Talk:Ego-dystonic sexual orientation

Former loveline host sufferer.
Adam Carolla has claimed on his various radio programs that, though he was not gay/homosexual, he wishes he were because life would be so much easier in his opinion. This would make him an example of a notable individual who meets the self-qualifying diagnosis of 'Ego-dystonic sexual orientation.' 4.255.53.2 (talk) 05:44, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

similarities to some of text under Conversion therapy
Regardless of where one places any material, it must be appropriate for an encyclopedia, must it not? So, one may not expect to hear this here: "Psychotherapy, support groups, and life events can change sexual orientation identity..." You must at least objectify this remark somehow, like "Some non-Psychologists believe..." or something. We all understand how some people want to change, while some do not. Some believe they can change; but most probably are wrong, though not all. These are facts most modern people know from personal experience if it is broad enough. The only two I know for a fact that apparently changed were not seeking change and would not have considered trying to change. The problem is no one can prove they really ever were homosexuals. The idea that a usable change process exists, let alone that anyone has identified it, has never been fulfilled with plentiful and unambiguous results to point to. The encyclopedia should refer all such optimistic theories to some outside link. --JimRodgers (talk) 01:32, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

I noticed that a fair bit of this article shares text with the above - particularly the section about non-professional approaches. Do we need this WP:FRINGE material repeated here, there, and other places? Perhaps it would suffice to provide a 'see also' link for the section to the section in that article, which deals with issues of therapeutic approaches, professional and otherwise, in some detail. Mish (talk) 17:02, 24 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Most of the section on non-professional approaches was originally on the conversion therapy page, but was moved here since it was determined these approaches really weren't conversion therapy. The only thing is on both pages is about Richard Cohen, who started off being professional and then moved to being non-professional, hence he is mentioned both places.  If you think that is redundant, we can remove Richard Cohen. Joshuajohanson (talk) 18:52, 24 July 2009 (UTC)


 * From your edit summary, I don't think you exactly understand what conversion therapy refers to. Conversion therapy is a specific type of professional therapy.  The Catholic Church is not a conversion ministry/therapy. Ex-gay ministries similarly don't practice any type of therapy.  Retreats aren't exactly conversion therapy either.  Where do you suggest putting the information?  The section was originally written for the conversion therapy page, but it was removed from there after it was determined that it really wasn't conversion therapy. Joshuajohanson (talk) 21:29, 24 July 2009 (UTC)


 * I don't know where you put it - but not under a mental health issue. I guess it would go under Ex-Gay ministry, or Christian homosexual ministries.  The relationship to the article is not clear. Mish (talk) 22:30, 24 July 2009 (UTC)


 * In reply to user:Joshuajohanson's comment above: there is no one definition of conversion therapy. Reliable sources give different definitions, and some of them do include religious ministries and ex-gay groups. Born Gay (talk) 22:50, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
 * I think it is rather broad to include churches in the conversion therapy group (Courage maybe, but not the Catholic Church), but if you can find a reliable source that includes them as conversion therapy, I guess they can be moved over there. I would suggest discussing it on the conversion therapy page first. Joshuajohanson (talk) 23:40, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
 * True, churches and their ministries do not belong there - just as sacramental healing would not feature under medicine - it should go under religious topics somewhere. Ex-Gay might be a good place. Mish (talk) 20:27, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

