Treating homosexuality as a sickness
http://www.100md.com
《英国医生杂志》
The two papers detailing the experiences of former patients and health professionals and the ensuing conflict between psychiatry and sexual orientation, accompanied by the Editor's choice on medicine's shameful past and the obituary of Judd Marmor, sparked a lively debate on bmj.com.1-4
Correspondents point out errors: it was not Marmor who declassified homosexuality but gay and lesbian acitivists in San Francisco; Marmor borrowed someone else's ideas and declared them as his own; and the Criminal Law Amendment Act 1885, not the Criminal Assessment Act, criminalised all sexual activity between men.
Credit: HULTON GETTY
Though correspondents generally support the need to adapt to changing social norms—since it is these that define disease—they see a need to continue classifying something as an illness if there is sound scientific evidence to do so. A legal framework against sexual, financial, or other social discrimination, argues one of them, remains a challenge to nature when biology is concerned.
In response to the patients' paper, correspondents both name what might be seen as current examples of victimisation and warn us that harmful psychological and behavioural tendencies should be eradicated, in the interest of society.
In response to the professionals' paper, one respondent describes a study showing that some homosexuals may be able to reorient themselves sexually as a result of some form of "reparative" therapy, with lower rates of depression reported before and after treatment. Another replies that this study is quoted by both critics and supporters of lesbian and gay people, many of whom, religious or not, do not wish to change and would be incapable of doing so, despite societal pressures. And the General Medical Council requires that doctors must not let their views about their patients' sexuality (for example) prejudice the treatment they provide or arrange—lest we forget.
Birte Twisselmann, technical editor
BMJ
Competing interests: None declared.
References
Electronic responses. Treatments of homosexuality in Britain since the 1950s—an oral history: the experience of patients. http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/eletters/328/7437/427 (accessed 29 Mar 2003).
Electronic responses. Treatments of homosexuality in Britain since the 1950s—an oral history: the experience of professionals. http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/eletters/328/7437/429 (accessed 29 Mar 2003).
Electronic responses. Lessons from medicine's shameful past. http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/328/7437/0-g#responses (accessed 29 Mar 2003).
Schaler JA. Giving Marmor credit for the idea that homosexuality is not an illness is undeserved. http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/eletters/328/7437/466#51086 (accessed 29 Mar 2003).
Correspondents point out errors: it was not Marmor who declassified homosexuality but gay and lesbian acitivists in San Francisco; Marmor borrowed someone else's ideas and declared them as his own; and the Criminal Law Amendment Act 1885, not the Criminal Assessment Act, criminalised all sexual activity between men.
Credit: HULTON GETTY
Though correspondents generally support the need to adapt to changing social norms—since it is these that define disease—they see a need to continue classifying something as an illness if there is sound scientific evidence to do so. A legal framework against sexual, financial, or other social discrimination, argues one of them, remains a challenge to nature when biology is concerned.
In response to the patients' paper, correspondents both name what might be seen as current examples of victimisation and warn us that harmful psychological and behavioural tendencies should be eradicated, in the interest of society.
In response to the professionals' paper, one respondent describes a study showing that some homosexuals may be able to reorient themselves sexually as a result of some form of "reparative" therapy, with lower rates of depression reported before and after treatment. Another replies that this study is quoted by both critics and supporters of lesbian and gay people, many of whom, religious or not, do not wish to change and would be incapable of doing so, despite societal pressures. And the General Medical Council requires that doctors must not let their views about their patients' sexuality (for example) prejudice the treatment they provide or arrange—lest we forget.
Birte Twisselmann, technical editor
BMJ
Competing interests: None declared.
References
Electronic responses. Treatments of homosexuality in Britain since the 1950s—an oral history: the experience of patients. http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/eletters/328/7437/427 (accessed 29 Mar 2003).
Electronic responses. Treatments of homosexuality in Britain since the 1950s—an oral history: the experience of professionals. http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/eletters/328/7437/429 (accessed 29 Mar 2003).
Electronic responses. Lessons from medicine's shameful past. http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/328/7437/0-g#responses (accessed 29 Mar 2003).
Schaler JA. Giving Marmor credit for the idea that homosexuality is not an illness is undeserved. http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/eletters/328/7437/466#51086 (accessed 29 Mar 2003).