Federal judge upholds New Jersey’s ban on reparative therapy for minors: exposing children to suicide and sexual immoral confusion
A federal judge has ruled that a New Jersey law barring therapists from trying to eliminate homosexual urges in children does not violate therapists’ freedom of speech or religion. Two New Jersey-based therapists, along with the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality and the American Association of Christian Counselors , had sued to block the law’s enforcement, arguing that that it violates therapists’ free speech rights by prohibiting them from offering their minor patients reparative therapy designed to help them overcome unwanted same-sex attraction . Two New Jersey-based therapists had sued to block the law’s enforcement, arguing that that it violates therapists’ free speech rights. But on Friday, Judge Freda L. Wolfson dismissed the therapists’ case, claiming that the ban “on its face does not target speech, and ‘counseling’ is not entitled to special constitutional protection merely because it is primarily carried out through talk therapy