--- title: Gay Conversion Therapy: Ex-Leaders Sign Letter Calling for Ban description: Former members of organizations that advocated therapy to "cure" homosexuality have joined LGBT groups in rejecting the concept. canonical: https://time.com/3065495/9-ex-leaders-of-the-gay-conversion-therapy-movement-apologize/ author: Maya Rhodan article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-07-31T20:16:37.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:45:27.101Z og:title: Gay Conversion Therapy: Ex-Leaders Sign Letter Calling for Ban og:description: Former members of organizations that advocated therapy to "cure" homosexuality have joined LGBT groups in rejecting the concept. og:url: https://time.com/3065495/9-ex-leaders-of-the-gay-conversion-therapy-movement-apologize/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Gay Conversion Therapy: Ex-Leaders Sign Letter Calling for Ban twitter:description: Former members of organizations that advocated therapy to "cure" homosexuality have joined LGBT groups in rejecting the concept. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # 9 Ex-Leaders of the Gay Conversion Therapy Movement Apologize > Sponsored content. 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Worth Your Time is TIME's culture recommendation newsletter, edited by culture editor Eliza Berman. Twice a week it surfaces the books, shows, films and ideas TIME's editors think are worth your attention, and explains why. It is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Does TIME have a culture newsletter? Yes. Worth Your Time is TIME's culture newsletter, published Tuesdays and Saturdays. #### Who writes TIME's culture recommendations? Culture editor Eliza Berman writes Worth Your Time, drawing on TIME's critics and culture desk. #### Is Worth Your Time free? Yes. It is a free newsletter available at time.com/newsletters. ## Video: How 2 Gay Men Live in a Country Where Homosexuality Is Illegal [Watch (HLS stream): How 2 Gay Men Live in a Country Where Homosexuality Is Illegal](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/qq80V8ai.m3u8) (2:58)  _Published 2014-07-30. Brave, young homosexuals speak out in a country where their entire lives are illegal._ by [Maya Rhodan](https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/) ## Maya Rhodan Jul 31, 2014 8:16 PM UTC by [Maya Rhodan](https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/) ## Maya Rhodan Jul 31, 2014 8:16 PM UTC Yvette Schneider spent a little over a decade as an active participant and a leader in the gay conversion therapy movement. In other words, she spent years working to convince men and women that they could stop being gay, lesbian, or bisexual through suppression and therapy. But in 2010 she began to see things differently. At the time, Schneider did not share her feelings with her colleagues, but that same year, she was let go from her position as the director of the women’s ministry at Exodus International— a leading sexual orientation conversion organization that closed in 2013. “I realized that no one was actually saying, ‘I’m straight,” she explains, referring to the post-treatment disposition of the Exodus clients she saw. “You can go through years of therapy and what are you left with—shame?” Schneider, now 48, realized that simply leaving the movement wasn’t enough. On Monday, she officially apologized for her involvement in the anti-gay movement in an open letter published by [GLAAD](http://www.glaad.org/blog/change-possible-ex-gay-activist-yvette-schneider-celebrates-worthiness-and-equality-all-people). And on Thursday she joined with eight other former leaders in the ex-gay movement to formally come out against the controversial practice in an open letter and support a widespread ban of the practice on minors. “We know first-hand the terrible emotional and spiritual damage it can cause, especially for LGBT youth,” reads the letter, published by the [National Center for Lesbian Rights](http://www.nclrights.org/former-ex-gay-leaders-unite-in-opposition-to-conversion-therapy/). “We once believed that there was something morally wrong and psychologically ‘broken’ about being LGBT. We know better now.” The former gay conversion leaders, including Schneider, Brad Allen, Darlene Bogle, Michael Bussee, Catherine Chapman, Jeremy Marks, Bill Prickett, Tim Rymel, and John Smid, are joining the National Center for Lesbian Rights’ #BornPerfect movement aimed at expanding state bans on conversion therapy. “Conversion therapy reinforces internalized homophobia, anxiety, guilt and depression. It leads to self-loathing and emotional and psychological harm when change doesn’t happen,” the letter reads. “We now stand united in our conviction that conversion therapy is not “therapy,” but is instead both ineffective and harmful. Currently, California and New Jersey are the only two states that have laws in place to ban the practice of using therapy to try to “cure” minors of homosexuality, though a Michigan lawmaker introduced a bill last week that would ban the practice on minors. In fact, the Texas Republican Party [formally endorsed](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/21/texas-gay-conversion%5Fn%5F5518490.html) gay conversion treatments in their official platform in June. Yet, the American Medical Association, the American Psychological Association and most leading professional medical and social science organizations oppose the therapy given its basis in the idea that homosexuality is “curable.” “The idea that homosexuality is a mental disorder or that the emergence of same-sex attraction and orientation among some adolescents is in anyway abnormal or unhealthy has no support among any mainstream health and mental health professional organizations,” reads an American Psychological Association brochure titled “[Just the Facts about Sexual Orientation and Youth](http://www.apa.org/pi/lgbt/resources/just-the-facts.pdf).” Michael Bussee, co-founder of Exodus International who has been speaking out against conversion therapy since 1989, says Thursday’s letter was the next step for leaders in the movement after [Exodus closed](http://www.cnn.com/2013/06/20/us/exodus-international-shutdown/). Now, he says their efforts should be focused on educating the public and ending the practice. “There will be people who will be understandably upset, leaders can’t undo the harm they caused while they’re a part of these programs,” says Bussee who in 2007 publicly apologized for his work in the movement from 1976 until 1979\. “All we can do know is say this harm needs to stop.” ## Transcript It's no one's intention, right, to be gay. People have, have, have brought something up that this is devilish. This is evil. This is an abomination. This, this, this is, this is that. It's very difficult being gay in Ghana. Most people, most MSMs in Ghana, the gays in Ghana want to come out. It hurts that, you know, you are doing something, you are in, doing something. And you want [ MUSIC ] You want people to hear you, you want people to see you, you want to come out. And it's like it's being difficult for you to do it. It's really hurting. If i'm in my family, and I'm gay. That's fine. You won't know what someone in your family is engaged to. Or en, engaging him or himself into. You may see me to be gay, I'm open, I'm out now. How could you tell? How will you see that maybe your junior brother, your elder brother, your father or your grandfather, is engaging himself [ FOREIGN ] When I go out, I limit myself. I don't dance. I don't talk too much, I don't walk too much, I sit. I do everything I want to do sitting, but when I am with him, he tells me you are yourself be yourself. So when I am with him I'm able to move a bit, but not the way I would really want to be when I'm with, when I'm alone with him. With him or when we are with other people who are just like us. I went out for a party. And then when I was coming back, I happened to meet a new friend. And he, he came from a very far place so I had to go home with. Came to stay with me. And then he came to spend the night with me. And then, unfortunately something happened. And then my parents- my mommy happened to bump in, onto it, so she saw everything. She started screaming, my daddy came in. And then they packed my things and then threw me out of the house. In the morning. In Ghana, everybody is culturally and religiously blinded. They think that it's uncultural, it's unreligious, it's demonic and everything. So I pray a time comes when we decide to change and be like the western countries. Being a human rights activist. I'm helping and defending my LGBT friends. Telling them and letting them know that there's hope for the future. No matter what it takes. No matter what it takes. There will be a time which things will get all right and things will get stable. My fellow MSMs or gays don't want. Nothing to be legalized. 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