Editing Conversion therapy (section)

===Brain surgery===

In the 1940s and 1950s, U.S. neurologist [[Walter Jackson Freeman II|Walter Freeman]] popularized the [[Lobotomy#Transorbital lobotomy|ice-pick lobotomy]] as a treatment for homosexuality. He personally performed as many as 3,439<ref>{{cite news |last1=Day |first1=Elizabeth |title=He was bad, so they put an ice pick in his brain... |url=https://www.theguardian.com/science/2008/jan/13/neuroscience.medicalscience |work=The Observer |date=13 January 2008 |access-date=16 November 2017 |archive-date=20 October 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131020075415/http://www.theguardian.com/science/2008/jan/13/neuroscience.medicalscience |url-status=live }}</ref> lobotomy surgeries in 23 states, of which 2,500 used his ice-pick procedure,<ref>{{cite web|title=Top 10 Fascinating And Notable Lobotomies|url=http://listverse.com/2009/06/24/top-10-fascinating-and-notable-lobotomies/|date=24 June 2009|website=listverse.com|access-date=26 December 2013|archive-date=27 December 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131227024430/http://listverse.com/2009/06/24/top-10-fascinating-and-notable-lobotomies/|url-status=live}}</ref> despite the fact that he had no formal surgical training.<ref name="rowland">{{cite journal|last=Rowland|first=Lewis|date=April 2005|title=Walter Freeman's Psychosurgery and Biological Psychiatry: A Cautionary Tale|journal=Neurology Today|volume=5|issue=4|pages=70–72|doi=10.1097/00132985-200504000-00020}}</ref>

In West Germany, a type of brain surgery usually involving destruction of the [[ventromedial nucleus of the hypothalamus]] was done to some homosexual men during the 1960s and 1970s. The practice was criticized by sexologist [[Volkmar Sigusch]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Rieber |first1=Inge |last2=Sigusch |first2=Volkmar |date=1979 |title=Psychosurgery on sex offenders and sexual "deviants" in West Germany |url=https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF01541419 |journal=Archives of Sexual Behavior |language=en |volume=8 |issue=6 |pages=526 |doi=10.1007/BF01541419 |issn=1573-2800 |pmid=391177 |s2cid=41463669 |access-date=20 June 2023 |archive-date=24 September 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240924070658/https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF01541419 |url-status=live }}</ref>