Hand-picked by IOSS: Shame-Sex Attraction: Survivors Stories of Conversion Therapy

Conversion therapy—the pseudo-scientific, completely ineffective, and wildly damaging efforts to change individuals’ nonnormative genders and/or sexualities—remains a reality for many vulnerable populations today. We know that conversion practices happen disproportionately in high-control Christian contexts, and though many times these practices go unreported, such change efforts continue to ravage the mental health of countless LGBTQ+ individuals behind closed doors.

My new anthology of stories, entitled Shame-Sex Attraction: Survivors’ Stories of Conversion Therapy (Jessica Kingsley Publishers, 2025), knocks down these doors as it shines a spotlight on the effects of these dangerous practices. Having been positively reviewed in venues like Sexual and Relationship Therapy and Publishers Weekly, Shame-Sex Attraction is comprised of seventeen stories, written by conversion-therapy survivors, that give voice to the wide variety of conversion practices across three different countries and in a number of (religious) contexts.

Most of the stories included in the collection are set in conservative Christian contexts—mostly of the evangelical, Pentecostal, and Catholic varieties. My story, for instance, details my time at the world’s largest evangelical college founded by the late Rev. Jerry Falwell: Liberty University. Some of the other included authors, however, come from other backgrounds, including Orthodox Judaism and what one author describes as a Chinese cult. With a foreword by Garrard Conley, the author of the NYT-bestselling memoir Boy Erased, Shame-Sex Attraction is intended for a wide range of clinical and nonclinical readers interested in reading more about conversion therapy specifically and high-control religion more broadly.

Given the significant harm of conversion practices and their persistence across the globe, I wanted to put this collection of stories together. When I tell people that my work focuses on conversion therapy, I am typically met with responses resembling, “I didn’t realize conversion therapy was still a thing…” Unfortunately, conversion practices are very much still a thing, and the immense havoc they wreak on LGBTQ+ individuals’ mental health is significant. This book furnishes readers with a range of first-hand accounts that bear witness to the immense harms caused by conversion practices, along with providing an introduction that offers a comprehensive overview of the history of conversion practices, the consequences of such practices, and ways to support survivors.

Shame-Sex Attraction has allowed me to shine a spotlight on conversion practices and name these practices for what they are: abuse and, in some cases, even torture. In addition to publishing the book, I have been partnering with various organizations, including several mental-health organizations, to raise awareness about conversion practices and their numerous effects. If you or your organization is looking to collaborate on a book talk, a lecture, or something similar, please do not hesitate to reach out. I look forward to future opportunities to do what I can to use my experience, voice, and platform to continue the fight against conversion practices across the globe.

About the author

Lucas F. W. Wilson is a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Postdoctoral Fellow at University of Toronto and was formerly the Justice, Equity, and Transformation Postdoctoral Fellow at University of Calgary. He is currently working on a new anthology of stories about LGBTQ+ student experiences at Christian colleges, universities, seminaries, and divinity schools, tentatively entitled Don’t Ask, Tell All: Stories of Christian Higher Ed’s Anti-Queer Regimes (under contract with The University of Georgia Press).