If parents reject an adult child for embracing homosexuality, they are guilty of scientific ignorance and should be disowned for their hostility to truth, according to Dr. Richard Friedman, professor of psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical College.

In a column  about “toxic” parents in yesterday’s New York Times, Friedman described a patient who was harshly criticized by his family for his homosexuality. Friedman met with the man and his parents to bring about a reconciliation. He wrote:

The session did not go well. The parents insisted that his “lifestyle” was a grave sin, incompatible with their deeply held religious beliefs. When I tried to explain that the scientific consensus was that he had no more choice about his sexual orientation than the color of his eyes, they were unmoved. They simply could not accept him as he was.

I was stunned by their implacable hostility and convinced that they were a psychological menace to my patient. As such, I had to do something I have never contemplated before in treatment.

At the next session I suggested that for his psychological well-being he might consider, at least for now, forgoing a relationship with his parents.

Friedman is one of a vast army of psychology professionals who spout this pseudo-scientific bigotry. The major professional organizations, such as the American Psychological Association, virtually command orthodoxy on the subject, untroubled by the fact that homosexuals were capable of essentially changing the color of their eyes in less tolerant times. If a person has no more choice about their sexual desires and behavior than they do about their physical features then how can any sexual act be wrong? These parents could be as easily condemned if they had rejected a daughter for committing adultery or their son for raping a boy. If desire cannot be trained or modified, the same is true for heterosexuals and for pedophiles.

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