Tag: lgbt

Shocking Treatment!

Is the media erasing trans history?

This month is LGBTQ+ history month. A month where we both look back through LGBTQ+ history and consider where we are in relation to that.

In December 2025, the BBC aired a documentary on shock treatment for LGB(T)Q+ people. This is known as ‘aversion therapy’ and has strong links to the conversion ‘therapy’ (Davison et al. 2024) that TACTT stands against now. 

Aversion therapy is at its core a behaviourist treatment. It would be too easy to disavow ‘aversion therapy’ as in no way linked to conversion therapy, but when we consider that ‘cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT)’ is considered a type of talking therapy currently available, and that aversion therapy is a type of behavioural treatment, it becomes easier to see the links between the two. This is not in any way to suggest that CBT is aversion or conversion therapy by default; merely to show how aversion and conversion ‘therapies’ are linked and why we are talking about them as part of our history.

At TACTT we stand against all types of conversion practices, and we also stand for the inclusion of trans people in any policy against conversion practices. Inevitably this has meant showing that trans people have always been a part of the narrative – one of the arguments for excluding trans people from any policy on conversion practices has been that there is ‘no evidence’ to suggest that this has ever happened, and therefore we don’t need to include trans people (thus leaving the way clear for this to be accepted). Our history matters for our future. The media representation of both our history and our imagined futures, shape the landscape that we are all situated in, whatever our relationship to sex and gender. This must be accurate where we have the information, and clear that we do not, where we do not. Anything else risks harm.

TACTT’s guest post from Hel Spandler, professor at the University of Lancashire, for LGBTQ+ history month, shows us that trans people have always been included in this horrific practice, and that erasure of trans people’s narratives continues to exist in the present day media conversations.

Shocking Treatment!

Is the media erasing trans history?

Hel Spandler, Professor of Mental Health Studies, University of Lancashire

The mainstream media seems to be fascinated with contemporary stories relating to trans people, especially trans women, and debating trans rights. Yet, at the same time, the media appears to erase trans people’s existence, potentially reinforcing the idea that being trans is a recent phenomenon or a fad. Moreover, it downplays the historical relationship between trans oppression and lesbian and gay oppression. 

For example, following a BBC investigation and subsequent documentary (‘Shock Treatment’), aired on 5th December 2025, the UK Government has apologised for the practice of subjecting LGBT+ people to a particularly crude and unpleasant example of conversion practice, known as Aversion Therapy in NHS hospitals in the early 1960’s to the early 1970’s.  This involved subjecting LGBT people to electric shocks (and emetics) to try and change their sexuality or gender.  Whilst the existence of this ‘therapy’ is nothing new to historians and activists, the documentary did an excellent job of bringing its attention to a wider audience and highlighting LGBT survivors’ calls for acknowledgment and justice.  

However, subsequent BBC coverage of the investigation primarily referred to the treatment of sexuality, rather than sexuality and gender.  Unfortunately, this confusion resulted in critics on social media complaining that the BBC was merely “pandering to the trans lobby” by erroneously using the acronym ‘LGBT’ when the treatment was “overwhelming inflicted on gay men and lesbians”.  Yet the documentary was historically correct in referring to LGB&T people suffering from this practice. 

Research and personal testimonies clearly indicate that many trans (as well as bisexual) people were treated with aversion therapy as well as gay men and lesbians.  Indeed, a recent summary of the available evidence concluded that:

“It is reasonable to assert that while men with sexual desire towards other men were most likely to undergo this ‘treatment’, the next largest LGBTQ+ target group included people who ‘cross-dressed’ and those who may now be understood as trans” (Davison et al. 2024).

The oppression of people with non-normative sexualities and genders is deeply intertwined, and behavioural psychologists who practiced Aversion Therapy attempted to change people’s behaviour by associating their ‘undesirable’ behaviour with pain (whether through giving the person electric shocks or making them vomit by giving them emetics). If the undesirable presentation was ‘homosexuality’, then the stimuli used were homoerotic (sexualised images of the same sex). However, if it was ‘transvestite’ or ‘transsexual’ presentation, then the stimuli centred on images of the sex or gender which aligned with the person’s identity.  In other words, trans women would be given electric shocks (or emetics) when shown images of women. 

My study of lesbian and bisexual women’s experience of aversion therapy was only able to identify ten individuals who were ‘treated’ for female same sex desire by this method (Spandler and Carr 2022).  It is possible that more were affected, but there has been no dedicated study of trans people’s experience of this treatment in the UK.  Yet we know that there were more cases of trans feminine people subjected to this practice, including people who were then referred to as ‘transexuals’, ‘male transvestites’ and ‘cross dressers’ (note: I am not aware of any examples of ‘crossing dressing’ women or trans men treated with this method, although they might have been).

