LGBTIs Aim to Cleanse Bookstores From Homophobia

The mental health commission of Lambdaistanbul, an LGBTI organization, has launched a campaign to convince bookstore owners to remove books referring homosexuality as a disease. 

The commission is reportedly targeting on psychology and psychiatry books that considered homosexuality as a disease and recommended treatment options.   

Psychologist Özge Güdül told bianet that the continuation of selling those unethical books and its wrong practices affected LGBTI individuals negatively even though homosexuality was proved not to be neither mental or emotional disease. 

“Bookstores don’t need to sell every book that they dealt with the publishers,” she said. 

“Sometimes we email the bookstore owners and other times we go and talk to them face to face. For instance, Kabalcı Bookstore in Kadıköy Kabalcı agreed to remove a book on homosexuality treatment. But of course, there were bookstores that refused our request.” 

Lambdaistanbul also appealed activists to email titles of books that considered homosexuality and transsexuality as a disease and advised parents to take their children to treatment.   

The commission is also working on a free booklet aiming to provide correct information on sexual orientations and identities.  (ÇT/BM)

* Click here to read the article in Turkish.