{"id":53744,"date":"2015-02-16T12:00:33","date_gmt":"2015-02-16T12:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=53744"},"modified":"2015-05-05T21:26:06","modified_gmt":"2015-05-05T20:26:06","slug":"new-jersey-judge-rules-gay-conversion-therapy-is-consumer-fraud","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2015\/02\/new-jersey-judge-rules-gay-conversion-therapy-is-consumer-fraud\/","title":{"rendered":"New Jersey Judge Rules ‘Gay Conversion Therapy’ Is Consumer Fraud"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jersey City-based conversion therapist group, which calls homosexuality a \u2018disorder\u2019, made male clients stand naked with other men to quell attraction.<\/em><\/p>\n

11 Feb 2015 – <\/em>A judge in New Jersey<\/a> has ruled that claims of gay conversion therapy that describe homosexuality as a curable mental disorder are fraud.<\/p>\n

Hudson County superior court judge Peter Bariso Jr said Tuesday in his ruling on a case involving the Jersey City-based Jews Offering New Alternatives for Healing (Jonah) that those claims are illegal based on the state\u2019s Consumer Fraud Act. Bariso also said it\u2019s fraudulent to offer \u201csuccess statistics\u201d because \u201cthere is no factual basis for calculating such statistics\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the principal lie the conversion therapy industry uses throughout the country to peddle its quackery to vulnerable clients,\u201d David Dinielli, deputy legal director for the Southern Poverty Law Center, said of homosexuality being described as a mental disorder. \u201cGay people don\u2019t need to be cured, and we are thrilled that the court has recognized this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jonah attorney Charles LiMandri said the group\u2019s use of the word \u201cdisorder\u201d was based on their interpretation of Jewish law and not intended to describe homosexuality as a psychological disorder. He said Jonah expects to win when the case goes to trial in June.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re not your typical target of Consumer Fraud Act defendants who are making misrepresentations of people,\u201d LiMandri said. \u201cThey\u2019re just trying to help people who are in distress get help if they want it. If they don\u2019t want it, that\u2019s fine.\u201d<\/p>\n

The law center sued Jonah on behalf of four men and two of their mothers, who alleged their methods don\u2019t work. The four men said they went through the therapy and were forced to do activities including being made to strip naked while standing in a circle with other men and to be naked with their fathers at bathhouses.<\/p>\n

LiMandri said that the men didn\u2019t complete the program.<\/p>\n

Bariso also ruled last week that Jonah could not call on proponents to testify that homosexuality is an illness.<\/p>\n

Republican governor Chris Christie<\/a> signed a ban preventing licensed therapists from performing gay conversion therapy for patients under 18 in 2013. An appeal by two associations and therapists challenging the ban to the US supreme court is pending.<\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 theguardian.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

11 Feb 2015 – A judge in New Jersey has ruled that claims of gay conversion therapy that describe homosexuality as a curable mental disorder and made male clients stand naked with other men to quell attraction are fraud.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[181],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53744","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sexualities"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53744","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53744"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53744\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}