Diagnosis: Homophobic
LGBT people see services as ‘unsafe’ 
Mental health professionals have certainly played a central role in the oppression of LGBT people. The World Health Organisation, for example, only dropped its classification of homosexuality as a mental illness in the UK in 1992. Pathologising endures in concepts such as ‘ego dysphoria’, used to describe people who are confused about their sexual identity and feel they may be homosexual. Some psychotherapy training schools still don’t accept lesbian, gay and bisexual people on their training programmes because they believe being homosexuality signifies arrested development and anyone lesbian, gay or bisexual will thus be unable to help their clients overcome their own mental health problems.
Film-maker Christine Hibbins has first-hand experience of this kind of attitude. She describes how psychiatrists made assumptions about her (hetero)sexual orientation from age 13 and linked her being a lesbian with the fact that she was raped by a man. Christine was finally driven to ask her youth worker – who was lesbian: ‘Am I lesbian because I was raped? I was really confused by this thought.’ The worker assured her this wasn’t the case, but had little understanding of the mental health issues Christine was facing.
Christine Gildersleeve was senior group worker and training manager at PACE and co-authored a training pack on the impact of homophobia on the mental health of lesbian, gay and bisexuals and what mental health professionals need to do to provide a more understanding and responsive service. Homophobia is very much a live issue, she says, and cuts several ways. ‘Like other forms of discrimination like racism, homophobia lowers self esteem and produces social isolation, which can contribute to mental ill health, particularly depression.’ But lesbians, gays and bisexuals commonly report hostility and rejection when they seek, or are forced to seek, help from the mental health services, compounding their distress. The training pack includes a sobering catalogue of the discrimination experienced by lesbian, gay and bisexual people at the hands of health professionals, taken from PACE’s 1998 research Diagnosis Homophobic.
‘John’, 31, was admitted to a south London hospital after attempting suicide. He remembers seeing a board on the ward setting out various proscribed ’isms’, including racism, sexism and homophobia. However one group of patients took a particular delight in describing loudly and in graphic and violent detail what they would do to a ‘poof’ if ever one came near them. While staff did not hear these remarks, John lacked the confidence, especially as he was on major tranquillisers, to take it up with them. “It was the casualness with which these insults were made that shocked me – you expect it on the street but in a hospital you expect to be in a place of safety and I never felt that” he says bitterly. This compounded his sense of isolation and despair and made him feel reluctant to access services again.
Read Sarah Carr's account of how services stigmatised her sexuality. Sarah is a member of the Executive Committee of SPN
Earlier this February, during LGBT History Month, Sir Liam Fox, Chief Medical Officer, (transcript of speech)and Surinder Sharma, National Director for equality and Human Rights (transcript of speech) both spoke about their commitment to challenging LGBT health inequalities and of making services more LGBT friendly. This comes in the context of the Equality Act – which comes into force this October – and which forbids discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation in the provision of goods, facilities and services in the exercise of public functions.
Diagnosis: Homophobic can be downloaded from http://www.pacehealth.org.uk/homophobic.html
The training pack Creating a Safe Space can be obtained from Pavilion Publishing t 0870 161 3505 www.pavpub.com price £55
PACE can be contacted t 0207 700 1323
If you have any personal experience where you have suffered discrimination, felt stigmatised or felt that services have failed you, please contact Raza Griffiths with your story.
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