Therefore, rather than pandering to ‘gender ideology’, it could be argued that the media coverage is contributing to the erasure of trans people, especially trans women, and undermining public knowledge about trans history and oppression.

Whilst this might seem like an insignificant and innocent mistake, it is set within a broader context of a trans moral panic, especially about trans women – who, as we’ve seen, were one of the main targets of aversion therapy. Moreover, it has important implications for discussions about a trans inclusive ban on conversion therapy.    

I hope any inquiry will lead to a great awareness of extent of this practice, and restorative justice for all victims and survivors. This is not about blame and punishment – that would simply apply the flawed logic of Aversion Therapy. Rather it is about acknowledging, understanding – and hopefully preventing – the harm that all forms of conversion therapy can do.

Meanwhile, although aversion therapy is no longer used to treat people’s gender or sexuality, some autistic people, people with learning difficulties and mental health conditions are still subject to crude behavioural ‘reward and punishment’ techniques in mental health services (such as exclusion, segregation and restraint).  Moreover, LGBT+ conversion therapy is a spectrum and, whilst Aversion Therapy was a particularly crude and sadistic method, subtle and not-so-subtle techniques are still used to suppress or change LGBT+ people’s sexuality and gender.

 References

Davison, K., Hubbard, K., Marks, S., Spandler, H., & Wynter, R. (2025). An inclusive history of LGBTQ+ aversion therapy: past harms and future address in a UK context. Review of General Psychology, 29(1), 33-48.

Spandler H., & Carr S. (2022). Lesbian and bisexual women’s experiences of aversion therapy in England. History of the Human Sciences, 35(3-4), 218–236. 

Inspiration for inclusive practice and creating safe(r) spaces

This book review comes from another of our members.

Supporting Trans People of Colour: How to Make Your Practice Inclusive. By Sabah Choudrey

London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers, 2022

Paperback, 208 pages, £16.99. ISBN: 978-1787750593

I begin by acknowledging the lens through which I read this book and am writing now: I am a trans/non-binary psychotherapist; I am white, in my 50s, middle-class and neurodivergent.

On beginning to read Supporting Trans People of Colour: How to Make Your Practice Inclusive, I was struck by the author’s approach: Choudrey combines their own lived experience with voices from the community (via an anonymous survey) and with the voices, frameworks and tools of elders, researchers, leaders and organisations (for example, BARC Collective, adrienne maree brown, Brené Brown, Justice Founders and many more). This was a very powerful thread throughout the book and I experienced the writing as though it was flowing from a broad collection of lived experience and wisdom.

My second impression was of the holding and educating that is done by Choudrey. While the first section (Identity and Intersectionality) provides an extremely helpful resource on terminology, language, white privilege, cis privilege and the experience of trans people of colour in the UK in various areas (criminal justice, healthcare, faith, etc.), I wish that such education did not fall on the shoulders of those within the community and I acknowledge the effort it must have taken to put this book together.

The chapter Creating a Safe(r) Space was illuminating to me. Safety is such an important theme for the trans community and the encouragement to think about not being able to guarantee safe spaces but to “be accountable to harmdoing and transparent to risk taking” (p.67) in order to create safe(r) spaces, was very helpful for my own thinking about safety and the spaces I offer as a therapist, raising my awareness of my own responsibility. Equally, asking the question: “safer for whom?” (p.67) has already proven helpful to me in group and institutional settings to think more deeply about privilege and how I inhabit spaces. 

Similarly, the chapter Holding a Safe(r) Space outlines the need for us to be active in this endeavour, especially given the fact that trans people are often not allowed by society to take up space. Choudrey continually encourages us to think about intersectionality and overlapping areas of oppression, and this chapter offers helpful sections to understand not just race and gender, but also sexuality, dis/ability, language, access, and class. I admit that class is not an area that I have given a lot of thought to, and this section highlighted my hesitation to think about class privilege, providing me with a great starting point for doing some personal work in this area. The recommendations and discussion in this section have helped me to begin my reflections on how class and classism might impact my work.

