James Esses taking legal action against Metanoia Institute

[rogdmum]

Not only did Metanoia expel him after he started the petition to the govt, “Safeguard evidence-based therapy for children struggling with gender dysphoria” but Childline kicked him out as a volunteer counsellor.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9847741/Man-lost-job-Childline-raising-fears-children-rushed-changing-sex.html

I'm also looking forward to the Metanoia institute explaining to the courts exactly how someone legally involving themselves in a thoughtful and civil manor with British politics with the clear aim of safeguarding children and opening a very important debate about a proposed piece of legislation that if rushed or poorly worded will cause serious harm to those it intends to help could be seen to bring the institute into disrepute🤔 and that's before anyone mentions his legally protected beliefs

This is what I dont get.

Between the keira Bell case where a judge ruled that under 16s can't consent to treatment.

The release of the Tavistock own study showing that PBs did nothing to improve the mental health of the children.

Just what is it that they are basing all this on?

Are they openly advertising they are going against the nhs, the Tavistock and court judgments?

Would there not be legal ramifications for this?

And this is an organistion training psychotherapists to do what? Ignore evidence based approaches and conform unquestioningly to an ideology?

From website,
"Metanoia Institute has provided high-quality training in the psychological therapies for more than 30 years. We offer part-time, university validated undergraduate and postgraduate courses in Counselling, Psychotherapy and Counselling Psychology and allied programmes in Coaching, Creative Writing for Therapeutic Purposes, Organisational Development and Therapeutic Fostering.

Our Vision, Mission and Ethos
Vision
Excellence in counselling, counselling psychology, applied psychology and psychotherapy.

Mission 2015-2020
To offer teaching, training and lifelong learning of the highest quality.
To provide students with a theoretical and practical framework on which to base a professional and ethical practice in their chosen area of work.
To enhance the Institute's reputation for excellence in practice-based research and scholarship.
To offer practitioner training within a supportive and inclusive environment.
To provide accessible and effective educational and clinical services to the wider community.
To develop a research active culture. (continues)

Standards and Quality
Our professional training programmes lead to registration with the appropriate regulatory bodies, BACP, UKCP, HCPC and BPS. This means that our training programmes are monitored annually and re-accredited every five years.

Our academic standards and quality are monitored not only by the bodies mentioned above, but also by our validating higher education organisation Middlesex University. Each year our students who are taking optional academic qualifications are taken to academic boards where their training achievements are ratified and academic credits awarded.

Middlesex University also appoints external examiners to our courses to ensure that our training programmes meet required academic standards and are equivalent to other university undergraduate and postgraduate courses and CPDs."

www.metanoia.ac.uk/about/policies-and-procedures/

The Metanoia Institute has a research group - this is one of their strands. Why does this kind of open questioning not apply to gender? I'm very interested to see their arguments - is this about the Memorandum and conversion therapy. I thought we were awaiting legislation.

Religion and Spirituality Research Group
Research in the area of religion and spirituality has grown considerably over the last few decades and is becoming an increasingly important area for therapeutic practitioners to pay attention to in their clinical work. It has been well documented that religion and spirituality can be positive indicators of mental health, as well as triggers for mental distress (King 2013; Dein et al. 2013). This research group therefore provides a space to foster and support research in this area, including a forum to share research ideas, methodologies, and papers as well as supporting researchers to develop confidence and competence in this field

Well, no mention of evidence-based approaches in that blurb.

Nor critical analysis/thinking skills.

@SpindleWhorl

He's a former barrister. I imagine he's pretty good at assembling a decent case.

That’s what I thought. Picked with the wrong guy there... what utter gits.

Childlike - well they have had a bad rep for a while. This hasn’t helped.

Does his case include Childline?

Can recommend this podcast where Julian Vigo talks with James Esses:
savageminds.substack.com/p/james-esses
(This was recorded before James's dismissals.)

I'm also looking forward to the Metanoia institute explaining to the courts exactly how someone legally involving themselves in a thoughtful and civil manor with British politics with the clear aim of safeguarding children and opening a very important debate about a proposed piece of legislation that if rushed or poorly worded will cause serious harm to those it intends to help could be seen to bring the institute into disrepute🤔 and that's before anyone mentions his legally protected beliefs.

James Esses
"A few months ago, without warning, I received an email from my educational institute - @ Metanoia_Inst

• expelling me with immediate effect from my Masters course that I spent 3 years working towards. I was provided no evidence and not a single opportunity to defend myself."

twitter.com/JamesEsses/status/1421730360249962499

The Metanoia Institute's 'Student Conduct and Discipline Policy and Procedure' is available to view,
www.metanoia.ac.uk/about/policies-and-procedures/

I guess it's a good thing that i still have the capacity to be shocked...?

@Tibtom

Does his case include Childline?

Yes - he has volunteered for childlike for 5 years - 1000 hours on the lines. They told him that he was no longer required because of his thoughts (bad thoughts obviously...).

Kittenkong I read that but wasn't sure if his legal case was against them too.

I don’t think the case is with CL - but I guess it’s part of the whole ‘reputation’ things isn’t it?

@ArabellaScott

the NSPCC terminated his position calling it an 'inappropriate personal campaign.'

This from the charity with statutory power who saw nothing wrong with an employee wearing a gimp suit, masturbating in the toilets and uploading the video for further consumption. And complained at the criticism levelled at them calling it homophobic.

not shocked.

Were you not around for that particular lowlight?

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3611447-Potential-Systemic-Safeguarding-failures-in-NSPCC-Childline-illustrated-by-appointment-ending-of-relationship-with-Munroe-Bergdorf-Thread-2?pg=1

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3611125-AIBU-to-say-that-if-you-work-in-child-protection-you-shouldnt-post-pictures-of-yourself-wanking-at-work-in-fetish-gear

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3714849-Sacked-by-the-NSPCC-on-12th-August

SANCHEZ MANNING FOR THE MAIL ON SUNDAY
(extract)
2Earlier this year he resolved to make his concerns public.

