Hill, who reportedly grew up in Tennessee with a conservative family, sought out support on the app after his parents allegedly kicked him out of the house. He wanted support and got a referral to conversion therapy. And this happened after, according to Hill, he requested an LGBTQ+ therapist on the app. Yikes!
In speaking to the Journal, Hill recalled that the therapist said: “Either you sacrifice your family or you sacrifice being gay.” Hill added that he had “needed someone to tell me I was gay and that was OK. I got the exact opposite.” He says he found BetterHelp because he heard ads for the service on various podcasts. (As an aside, I myself have heard a ton of ads for virtual therapy on podcasts!)
Hill alleges that the therapist asked if he had been intimate with another man. Hill said he had not. The therapist allegedly replied “Good.” Hill says the therapist told him it would be a “lot harder” to go back to his family after he had been intimate with a man.
Again: Yikes!
If you’re wondering how this situation possibly came to be, there are a few factors at play. First of all, BetterHelp (and many virtual therapy sites like it) use an algorithm to match patients to providers. The providers are not full-time employees of the site, but rather independent contractors. Patients can request a different therapist but Hill says he didn’t feel comfortable doing so because he was afraid to be matched with another queerphobic person.
According to Hill, the provider’s personal website describes him as a Christian therapist. The therapist does not appear to specialize in LGBTQ+ issues. But (obviously) one can be a Christian therapist without pushing literal conversion therapy. And one can be an ally without being queer or having queer-specific training. And yet, Hill’s story is deeply disturbing.
“If we do get information that a therapist conducts conversion therapy or similar practices,” a spokesperson for BetterHelp said in a statement to the Journal. “They would be removed from the platform.”
Obviously, therapists aren’t always the best fit for their patients. Even patients who do have a good relationship with their therapist may choose to change for various reasons. Not a problem and not unusual. But Hill’s alleged experience is incredibly upsetting and could be dangerous. LGBTQ+ already report higher rates of mental health issues like depression and anxiety. Lesbian, gay, and bisexual adults are three times more likely to report suicidal risk than heterosexual adults, and that rate is even higher for trans adults versus cisgender ones.
It’s important to remember that in spite of its name, conversion therapy is not a legitimate style or practice of therapy. It is not a matter of preference. It is archaic. It is disavowed by major medical associations and many—including the American Medical Association—have supported nationwide bans of the practice. Unfortunately, only several dozen states, plus Washington, D.C., outright ban conversion therapy. How are folks able to practice it, even though it’s clearly not based on science or backed by reputable research? Free speech protections, basically.
We don’t know the therapist’s side of this specific story. But we do know conversion therapy (and its latent, subliminal tactics) is cruel and illegitimate mental health care.
