JERSEY CITY, N.J. (AP) — One of four plaintiffs who sued a nonprofit that promised to turn them from gay to heterosexual wept on the witness stand Wednesday as he described cutting off contact with his mother after being told she was the cause of his homosexuality.
Benjamin Unger also described for jurors an exercise in which he was encouraged to take a tennis racket and repeatedly beat a pillow, meant to symbolize his mother.
“I had a gash in my hand” from taking so many swipes with the racket, Unger said.
The four men sued Jersey City-based Jews Offering New Alternatives for Healing in 2012 under New Jersey’s consumer fraud laws, claiming the group violated state consumer fraud laws by characterizing homosexuality as a mental disorder and claiming it could successfully change patients’ sexual orientation.
The plaintiffs say they underwent treatment that included being told to spend more time naked with their fathers and participating in role-playing in which they were subjected to anti-gay slurs in a locker room setting.
The group’s attorney said during his opening statement Wednesday that even the plaintiffs’ experts will testify that its methods are commonly used by therapists and that some patients have reported successful experiences.
Three of the four plaintiffs were young men from Orthodox Jewish families, plaintiffs’ attorney David Dinielli said, who were grappling with their sexuality in a culture in which “there were no gay people” and there was pressure to marry and have children. The fourth, Michael Ferguson, is a Mormon who sought out JONAH.
“My clients needed help but JONAH lied and JONAH made it worse,” Dinielli told jurors. “All they got was junk science and so-called cures.”
Attorney Charles LiMandri, representing JONAH, said none of the four men asked for their money back at the time.
“All four of these men left JONAH on good terms, speaking glowingly” of their experience and referring it to friends, he said. It was only after being contacted by activists that they denounced the organization, he said.
“The plaintiffs became aggressors after they left JONAH to destroy JONAH,” LiMandri said.
Cross-examining Unger, LiMandri displayed emails Unger had sent at the time of the therapy in which he sounded pleased with his progress. His questioning sought to show jurors that Unger had willingly sought out the treatment but discontinued it after 10 months — well before the two years to four years JONAH suggested it would take forconversion.
The trial is scheduled to resume Monday.
The lawsuit is the latest court battle in New Jersey regarding conversion therapy, a practice that has come under fire from gay rights groups, which are trying to ban it in more than a dozen states.
Lawyers for JONAH have argued that debate continues among scientists about whether sexual orientation is fixed or changeable and whether conversion therapy is harmful. They charge that plaintiffs are seeking to “shut down the debate by making one viewpoint on the issue literally illegal.”
Republican Gov. Chris Christie signed a law in 2013 banning licensed therapists from practicing conversion therapy in New Jersey. Two court challenges to the ban, one by a couple and their son and one by a group that included two licensed therapists, were dismissed by a federal judge. Those decisions were later affirmed by a federal appeals court.
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This story has been corrected to remove a reference to the three Orthodox Jewish men being from Brooklyn. Only two were from Brooklyn.
Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
In the best of all worlds, the plaintiffs should not see a cent of their money back. Going to gay conversion therapy and expecting a “cure” in the 21st century is like going to a witch and asking her for a love potion or for a spell on your neighbors cows or for a spell to make you invisible. Anyone stupid enough to believe that this can work should pay the price for it. Same with gay conversion.
In the real world of 2015, however, I hope that they can bleed the charlatans dry and then give a considerable amount of their settlement to gay charities.
So it turns out according to the Christian Wrong that all conservative males have an Oedipus complex? Their baby sisters are Jezebels? And sex continues to fascinate and obsess them.
As far as I’m concerned, the best thing that could happen to any of these family values men is the chance that they might actually turn out to be gay. That would give them a far better chance of experiencing a full and happy life.
It’s become all to apparent to the rest of the world that evangelicals have major problems with acknowledging that women are human beings or dealing with their own sexuality. Everything is dirty to them because they spend so much time down in the dirt slinging it at others?
Your post assumes that these men sought this type of ‘treatment’ voluntarily, when the most likely scenario is being bullied by their parents at the behest of their strict religious ‘leaders’. (Note that the article references strict orthodox Judaism, a frequent and vocal foe of gay rights).
It is sad that some sham artists are selling this lie to families. Parents in denial and what do they do - they make it worse. I can only hope that they feel deep shame for what they did - but I’m not holding my breathe on that happening.
Step 1: Hate your mom and symbolically beat her for making you gay.
Step 2: Naked bonding with your dad .
Step 3: Lessons in locker room etiquette from 4chan.
The person who developed this “treatment” regimen should be convicted of child abuse*(fraud) and sent to a licensed therapist.
*The victims were adults