All In The Family

My brother recently disclosed to me that he is gay. I have no issues with this at all and neither does my husband. The real problem is my family, especially my parents. It would break them to know about this, just totally shatter them along with the rest of our family.

My brother has been quite lonely and he has been fighting this battle alone for a long time. It has affected his work many times. Now he wants to find a partner, and he wants all of us to accept him and get to know him for who he really is. I do have to say, ours is a very close-knit and liberal south Indian family—we’ve even had inter-caste and international marriages. We always support each other and everyone adores my brother. However, I don’t think my family members are liberal enough to accept that my brother is gay. It would be so shocking for everybody!

I don’t know how to handle this whole situation. I want the best for my brother but I also don’t want my parents to suffer. They love us both a lot and they’ve done a lot for us. It’s just not possible to tell them. They’re very naïve and this would affect them badly, both socially and emotionally. So right now we’re all just ignoring this issue and muddling through. My parents tell people that my brother will marry when he wants to. However, I know that one day or the other we will have to deal with this situation.  I just don’t know how.  And please don’t tell me that I have to sit down with my parents and explain what’s going on.  I seriously think they would have a heart attack.

I read somewhere that homosexuality is not genetic—it’s the environmental factors at childhood that are responsible. I’ve also read that it’s possible to change with psychiatric intervention. Is this true? Should I tell my brother about this possibility?

What should I do? I really hope I will get a sense of direction from your reply.
–A Confused Sister

I think you need to focus less on what to do about your parents, and focus more on being a supportive presence for your brother. The fact is, your brother is the only person who can make the decision about disclosing his orientation to your folks. If you step in and do it for him, you’ll be committing a terrible breach of trust. He’s entrusted you with this information because he knows you support him, and I have no doubt he’s equally capable of deciding whether there’ll ever be a good time to tell your parents. He’s the one who’ll be dealing with the fallout of coming out, so he should be the one to decide when to do it. Not you. So don’t sweat it. If you really think your parents will never be able to handle it, then you’re certainly free to communicate that opinion to your brother, but it’s ultimately his choice to make.

But I have to say, I do understand your confusion. It’s very hard to keep secrets from your loved ones, especially on behalf of someone else. Your taking on a big emotional responsibility and that’s a tough thing to do. And I’m very impressed by the level of care and compassion you have for your sibling. He’s lucky to have you and your husband, and the best thing you can do for him is to continue to be supportive without judging him.  It’s precisely the support of an encouraging relative or friend that can prevent a young queer person from falling into despair, growing desperate with loneliness, or making really stupid mistakes.  Your presence is invaluable here and you can really use this as an opportunity to know your brother better and develop a closer relationship with him. I highly suggest that the both of you check out the website Orinam. It’s a support and resource website in Tamil and English for young queer people and their families. You’ll find a lot of advice and guidance there.

As for this issue of “changing” someone’s sexual orientation through psychiatric therapy, it’s been proven that these methods don’t work because being gay or lesbian is not a disorder or pathology—psychiatric intervention doesn’t work because there’s no problem to fix.  In fact, the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-I) in 1973. As further support, the APA, the American Psychological Association, the American Counseling Association, the General Assembly of the Norwegian Psychiatric Association, the Royal College of Psychiatrists in the UK, the Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists, and the German Parliament have all denounced conversion therapy as unethical and stated that same-sex desire is not a mental disorder. All of these organizations strongly suggest that practitioners do not refer clients to conversion therapists. Heck, even the Chinese Classification of Mental Disorders (CCMD—III) has declassified homosexuality as a mental disorder. Conversion therapy carries strong risks for undermining the emotional health of queer individuals and perpetuating self-harming behavior by encouraging individuals to reject this foundational aspect of their selfhood, and the therapy also encourages the continued societal stigmatization of queer people as mentally disturbed and ill.

The reason why I’m going into so much detail is because I get a lot of letters from people asking about psychiatric therapy to change sexual orientation and it seems like there is a tremendous amount of misinformation floating around out there on this subject. So let me come down on this once and for all: conversion therapy is unethical and damaging to individuals and communities. Any doctor or therapist who tells you otherwise is selling you a bunch of bunkum. Confused Sister: attempting to get your brother to “convert” to heterosexuality will only undermine his sense of identity, fuel into possible feelings of self-hatred and anxiety, and prevent him from being a strong, proud adult. Don’t go there.

