The United States Supreme Court appears poised to side with a challenge against a Colorado law that bans psychotherapists from conducting \u201cconversion therapy\u201d on minors in an attempt to influence their gender identification or sexuality.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, the high court, which has a six-to-three conservative majority, heard arguments in the case, which weighs whether the ban violates the protections for free speech under the First Amendment of the US Constitution.<\/p>\n
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The complaint was brought by licensed counsellor Kaley Chiles, a Christian who claims Colorado\u2019s law infringes on her free speech rights.<\/p>\n
But the state has defended its law. Colorado Solicitor General Shannon Stevenson argued that the ban regulates harmful conduct, not speech.<\/p>\n
The 2019 Colorado law<\/a> prohibits licensed mental healthcare providers from seeking to change a minor\u2019s sexual orientation or gender identity with a predetermined outcome in mind. That practice, known as conversion therapy, has been often associated with religious prohibitions against gay or transgender identities.<\/p>\n Detractors have warned that such \u201ctherapy\u201d is pseudoscience and can be harmful, not to mention discriminatory, for LGBTQ youth.<\/p>\n Justices weigh arguments<\/p>\n Colorado maintains<\/a> that Chiles\u2019s allegations of free-speech violations are hypothetical because the state has not actually disciplined her.<\/p>\n But the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative organisation representing Chiles, has argued<\/a> that the danger is that professionals might censor themselves for fear of punishment.<\/p>\n James Campbell, a lawyer for Chiles, told the justices that Colorado\u2019s law \u201cforbids counsellors like Kaley Chiles from helping minors pursue state-disfavoured goals on issues of gender and sexuality\u201d.<\/p>\n Conservative Justice Samuel Alito seemed to embrace that claim that Colorado\u2019s law marginalises certain points of view.<\/p>\n At one point in Tuesday\u2019s hearing, Alito told Stevenson that her state\u2019s measure allows therapists to help a patient feel comfortable about being gay but bars them from helping a patient who seeks to \u201cend or lessen\u201d their same-sex attraction.<\/p>\n \u201cIt seems to me your statute dictates opposite results in those two situations,\u201d Alito said, adding, \u201cLooks like blatant viewpoint discrimination.\u201d<\/p>\n Conservative Chief Justice John Roberts also pushed back on Colorado\u2019s law and on Stevenson\u2019s assertion that it only regulates the conduct of licensed therapists.<\/p>\n The court\u2019s precedents make clear that \u201cjust because they\u2019re engaged in conduct doesn\u2019t mean that their words aren\u2019t protected\u201d, Roberts said.<\/p>\n Concerns from medical professionals<\/p>\n Colorado is one of\u00a0more than 20 states in the US that have banned conversion therapy, a widely discredited practice in the medical field.<\/p>\n The American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry is one of the groups that has spoken out against the practice.<\/p>\n On its website, the academy warns that conversion therapy could trigger or worsen mental health conditions among minors. It also says the practice could stigmatise LGBTQ identity.<\/p>\n \u201cThese interventions are provided under the false premise that homosexuality and gender diverse identities are pathological,\u201d it explains. \u201cThey are not; the absence of pathology means there is no need for conversion or any other like intervention.\u201d<\/p>\n In 2019, the Williams Institute, a think tank at the School of Law at the University of California at Los Angeles, issued a report that found as many as 698,000 LGBTQ adults<\/a> had undergone conversion therapy at some point in their lives. That included about 350,000 who received treatment as adolescents.<\/p>\n \u201cThis court has recognised that state power is at its apex when it regulates to ensure safety in the healthcare professions,\u201d Stevenson told the justices in her opening remarks.<\/p>\n \u201cColorado\u2019s law lies at the bull\u2019s-eye centre of this protection because it prohibits licensed professionals from performing one specific treatment because that treatment does not work and carries great risk of harm.\u201d<\/p>\n The Supreme Court\u2019s ruling is expected by the end of June.<\/p>\n In recent rulings, the court\u2019s conservative majority has largely sided with arguments that expand the concept of religious freedom, even in cases that raise questions of anti-LGBTQ discrimination.<\/p>\n