He was further motivated after learning that the Government was planning to ban conversion therapy, which attempts to change a person's sexual orientation and gender identity.

He feared that such a ban might lead to psychotherapists who help children with gender issues facing prosecution.

So he launched an online petition in May called 'Safeguard evidence-based therapy for children struggling with gender dysphoria'.
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/582083

However, he was emailed by Metanoia's deputy chief executive Professor Carrie Weston, who said that two members of the public had complained about his 'social media activity'.

He was assured it was nothing to worry about.

The next day, however, Prof Weston emailed again, telling him he had brought 'negative attention' to Metanoia.

His student contract, he says she told him, was 'terminated'.

Mr Esses said: 'I'd been working towards becoming a therapist for almost four years and spent tens of thousands on the course.'

A few weeks later, he says, he was called to a meeting with Childline head Shaun Friel.

He says Mr Friel told him his volunteering contract was being terminated immediately and said: 'It is not appropriate for Childline representatives to use the service to advance their personal campaigns.'

Mr Esses said he was shocked. He'd given 'five years of my life' to Childline, keeping in a logbook each of the 200 shifts and 1,000 hours of counselling he had done as a volunteer for no pay.

He appealed to Childline's directors and to the chief executive of its umbrella charity, the NSPCC, but his appeal was rejected.

An NSPCC spokesman said: 'Volunteers cannot give the impression that Childline endorses their personal campaigns.'

Last night Prof Weston of the Metanoia Institute said: 'When he was a student Mr Esses made a series of public pronouncements.

'In doing so he brought the institute into disrepute and made his position on the course untenable.' (continues)
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9847741/Man-lost-job-Childline-raising-fears-children-rushed-changing-sex.html

Relevant thread re James Makings (NSPCC / 'rubberman') from page 16

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3605120-Munroe-Childline-s-first-LGBT-campaigner?pg=16&messages=25

The next day, however, Prof Weston emailed again, telling him he had brought 'negative attention' to Metanoia.

I just spat coffee all over my monitor lol

They kicked him off the course because they thought that raising safeguarding concerns would being them "negative publicity". I am speechless.

Metanoia and Middlesex University are organisations well known to me in relation to my research into cults.

I am insanely busy this morning but will be posting some interesting information about both Metanoia and Middlesex University when I get back.

I believe that James Esses big mistake was to train at Metanoia in the first place.

If they think that’s negative publicity just wait and see why crawls out in a case.

June 2019
Charity Commission reports on inquiry into Oxfam GB: “No charity is more important than the people it serves or the mission it pursues”
Regulator finds culture of "tolerating poor behaviour" at Oxfam GB and concludes charity “failed to meet promises made”
(extract)

"In a foreword to the report, Baroness Stowell, Chair of the Charity Commission, says no charity is more important that the mission it pursues or the people it serves:
No charity is so large, nor is its mission so important that it can afford to put its own reputation ahead of the dignity and wellbeing of those it exists to protect. But the implications of this inquiry are not confined to the failings of a single, big charity, because no charity is too small to bear its own share of responsibility for upholding the wider good name of charity.

Ultimately being a charity is more than just about what you do, it is also about the way in which you do it. The Charity Commission is determined to reassure the public that it understands this fundamental point and will work with the sector it regulates to demonstrate that fact in the months and years ahead."

www.gov.uk/government/news/charity-commission-reports-on-inquiry-into-oxfam-gb-no-charity-is-more-important-than-the-people-it-serves-or-the-mission-it-pursues

The people that the NSPCC & Childline serve are children and young people.

"What we stand for
The NSPCC stands up for children, demanding that laws change and action is taken to better protect them.

NSPCC stands for the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children
It means that each of us has a responsibility to keep childhood free from abuse, and we must do everything possible to protect children and prevent it from happening."

cf. 'Gender Transition and Desistance in Teenage Girls: Two Psychotherapeutic Case Studies'
written by Susan Evans and Marcus Evans
Published on July 30, 2021

quillette.com/2021/07/30/gender-transition-and-desistance-in-teenage-girls-two-psychotherapeutic-case-studies/

This link is interesting

<a class="break-all" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20210801095137/metanoia.ac.uk/prospective-students/equality-and-diversity/equality-and-diversity-events/lgbtqplus-article/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">web.archive.org/web/20210801095137/metanoia.ac.uk/prospective-students/equality-and-diversity/equality-and-diversity-events/lgbtqplus-article/

One of the fonders of the Metanoia Institute was the late Petruska Clarkson.

The below text, written by Tuppy, and link are interesting on a number of levels - running late now so more later

Clarkson was an associate of the PIE activist Tuppy Owens and was involved in organising sex workers for disabled people through Tuppy's various dodgy organisations, SHADA and TLC.

A group of interested parties including myself, the founder of IUSW, the International Union of Sex Work Projects, Ana Lopes, Professor Petrouska Clarkson and James Palmer met in Petrouska’s Harley Street house to discuss the Institute. We were enthusiastic about starting TLC as an educational academy, which would raise funds to train sex workers and disabled people.

<a class="break-all" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20210116030950/shadainternational.com/all-impairments/sexual-services/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">web.archive.org/web/20210116030950/shadainternational.com/all-impairments/sexual-services/

That's interesting R0wantrees. I wonder what the CC are intending.

If they think that’s negative publicity just wait and see why crawls out in a case.

Indeed. Their actions here are foolish in the extreme and they will regret their actions in this respect.

• and the Metanoia info also interesting, hooda. Looks like all of this needs a thorough airing.