Blog
The Resistance Brief: We Don’t Need Fixing
Blog by Ricardo Martinez (he/him), Executive Director
When I was 12, my parents held our one and only family meeting ever. They sat my siblings and me down on the living room couch and proclaimed that if we “decided” to be gay, it was totally fine with them. We were loved, no matter what. Then they sent us back to our rooms.
It was awkward. It was the ’90s. They were devout Catholics. Their language wasn’t perfect, but their intention was clear: we were safe in our home, just as we were.
I didn’t fully understand the weight of that moment until I got older—until I started hearing other queer people’s growing up and coming out stories. As I moved through life, traveled, and built relationships within the LGBTQ+ community, I saw how often those stories were shaped by a lack of acceptance. Sometimes it came as quiet disapproval, sometimes as strained silence. Often, it was an outright rejection. Some people shared that they had been sent to conversion “therapy” by families who were led to believe they were helping and couldn’t see the harm being done at the time.
Conversion therapy refers to a range of discredited and dangerous practices that seek to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity. These practices have no basis in science or medicine, and their consequences can be devastating. Survivors often describe lasting trauma, feelings of shame, depression, anxiety, and even suicidal ideation. It’s a practice rooted in the false idea that LGBTQ+ people are broken and need to be fixed.
We don’t need fixin’.
Just last week, the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in Chiles v. Salazar, a case challenging Colorado’s 2019 law protecting minors from conversion therapy. Like nearly half of the states in this country, Colorado passed this law to shield young people from these very harms. But now, a therapist named Kaley Chiles, represented by the conservative group Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), is arguing that the law violates her First Amendment rights. She claims that the treatment she provides, talk therapy, is “pure speech,” and therefore can’t be subject to state regulation.
GLAD Law submitted an amicus brief to the Court, sharing stories that illustrate the lasting damage of conversion therapy. One of them was Matt Salmon’s. As a devout Mormon teen, Matt turned to conversion therapy hoping it would help him live in alignment with his faith. Instead, it left him feeling isolated, ashamed, and emotionally fractured. His relationship with his family suffered deeply. Even now, decades later, they are still trying to heal from what that experience broke.
The ADF and Chiles’s arguments being made in this case misrepresent what’s truly at stake. Colorado’s law does not ban conversations about faith or identity. It does not prevent therapists from helping clients navigate questions about gender, sexuality, and belief. What it bans are practices—by practitioners who have received a medical license from a state–that have been discredited and shown again and again to cause harm.
If the Court sides with Chiles, it could set a troubling precedent. One that limits states’ ability to regulate not just conversion therapy, but other forms of harmful mental health practices. It would send a message that protecting free speech includes protecting the right to use that speech to endanger vulnerable children.
But this case isn’t just about therapy or speech. It’s about whether LGBTQ+ people—especially kids—are allowed to grow up without being told something about them is fundamentally wrong. It’s about whether we believe everyone deserves to live free from imposed shame.
For many of us, simply existing with honesty is an act of quiet defiance. The freedom to live authentically, to embrace who we are without apology, stands in sharp contrast to the rigid boxes others still try to force us into. In that way, our very existence is resistance. A refusal to be made into something we are not.
I think back to that awkward family meeting when I was 12. My parents didn’t have the right words, but they gave me something that would prove to be incredibly rare: a sense that I was okay. That I was loved, perfectly made, and free to be me.
Every child deserves at least that much. Let’s hope the Court agrees.
What to know, what to do:
- Missed our briefing on the cases and petitions before the Supreme Court this year? Check out the recording for what’s at stake and what you need to know.
- We know this is a worrying time for access to transgender health care. Contact our free and confidential legal helpline, GLAD Law Answers, with any questions about losing access to care at Fenway Health or another New England medical center.
- Sign up for our free community discussion on Nov. 5 to learn what state and advocacy leaders can and should do to safeguard LGBTQ+ rights and protections.
- Limited tickets remain for our Spirit of Justice Award Dinner on Nov. 6! RSVP today for this inspirational evening.
- “At the end of the day, we’re all just people trying to live our lives and find our happiness – nobody should be making that process harder for anyone else.” Read more from Nic Talbott, a plaintiff in our transgender military ban challenge and one of this year’s OUT 100.
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