Conversion Therapy Bill in Canada Gets a Unanimous Vote

Conversion therapy is officially outlawed in Canada. A bill making it a criminal offense to provide, promote, advertise, or profit from conversion therapy—used in an effort to change a person's sexual orientation or identity—unanimously passed the Senate "with little debate and no committee study" on Tuesday, less than a week after it unanimously passed the House of Commons, per CTV News. The bill—which additionally bars a person from removing a "child from Canada with the intention that the child undergo conversion therapy outside Canada"—then received Governor General Mary Simon's royal assent on Wednesday, making it law. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau celebrated the ban on the
"despicable and degrading practice" in a tweet.

The bill defines conversion therapy, discredited by various medical associations and already banned in certain jurisdictions, as a practice intended to "change an individual's sexual orientation to heterosexual, change a person's gender identity to cisgender or change their gender expression to conform to the sex assigned to the person at birth," per Axios. The practice, which once involved shock therapy, is carried out by licensed clinicians, but more often by religious leaders. Criminal offenses will take effect in 30 days, meaning as of Jan. 7, anyone who causes someone to undergo conversion therapy could face up to five years in prison, per CTV. A person who promotes, advertises, or profits from conversion therapy could face up to two years in prison.

"I'm really happy and hopeful that no other person will have to go through what I had to go through," Jules Sherred of British Columbia tells CityNews. He says he underwent conversion therapy at age 17, as he was uncomfortable with his assigned gender, but was left suicidal into his 30s. It's often presented "as trauma therapy or reparative therapy" for trans and nonbinary people, with gender dysphoria blamed on past trauma, he explains, adding, "If you are not working through that trauma and not feeling comfortable in your body, then you are basically failing." Other countries, including Malta and Germany, have also imposed bans on the practice, in addition to 20 US states, per CNN. (That includes Utah.)