Oh, Lord. Hong Kong’s Social Welfare Department recently held the world’s first government-sponsored training session on gay conversion therapy. The workshop was led by prominent local psychiatrist Hong Kwai-wah, who specializes in “treating unwanted homosexuality,” and claims he can “re-wire” homosexuals with a mixture of cold showers, prayer, and abstinence.
Rightfully so, LGBT activists are up in arms.
“The government seems to think that homosexuals are possessed by evil spirits and needed to be ‘cleansed’ or ‘cured’ through conversion therapy,” Joseph Cho, spokesman for gay rights group Rainbow Action, told reporters during a protest outside the city’s Social Welfare Department Friday. “They are criminalizing people with same sex orientation — this is an international joke.”
Activist Dan Choi and Truth Wins Out started a petition on Change.org which has garnered over 14,500 signatures in 48 hours. You can sign it and pass it along here.
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Choi says, “It is shocking that Hong Kong would risk its reputation as an international business and cultural center by hiring a therapist with such disturbing views… Hong Kong should move decisively to restore its honor and dignity by removing Hong Kwai-wah. The world is watching and taking note of this embarrassing travesty.”
Truth Wins Out’s Wayne Besen adds: “The hiring of Hong Kwai-wah is the tip of the iceberg. If we don’t take a stand now and stop the Social Welfare Department, the efforts to infiltrate Hong Kongand spread a radical, hate-filled ideology will only intensify.”
Change.org reports:
“The effort to infiltrate Hong Kong’s government and promote anti-gay ideology has been spearheaded by Canada-based Exodus Global Alliance and United States-based Exodus International… Exodus has been spreading its fundamentalist anti-gay doctrine overseas for some time — as it did in Uganda, encouraging advocates of the notorious “Kill the Gays” bill to criminalize homosexuality.”
But Hong Kong’s government says that in the past they have invited gay rights activists to speak and that they are just trying to be fair and balanced. In a statement they say that “knowledge from multiple perspectives was essential for social workers to make professional and independent assessment on their cases and to address specific needs of service users.”
Cold showers and prayer? That doesn’t sound particularly essential to us.
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Steve
I think gay rights activists are pretty balanced. Last I checked, they believed that if your LGBT, then cool. If you’re not, also cool.
That seems pretty balanced to me.
Jim Hlavac
Cold showers just make people sick, not straight. Oh, dear, I guess that’s similar 🙂
Meanwhile, Communist China is virulently anti-gay — apparently gays not having even one child is the threat, as usual. We ain’t makin’ no babies, after all. Meanwhile, China has a much bigger problem — 150+ boys for every 100 girls. And that means 50 or so randy horny hetero guys with no girls to marry — and they will need cold showers indeed. Perhaps Mr. Hong Kwai Waaaaah! will have his hands full after all.
the crustybastard
It is just as logical to think that if you put a Christian in a hot shower and don’t pray, they will become atheist.
You can neither scrub nor pray away a person’s sexuality, morons.
Really.
Fitz
Tempest in a bitter-tea pot.
Our own government has spent tons of energy and money
on figuring out how to spot the gays. Most of the
major psychological testing tools still in use today had
their prestigious start as screening tools to keep out gay people. So..
yeah, this is stupid. But we are stupid too.
Kino
Right now, the discussion about homosexuality and equal rights are really big on Chinese internet, becase a high-profile Chinese actress who publicly refers to homosexuality as “a sin against humanity”on her Weibo(Chinese Twitter).
Ian Awesome
I am far too gay for cold showers to dissuade me.
12345deviant
@Ian Awesome: dido
Nick
As a gay 17 year old from Hong Kong, this is both surprising and disgusting.
Hong Kong is a special administrative region, so you wouldn’t expect this shit to happen. We have separate laws from China and society here is a lot more accepting, or at least it seems more accepting – people in Hong Kong have a tendency to ignore the parts of society they don’t like.
Just another reason to leave Hong Kong after high school and avoid China like the plague…
Fred
Forty years ago I tried cold showers, prayer, and abstinence. It didn’t work at all.
DannyB
Some people believe the sun rises in the East. But in order to be “balanced” we need to present views of people who believe it rises in the West.
Rainfish
I was taking a cool shower the other day, and feeling some of the “gay” slowing washing off from me (my lover and I just had sex), when all of a sudden he flushed the toilet while I was still in the shower and the water really turned kind of hot and burnt the “gay” right back into me — and then some.
…Funny how that works.
>>>>>>in response to “Hong Kong Government Sponsored Workshop To Cure Gays With Cold Showers”
chrissie riot
I’m going to need to see some pictures of the showers washing the gay off some women before I can really judge this properly. As many as possible. Thanks.
Mike In London UK
Cold showers cure gays …. right. They’ve never been to a British school have they?