Electroshock Therapy Is No Good

I am a 28-year-old woman and I think I may be a lesbian. I am very much depressed due to this. I have come to know that I will never be able to marry and have true a life partner. I am destined either to live alone all my life or to marry a man I don’t love or want and be forced to have children. I often weep in bed due to this. Sometime ago, I read somewhere that psychotherapy can convert a homosexual into a heterosexual. In which hospital can I undergo this therapy? What will be the approximate expenditure I will have to incur?
–Want To Be Cured

I have no intention of telling you where you can get conversion therapy or how much it would cost, because conversion therapy doesn’t work. Being lesbian isn’t a disease or a psychological disorder; it’s a state of self. The other things you mentioned—the possibility of not finding a life partner, the pressure to enter a heterosexual marriage and have children—now, those are problems. But being lesbian itself is not the issue and it’s not something you should seek to change. Obviously, I can’t make you feel better about your orientation. You have to find a place of self-acceptance and peace, and I can’t do it for it for you. But I can tell you that conversion therapy is emotionally and psychologically undermining, and it’s not going to change anything anyway.

As for the other issues, I empathize with your anxiety. It’s absolutely true that as a lesbian woman, you will face a tremendous amount of pressure to get married to a man and have children—and stress, fear, and loneliness of trying to submerge your identity and desires in a heterosexual marriage are no joke. You may also have to confront the possibility of not ever finding a life partner (although in all fairness, everyone has that problem). But ultimately, this is the world we live in: a world of injustice that censures and punishes those who, in their desires and identities, challenge unequal social structures. What can we all do but keep fighting for equality? You are a lesbian woman: you have the right to make your own decisions about what kind of life you want to lead, whether you want to be partnered with anyone, and whether you want have children. It’s as simple as that. While those may not be rights that the state protects with any degree of regularity, they are rights that are yours simply by virtue of being alive. That said, what you need now is a solid support and counseling network to help you work through your feelings of fear and sadness. You can contact any of these organizations for help: Sangama in Bangalore, Sahayatrika in Trivandrum, or the Shakti Center in Chennai. We’re all here to help, and we’re all here for you.

Advice For Young Lesbians

I am a 15-year-old lesbian. I am feeling very painful. I want to have a successful career. My mom says never to be a lesbian. You must be heterosexual always. The society will ostracize you. I really love girls. My friends also make me feel insulted. Some secret lesbian like stuff is with my friend. How will I let it get burnt? Please suggest. How will I tell someone that I love them? I have fallen in love with a senior class girl. She doesn’t know anything about that. Please tell me how will I tell her.
–Goody Dash

I’m not sure what this purpose of this letter is supposed to be, but I’ve gotten a number of e-mails that kind of look like this, so I’m going to take this as an opportunity to lay out some guidelines for sending in questions.

First off, please make sure you have a clear, comprehensible question in mind when you send your queery (I love puns, obviously) to the column. Secondly, try to provide as much detail as you can. As much as I sympathize with what seems to be the general existential confusion of GD’s missive, there are too many questions and there’s not enough context in her letter for me to respond productively. And finally, I’m sure some of you are wondering about the language barrier. How can someone provide the requisite details and write a cogent question when they’re not too comfortable with their English, you ask? Well, never fear, gentle readers. I’ve recruited people to translate letters in Tamil, Hindi, Marathi, and Telegu, and I’m trying to get friends on board for working with other languages, so please send me your question in whatever language you feel comfortable with. My answer will obviously be published in English, but I’ll try to personally send you back a response in the language you wrote to me. Sound good?

As for GD, like I said, I’m not sure what you’re asking. Are you upset about her mother, your “lesbian like stuff”, or your crush on the senior class girl? So here are some organizations that provide support services for lesbian women if you need people to talk to: Sangama in Bangalore, Sangini Trust and TARSHI in Delhi, LABIA in Mumbai, Sappho for Women and SAATHII in Calcutta, and Sahayatrika in Trivandrum. All of these orgs have websites and helplines, so go ahead and get in touch.