Can “it” be healed?

Even today, there are charlatans who claim that they can “heal” homosexuality. This is nonsense! Homosexuality, just like heterosexuality, is not a disease. Still, many parents believe they should “heal” their homosexually oriented children, and send them to physically and psychically painful therapy, where they become seriously ill, developing a disturbed relation to their body and their sexuality. Unfortunately, there still are doctors and therapists who offer such “treatment”. Not long ago, some of them tried “curing” homosexuality with electric shocks! Even if these methods are not practiced any more – at least not in Austria – there are other, tormenting ways of putting homosexual persons “back on the right track”.

Sexuality is nothing unnatural. It is not a perversion. Homosexual women and men have existed in every culture, at all times. Without clear figures, scientists estimate that five to ten percent are gay or lesbian. The sway comes from the fact that, because of dominant social discrimination, homosexual women and men often do not dare state their sexual orientation in surveys. The declaration of homosexuality depends on the general social and cultural setting.