A.E. Thompson: Censoring Psychologists

Others have commented on the NZ College of Clinical Psychologists' removal of an article it previously published in its professional journal because, in retrospect, that article did not conform to the organisation's values. Some values!

One thing that Dr Mitchell in her now censored article informed us of was that, under the Ardern government, the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment gave $10 MILLION to an organisation called WERO, full name Working to End Racism and Oppression. WERO used some of that money to produce a report with the stated aims to 1) assess the extent to which current psychology training programmes have progressed in meeting Te Tiriti O Waitangi aspirations in training cohorts and course content; and 2) examine barriers and facilitators for Maori and other minoritised groups to participate effectively in psychology training and the workforce of practising psychologists.

Te Tiriti O Waitangi aspirations? What in Te Tiriti says anything about aspirations? Make up whatever takes your fancy. In this case, aspirations to turn psychology away from its longstanding commitment to sound knowledge supported by scientifically obtained evidence and able to be challenged and debated.

Barriers and facilitators for Maori and other minoritised groups to participate in training psychologists? Surely that begged the question of whether people, on the basis of being Maori or part of some other 'minoritised' group, will be useful or necessary for training psychologists. Remembering that 'psychologists' cover a wide range of sub-disciplines including research psychologists, organisational psychologists, neuropsychologists, forensic and clinical psychologists.

The term 'minoritised' implies that certain groups have been deliberately kept at low numbers, or low influence, or low something, by oppressive others. And which 'minoritised' groups should be involved in training psychologists? Gangs? Neo Nazis? Intellectually Disabled People? North Sentinelese defectors? Imagine how expensive it would be to involve every 'minoritised' group in training anyone.

The WERO report went far beyond even those silly aims. It sought to overturn the ideology adopted a long time ago by wise psychologists, an ideology striving to base belief and practice on good evidence obtained by research using sound scientific methods. And because the implication was that disagreeing with WERO would be seen as 'racist', some psychologists went along with it. Those who didn't knew to keep their mouths shut to avoid losing their jobs, being subjected to character assassination by woke colleagues and others, or otherwise being punished.

The NZ College of Clinical Psychologists, with the collusion of the statutory Psychologists Board, have brought their profession into disrepute and ridicule by removing a published article, but also by devising vacuous 'values' on spurious ideological grounds that were then used as justification for removing the article. Those values, actually requirements now for practising as a registered psychologist in any field, include agreeing with recently invented, fake Treaty 'principles' that even then have little or nothing to say about psychology practice.

A.E. Thompson is a working, tax-paying New Zealander who speaks up about threats to our hard-fought rights, liberties, egalitarian values, rational thinking and fair treatment by the state.