Call for NHS therapists to "educate" clients - British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP)

[BridgetYourFortyDaysAreUp]

From Nick Wallis' GenderBlog today:

Call for NHS therapists to “educate” clients – GenderBlog

The British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP) has proposed requiring its therapists to “actively promote inclusion” during therapy sessions and “ensure that any discriminatory attitudes and behaviours are challenged” when expressed by patients.

The BABCP regulates psychotherapists and BABCP accreditation is considered important for any Cognitive Behavioural Therapist (CBT) working in the NHS. It has more than 23,000 members. The new requirements are part of a proposed overhaul to the BABCP’s Standards of Conduct, Performance and Ethics, which, if approved, will come into force later this year....

Susan Forbes is a BABCP member and has been a psychotherapist for 25 years. She has worked with detransitioners and individuals with what she calls “gender distress”....

Forbes calls the proposed ban on challenging beliefs “dangerous”, because “it makes it impossible for the therapist to work in the client’s best interest. We cannot offer effective therapy if we treat every aspect of their self-concept as immune from therapeutic examination or change....”

….............................

I wonder if this is just another of BABCP's "ideas" or if they are trying to get ahead of the Conversion Bill failing? Or trying to get ready for a successful Conversion Act?

The few comments on the blog are interesting. It appears that BABCP's consultation received a few hundred responses out of some 23,000 members. Did the other members not respond because they didn't know about the consultation, didn't care to respond, or were they afraid to respond?

I'm bothered by the 'challenge' and 'inclusive beliefs' bit because that's usually about not including women, and making everyone convert to the borg. In other words, ooh look, it's conversion therapy to transgenderism.

The second part seems to contradict this, so I'm not sure either way.

Why would anyone be afraid to respond to a consultation? More likely people cba because they don't have a strong view either way.

Do you not know how people have lost their jobs and livelihoods for wrongthink on gender?

I agree that on the face of it, it seems like the kind of response you get from most consultations (i.e. no one can be bothered). From that, however, you get a very unrepresentative take from your members. I have run consultations before, and a response rate as low as this might even have been worth a "let's scrap this and try again."

Why would members be afraid to respond? It depends on BABCP's reason for putting out this consultation, and the information on respondents that they intended to collect. As the PP has said, people have lost their jobs, or been driven out of jobs, for "wrong think." If the consultation wasn't completely anonymous, I imagine quite a few members would have had to word their responses very carefully. Conversion therapy is a hot topic, about to get hotter.

Or the members didn't have to worry about what they responded, and everyone thinks this is a great idea? Anything is possible, I suppose.

By replying to a consultation? Do you have evidence for that? Are you saying BCAP will log everyone's responses and get all the ones who disagree with them fired somehow?

No, but a proper consultation response requires a name and address etc, and strange things have been happening in the last 10-odd years.

WTF 🤯

"has proposed requiring its therapists to “actively promote inclusion” during therapy sessions and “ensure that any discriminatory attitudes and behaviours are challenged” when expressed by patients."

Nothing sinister about that at all.

I wonder if this is just another of BABCP's "ideas" or if they are trying to get ahead of the Conversion Bill failing? Or trying to get ready for a successful Conversion Act?

or perhaps they're setting themselves up to be the brainwashing arm of the government. So all those parents who fall foul of the new law can be sent for re-education instead of imprisonment.

“ensure that any discriminatory attitudes and behaviours are challenged” WTAF

Yes, whatever happened to therapy being a safe, person-centered space?

or perhaps they're setting themselves up to be the brainwashing arm of the government

Interesting, hadn't thought of that. I wonder if they even have lobbyists? Well, if Nick Wallis is on the case, they won't be able to do anything without him noticing (and eventually writing a book about it!)

This is sinister. It is not the place of a therapist to challenge any beliefs of their clients, apart from beliefs that harm the client themselves.

If a client is struggling with self-esteem, for example, and has a feeling they’re just useless, then a therapist should dispute that.

What they shouldn’t ever do is impose their own value system or political beliefs on their clients. That isn’t therapy. Therapy is meant to be for the benefit of the client, not the therapist or other people.

I genuinely think this is terrible.

I have mentioned on here before that gender ideology has split my family and two of my children have stopped contact.

