Supreme Court Allows Conversion Therapy Ban to Remain in Place

metroweekly.com:

ruled in favor of the state, finding that Tingley’s free speech rights were not violated.But on December 11, three justices — Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Brett Kavanaugh — said they would have heard Tingley’s appeal. “There is a fierce public debate over how best to help minors with gender dysphoria,” Thomas wrote in his dissent. “The petitioner, Brian Tingley, stands on one side of the divide.

He believes that a person’s sex is ‘a gift from God, integral to our very being.'”Thomas added, “As a licensed marriage and family counselor, Tingley seeks to assist minors who suffer from gender dysphoria but ‘want to become comfortable with their biological sex.’ Tingley does so through ‘talk therapy’ — i.e., therapy conducted solely through speech.“The State of Washington is on the other side of the divide.

Its view is that the State should ‘protec[t] its minors against exposure to serious harms caused by’ counseling to change a minor’s gender identity… and, as a result, that counselors should only affirm a minor’s chosen gender identity.”Thomas argued that Tingley and other therapists enjoy a right to free speech, even when acting in a professional, rather than a spiritual capacity.In a separate dissenting opinion, Alito said he would have heard the challenge to the ban. “In recent years, 20 States and the District of Columbia have adopted laws prohibiting or restricting the practice of conversion therapy,” he wrote. “It is beyond dispute that these laws restrict speech, and all restrictions on speech merit careful scrutiny.“There is a conflict in the Circuits about the constitutionality of such laws,” Alito continued, referring to an 11th U.S.