The new findings from the APA task force include a lot of information about religious groups, and how to incorporate their use in psychotherapy, so if they think it is relevant, then I think it should be covered, at the bare minimum it should cover what medical papers cover. As I said, most of this was taken from the conversion therapy page, so most of it is geared towards trying to change the individual's sexual orientation identity, whereas the report gives equal weight to helping clients accept a LGB identity. I started putting in some stubs, but a lot of work needs to be done in order to balance this out. Since I don't know much about LGB support groups and religious organizations, can someone help me with this? Joshuajohanson (talk) 18:36, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Removed information from paper
A lot of information was removed from this article, including: If there is no reason to remove these sentences, I'll put them back in. Joshuajohanson (talk) 21:23, 17 August 2009 (UTC)
 * The therapist should neither promote nor reject the idea of celibacy, but help the client come to their own conclusion by evaluating the reasons behind the patient's goals. supported by the quote "Licensed mental health providers may approach such a situation by neither rejecting nor promoting celibacy but attempting to understand how this outcome is part of the process of exploration, sexual self-awareness, and understanding of core values and goals."
 * These reports of perceptions of harm are countered by accounts of perceptions of relief, happiness, improved relationships with God, and perceived improvement in mental health status, among other reported benefits. (direct quote from report)
 * Participants have reported both harm and benefit from such efforts, but no causal relationship has been determined between either the benefit or the harm Supported by the quote "Although the recent studies do not provide valid causal evidence of the efficacy of SOCE or of its harm, some recent studies document that there are people who perceive that they have been harmed through SOCE, just as other recent studies document that there are people who perceive that they have benefited from it."
 * Psychotherapy, support groups, and life events can change religious identity or sexual orientation identity, but not sexual orientation Supported by the quote "sexual orientation identity, not sexual orientation, appears to change via psychotherapy, support groups, or life events."  This is different from saying it develops.  Even sexual orientation develops across the lifetime of a person.
 * Please provide diffs - I cannot see any recent edits which included these statements. Mish (talk) 23:45, 17 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Yet you remove these statements again. I agree that sexual orientation identity develops across a lifetime, but in that respect, so does sexual orientation.  What is important is that sexual orientation identity can be changed through psychotherapy, support groups and life events. I think it would be redundant to say sexual orientation identity develops across a lifetime, is influenced by life events and can be changed by life events. I also agree that it says there is no evidence that sexual orientation can be changed, but it also says there is no evidence whether or not sexual orientation can be changed. It would be redundant to say both.  It makes more sense to say it together.Joshuajohanson (talk) 15:15, 20 August 2009 (UTC)
 * "Yet you remove these statements again." - yet I asked you to provide diffs, and you didn't. You say these were here, and removed, yet I cannot find them in the history.  So, provide the diffs so I can see where what you say was removed was removed, and check why they were removed (if they ever were there). Mish (talk) 18:10, 20 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Here is the diff. Joshuajohanson (talk) 18:49, 20 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I have put it back in, although it is a bit long-winded, and repetitive. Mish (talk) 22:45, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Sexual orientation can't be changed, period. Claiming that they are merley chainging thier "Sexual ORientation identity" is simply an atempt to get around this with semantics. There is no scientific evidence to the contrary.Kairos (talk) 20:32, 19 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Agreed, I think the weasel words in this article make this page kind of dishonest, harmful even... (99.255.30.132 (talk) 15:02, 27 January 2013 (UTC))
 * I agree with this assessment - The article feels disingenuous and slimy even. I would start over with a clean start on this page.  It feels like other pages and ideas are colonizing this one.  The article should be on the subject - Ego-dystonic sexual orientation or a history of that topic not on how various groups use the topic.  Links to these various pages are all that is necessary.  I would suggest removing 60% of the material as it appears to just duplicate what is else where in the encyclopedia.Eric James Wolf (talk) 16:19, 11 May 2014 (UTC)

This discussion needs to be revisited. I concur with the opinion that there is intellectual dishonesty in the way this page is written. 2602:306:80B0:28E0:D2:A0E1:E403:1D90 (talk) 00:18, 5 September 2015 (UTC)

Moved quotes from lead
The introduction was mostly made up of quoted from ICD.10 code F66.1 (and accompanying note). This did not appear in the article text. The lead is supposed to summarise the article, so I moved the material from ICD.10 to a new section at the beginning of the article called 'diagnosis' (as that is what the codes represent, rather than 'description'). I have summarised the ICD.10 diagnosis and note in the lead. Mish (talk) 00:08, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Reorganization
Instead of dividing professional and non-professional methods, I wanted to reorganize this page in the following manner:
 * 1) Affirming of LGB identity
 * 2) Disidentifying with LGB identity (Either promote another identity such as ex-gay or straight, or promote diminishing of same-sex behaviors or attractions without trying to change sexual orientation)
 * Sexual orientation change efforts (This will be under the Disidentifying with LGB identity section and will eventually be summarized and directed to its own page)

Organizing it in this manner will also be helpful because it would help distinguish which professional statements apply to which method. Joshuajohanson (talk) 15:55, 17 September 2009 (UTC)
 * 1) Exploratory methods (In which outcome is not determined beforehand.)


 * Remember that this is about a psychiatric diagnosis, and having such substantial and detailed attention to treatment/therapy that it dominates the article may make it subject to criticism as off-topic and undue. I also think that a distinction needs to be made between SOCE and therapy aimed at changing sexual orientation identity. Mish (talk) 18:29, 17 September 2009 (UTC)
 * This was an attempt to follow your suggestion to distiguish SOCE from others. I have it as a subsection of Disidentify with LGB.  I wanted something a bit broader than Therapy aimed at changing sexual orientation identity.  Many methods have chastity or celibacy as a goal, and may not change the sexual orientation identity per se, either because that is not the goal, or the person never really had an LGB identity, just reinforcing that disidentification.  I thought Disidentify with LGB was a good alternative, because that doesn't imply that they ever identified with LGB, whereas changing sexual orientation identity has that implication.  However, I am open to suggestions.
 * About your comment about dominating the page with methods. This suggestion is just about reorganization.  I'm not suggesting we add or take away any methods yet.  Hopefully, if I can get the SOCE page going, we can move some of the methods there, but I first wanted to reorganize it to make sure we are on the same page on which methods are SOCE and which ones are not.  I am trying to eventually remove methods, but not yet.  I do think it is perfectly acceptable to have treatments and even social/cultural aspects.  I am looking at other psychiatric diagnosis, and many where there is a known treatment has a section on treatments, and some even have social/cultural section, (eg. Bipolar disorder).  For ego-dystonic sexual orientation, the diagnosis is pretty straight-forward, so there isn't a lot of material on that.  There is some stuff about demographics that would be interesting, like more dominant in religious circles, and those with abusive parents or who were sexually abused (One theory is that they are more likely to reject homosexuality if they place the blame on abuse, which helped contribute to the misconception that homosexuality is caused by abuse, since a huge number of people with ego-dystonic homosexuality had been abused).  I think the article would be improved with some of that stuff and would provide balance, but I see no reason to remove some of the methods until we can get a place to move it to. Joshuajohanson (talk) 19:57, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

