A Therapist's Opinion on the Colorado Counseling Law
Personal Perspective: State, please stay out of my therapy room!
Posted October 10, 2025 | Reviewed by Tyler Woods
Recently, the state of Colorado enacted a law prohibiting counselors from having conversations with clients that include anything but affirmation of a client’s gender dysphoria and thoughts about transitioning. Any counselor discovered to be inviting or allowing a client to question or alter feelings about their sexuality or gender in talk therapy would be subject to legal penalties.
A counselor who challenged the law, Kaley Chiles, was given the opportunity to argue the issue before the United States Supreme Court, and the court is now deliberating. Chiles argued that the state is interfering with the free speech rights of counselors to provide therapy to clients who are questioning their sexual orientation or gender identity . She charges the state with practicing a form of viewpoint discrimination against counselors.
I’d like to assume that these were well-meaning legislators who wrote this law, sincerely concerned about preventing perceived harm to clients. But they swerved into grievous error, in my opinion, when they sought to limit the free speech of counselors who might not personally or professionally hold to the state’s ideological position on the complicated issue of gender dysphoria.
It’s a sticky, tricky issue. I am not an attorney, so my perspective on the case is not legal, but ethical. Because I’ve been a therapist for 33 years and have taught and consulted widely on ethical principles and violations for 25 years, I believe I can provide an informed ethical opinion on the Colorado case and others like it.
I see these major ethical principles at issue in the case: client autonomy, confidentiality rights, counselor influence, and counselor competence.
Autonomy is one of the fundamental values of the counseling profession. The American Counseling Association defines this as a counselor’s responsibility to foster clients’ right to control the direction of their lives .
Connected with this is the principle that in the counseling relationships, the primary responsibility of counselors is to respect the dignity and promote the welfare of clients.
The ACA Code further states:
Counselors are aware of—and avoid imposing—their own values, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors. Counselors respect the diversity of clients, trainees, and research participants and seek training in areas in which they are at risk of imposing their values onto clients, especially when the counselor’s values are inconsistent with the client’s goals or are discriminatory in nature.
So, how does this work in the real world of talk therapy?
If I accept a client, especially a minor, who begins to confide in me about same-sex attraction , gender dysphoria, or any other highly sensitive personal issue, I must tread very carefully, applying scrupulous ethical judgment.
Whatever spiritual or ideological position I may hold about these issues must be put to the side at this point. I need to stop, take a breath, ask good questions, and listen more than I talk. My priority, ethically, is to work to understand the client’s goal for the therapy, and not make assumptions or charge ahead with an agenda of my own.
If clients tell me they feel uncomfortable in their bodies and believe they might want to transition to the other gender, I’m going to process that with them, subjectively, scientifically, and spiritually, hopefully over a series of sessions.
I’m going to allow them to consider all options and possible consequences, of going forward with a transition, postponing the decision to allow for further exploration, or seeking to become comfortable with the body they were born with.
I will go slowly and listen carefully. I will take them seriously. And if they are minors with loving, concerned parents, I will encourage them to discuss their feelings with their parents, in my presence or otherwise.
This is an important point, because parents in most cases have a legal right to be informed of anything in their child’s life that might lead to harm or a major, life-altering change. I encourage parents of minor clients to allow their child as much privacy and autonomy as possible, while promising to honestly answer parents’ questions and concerns about the welfare of their child as the child proceeds in therapy.
The important thing is that therapy involves private, privileged conversations . Confidentiality must be protected for clients of any age or circumstance to build trust with their therapists and feel safe enough to address highly sensitive issues.
Counselors have gone to jail to uphold this right to privacy because it is so fundamental to the safety and effectiveness of the work we do.
At this point, I’ll pause and ask, Does anything I’ve described so far strike you as unethical or illegal?
In Colorado, or in the more than 20 other states with similar laws, the state would say yes. If it were discovered that I had not reflexively provided gender-affirming care , as they define it, I would have broken the law, even if clients tell me that it is not what they are seeking!
They would likely suspend or terminate my license and send me to diversity and inclusivity training classes to save me from my profound ignorance and lack of cultural competence. They might even put me in jail.
Sometimes people come to counseling to discuss these issues because their feelings conflict with their values and beliefs, and this is causing pain and cognitive dissonance for them. They need to be able to look at their internal conflict fully and honestly, and not be pushed toward one ideological position. Because they are the ones who will ultimately choose the path they take and live with whatever consequences it may bring.
If clients ask for my opinion, I may carefully provide it, informatively, not normatively. In other words, the client has no obligation to agree with or adopt my view. I will not reject, despise, abandon them, or discriminate against them based on choices they make, whether they agree with my values or not. This is a promise I hold sacred.
As noted above, my ethical code demands that I am aware of the values, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors—that I am fully entitled to hold-—but that I am not entitled to impose them on my clients. If I can’t unconditionally, competently care for clients and support their goals, ethical practice dictates that I refer them to someone who can.
The Colorado law, and those like it, are insulting and threatening to those of us who are gently, wisely, and skillfully engaging in talk therapy that facilitates the changes the client wants to make . How dare the state predetermine limits on the kinds of changes we are allowed to discuss!
Clients need to be informed that if they feel they have been harmed by the words or actions of a counselor, they can make a report to their state’s licensing board, and may initiate criminal or civil charges if the alleged infraction is more serious.
But at no time should the state preemptively squash the rights of counselors and their clients to discuss any topic in the privacy of the counseling room. It’s not their business.
American Counseling Association. (2014). ACA code of ethics . Alexandria, VA: Author. Retrieved from https://www.counseling.org/knowledge-center/ethics
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Ruth E. Stitt, M.S., M.Div., LPCS, has been a licensed professional counselor for 30 years. She is also a counselor educator and supervisor and has served as an adjunct professor of psychology and human development.
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