might have because the, the
1:16:26
parents are like, he's, you know, he's trans now or
1:16:28
whatever. And the therapist just says,
1:16:30
we're like, yes, tell me more. You know, as opposed to maybe
1:16:33
getting curious, maybe your mother, you have disordered
1:16:35
attachment with your mother because she's one of the 52%
1:16:38
that are, you know, it is wild. It is wild.
1:16:44
Well, listen, I, I am very hopeful that our court will have
1:16:48
some good sense and children's lives are on the line here and
1:16:52
their futures. So thank you for being
1:16:54
courageous and serving people and and wanting to love them.
1:16:57
And thank you for being willing to do this show and to bring
1:16:59
people like Michael Gasparo, Beckett Cook and others.
1:17:04
That takes a lot of courage on your part.
1:17:05
And I know that you've taken flak for that.
1:17:08
Big time flak and you're willing to press on in pursuit of truth
1:17:12
despite, you know, all the, all the obstacles you face.
1:17:16
That takes a lot of courage. And we live in a time period
1:17:19
where we desperately need more people with courage.
1:17:21
So thank you. How can people support your work
1:17:23
and help you with your future research?
1:17:26
Reintegrativetherapy.com. Just go to
1:17:28
reintegrativetherapy.com and you can watch what these
1:17:30
interventions look like. You can see the peer review
1:17:34
data. You can read it for yourself.
1:17:36
If you're a therapist, you know, come and get trained if you're
1:17:39
interested in getting trained with us.
1:17:41
This is why we exist. Amazing.
1:17:43
Thank you so much Doctor Nicolosi.
1:17:45
Phenomenal work. Thank you.
1:17:46
Thank you. Thanks so much for listening to
1:17:48
this episode of the Lila Roche Show.
1:17:50
I hope you all enjoyed it. And if you did, make sure that
1:17:52
you're subscribed to the channel.
1:17:53
And if you're listening on podcast app, make sure that you
1:17:55
give us five stars. Leave us a review.
1:17:57
It helps the show reach more people.
1:17:59
Thank you all so much. Be sure to check out Doctor
1:18:01
Nicolosi's work and share this episode with a friend.
1:18:04
And a huge thank you to EWTN Eternal Word Television Network,
1:18:08
which is the largest religious broadcaster in the world.
1:18:10
You can get access to Lila Rose Show episodes 24 hours in
1:18:15
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1:18:19
you to EWTN and their incredible mission to bring souls to Jesus.