The latest skirmish in the Culture War unfolded last week in the New Hampshire House Committee on Health, Human Services, and Elderly Affairs.

The panel rejected, along party lines, a pair of bills purporting to ban “conversion therapy.” Supporters claim this practice harms gay people, who are abused for expressing any attraction to the same sex.

There are disreputable groups that prey on parents with empty promises to convert their gay children. Disreputable therapists have used shock therapy and other aversion techniques, which are not only cruel but lack any scientific basis. These practices should not be tolerated.

But HB 587 and SB 224, the two bills that the committee recommended against last week, went far beyond this. *| Keep Reading at the Union Leader