Strong documentation of how the feedback process got steamrolleed. The part where respondents warned about alienating half the profession and communities yet the CSWE kept its ear bent toward supporters says a lot. My undergrad sociology program had similar dynamics around 2018, people quietly uncomfortable but noone wanting to speak up publicly.
I honestly don't think that feedback--even if it were from numerous others--ever stood a chance. They seemed committed, no matter what. It was the morally virtuous thing to do after all.
Please don’t use the term, “liberal” to describe these actions. True liberals were Jefferson, Madison, Franklin etc. The behaviors including co-opting the language and changing its meaning to eliminate history exhibit the Marxist behavior that has replaced the once Democratic Party and their like. Read The Communist Manifesto or Saul Alinsky’s 12 Rules for Radicals. I learned this in my B.A. program in the 70’s.
I am reading this with great interest. We have always had conservative students in social work programs. I just retired from a 45-year career as an Endowed Professor of Social Justice. However, the widespread disdain for conservative students is relatively new and, I believe, tied to the automatic (and largely mistaken) assumption that they must be MAGA. Before this turn to making anti-racism the primary focus of the EPAS, my college generally handled students who clearly did not subscribe to the NASW Code of Ethics on a case-by-case basis related to our professional ethics.
Part of what is missing here are 2 facts:
1. This is not totally new. For many years, CSWE has exempted SW programs in religiously-based colleges from adhering to all of the previous EPAS standards. In the past, much of this related to beliefs and attitudes about abortion, which was then a "hot" topic for Christian-based programs.
2. The change in leadership at CSWE to a very small group of people who fully and unquestionably supported ADEI and the somewhat singular focus on race was largely responsible for this change. Once in charge, they pushed through the EPAS changes they supported and disregarded all feedback that did not align with their ideological stance.
I have personally been in charge of one self-study in my college and served as a self-study consultant for other programs. I have watched the EPAS change over the years. The current narrow, ideological change will not serve our social work students well in their eventual employment.
However, we cannot ignore the other extreme that is being enacted in conservative states. In Texas (where I live and taught), our University and College websites have been scrubbed of ALL ADEI content. All sections of a course I designed many years ago, "Confronting Oppression," were cancelled, and our syllabi for all courses in all colleges are fully online, where legislators (and others) can peruse them for banned DEI content.
I don't think that this has anything to do with a lack of strong documentation. It has to do, in my opinion, with the change in leadership to a small group of people who think alike and are not open to other ideas or feedback from anyone else.
We are receiving reports today of failure to treat or poor treatment provided to conservatives by nurses at hospitals. I have been monitoring this in psychotherapy since 2020 when the Covid scam and the Trump Derangement led to many psychotherapists claiming they would discriminate against anti-vaxers and Trump supporters.
I have been at this for several decades. In that time I do not believe I ever met a LGBTQ therapist that I believed was competent. This is all projection. These are disordered people that should not be psychotherapists. I suppose they can run around doing case management and not do too much damage but they cannot offer balanced containment and change pathways for normal people.
In light of the new federal guideline regarding affirmation medicine I created six new ethical principles for psychotherapists working with questioning youth. I am putting together a training for CE in Idaho. I was attempting a discussion about the principles on (in very conservative Idaho) a Facebook group and was censored and effectively banished from the group. I received a veiled threat. None of the presumably common sense therapists spoke out in support of the principles, Here they are:
Proposed Ethical Statements for children under 18 in Idaho
Ethical psychotherapists working with questioning youth conduct an accurate, differential assessment of patients' problems of living that is uncontaminated by politics, reimbursements, or societal preferences, and leads to effective treatment.
Ethical psychotherapists working with questioning youth offer thorough informed consent in their marketing materials and during pre-therapy that includes not only the psychotherapy process and fees, but also transparency about any beliefs or values the therapist might hold that could impact a diagnosis or prescription.
Ethical psychotherapists working with questioning youth always offer the least restrictive, least invasive intervention (or no intervention) that, based on their clinical experience, and the available research, has the capacity to be effective.
Ethical psychotherapists never participate in concealing new gender experimentation from the parents of a dependent child because such experimentation necessarily creates psychological distress that requires family support. Since gender experimentation is a sign of a serious psychological impairment, it should be documented in the medical record, which parents can access under Idaho law. Ethical psychotherapists work with their child patients to collaborate with their parents if they wish to engage in gender experimentation. In most cases, an ethical psychotherapist would inform the parents that their child is engaging in gender experimentation even if the child (and other people in their support system) wants to conceal the experimentation from the parents. A psychotherapist who fails to involve parents when serious and potentially dangerous acting out is occurring is not acting prudently to protect a minor, which could constitute an ethical violation.
Ethical psychotherapists working with questioning youth provide unconditional positive regard to all patients, but they do not routinely confirm their patients’ self-perceptions (or the perceptions of other professionals or people in their personal lives) in the absence of objective reality.
Ethical psychotherapists help questioning youth recognize that changing their bodies is not always possible or beneficial and is often harmful. Therefore, the least restrictive intervention for these children is Watchful Waiting, a process that allows ethical and effective psychotherapists to help their patients reconcile who they are so that they can accept themselves as they are.
Strong documentation of how the feedback process got steamrolleed. The part where respondents warned about alienating half the profession and communities yet the CSWE kept its ear bent toward supporters says a lot. My undergrad sociology program had similar dynamics around 2018, people quietly uncomfortable but noone wanting to speak up publicly.
