Virginia Governor Ralph Northam signed a bill Tuesday outlawing so-called conversion therapy — a pseudoscientific practice that seeks to coerce LGBTQ youth into renouncing their sexual orientation. When the new law takes effect in July, Virginia will become the first Southern state — and the 20th in the U.S. — to ban the practice, which has been rejected by mental health professionals for decades. A study last year by the suicide prevention organization The Trevor Project found LGBTQ youth who had undergone conversion therapy were more than twice as likely to attempt suicide as those who did not.