Lucas is a SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellow at University of Toronto Mississauga and was formerly the Justice, Equity, and Transformation Postdoctoral Fellow at University of Calgary. He is the editor of Shame-Sex Attraction: Survivors’ Stories of Conversion Therapy (JKP Books), and he is the author of At Home with the Holocaust: Postmemory, Domestic Space, and Second-Generation Holocaust Narratives (Rutgers University Press), which received the Jordan Schnitzer First Book Publication Award. His public-facing writing has appeared in The Advocate, Queerty, LGBTQ Nation, and Religion Dispatches, among other venues. He is currently working on an edited collection about queer experiences at Christian colleges, universities, and seminaries. You can follow him on Twitter, Instagram, Bluesky, LinkedIn, Facebook, & Threads

AMW Your book highlights the persistence of conversion practices, even in places where they are legally banned. Can you elaborate on how these practices continue to exist underground and the challenges this presents for victims and advocates?
LW: Like all crime, conversion therapy will continue to happen in places where it is banned; just because something is outlawed does not mean it will no longer happen. It oftentimes just means that such illegal activity will go underground. The most common contexts in which conversion practices take place, including in places where it is banned, are Christian churches and ministries. These organizations do not label their efforts to change queer individuals’ sexualities and genders “conversion therapy.” Rather, they use euphemisms—like “pastoral counseling,” “biblical counseling,” and “sexual addiction counseling”—to obfuscate their dirty and damaging work.

These efforts to conceal their conversion practices pose several challenges for victims and advocates alike. Victims are made more vulnerable because those practicing conversion therapy in religious spaces are able to get away with their efforts to change queers; conversion practitioners hide behind religion, arguing that they are helping queers pursue spiritual wholeness, when in reality they are practicing textbook conversion therapy that wreaks psychological, emotional, and spiritual havoc on their victims. For advocates, this euphemistic language, in tandem with religious organizations hiding behind their sincerely held (homophobic and transphobic) beliefs, makes it more difficult to find conversion-therapy programs. Regardless, we advocates will not stop doing our best to expose organizations that practice conversion therapy and to support survivors.

AMW: Shame is a recurring theme in the narratives of conversion therapy survivors. How do you see shame being used as a tool within these practices, and what impact does it have on survivors’ identities and recovery journeys?

LW: Often, shame is what first draws individuals into conversion therapy, and it is also typically one of the main consequences of such practices. Unless they were forced into conversion therapy by their parents, religious communities, or otherwise—and even then, many have long been made to feel ashamed of their queerness—most who undergo conversion therapy are motivated to change themselves by the shame they have been made to feel throughout their lives. Indeed, why would they submit themselves to conversion practices, if it were not for feeling like who they are is dirty, defective, and/or damaged? This shame is then compounded during and/or after conversion therapy. Individuals frequently realize that, despite their efforts to change their sexualities and/or genders, they will never change, which causes them to feel like failures (especially in God’s eyes) and thus amplifies the shame they had felt for years about being queer. As both a significant motivator for and a common outcome of conversion therapy, shame is a necessary ingredient in such death-dealing practices.

AMW: Your book explores the connection between conversion practices and broader cultural and religious systems. What do you think needs to change within these systems to meaningfully address and dismantle the conditions that allow conversion therapy to persist?

LW: Much needs to change. If we think about conservative Christianity specifically, we need to recognize that such a religious system is wildly allergic to difference, especially when it comes to gender and sexuality. Insofar as conservative Christianity is predicated on a binary understanding of the world—black vs. white, of God vs. of the enemy, etc.—there is no room for diversity in numerous senses; everything is considered either right or wrong, and if it does not align with conservative Christian dogma, it is labeled evil or even demonic. This does not allow for productive dialogue.

As such, we need to view this conservative religious system for what it is: emphatically dangerous. We are already seeing the consequences of white Christian nationalism in the United States after Trump regained power, and we will continue to see how destructive this way of thinking and being is. With conversion practices being only a part of this system that seeks the erasure of anyone or any group that looks different from conservative Christians, we must be vigilant and work against the colonizing efforts of the Christian Right to homogenize society in its own image. If we don’t—and I don’t think this is in any way hyperbolic—life as we know it will be radically different soon.

Alicia M. Walker is Associate Professor of Sociology at Missouri State University and the author of two previous books on infidelity, and a forthcoming book, Bound by BDSM: What Practitioners can teach Everyone about Building a Happier Life (Bloomsbury Fall 2025) coauthored with Arielle Kuperberg. She is the current Editor in Chief of the Council of Contemporary Families blog, serves as Senior Fellow with CCF, and serves as Co-Chair of CCF alongside Arielle Kuperberg. Learn more about her on her website. Follow her on Twitter or Bluesky at @AliciaMWalker1, Facebook, and Instagram @aliciamwalkerphd