The Twisted News

The Republicans are quietly twisting the meaning of conversion therapy in to something nasty. They are saying that Conversion Therapy bans include our healthcare! But they want insurance to pay for detransition costs.

Jennifer Lawrence roasts Mike Pence over LGBTQ conversion therapy

Hunger Games star Jennifer Lawrence roasted Mike Pence at the GLAAD Media Awards, joking that the former US vice president was secretly gay and had gone through conversion therapy. 

Pink News

By Emily Chudy

May 14, 2024

During the LGBTQ+ organisation’s 35th annual media awards on Saturday (11 May), which was disrupted by a pro-Palestine protest, Lawrence took to the stage to tear into Pence’s alleged support for conversion therapy. 

Joking that she had once fallen in love with a gay man and tried to “convert” him, before realising that “conversion therapy doesn’t work”, Lawrence went on to target Pence, quipping that he must be secretly gay. 

“Did you hear me, Mike Pence?” Lawrence said. “I said: ‘Conversion therapy is not real’, even though you think it worked on you.”

While Pence has denied supporting the practice – which purports to change a person’s sexuality or gender identity – opponents, highlighting his well-publicised broadly anti-LGBTQ+ views, have claimed the former presidential candidate backs the idea.

There have been a couple of bills to say the trans healthcare is really “Conversion Therapy.” The Florida Phoenix writes,

Florida House Republicans approved a proposal Monday that would require health insurance companies providing gender-affirming care for transgender people to also cover therapies to affirm a person’s sex assigned at birth — otherwise known as conversion therapy.

The sponsor of HB 1639, GOP Rep. Douglas Michael Bankson representing parts of Orange and Seminole counties, said he doesn’t intend to make anyone choose to reverse transition procedures but that he wants to make that choice more accessible.

The legislation mainly focuses on mandating coverage of detransition treatments to reverse the process of gender-affirming care such as hormone replacement therapy. However, Bankson also plans to swap gender for sex assigned at birth in state driver’s licenses and IDs.

While down in Arizona the Arizona Mirror writes about that state’s effort,

“This is a pretty normal tactic from any anti-LGBTQ elected official to find maybe the couple of folks who have had bad experiences and maybe decided to detransition — and again, that’s up to them — and use it as an example for every single transgender person in the country,” Sharpe said. “It becomes this sort of scare tactic and feeds into this disinformation machine that anti-equality elected officials have been feeding into for the past several years.”

Senator Kelda Helen Roys of Wisconsin wrote on her state webpage,

Today, Republicans voted to suspend a rule preventing state-licensed counselors and therapists from subjecting youth to so-called “conversion therapy,” a discredited and abusive practice that purports to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity. 

Sen. Kelda Roys: “‘Conversion therapy’ is child abuse and has no place in Wisconsin. This discriminatory, harmful practice should be banned to protect every child. As Republican legislative leaders have called for good faith efforts to work with Gov. Evers and Democrats, it’s disappointing that one of their first official actions is to use vulnerable children as pawns in their right-wing culture war.

“Actions like this send a clear message to LGBTQ children and families that they aren’t welcome in Wisconsin. It contributes to the outflow of young professionals and working families leaving the state to live in more inclusive places. Worst of all, conversion therapy causes concrete harm to vulnerable young people – including increased risk of depression, drug use, homelessness, and suicide.”

Rep. Sue Conley: “Today’s vote by Republicans is deeply disappointing and disturbing. ‘Conversion therapy’ has no basis in science and is adamantly opposed by professionals in the counseling field. This practice has been proven to put youth at risk of psychological harm. Allowing conversion therapy in Wisconsin reverses the decision made by professional social workers and experts to ban the practice in their profession. Politicians have no business interfering in the work of mental health experts, especially when it involves our children.”

And it is not just the states, the House Republicans added this amendment according to Roll Call.

House Republicans who waged fierce political battles over Obamacare and abortion after that have found a new focus as the lead-up to the 2024 elections: gender-affirming care for transgender Americans.

They’ve added riders on seven of the 12 House fiscal 2024 appropriations bills that would put restrictions on gender-affirming care, which can be anything from hormone therapy to surgical care to insurance coverage of either.

The fight has extended beyond spending bills into policy measures as well: They’ve held up traditionally bipartisan programs to pay for pediatrician training over hospitals’ decisions to provide such care. Another bill would create a global gag rule for gender-affirming care similar to the Mexico City policy for abortion care.

That is the Republican version of Doublespeak which Wikipedia defines as…

Doublespeak is language that deliberately obscures, disguises, distorts, or reverses the meaning of words. Doublespeak may take the form of euphemisms (e.g., "downsizing" for layoffs and "servicing the target" for bombing), in which case it is primarily meant to make the truth sound more palatable. It may also refer to intentional ambiguity in language or to actual inversions of meaning. In such cases, doublespeak disguises the nature of the truth.

Doublespeak is most closely associated with political language.

That sure does sound like what the Republicans are doing! And you can bet your bottom dollar that if Trump wins and the Republicans gain control of Congress you will see legislation on a national level as those laws that the Republican states have passed!

So the next time you hear Republicans talking about a ban on Conversion Therapy beware; what they are really talking about is a ban of trans healthcare!

They want to wipe us off the face of this earth!

Vote Blue and save lives!