Conversion therapy is the practice of attempting to change an individual’s sexual orientation. It is an age-old practice that has frequently proven ineffective as studies have developed.
On January 25, 2022, French President Emmanuel Macron took to Twitter stating “The law prohibiting conversion therapy is adopted unanimously.” Anyone convicted under this new law would be fined or face a lengthy jail term.
As reported by BBC, the European Island of Malta became the first European nation in 2016 to ban conversion therapy. A study by Cornell University, a privately-financed research university in Ithaca, New York, stated that “there is no credible evidence that sexual orientation can be changed through therapeutic intervention”.
Likewise, former Icelandic Prime Minister Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir, the first openly gay Head of State iterates in the report, “it is absolutely imperative that every human being’s freedom and human rights are respected, all over the world.”
Read the entire report here.