RCVS Survey of the Veterinary Profession

[PriOn1]

I had hoped that the RCVS might actually get back to some degree of reality, now they’ve left Stonewall. Unfortunately, towards the end of the RCVS survey of my profession, there was this unprofessional nonsense. I do not understand how a profession that deals on a daily basis with sexed animals and who have undergone a professional degree course have become so captured with something that’s actually worse than homeopathy.

You can probably see that I was outraged by my responses, but I am also furious that this nonsense means they are missing out on genuine information about the demographics of the profession.

Please make it stop. It’s genuinely distressing.

How depressing.

Your replies did cheer me up though. I wonder how many other people used the 'self decribe' box to say 'stop with this bullshit' or similar?

At least there is one vet who can tell my cat that eating the dog's dinner does not make my cat a dog.

Haha nice one!

I recently completed a NHS questionnaire about diagnosis, prescriptions and hospital visits, and got a load of idiotic gender questions (which really had NO relevance) so I answered in a similar vein.

I am full of nothing but incredulity that a society representing a profession which is based on science, is now so seemingly confused.

IES.

I had a rather heated exchange back in 2018 when they were hired to evaluate one of my rather large government projects.

I put the spreadsheet together to capture Sex

They changed it to Gender

I changed it back

They changed it back

This went on for several exchanges when I explained that SEX was the protected characteristic and the one we were FUNDED to record

I had to go through and find a piece of paperwork that showed that the DfE [our funders] recorded SEX not GENDER [it was before they changed this over] and they shut up.

I then had 3 years of the providers changing it back to GENDER on their forms with the people on the courses.

ALL FUCKING IDIOTS.

Maybe this is actually how they are going to tackle the gender pay gap issue once and for all.

By claiming there no longer is one as gender and sex is fluid and it is therefore immeasurable 😬

I visited a vet school recently and there were trans flags hanging in the main reception. Apparently their brand new building needs modified to provide "gender neutral" changing rooms... student pressure.

I looked at retraining in the veterinary profession in 2018. It was the only profession that discriminated against people with any mental health diagnosis at all whatsoever, even depression, anxiety or neurodiversity. So I'm not surprised they're a bunch of cunts in other ways as well.

You can't become a veterinary nurse or vet with any existing diagnoses but you can become a brain surgeon, anaesthetist, prime minister, or nuclear physicist FFS because every other profession you can train in recognises that your health doesn't define you as long as you can do the job.

Edited: Stupid autocorrect.

How depressing. Sounds like it’s going to get worse then, before it (hopefully) gets better.

Then again, student pressure can come from a tiny, loud minority. Surely there must be some coming into the profession with some common sense.

Can I ask which it was? Edinburgh, where I studied, is painfully captured. That much I know already.

Really? That’s crazy.

The profession is filled with depressed people and has a high suicide rate. You’d have fitted right in.

Where did that horrible information come from?

I guess it might have been more effective to politely point out the contents of EA 2010, but I’ve been pointing them out for years, to little avail and no response.

I agree completely.
As an RVN of almost 15 years, I recently left the profession, not because of this issue but it didn't help.
The conversations I heard in the staff room beggared belief from so called science / biology "experts". Much of the profession is well and truly captured.

Like you say, we deal with the reality of sex every day, reproductive issues like pseudopregnacy, unwanted litters, accidental matings, pyometra, undescended testicles, spaying and neutering, uterine cancers, hormonal issues, caesarians, and more.

And then to hear that some people believe sex is a "construct" or some other absolute bollocks is alarming.
I don't know if its a coincidence but I'm based in Central Scotland and most of the vets I worked with graduated from Edinburgh Vet School too.

You have my sympathies if you are still in the profession, I don't think I could bite my tongue any harder or it would fall off.

Yep, it was Edinburgh.

Whilst I don’t agree with any sort of discrimination in any profession; I can see why the applications process is trying to reduce intake of those with mental health issues (if that is what is happening). I have lost two friends and colleagues to suicide, and both started their veterinary training with significant, underlying problems. Joining the profession, the stresses and strains the job handed to them definitely exacerbated those issues, and contributed in some parts to their loss.
The number of students we are seeing with concerning mental health is also increasing, as well as those just totally unable to cope with the stress of the course - I worry for them terribly, and hope they find ongoing support when they graduate.

Again, I don’t mean this in a dismissive manner- just musing on what the right answer to this major issue facing us all at the moment. I’m not sure there is a right answer.

Apologies for the thread derail.

Surely that is illegal, though - to discriminate against applicants on the basis of mental health? I thought the EQ protected characteristic of disability would cover mental health problems?
Is the concern partly to do with the potential for access to drugs that could be abused? A vet nurse at my local practice killed herself by abusing the ketamine they had there.