Undue weight
The undue weight tag has been placed on the Disidentify with LGB section. I am working on getting the subsection Sexual Orientation Change Efforts to be split off into its own page. Once I do, that subsection will be smaller. Are there other problems with the section as a whole? Joshuajohanson (talk) 18:29, 18 September 2009 (UTC)
 * I've moved it to cover the whole article, as it is not the balance within the section, but the weight the section represents within the article as a whole that is the problem. Mish (talk) 19:01, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

There is definitely A LOT of undue weight in this article. NOTE: this diagnosis is not even in the DSM anymore. It is actively opposed by the APA, who have taken the unusual step of releasing statements about its use in sexual orientation change efforts. The fact that some continue to use it in very marginal practices of conversion/reparative therapy is given far too much weight in wikipedia. Considering that the APA has come as close to saying "SOCE never works and are damaging" as an organization based on scientific consensus ever will, we need to worry about the ethics of what is communicated to wikipedia readers on this page.

One possibility is to edit down the SOCE section significantly, moving all the stuff about techniques to the SOCE page, and retain the APA advice on such techniques here.

The weight should be on the "Identify with LGB" section, by far - given the scientific consensus on the subject 2602:306:80B0:28E0:D2:A0E1:E403:1D90 (talk) 23:46, 4 September 2015 (UTC)

Regent University
The article states: "According to a Regent University website, which describes a client's adoption of the 'gay affirmative' or 'integrative' therapeutic model as a clinical failure, sexual identity therapy is not a form of conversion therapy" The article does not mention that Regent University was founded by Pat Robertson--hardly an unbiased source. Faculty at Regent have complained of a "climate of fear and intimidation” within the school, and there are incidents where freedom of expression on the part of students has been quashed. I think this reference should be removed. Just because a source has the word "University" on it, doesn't make it reliable or encyclopedically NPOV. MishaPan (talk) 17:47, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

Regent University is not a leading figure in research into sexual orientation. Thier assertions on this subject is marginal and not even based on clinical research or any empirical findings. It should be entirely excluded from this page 2602:306:80B0:28E0:D2:A0E1:E403:1D90 (talk) 23:46, 4 September 2015 (UTC)

Update with DSM-5
The DSM-IV the category of "sexual disorder not otherwise specified" including "persistent and marked distress about one’s sexual orientation” is no longer in DSM-5. This article could be updated to reflect this. --Slatecow77 (talk) 19:33, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
 * That would be vital to cover. I cannot quickly find a secondary source stating this. Anything you can point us to? --Nat Gertler (talk) 21:05, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

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Planning a rewrite in light of removal of ego-dystonic sexual orientation from ICD-11
Ego-dystonic sexual orientation has been declassified as a mental disorder by the World Health Organization; the entire section of disease categories related to sexual orientation (part F66) was deleted from the ICD-11, which went into effect in January 2022. I've made updates to the Wikipedia articles for the two other deleted diagnoses, sexual maturation disorder and sexual relationship disorder, and I'd like to rework this page in a similar manner, but with more historical context related to both the ICD and the DSM, since this diagnostic category appeared in both at different times.

I propose removing all content related to treatment, because it doesn't make sense to discuss treatment for something that is no longer considered a disorder by the international medical, psychological, and scientific communities. The working group that recommended the deletion reported: "A literature search revealed no references to evidence-based treatment for F66 disorders. Moreover, there was no evidence that concern about gender identity or sexual orientation requires unique interventions that are substantially different from the common methods of treating distress, anxiety, depression and other mental disorders. The best clinical care for people with a same-sex orientation does not differ from that for their heterosexual counterparts. Therapies aimed at changing a person’s sexual orientation have been deemed outside the scope of ethical practice." The working group's report was peer reviewed by a variety of experts including some from countries that criminalize homosexuality, and none of them made a case for retaining part F66. The recommendations had to be approved by health ministers from all 194 WHO member states in order to make the deletion from the ICD-11.

Furthermore, sexual orientation change efforts, conversion therapy, and ex-gay all have their own articles, which are the best places for content related to those topics.

I'm going to start working on this rewrite and I welcome input and help! RadicalCopyeditor (talk) 03:17, 4 March 2022 (UTC)


 * Rewrite complete! Note: I moved some unique content about gay-affirming psychotherapy to the article devoted to that topic, but there was no other information in the previous "treatment" section of this page that was unique or made sense to retain. I hope readers find this rewritten page helpful in understanding what this diagnosis was, where it came from, and what its impacts were. RadicalCopyeditor (talk) 21:19, 7 March 2022 (UTC)