The Threshold (1/4): What Conversion Therapy Actually Is

Status at 9 October 2026. This series was written on 25 June 2026, the day the government published the Draft Conversion Practices Bill. It is still a draft: GOV.UK, last updated on 1 September 2026, says it “has been shared with Parliament to undergo pre-legislative scrutiny”, and gives no date for its introduction. The analysis is of the draft as published on 25 June 2026. This note will be updated when the Bill’s status changes.

TL;DR

“Conversion therapy” is the attempt to change, suppress or discourage someone’s sexual orientation or gender identity. The word “therapy” is a misnomer — no major medical or psychological body recognises it as legitimate treatment.
It is not usually the clinic people picture. Government-commissioned research found it appears most commonly in religious settings; it also happens in families and through informal pressure, and is often quiet and sustained rather than dramatic.
It isn’t only about turning someone straight or cisgender. It can also be pressure to suppress, hide, or not act on who you are.
The UK’s major psychological and medical bodies hold that these practices — for both sexual orientation and gender identity — are unethical, potentially harmful, and unsupported by evidence.
Galop’s UK survey found nearly one in five LGBT+ people affected — far more among trans and non-binary people.

The phrase “conversion therapy” was everywhere the week this was written, because the government had finally published a draft law to ban it. But in conversation after conversation, I’ve found that a lot of people — including people who broadly support a ban — aren’t sure what the term actually refers to. They picture something rare, clinical, and obviously monstrous. The reality is more ordinary than that, which is exactly why it has been so hard to legislate against. So before any of the law makes sense, it’s worth being plain about what the thing itself is.

It was never therapy

Start with the word, because the word does a lot of quiet work. “Therapy” implies care, a clinician, a problem being treated. None of that is true here. Conversion practice is any sustained attempt — an intervention, a course of counselling, a programme of prayer — carried out with the predetermined aim of changing, suppressing or discouraging a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity. The outcome is decided in advance. The person on the receiving end is not being helped toward their own answer; they are being moved toward someone else’s. Exploratory, person-centred therapy, by contrast, does not predetermine an outcome — which is exactly what makes it a different thing.

The word “therapy” is a misnomer: no major medical or psychological body recognises these practices as legitimate treatment. Many practitioners and survivors prefer the term “conversion practices,” which drops the flattering disguise. Throughout this piece I use both, but the second is the more honest one.

What it actually looks like

The picture most people carry — a sinister clinic, electrodes, something from another era — describes an extreme version. Research commissioned by the Government Equalities Office in 2021 found that modern practices appear to be mainly talking therapies and spiritual interventions: much quieter.

The same research found that they appear most commonly in religious settings. They also happen in families and through informal community pressure, and some may be carried out by healthcare professionals. They run from talking therapies and counselling, through intensive prayer, exorcism and “deliverance,” all the way to coercion, threats, and abuse. And the goal is not always to flip someone to straight or cisgender. Some of it is aimed at getting a person to suppress what they are — to stay silent, to not act on it, to perform a version of themselves that other people find acceptable.

That matters, because the quiet, sustained form is the easiest to miss. It often arrives gently, sometimes from people who sincerely believe they are helping. That is not a softening detail. It is one reason these practices so often go unrecognised for what they are, and can continue for years.

What the evidence says

There is no credible evidence that conversion practices can safely or effectively change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity. Instead, the published evidence consistently associates them with increased psychological distress and poorer mental health outcomes.

This isn’t a fringe position. Through a joint Memorandum of Understanding on Conversion Therapy, the UK’s major psychological and medical bodies — among them the British Psychological Society, the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy, the Royal College of General Practitioners, the British Psychoanalytic Council and NHS England — set out that conversion therapy, in relation to both sexual orientation and gender identity, is unethical, potentially harmful, and unsupported by evidence. First published in 2015 for sexual orientation, it was extended to gender identity in 2017. The professional consensus, in other words, is not that these practices are risky but effective. It’s that they don’t work and they wound.

And the consensus is not only British. The World Psychiatric Association — the global body for the profession — has likewise stated that there is no sound scientific evidence that sexual orientation can be changed, and that offering to “treat” something which is not a disorder is wholly unethical and potentially harmful.

Who it happens to

More people than you’d think. In its UK survey of LGBT+ people, the anti-abuse charity Galop found that nearly one in five — 18% — had been subjected to someone trying to change, “cure” or suppress their sexual orientation or gender identity, rising to 43% of binary trans and 36% of non-binary and gender-diverse respondents. That survey question did not ask who was responsible. A later Galop report, on 195 cases handled by its support service — cases that reached a service, not a representative sample — found that about three in four involved family members, most often parents, and that about four in five involved multiple attempts over time. The pattern that emerges is not the clinic of the popular imagination but the home, the congregation, and the community.

That is why the question of who a ban covers is never academic.

So that’s the thing itself: not rare, not always loud, not usually a clinic, and built on a claim about people that simply isn’t true. Once you can see it clearly, the law makes a lot more sense — including where it falls short. In the next piece, I read the government’s draft Bill and what it actually does about all this.

Sources

Memorandum of Understanding on Conversion Therapy in the UK (first published 2015; extended to gender identity in 2017).
Galop, “There was nothing to fix: LGBT+ survivors’ experiences of conversion practices” (January 2023).
Galop, Still not illegal (2026): 195 cases handled by Galop’s conversion practices support service; not a representative sample.
Government Equalities Office, “Conversion therapy: an evidence assessment and qualitative study” (2021), sections 1.2–1.3 and 4.4.
World Psychiatric Association, position statement on conversion therapy (sexual orientation).

Revision history

Correction — 11 October 2026. This piece made claims about how often conversion practices take particular forms that the evidence does not support. It said they happen “far more often” and “most often” in religious settings, families and informal pressure; that “a great deal” or “a large part” of it seeks suppression; that the quiet form is what “most people actually encounter”; and that “a majority of survivors” said the attempts came from family. The Government Equalities Office’s 2021 research says modern practices appear most commonly in religious settings, and we now say only that. No source we hold measures how much conversion practice seeks suppression. The family figure came from a general question in Galop’s survey, not from its question on conversion practices, and is replaced with figures from Galop’s 2026 report on cases handled by its support service, described as what they are. The Galop percentages are now given for the groups the survey actually reported (binary trans; non-binary and gender-diverse). The argument of the piece is unchanged. Later the same day, two lines added in that correction were themselves corrected. We had written that “only about one in five” of Galop’s cases was a single incident; that was our inference, not Galop’s finding, which is that about four in five involved multiple attempts over time, and the remainder need not all have been single incidents. We had also written that some practices “are carried out” by healthcare professionals, where the 2021 research says healthcare professionals “may be providing” them; the piece now says “may be”.

Updated — 9 October 2026. A dated status note is added at the top: the Bill is still a draft in pre-legislative scrutiny. The opening line, which read “is everywhere this week, because the government has finally published a draft law”, now says the phrase was everywhere the week this was written. The rest of the piece is unchanged.

First published — 25 June 2026.