Going undercover at the BPS…

Below is the full text of James Esses’s blog post which we are publishing with his permission. The link to the full post is here which will allow you to view the videos and see comments.

In our view this shows the full extent of the misgovernance, lack of proper oversight and organisational capture within the BPS. This is no way for a learned society to act. Surely its job is to be the place where open, honest, evidence-based discussions are encouraged and supported – it’s not part of its job to be an “ally”. Ultimately, the BPS is failing the public, particularly in relation to child safeguarding. The BPS is increasingly dysfunctional as is shown in our recently published book.

Lunatics Running The Asylum: Going Undercover at the British Psychological Society

The British Psychological Society (BPS) was founded in 1901 and currently acts as the representative body for well over 60,000 psychologists.

I first became concerned with ideological capture in the BPS when I saw that they were actively promoting Mermaids to vulnerable patients (this is the same Mermaids under investigation by the Charity Commission for safeguarding issues, including sending breast binders to children behind parents’ backs).

So, when the opportunity presented itself last week to go undercover to an internal BPS webinar, I took it. The purpose of the webinar was to “shine a light on the history of the LGBT+ community’s experience of receiving healthcare”.However, this was far from a mere talking shop. The BPS stated that the webinar “aspires to equip psychologists with actionable insights and recommendations to implement systemic change”.

It is clear from this blurb that the BPS sought to impress recommendations upon their members.

Before attending the webinar, I looked up the speakers. They included:

·       Dr Adam Jowett – Chair of the BPS EDI Board, who has led research for the government on their proposed ban on ‘conversion therapy’

·       Penny Catterick – A ‘trans’ member of the BPS Human Rights Advisory Group

·       Dr Heather Armstrong – Academic at the University of Southampton

·       Dr Katherine Hubbard – Academic at the University of Surrey

·       Dr Rob Agnew – Clinical psychologist and Chair of the BPS Section of Gender, Sexuality and Relationship Diversity

Clearly, the BPS were bringing out the big guns.

The webinar began with panellists’ thoughts on the current state of play regarding ‘trans healthcare’ in society. The audience were told that “LGBTQ people face huge medicalisation”. This statement was ironic, given that the BPS support puberty blockers, hormones and surgery for those with gender dysphoria – the very definition of ‘huge medicalisation’.

The usual dollop of scaremongering was quickly added. We were informed that we are living in a “precarious and serious time”. Dr Katherine Hubbard, on the theme of patients feeling anxiety and distress, said: “Of course you feel anxious and distressed…look at the world you’re living in and the way your being is being pathologised”.

This is a worrying sentiment from a senior psychologist who appears to impose her own narrative and worldview on vulnerable patients. Rather than seeking to explore potential causation and co-morbidities of gender dysphoria, she simply views anxiety and distress as evidence as to why someone should transition.

However, the most concerning statement of the session came from Dr Rob Agnew (remember, he is a Chair within the BPS).

Agnew began with what can only be described as a rant, claiming that we have allowed “socially sanctioned discrimination” from people who can “hide behind other protected characteristics”.

It is clear who Agnew is referring to here – those of us who hold ‘gender critical’ beliefs, which, as we know, are protected under the Equality Act 2010. How would gender critical members of the BPS feel listening to this?

However, the worst was yet to come. 

Agnew went on to refer to a recent statement from the United Kingdom Council of Psychotherapy (UKCP) as being “transphobic”. This statement was off the back of litigation I had pursued against UKCP and it recognised explicitly that psychotherapists are both professionally and legally entitled to hold ‘gender critical’ beliefs.   

Agnew stated that we should clamp down on therapists with gender critical beliefs “in the way we wouldn’t expect a female client to accept therapy from an incel or a misogynist”.

To compare clinicians who believe in biological reality with incels or misogynists is beyond disgraceful. Shockingly, not a single panellist challenged Agnew on this statement. Remember, these panellists are purporting to speak on behalf of the entire BPS. 

I wrote an anonymous question into the Q&A box, challenging what Agnew had just said. Unsurprisingly, my question was ignored.

Up next was a dose of identity politics from Penny Catterick, the ‘transwoman’ who told viewers that he has “55 years of track experience”,whatever that means.

Reflecting on recent attempts to introduce self-ID in Scotland, Catterick claimed that Scottish women are suffering from “minority stress”, on the basis that they are “living in nested minoritisation in the UK”.Truthfully, I don’t even know what this means…I think Catterick was trying to suggest that because Scottish people are not the majority nationality within the United Kingdom, that this is innately stressful for them…

Catterick, a man identifying as a woman, went on to say that we are “living in a patriarchy”.That he could not see the irony in this statement is truly worrying.

At this point, Dr Rob Agnew chimed in again with more random ranting. He chastised paramedics who “assume a person is a man because they have a beard…putting them in a situation in which they have to out themselves”.

He went on to question: “how relevant is it if they were assigned male or female at birth?”

In the world of emergency healthcare being provided by paramedics, extremely relevant.

But Agnew, blinded by his devotion to gender ideology, cannot even see this. He then said that “social background” is more important that “biological background” and expressed hope that one day we will live in a world in which clinicians can “engage with non cis het people” without needing to know their “personal history”.

This is complete and utter madness being spouted by the association of psychologists – a profession operating within a framework of medicine and science. Or at least they used to.  

I was particularly concerned to hear a recommendation from the panel that “WPATH psychologists should be recognised by NHS”and that “recognition and promotion of WPATH practices by BPS practitioners could likely benefit psychological treatments in the UK.”

This is the same WPATH recently under intense spotlight, following the publication of the ‘WPATH Files’, demonstrating that their clinicians are clearly aware of the serious damage that can be caused by puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgery, in the name of ‘gender affirmation’. This is the same WPATH which recommends breast and penis removal for children as young as 9 years old and has even advised that ‘eunuchs’ are recognised as a distinct gender identity.  

Towards the end of the webinar, the panel engaged in a highly unprofessional and deeply disgusting attack on the ongoing Cass Review – the independent, government-commissioned review into gender services for children.

Dr Rob Agnew said that we should not have a “cisgender person deciding what trans youth services are going to look like” and instead “should have someone we can have faith in”.

To attempt to raise doubt, suspicion and paranoia over the work of Dr Hilary Cass, solely on the basis that she is “cisgender”, is utterly abhorrent and incredibly dangerous.

He went on to claim that there are “risks of explorative therapy” and that explorative therapy is “tied very strongly to conversion therapy”.To allege that therapists who seek to explore issues with clients (a bedrock of psychotherapy) is a form of ‘conversion therapy’ is simply beyond words.

The webinar finished with ‘transwoman’, Penny Catterick, saying that people have always told him “what a courageous person” he is for ‘transitioning’. He then, dramatically, paraphrased Franklin D. Roosevelt, telling his fellow trans people that they have entered the “Theatre of Critics” and reminded them that they are on a “hero’s journey”,even if “people in the cheap seats do chuck stuff at you”.

The webinar finished with a statement that “trans affirmative healthcare is the right side of history.”

I closed my laptop, feeling like I had just come from a Stonewall rally, rather than a professional, psychological webinar.

The lunatics are well and truly running the asylum. This should be of great concern to us all.