(WSPA) — North Carolina lawmakers have introduced three bills that would affect the LGBTQ community, including one law that would repeal HB2, also known as the bathroom bill.
Another bill would ban licensed mental health professionals from providing gay conversion therapy to children.
The American Psychiatric Association says it opposes any treatment that calls homosexuality a mental disorder or attempts to change sexual orientation.
A spokesperson for North Carolina Values Coalition, a conservative nonprofit, says the bill would would “threaten our most basic rights as Americans – the right to free speech, the right to practice our religious beliefs without fear of government interference or retribution, the right as parents to oversee the upbringing of our own children.”
But advocates of the proposed legislation say the Mental Health Protection Act does not violate free speech or religion since it only applies to licensed mental health professionals, meaning faith leaders can continue practicing conversion therapy.