Any topic around oppression can feel overwhelming to tackle, but this book offers many practical and manageable starting points for professionals and organisations (therapists, healthcare professionals, charities, educators, and others). The range of subjects covered is broad but always comes back to lived experience and meaningful actions. For example, there were some small actions I could immediately take in my therapy practice, even as I was reading the section on Agreements, contracts and policies. I reviewed my contract and added more detail to provide greater transparency. I also added a task to my calendar to review it regularly because, as Choudrey reminds us, inclusion is an ongoing process. In the chapter Celebrate and Commemorate, I found the calendar of cultural, historical, and social events useful – I know how isolating it can feel if a significant day is not acknowledged by those around us, and educating myself about events important to other communities feels like an easy, supportive step to take.

The book contains moments to pause: breaks in the text in the form of boxes with points to reflect on. I found these challenging, inspiring, interesting… There were parts that raised questions requiring deeper self-examination and ongoing work, such as: Where do I hold influence in my life? How can I take responsibility for widening my circle and experience? Where is my collusion? What do I not see in my much-valued trans spaces?

The other chapters in the book include one entitled Practice (especially helpful for organisations, covering tokenism, visibility, and accessibility – whether your spaces are online or in-person – advertising and recruitment, and partnerships and funding) and one called Exclusion and Inclusion, which includes a 10-point summary for making your practice inclusive.

The care I have experienced in the trans community is something that is very precious and supportive to me, it helps me thrive in life. This book brought into sharp focus the whiteness of my trans spaces, and I realised with sadness that I do not think enough about how these spaces could be safer for trans people of colour. I want our community to be accessible and welcoming to all. Supporting Trans People of Colour provided me with practical ways to think about transforming my community spaces, as well as a wealth of information and points for further reflection. I ended the book feeling empowered.

A book review: The Queer Mental Health Workbook

We asked some of our members if they would care to read various books around working with LGBTQ+ topics, and write book reviews. Here is a review from one of our members, who has approached the reading of this book from the point of view of being a therapist who might want to explore this book as a way to work with clients.

The Queer Mental Health Workbook
A creative self help guide using CBT, CFT and DBT
Dr. Brendan J. Dunlop

Dr. Dunlop’s book definitely fits the criteria of self-help, and shares some of the positive and negative features of this genre. On the positive side, it does offer practical (rather than creative, if I’m being picky) exercises that are easy to complete and buying the book gives you access to downloadable versions of resources too including some colouring sheets which, while not being exactly creative, does encourage the reader to get their felt tip pens out.


Dr. Dunlop puts his ideas in a broader context which helps get perspective and adds meaning to what we are reading or being encouraged to try. He often writes as if he is speaking directly to the reader which gives it a pleasant immediacy and directness and moments of honesty and familiarity would definitely, in my opinion, make a reader feel less alone (for example the list, in the chapter on identity, of very recognisable comments that queer people might find themselves exposed to).


Other useful aspects included in the chapter on self-acceptance and self-compassion, a table on what might be behind things such as self-harm, substance misuse, disordered eating and self-neglect, and Dr Dunlop offers a deep dive in side boxes in the test (for example, giving some background to Section 28 [the prohibition on teaching about ‘homosexuality’ in high schools that was in place 1988-2000/2003 depending on whether you lived in Scotland or England and Wales] and how it could have impacted queer people’s mental health).


The book is very broad, so there’s bound to be something in there for almost everyone and readers are encouraged to go directly to the chapters that will be most relevant to them. However, in this breadth comes some of the aspects of the book that I found less helpful. The exercises, because they are designed to be accessible and applicable to a wide range of people, can come across as quite simple and for me, did not have enough depth and the text was similarly general. 

Some concepts or ideas about concepts were presented as facts without acknowledging that they might not be true for all and a several concepts felt over-explained and overly simplified. I felt frustrated at what felt like ‘talking down to’ the reader.


As a therapist, I would recommend using exercises from this book in a personalised way in sessions with clients, tweaking them to suit the needs of your clients and guiding clients through them rather than just handing it over to a client. I felt, in its current form, it would be best suited to teenagers but for them, the patronising (in my opinion) feel of much of the voice could alienate and annoy them, making them feel that things are being overexplained. Having said that, when the author does go deeper (for example the activity on ‘identity in context’ in chapter 4), it seemed to me to be a lot more useful and beneficial.


In summary, do selectively read this book and choose the exercises you would share carefully, personalising them to your clients and putting them in the context of your clients’ lives and experiences. To be fair to Dr. Dunlop, this is hard to do in a very generalised book, and he does make it clear that a reader should choose the parts that work for them. There are some useful parts here, and it is worth making the effort to find them by zooming in directly to the chapters that seem relevant to your clients and personalising what you offer so it is meaningful to them and presented with respect, with free choice and with acknowledgement that one size certainly doesn’t fit all and ‘facts’ are to be handled with caution.