Resolved: Parents ought be banned from forcing minors into ex-gay therapy or conversion practices.

Definitions clarificationIn my round, I'm going to differentiate between ex-gay therapy and sexual conversion practices. My opponent defined ex-gay therapy as being a sexual orientation change effort - that's actually what sexual conversion practices are. Ex-gay therapy, by contrast, is for people whose orientation has been changed IN THE PAST (hence the title "ex-gay"), to help them atone from their previous sinful ways. SourcesI'd appreciate a link to any sources cited in future. BOPBOP is held by my opponent in this debate. Why there is no inherent immorality (response to 1A)By exactly the same logic as what the Pan-American Health Organization espouses, Mardi Gras should be banned because it is prejudiced against those who run these camps. The logic goes, essentially, that they believe the homosexuality is immoral (of course, as with all matters of spirituality, nobody really knows for certain who's right), which causes pain and suffering to homosexuals. Exactly the same thing happens if you say bashing homosexuals is immoral - it causes pain and suffering to homosexual bashers. Inherently, none of these groups is more important than the other. Why long-run harm won't accrue (response to 1B)My opponent cites the APA at length, who essentially argue that therapy is inefficient and not tested thoroughly enough. It's important not to overlook the obvious here: these conclusions are contradictory. If something was not tested thoroughly, how would one know whether it was inefficient? Furthermore, it asserts the practice to be immoral, but provides no evidence for it. That's because it's a pseudo-scientific body: science cannot prove morality because science must be testable, but with morality you cannot exclude alternatives, meaning it is not testable. It's true that there isn't much research into this but that's no reason to call it immoral. Lots of research has been done into murder, but that doesn't make murder moral, does it? By the way, if you're wondering how this relates to the long-run any more than pro's previous point, I'm just as confused as you. Why discrimination will accrue anyway (response to 1C)I agree discrimination is bad, but people who don't like gays will discriminate against them whether they go to these camps or don't go. If they don't go to the gay camps, they'll get bullied for being queer. On the other hand, if they do go, even if the gay camp is 100% successful in every way, they'll still get bullied for being "that kid who had to go to gay camp". So while I agree discrimination is a problem, people who discriminate aren't discriminating because of the camps, they're discriminating because they're homosexual. If causing discrimination is my opponent's standard of morality, then I suppose he must believe homosexuality is immoral. Why human rights is not affected (response to 2)My opponent believes that children have a "human right" not to be put in a position of potential harm, and not to be coerced against their will. If the former were true, then parents should not be allowed to send their child to swimming lessons because of the potential for drowning. If the latter were true, then taxes would be a gross violation of human rights. He cites article 20, that people should not be forced into associations - does that mean states violate human rights by giving residents citizenship? Human rights are not absolutes - they exist to guarantee us basic dignities as humans, but not to entitle us to complete freedom of action and total anarchy. A more pertinent example is the UN declaration of the rights of the child (. http://www.un.org...), which specifically states "The child shall be protected from practices which may foster racial, religious and any other form of discrimination. " Which brings me on to my next point. .. Tale of Two DiscriminationsOn the one hand, you can't discriminate against people's religion. On the other, you can't discriminate against sexuality. Trouble is, religion discriminates against deviant sexualities all the time, and equally (though arguably as a response), deviant sexual groups discriminate against religion. Being spiritually and sexually secure are both important to being human. The existence of gay people means that one of these rights must be privileged over the other. So on what moral basis is sexuality more important than religion. Surely, sexuality is premised on religion in every way. For instance, if nothing existed there would be no sexuality. Religion is a metaphysical concept, and sexuality is a physical concept. The sheer scope of religion demands that it is of a higher moral order. An analogy to this might be asking whether electricity or the electric light bulb is more important - the answer is obviously electricity, because it is of a higher order than the light bulb. One depends on the other making it a more fundamental thing to discriminate against. ConclusionMy opponent has failed to meet the BOP. I look forward to the next round.