Kinky is NOT a Diagnosis

story archive

10/15/09

Action Alert
National Coalition for Sexual Freedom


Kinky is NOT a Diagnosis

Help make history by signing the DSM Revision Petition now! The diagnoses in the DSM-IV-TR still subject
people who practice BDSM, fetishes and cross-dressing to bias, discrimination and social sanctions
without any scientific basis.

We need 3,000 signatures, but we only have 2,200 now. If you don't speak up and call on the American
Psychiatric Association to adhere to empirical research when revising the diagnoses in the Diagnostic
and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM V), then the Sexual and Gender Identity Disorders Work
Group won't make a meaningful change.

To sign, go to: www.thepetitionsite.com/1/DSMrevisionpetition

You can make your signature anonymous on this secure petition site so it doesn't appear on the Internet
or when the petition is delivered to the APA.

Petition:
       "We, the undersigned, support the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) own goal of making
its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) a scientific document, based on empirical research and
devoid of cultural bias. A diagnosis of a mental disorder can have a severe adverse impact on employment
opportunities, child custody determinations, an individual's well-being, and other areas of functioning.
Therefore we urge the APA to remove all diagnoses that are not based upon peer-reviewed, empirical
research, demonstrating distress or dysfunction, from the DSM. The APA specifically should not promote
current social norms or values as a basis for clinical judgments."


To find out more about the DSM and the Paraphilias section, read the NCSF & ITCR: The Foundation for
NCSF's "White Paper on the DSM Revision" at www.ncsfreedom.org

For more information, email: susanw@ncsfreedom.org

Help spread the word - please distribute this call for signatures!