Pray your gay away! /s

[matchplease]

That's my take as well. I'm pretty sure everyone has populations and/or areas in which they choose not to work.

Religion is obviously a very personal thing, and I don't know how I'd feel about a school attempting to force a grad student to work against those beliefs they might hold (for some of the reasons already listed). Does that mean I would agree with the beliefs? No, not necessarily, but that also doesn't mean I don't disagree with that individual's right to hold them.

It is called "multicultural competence" people. Learn it. It is a APA guideline and an ethical principle.

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[matchplease]

This is a good point, and one to which I hadn't given much thought. It's quite possible to work with a client long-term -- maybe for years -- until the client comes out to you, or comes to terms with his/her sexuality. I've had that happen, too, albeit in a shorter timeframe. (I cringe to think of what my supervisor would say if I'd suddenly refused to work with this client.)

For those saying that a competent clinician can ethically refuse to work with gay clients, what should happen in this situation? Should the therapist refer the client? Work with the client, but refuse to discuss sexuality? Discuss sexuality, but tell the client that he/she believes that the client's sexual behavior is wrong? Flee to Brazil with a suitcase full of money?

Seek consultation and become un-bigoted.

 

[matchplease]

From a purely philosophical standpoint, I agree that someone who refuses to work with one group of people they consider morally repugnant but will work with another group that they also consider morally repugnant is being highly inconsistent and therefore discriminatory.

But it isn't that clean unfortunately. As for the comments about "defending" these beliefs - well yes, I defend someone's right to be an *****hole, so long as they are not actually causing harm, I could care less what their beliefs are.

I think our disagreement here stems from how we view a) suitability for training or continued practice and b) whether or not referring someone out is indeed a harmful act.

With regard to a, we can do everything we can from a training perspective to help practioners recognize and manage any biases they may have. However, I really view this as a slippery slope. Unless our profession comes out with an edict saying "all psychologists must be capable of working with all people" then you will undoubtedly have continued referral out. These things already happen with other subgroups than the queer population a lot. Unless you are willing to address all biases that result in all referals out due to the therapist's level of discomfort or bias, I don't think your argument is valid. The fact of the matter is that there are tons of biases out there - the ones involving the queer population are just particularly emphasized, publicized, and politicized.

With regard to b, I would suggest that referring a patient to someone better suited to treat them is always less harmful then trying to treat them yourself.

I just think making some blanket statement about who is and who is not cut out for mainstream training in clinical psychology based on personal beliefs is a very dangerous statement to make. Whomever makes such a statement would have a difficult time proving their complete personal bias management system to me. To bring it back to our lovely religious texts - I'd see them as having an eye full of plank. I think it is much more realistic to expect responsible management of biases without placing some value on which biases are worse than others and then excluding people based on their personal beliefs. If they in fact are willing to ethically manage those beliefs, I don't see why we can't allow them to practice.

I agree somewhat. If you are not willing to examine your biases and see how the influence clinical work, and try to change for the better you have no business being in the field!

 

[futureapppsy2]

It is called "multicultural competence" people. Learn it. It is a APA guideline and an ethical principle.

But isn't part of multicultural competency realizing that you may not always be adequately competent to work with certain populations because of your own inherent cultural biases? Isn't that part of the drive to train and hire culturally, racially, and ethnically diverse psychologists--so that you don't have a homogenous body of clinicians and clients are more likely to have access to a psychologist from a similar background and/or who has expertise in issues related a particular group or groups? That's not to say that people should only treat clients like them (although some do market their specialities to certain groups) but that any given clinician may not always be a good fit for a client and that a client should ideally have multiple options for treatment if they feel like the therapist isn't a fit for whatever reason (expertise, personality, theoretical orientation, language, clinician background or biases, etc). Of course, this can be hard in real life, especially in underserved areas, but I've heard this frequently used as a rallying point for the need to recruit grad students from diverse backgrounds (race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, disability, SES, etc).

 

[matchplease]

But isn't part of multicultural competency realizing that you may not always be adequately competent to work with certain populations because of your own inherent cultural biases? Isn't that part of the drive to train and hire culturally, racially, and ethnically diverse psychologists--so that you don't have a homogenous body of clinicians and clients are more likely to have access to a psychologist from a similar background and/or who has expertise in issues related a particular group or groups? That's not to say that people should only treat clients like them (although some do market their specialities to certain groups) but that any given clinician may not always be a good fit for a client and that a client should ideally have multiple options for treatment if they feel like the therapist isn't a fit for whatever reason (expertise, personality, theoretical orientation, language, clinician background or biases, etc). Of course, this can be hard in real life, especially in underserved areas, but I've heard this frequently used as a rallying point for the need to recruit grad students from diverse backgrounds (race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, disability, SES, etc).

Right, I agree with you. But I don't think it is okay to say "I am racist against x, y, z groups, so I can't work with them. I think we need to be better than that and grow and stretch ourselves, challenge our beliefs and biases, so that we can work with different types of people. Now, if those worldviews could negatively influence our clients, I think referring out is fine. However, as one person mentioned, you may not find out something until later...and what do you do then...rupture the therapeutic alliance after so many months, years of working together. Think of what that could do to the client. how would that client think of you or themselves after that?!

 

[minorityreport]

Ridiculous new anti-gay bill passed in TN that "bars public universities from making graduate students in psychology counsel anyone if that would conflict with their "deeply held religious beliefs."

http://www.nashvillescene.com/pitw/...sychology-students-learn-to-pray-away-the-gay

The more gay/lesbian scholarship opportunities universities decide to implement the better! We need to boost affirmative action plans to include gays and lesbians on everything. Hiring the most qualified applicant is not as important as ensuring a targeted minority group is hired or selected.

 

[MBellows]

The more gay/lesbian scholarship opportunities universities decide to implement the better! We need to boost affirmative action plans to include gays and lesbians on everything. Hiring the most qualified applicant is not as important as ensuring a targeted minority group is hired or selected.

This is more of a comment for the Socio-Political thread, but most of these are...

AA is at large seen as the opposite as an effective means of bolstering a minority in public opinion, and typically serves to make people who are already a little biased against that group even more biased against them.

 

[erg923]

The more gay/lesbian scholarship opportunities universities decide to implement the better! We need to boost affirmative action plans to include gays and lesbians on everything. Hiring the most qualified applicant is not as important as ensuring a targeted minority group is hired or selected.

I do not think psychology does itself any favors by remaining a white, hetero profession. think about relationship, cultural aspects/benefits, treatment access barriers, etc.

 

[MBellows]

I've learned today that I don't read sarcasm well before coffee.

 

[MBellows]

I hate to bring this thread back, but a Neurosurgeon trained at Johns Hopkins said this to explain his juxtaposition of homosexuality, beastiality, and polygamy.

“What I was basically saying and if anyone was offended, I apologize to you. What I was basically saying is there is no group. I wasn’t equating those things, I don’t think they’re equal. If you ask me for an apple and I give you an orange you would say, that’s not an orange. And I say, that’s a banana. And that’s not an apple either. Or a peach, that’s not an apple, either. It doesn’t mean that I’m equating the banana and the orange and the peach. In the same way I’m not equating those things.”

Maybe med schools should add the MAT as a screening tool.