by Veronica Esposito<\/p>\n
As a therapist licensed by the State of California, I am required to provide a client with a printed copy of the 16-page pamphlet Therapy Never Includes Sexual Behavior<\/a> whenever anyone discloses a sexual relationship with a therapist to me. This is just one of the many ways that the State restricts or compels my speech as a licensed clinician.<\/p>\n While on the job I also must be careful to remain within my scope of practice, which means that if I give financial or medical advice to my clients, I could end up in big trouble, even though conversations about health and money frequently come up during therapy. If I find out that one of my teen clients has texted a nude photo to a peer, I must immediately report that as child pornography\u2014even if it\u2019s a purely consensual choice between unwitting youth.<\/p>\n Every therapist is extremely aware of these mandates, as we can end up in serious trouble if we do not follow them. So I was rather surprised to see that in the Supreme Court case Chiles v. Salazar, which challenged a Colorado law banning therapists from practicing conversion therapy, a majority of justices seemed to support the view that the government cannot regulate many forms of speech made by counseling professionals. As summarized by Chris Geidner<\/a>:<\/p>\n Colorado\u2019s effort to justify the law as a traditional licensing law, Gorsuch wrote, doesn\u2019t work. \u201c[W]hatever traditional interest a State may have in ensuring a professional possesses a particular set of qualifications, that interest does not automatically entail a right to dictate a professional\u2019s point of view,\u201d he concluded for the court.<\/p>\n This is complete nonsense for at least two reasons.<\/p>\n First of all, in this case efforts to eliminate conversation therapy do not come down to a mere \u201cpoint of view.\u201d Numerous pieces of research have shown<\/a> that the practice of conversion therapy is not only useless, it is incredibly harmful. States certainly have an interest in regulating harmful practices, particularly when they are performed on minors who lack the agency to reject therapeutic treatments that their parents may subject them to. As a professional, there are many forms of \u201ctherapy\u201d that I\u2019m legally restricted from practicing, and the debunked, pseudoscientific practice of conversion therapy is among them.<\/p>\n Secondly, the state already prescribes certain viewpoints to me in numerous ways without issue. For instance, for many years California dictated that I report<\/a> consensual sex acts more likely to be made by LGBTQ+ youth\u2014such as oral and anal sex and object penetration\u2014more stringently than intercourse as possible child abuse. This was clearly imposing a particular viewpoint onto me, as is the current requirement that I do not regard those things as different for the purpose of mandated reporting.<\/p>\n In another piece of regulation, the state dictates that I may not practice therapy on anyone not currently residing within the State of California, even if that person is in acute crisis and desperately needs to talk with me. This is an imposed viewpoint that many clinicians disagree with.<\/p>\n Even though these laws can impose extra burdens onto me and present ethical quandaries, I\u2019m generally glad that they exist\u2014for instance, here is a social worker licensed by the State of California arguing that we should be able to heal our clients by sexually touching them<\/a> during therapy. I\u2019m extremely glad that state law prevents her from doing that. Would the Supreme Court also declare that her viewpoint shouldn\u2019t be silenced?<\/p>\n