From their own website on fitness to become a vet/vet nurse. I've just gone back to check and they do seem to have changed it now in line with their legislative reform consultation and are now taking a more situational approach but it beggars belief that even in 2018 this discriminatory attitude was still their party line. However to clarify, I do not have depression!

@feelingalittlehorse Look that's utterly shit but do you seriously think it's reasonable that with my diagnosis of ADHD, even though I'm medicated and have made great progress working with a therapist and ADHD coach, that the neurodiversity I'm born with and that was diagnosed when I was a child should have prevented me from being a vet when even the BMA don't discriminate on this basis? What makes vets different to doctors here? Or veterinary nurses, for that matter, who are also being held to higher standards than doctors. It's just fear stemming from lack of understanding of mental health and you have demonstrated it perfectly.

And do you not think that maybe if they hadn't had that discriminatory policy for so many years, vets and nurses wouldn't feel so stigmatised about admitting they have problems and getting help, or afraid of losing their profession if they got help, and therefore would be better protected and at less risk?

I’m horrified that the RCVS was discriminating in that way. I wasn’t aware (likely most vets weren’t) but I was aware that having a diagnosis such as ADHD or Autism could affect your being allowed to join certain professions or do certain jobs. It’s one of the reasons I didn’t hurry to get my son diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder as he was fairly functional and I thought a diagnosis might hold him back. Thank goodness some progress is being made on that front.

I can’t imagine the policy had much influence over stigma within the profession, mainly as once in, we’d be unlikely to check that policy.

Perhaps the over-zealous attachment to transactivism now is partly driven by the knowledge of past discriminatory policies.

You probably dodged a bullet in not becoming a vet though. The profession is in something of a mess at the moment due to the increasing power of corporate companies and a painful lack of vets to fill the posts there are. If I could go back, I wouldn’t choose it again.

My DD started her vet degree in 2016 and there were definitely ND people on her course. In fact the Uni seemed to welcome them. One of her flatmates in first year is autistic. I think he wanted a scientific career more than as a bog standard small practice vet. I can’t remember what he did when he graduated.

I have 2 DC in their mid to late 20s. They are totally captured by TRA agenda and think it’s progressive. They have trans or non binary friends and believe they are being kind by supporting them (or their delusions).

It does surprise me that my DD can tell the difference between male and female animals but thinks it’s ok for men to pretend they’re women.

I am a secret GC activist. They know my views but we rarely discuss it or it leads to terrible arguments.

DD is in an independent practice and is luckier than many.

It does surprise me that my DD can tell the difference between male and female animals but thinks it’s ok for men to pretend they’re women.

It’s a very religious outlook, assuming humans are not normal mammals but some kind of superior being.

I am a secret GC activist. They know my views but we rarely discuss it or it leads to terrible arguments.

My daughter is a lesbian and though she used to agree with my GC views, she objects now to me mentioning them because she sees it as an attack on her (lovely) trans friends. It’s incredibly frustrating and hurtful that she basically treats it as a no-go area for discussion. My two sons are GC through and through, though the younger thinks I am exaggerating the impact sometimes) as now is my mother (no prompting from me).

I hope, so much, that this will be resolved at some point. It’s so painful to have such a fundamental disagreement, where family members treat you (to quote the recent Jo Phoenix case) “like a racist uncle”.

Perhaps send an email to the authors highlighting the legal bother the ONS got into when it planned to only record self id data in the census.

In the end they asked about sex as well as a seperate question on gender identity thanks to a court challenge by fair play for women.

As the ONS are the gold standard for data collection, it seems reasonable to ask why RCVS and IES are taking the approach of ignoring sex, which after all is a protected characteristic.

It really does seem to be a divide between the university educated ad the not university educated. I know some people thought the sciences would be less susceptible, but I don't see that at all.

This is probably a good idea. Does anyone have any good links I could include with this information please?

This is a page where the ONS talk about the separation of sex/gender identity data they collect following their legal challenge.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/census/planningforcensus2021/questiondevelopment/sexandgenderidentity

Here also is a page from Fair Play for Women about their successful challenge which they say established that sex is a separate concept to gender identity in law.

https://fairplayforwomen.com/fair-play-for-women-wins-high-court-challenge-against-ons-census/

I'm sure Sex Matters have some good resources on why to collect sex as distinct to gender identify which you could access.

Have a look at their Data and Statistics section

https://sex-matters.org/where-sex-matters/data-and-statistics/

Good luck!

Sorry, OP.

I've started to get just as snippy when 'gender' questions are fired at me.

No, in my instance all of us were university educated.