Ann – Yes, I think the word change means something different to those on all sides. This is why I avoid it and believe the issue is how one lives rather than argue over some degree of attraction change.

Patrocles said:

The basic argument is as follows: Former experience has shown that SOC can change. So it’s a matter of trial and error to find out the most effective approach to incite change.
Seen that way, the argument is completely sane.

Except I doubt you would want anything else in medicine to work that way. Laetrile anyone?

The argument is completely lazy and self-serving to those reparative therapists who use it.

That is an admirable quality if the solution you offer is for the well being of the individual and not coming from an advocacy position you are hell bent on being right about.

Ann, what you’ve stated here is brilliant. It seems it’s always about someone wanting to have thee answer, whether from the left or the right. In my own life, I never knew what was right or best for me at an existential level. Oh, I knew all the correct stuff, but I was unable to be the correct stuff.

If I never knew what was right for me, how in heaven’s name can I ever think I know what is right for you or anyone else, at any given time. If it took the school of hard-knocks to open up the world for me in a way the rules never did, why would I think I know what is best for someone else.

At the end of the day, if God is working in my life, He’s sure as heck working in everybody else’s. What that looks like is not my business.

The problem with NARTH is not its trial and error approach. It’s that they aren’t prepared to document their errors and learn from them (using systematically varying therapeutical approaches). That’s why I basically agree with you: NARTH shouldn’t sell itself as a therapeutical unity (but as a self-experimentation group).

http://www.gaystarnews.com/article/pastor-plans-take-stroking-horses-gay-cure-therapy-worldwide220213

But in a new email, Bell has said he now wants his scheme to go international.

He says he wants interviews with the ‘three major networks and morning shows’ and is planning an international meeting/training event at some point next year.

Bell said as everyone is born into sin, gay people cannot say they are ‘born this way’. He claims only through salvation that gay people can be truly as God intended.

In a new statement released to GSN, he compares the gay community to gangs, saying LGBT people are all too ready to call a member who expresses an interest in gay ‘cure’ therapy as a traitor.