Surely their must be countless varieities of therapy that involve the patient and the professional mainataining complete and utter silence. It’s not like every single form of therapy ever created involved speaking to the client and that this same argument could be used to defend any sort of quackery you wished.

“Well yeah theirs absolutely no proof that me dancing around patients singing Beatles songs cures bipolar people, but I demand the state license me because it’s my freedom of speech!”

Is it merely a ‘ viewpoint’ that cancer can be cured using drugs? Does the State allow snake oil salesmen?

Having wrongly applied strict scrutiny, the Judge then messes up on the evidence supporting the protection of minors. The very reason that there isn’t voluminous evidence to support the conclusion that so-called SOCE is harmful, is because it would be unethical to use the kind of randomised control science he seemed to be looking for, in a field where mental health professionals, (real ones, not the pretend priests of delusion aka Plaintiffs in this appeal) ALL agree that homosexuality is not a disorder, least of all to find evidence from minors.

Does the State need an RCT and longitudinal study to ban unorthodox risky psychologically invasive treatments to change left handers to right handers? That would be a return to the dark ages of neurological ignorance. No one would tolerate the collection of evidence to prove or disprove harm there. We no longer live in that age, except apparently for the Eastern Distict Court of CA.

Homosexuality doesn’t render a person anti social, or incapable of being productive, law abiding, responsible and self reliant.

The only criteria for a psychiatrist to get involved is if any of those issues are compromised by one’s emotional problems.
Which can also plague a heterosexual.
Yes, I’m with Ben on this.

Even someone claiming change into a heterosexual, needs to be honest about what made them want to be heterosexual.
Societal coercion? Not wanting to face prejudice or discrimination?
Nobody wants that.
But exploiting these factors is another matter.
And no business, claiming a compassionate reason, would exploit their client because of vulnerability to societal prejudice.
Nor engage in tactics that fomented the prejudice.
Certainly a minor, a child under the control of their parents would HAVE to be forced into this therapy.
No credentialed professional is allowed to tell a client their kid has cancer, knowing the parents and kid fear cancer.
They can’t say they have it when they don’t, then proceed to give them untested treatments to cure something that isn’t problematic to the individual. It’s problematic to those around them.
Big difference.
I don’t see how any legal analyst would say that this therapy deserves a free speech pass when it endangers young people this way.

Should be fun.