A former student contacted me during this debate to share that she was watching the streaming Minnesota House floor session with her daughter, who is studying civics in high school in Greater Minnesota.
When asked I shared resources on the Legislature's webpage for the daughter to use in preparing a presentation for class. That sure sounds more lively than my high school course.
At Session Daily, Tessa Pieper reports in Minnesota a step closer to banning conversion therapy following House passage:
For LGBTQIA+ youth, conversion therapy intends to fundamentally change their identity.
“We must move past the idea that queer people, especially our children, can choose their sexuality or gender identity and let them show up as their full, glorious, authentic selves,” said Rep. Athena Hollins (DFL-St. Paul).
She said conversion therapy is a discredited practice opposed by every mainstream medical and mental health organization.
Hollins sponsors HF16 that’d ban conversion therapy for children and vulnerable adults. It was passed 81-47, as amended, Monday by the House. It now moves to the Senate.
“How many of you second guess holding your spouse’s hand in public? How many get advice from strangers on which public restroom to use?” asked Rep. Brion Curran (DFL-Vadnais Heights). “This is the reality of being queer in America and it comes from the notion that people can be abused into conformity.”
Rep. Larry Kraft (DFL-St. Louis Park) said conversion therapy has been shown to cause serious and dangerous harm to those who undergo it, including depression, anxiety, lowered self-esteem, alienation and increased suicidal behaviors.
Unlike their cisgender, heterosexual peers, many queer kids undergo forms of talk therapy, as well as more extreme practices like electroshock or aversion therapy intending to change their sexual orientation or gender identity.
That’s not all the bill would address.
Similar to Gov. Tim Walz’s executive order prohibiting insurance companies and health care plans from paying for conversion therapy, the bill would bar medical assistance from covering it.
False or fraudulent misrepresentations of conversion therapy would be forbidden, such as guarantees of changing someone’s identity or portraying homosexuality as a mental disease, disorder or illness.
If it does not seek to change someone’s sexual orientation or gender identity, mental health professionals or practitioners could continue to provide counseling to people undergoing gender transition or any counseling that relates to identity exploration and development.
Rep. Anne Neu Brindley (R-North Branch) offered the only amendment that was adopted. It would limit the language of the bill and its implications on conversion therapy to a therapist-client relationship.
Neu Brindley voted for the bill, along with ten other Republicans, according to page 59 of the Journal of the House.
At the Star Tribune, Ryan Faircloth reported in Minnesota House votes to ban conversion therapy for minors about a distraction offered by Alexandria Republican Mary Franson:
. . .The House discussion on the conversion therapy bill segued for a time to the topic of gender-transition medical services. Rep. Mary Franson, R-Alexandria, proposed and later withdrew an amendment to ban those services for minors.
"We're talking about minors here. Children who do not know what they want for dinner half the time," Franson said.
Democrats, including the state's first transgender lawmaker, Rep. Leigh Finke, criticized Franson's motion.
"You want to ban gender-affirming care for minors. What you want to do is you want to make sure minors never grow up to be me," Finke said. . . .
Here's the Minnesota House Information Services YouTube of the House floor debate on the bill:
We're curious how many Republicans in the Senate will vote with the DFL majority there.
Photo: "Affirming & celebrating youth as who they are —banning the dangerous & discredited practice of conversion therapy. Rep @AthenaHollins working to change lives, improve lives and save lives." From a tweet by State Representative Liz Olson. DFL-Duluth.
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