An unnamed Towleroad reader emailed in search of help. She writes:
I am a Licensed Educational Psychologist here in Los Angeles. The California Board of Behavioral Sciences is responsible for licensing LEPs [Licensed Educational Psychologists], MFTs [Marriage and Family Therapists], and LCSWs [Licensed Clinical Social Workers] here in California. I was recently looking at BBS website in order to determine which organizations I could obtain my continuing education credits from in order to renew my license. Much to my shock and sadness, the BBS accepts CEUs from NARTH. I am absolutely appalled. No therapist in California should be able to renew their license by obtaining CEUs from this hateful organization.
Okay, yes. It’s a lot of acronyms. Basically when a therapist in California has to renew their license, they must complete a certain number of hours at accredited organizations – of which there are nearly 5000 in the state of California. It seems one of those companies (#1250 on the list, to be exact) is NARTH – or the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality. NARTH, you might recall was co-founded by George Alan Rekers, famed ex-gay therapist of the “Sissy Boy Cure” later caught enjoying the company of a Rentboy.
NARTH currently promotes “reparative therapy” – as seen in the case of Marcus Bachmann’s clinic – and has been at the root of several documented suicide attempts.
The fact that therapists can and do renew their license at NARTH is an outrage. So what can you do about it? There is currently a petition on change.org which you can sign and share or as Towleroad suggests you can contact the California Board of Behavioral Sciences and tell them to drop NARTH from their list of accredited organizations. And if you do, please leave us a comment below and tell us how it went!
How about we take this to the next level?
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The Continuing Education Coordinator for the CBBS can be contacted at [email protected].
Board of Behavioral Sciences
1625 N Market Blvd., Suite S-200
Sacramento, CA 95834
- Kim Madsen, Executive Officer
- Tracy Rhine – Assistant Executive Officer
BBS Main Phone Line: (916) 574-7830
BBS Main Fax: (916) 574-8625
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Cam
Since the therapy is supposedly discredited, I would also like to know who was responsible for putting them onthe list of accepted organizations.
justin
Cali it so unethical it makes me sick!!! I am in the medical field and something really piss me the fuck off!!!!
MikenStL
Maybe I’m a little confused… If I was married and got divorced due to finally coming out, would I be my ex-wife’s Ex-Homosexual?? Maybe I’m thinking about this too much.. LOL