are you a conservative Christian?

I was sitting in a doctors office one morning with my 8-year-old son and the TV was on in the lobby. We were the only ones in there. They had the news on the TV and they were discussing drag shows. I quickly asked the front desk lady to change the channel as I did not find it appropriate for my eight year old child. My son then looks at me and says “mommy what’s a drag show?” My son knows that I love fast cars so I explained “a drag show is when you take really fast cars to a strip and race up and down. It’s called drag racing, so you go to drag shows to watch cars drag race.” This answer satisfied my sons curiosity and we moved on.

The next week I decided to share a scenario to a group of counselors. The scenario is an 8-year old child attends a session with you and asks “ what is a drag show?” Each of the counselors responded something like this “a drag show is when a man dresses like a woman and performs.”

After each Counselor had an opportunity to respond, I then stated “I would  be filing a grievance on every license.” They of course, inquired as to why. I explained that their own personal values took precedence in responding to the child. If that were my child, he would have just been exposed to information that I do not believe he is ready to hear or process.

A counselor needs to confirm with the family what the values are and how they can support the values that are taught within the family system. Because the nature of the question “what is a drag show?” is controversial and up for interpretation, the counselor should have confirmed with the parents what their preferred approach would be for this particular topic.

A child exposed to the options for selecting gender were “man,” “woman,” “non-binary.” The child did not know how to pronounce non-binary, making the “i” a short vowel sound rather than a long vowel sound. The parent responded, “non-binary is a math term.” The child excepted this answer and moved on.

This is another example of personal values being imposed on a client, if the counselor does not confirm how a parent would like to address this particular issue with a child.

A.4.b. Personal Values

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.