I honestly don't think that feedback--even if it were from numerous others--ever stood a chance. They seemed committed, no matter what. It was the morally virtuous thing to do after all.
Please don’t use the term, “liberal” to describe these actions. True liberals were Jefferson, Madison, Franklin etc. The behaviors including co-opting the language and changing its meaning to eliminate history exhibit the Marxist behavior that has replaced the once Democratic Party and their like. Read The Communist Manifesto or Saul Alinsky’s 12 Rules for Radicals. I learned this in my B.A. program in the 70’s.
We purposefully used the word "illiberal" once in the essay.
Interesting. I’d like to know more about your group. I left the NASW 15 years ago because of this.
I'm not strictly part of any group in particular. My safe haven though has been commiserating with folks from Heterodox Social Work:
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/10497315251351865
https://www.facebook.com/groups/hxsocialwork
I am reading this with great interest. We have always had conservative students in social work programs. I just retired from a 45-year career as an Endowed Professor of Social Justice. However, the widespread disdain for conservative students is relatively new and, I believe, tied to the automatic (and largely mistaken) assumption that they must be MAGA. Before this turn to making anti-racism the primary focus of the EPAS, my college generally handled students who clearly did not subscribe to the NASW Code of Ethics on a case-by-case basis related to our professional ethics.
Part of what is missing here are 2 facts:
1. This is not totally new. For many years, CSWE has exempted SW programs in religiously-based colleges from adhering to all of the previous EPAS standards. In the past, much of this related to beliefs and attitudes about abortion, which was then a "hot" topic for Christian-based programs.
2. The change in leadership at CSWE to a very small group of people who fully and unquestionably supported ADEI and the somewhat singular focus on race was largely responsible for this change. Once in charge, they pushed through the EPAS changes they supported and disregarded all feedback that did not align with their ideological stance.
I have personally been in charge of one self-study in my college and served as a self-study consultant for other programs. I have watched the EPAS change over the years. The current narrow, ideological change will not serve our social work students well in their eventual employment.
However, we cannot ignore the other extreme that is being enacted in conservative states. In Texas (where I live and taught), our University and College websites have been scrubbed of ALL ADEI content. All sections of a course I designed many years ago, "Confronting Oppression," were cancelled, and our syllabi for all courses in all colleges are fully online, where legislators (and others) can peruse them for banned DEI content.
I don't think that this has anything to do with a lack of strong documentation. It has to do, in my opinion, with the change in leadership to a small group of people who think alike and are not open to other ideas or feedback from anyone else.
We are receiving reports today of failure to treat or poor treatment provided to conservatives by nurses at hospitals. I have been monitoring this in psychotherapy since 2020 when the Covid scam and the Trump Derangement led to many psychotherapists claiming they would discriminate against anti-vaxers and Trump supporters.
The bias against anything and anyone non-“liberal” in the psychotherapy profession is still quite real.
This is a recent video shared in a therapist Facebook group I’m in: https://www.facebook.com/share/v/17fzfZG9x9/?mibextid=wwXIfr
I have been at this for several decades. In that time I do not believe I ever met a LGBTQ therapist that I believed was competent. This is all projection. These are disordered people that should not be psychotherapists. I suppose they can run around doing case management and not do too much damage but they cannot offer balanced containment and change pathways for normal people.
In light of the new federal guideline regarding affirmation medicine I created six new ethical principles for psychotherapists working with questioning youth. I am putting together a training for CE in Idaho. I was attempting a discussion about the principles on (in very conservative Idaho) a Facebook group and was censored and effectively banished from the group. I received a veiled threat. None of the presumably common sense therapists spoke out in support of the principles, Here they are:
Proposed Ethical Statements for children under 18 in Idaho
Ethical psychotherapists working with questioning youth conduct an accurate, differential assessment of patients' problems of living that is uncontaminated by politics, reimbursements, or societal preferences, and leads to effective treatment.
Ethical psychotherapists working with questioning youth offer thorough informed consent in their marketing materials and during pre-therapy that includes not only the psychotherapy process and fees, but also transparency about any beliefs or values the therapist might hold that could impact a diagnosis or prescription.
Ethical psychotherapists working with questioning youth always offer the least restrictive, least invasive intervention (or no intervention) that, based on their clinical experience, and the available research, has the capacity to be effective.
Ethical psychotherapists never participate in concealing new gender experimentation from the parents of a dependent child because such experimentation necessarily creates psychological distress that requires family support. Since gender experimentation is a sign of a serious psychological impairment, it should be documented in the medical record, which parents can access under Idaho law. Ethical psychotherapists work with their child patients to collaborate with their parents if they wish to engage in gender experimentation. In most cases, an ethical psychotherapist would inform the parents that their child is engaging in gender experimentation even if the child (and other people in their support system) wants to conceal the experimentation from the parents. A psychotherapist who fails to involve parents when serious and potentially dangerous acting out is occurring is not acting prudently to protect a minor, which could constitute an ethical violation.
Ethical psychotherapists working with questioning youth provide unconditional positive regard to all patients, but they do not routinely confirm their patients’ self-perceptions (or the perceptions of other professionals or people in their personal lives) in the absence of objective reality.
Ethical psychotherapists help questioning youth recognize that changing their bodies is not always possible or beneficial and is often harmful. Therefore, the least restrictive intervention for these children is Watchful Waiting, a process that allows ethical and effective psychotherapists to help their patients reconcile who they are so that they can accept themselves as they are.