This has caused me huge amounts of grief. For the first time recently, I have admitted to an NHS doctor that I sometimes experience suicidal ideation. I’ve lived with it a long time now and am in no danger of going through with it, but if NHS therapists were required to push gender ideology, I would not be able to be open to them about the cause of my distress. I am already reluctant to seek help for that reason. This would make it worse. It isn’t just those transitioning who are being harmed psychologically by the lack of any alternative discussion to affirmation being allowed.

Things may be about to become much worse in Scotland (this from another thread)

All about trying to put "gender identity " into law:

https://www.thetimes.com/article/948af8ac-30b1-4bf3-acaa-11b3e49cbc83?shareToken=e11dca08b0ef51902ba205e3e0b9fdf6

FWS said a Scottish human rights bill could become the latest example of the Scottish government attempting to bypass the Supreme Court ruling. The group warned that it was “almost guaranteed to be another law that will end up in the courts”.

I, too, have had this in my family. It does tear families apart, silences everyone, and you have no idea where to turn just to have a "safe" conversation. Solidarity 💐

Who gets to decide what a "discriminatory attitude or behavior" is? Will a Muslim woman be challenged on her attitudes towards homosexuality? Will a Muslim man be challenged on his beliefs about women's rights? Will a Jew who is experiencing heightened stress and anxiety due to rising antisemitism be challenged on their beliefs about Palestine? Are the "correct" attitudes and behaviors going to be thoroughly documented so therapists know which ones are suitable for challenging, or do individual therapists get to be the sole arbiters of what is right and wrong against their clients? Doesn't that create an unhealthy power dynamic?

Exactly.

Though in terms of ‘who gets to decide,’ it will be Omnicause beliefs that are imposed, won’t it.

It isn’t just those transitioning who are being harmed psychologically by the lack of any alternative discussion to affirmation being allowed.

Fully agree @PriOn1 Sending 💐 and 💪 I think we're coming out of the other side of my daughter being gender questioning now, but there was a time when being unable to protect her from the harms of this awful medical scandal was my first and last thought every day.

Allowing therapists to gently explore a viewpoint, such as why a child (or vulnerable adult) has come to believe themselves to have a gender identity that differs from their sex, is fundamental.

Who gets to decide what a "discriminatory attitude or behavior" is?

This is a great way to put it @ThatZanyFatball , along with your examples. Gender identity belief seems to get a free pass on being enforced as the correct belief to hold. The main problem seems to be that it's difficult to articulate why the idea that we all have a gender identity that is separate from our physical body is a belief and not a psychological fact. Therapists are being asked/told to take it as a given that everyone has a gender identity.

This discussion about challenging and educating reminds me of the things Wadhwa would say in interviews.

Plenty of people won't visit their GP over fears of just being 'nagged' to lose weight and cut down on alcohol, in lieu of having their underlying problem(s) addressed. If this proposal goes ahead, and becomes common knowledge, then it will simply put off people from seeking help, lest they be accusd of an -ism instead of having their underlying problem addressed. Completely counter-productive.

Are BACP suggesting that therapists will have to somehow REPORT patients for "discriminatory beliefs"?

And, as said upthread, which beliefs? Couldn't all beliefs be considered "discriminatory" in some way?

Would they have to challenge and/or report patients for GC beliefs? And if so, would they also have to report for believing in Gender Ideology?

If this isn't what they mean, they really need to make their "Standards of Performance, Behaviour and Ethics" a lot clearer.

https://babcp.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/BABCP-Standards-2026-Proposed.pdf

See also:

As if the last few days haven’t demonstrated that a) it is a terrible idea to lie to vulnerable people and b) vulnerable people who lie, or who believe impossible things about themselves shouldn’t be encouraged.

"Added expectation to expectation to challenge discrimination"
"Provides more clarity on our expectation that members will not engage in coercion or suppression of identity"

I have not been able to find this clarity in the document, though I did understand all the individual words.

https://babcp.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/BABCP-Standards-of-Conduct-Performance-and-Ethics-Review-2026.pdf

I agree, this just all seems like a recipe for disaster, they'll be encouraging people in therapy to believe in a world that doesn't exist outside therapy. Nobody is going to get any help, they're just going to push people who are already struggling further into difficulties.
I thought the whole point of therapy was to help, this is not going to help, this is going to harm.

Well that would exclude me from any counselling then. Nice.

We really do seem to be heading straight back to christian colonialism in a new outfit.

I hadn’t thought about it in terms of Christian colonialism, but you are so right. This is that in a different outfit.