What do I think?

My late father, who died when I was only 17, had a keen wit and a sceptical turn of mind. One of his favourite sayings was: 'There are two reasons for everything: the good reason and the real reason.'

I thought of this as I was reflecting on the education programme in the 1970s (I think it was) called Helping Youth Decide. It was based on the then-trendy ideas of values clarification, stemming from the work of Carl Rogers.  Its good reason was to encourage young people to make decisions based on their values - with regard to tobacco usage and drugs, for example.  

Its real reason - well, according to Dr William Coulson, long-time friend and colleague of Carl Rogers, it was funded by Philip Morris, the tobacco giants whose best-selling product is Marlboro. In Coulson's view, the tobacco industry had realised that nobody with a fully mature brain was going to take up smoking, so they needed to get to people whose brains were not fully mature - teenagers. 

Helping Youth Decide (later re-branded as Helping Youth Say No and promoted by the Tobacco Institute) was a way of teaching them, and the adults who should be looking out for them, that adults' views and values are irrelevant to their decisions. Meanwhile, of course, Philip Morris continued to spend millions of dollars inviting them to 'Come to Marlboro country.'  So their commitment to a non-directive approach was, how can we say this, a little selective.

All this came back to me (from a talk I heard William Coulson give many years ago) when I was thinking about the trans issue.

Assiduous readers of my posts may have noticed that I keep circling around this: it troubles me.  In part, it troubles me because I see the toxicity with which the issue tends to be discussed (particularly on social media) and the polarisation (particularly in Higher Education, where most of my work is done) that surrounds it.  But deeper than that, it troubles me because I fear that serious harm is being done.

At this point, of course, it would be easy to dismiss me as a transphobe.

But that is precisely the problem, in my eyes: tactics designed to shut down any discussion, and the reduction of this complex set of issues to a simple goodies versus baddies narrative that loses all nuance.

Yet I think it is complex; and I have no generalised fear of, or hatred of, people who identify as trans (or non-binary or anything else). I only wish them well; but I believe that we must seek truth, as well as offer care, if we are to achieve good ends for them and for society more broadly. That is why I see 'No debate' as a very bad approach.  As the Cass Review's interim report makes clear, 'There is lack of consensus and open discussion about the nature of gender dysphoria and therefore about the appropriate clinical response.' 

So in this post (and others that may follow) I thought I'd throw caution to the wind, and think out loud about that complexity; and if a nuanced approach offends anyone... well it is of course their right to be offended; but again, I think that the instinct to be offended at ideas that differ from ours is not a helpful one.

One of my concerns, then, is that I think well-meaning teachers who used the Letting Youth Decide programme with teenagers may have done great harm, by withdrawing from their adult responsibilities and teaching teenagers that whether to smoke or take drugs was a choice they should make as autonomous individuals. The result for many: addiction to tobacco (or worse) and the long term likelihood of severe health outcomes.  

Likewise, I think that well-meaning teachers who teach children counter-factual ideas (such as 'sex is a spectrum') may also be doing great harm.

In the first case, they ignored the huge pressures (from Philip Morris' and others' relentless advertising campaigns, and the need to look cool in front of peers) that meant that teenagers (whose brains, remember, are not yet fully developed) were unlikely always to make wise choices.

I fear that in the second case, we may have something similar; distressed teenagers who are under huge pressures (from social media influencers, and a need to find acceptance among their - often online - peer group) may reach conclusions that are neither accurate, nor in their best interests. And the results may be unnecessary double mastectomies and lifelong dependency on a drug regime that may result in sterility, loss of sexual function and other unwanted consequences. How many Keira Bells does it take?...

And for teachers to undermine truth by taking a naive, ideologically-driven approach (albeit with the best of intentions) risks many other serious unintended consequences. One, of course, is to undermine trust, both from parents and children. Another, is to de-stabilise children's sense of their own identity. 

We know that the young brain develops fast, particularly in early years, and again in puberty and adolescence. (The Oxford Brain Story is very good on making the research on this accessible). We should pay serious heed to this well-established knowledge, and banish the notion that children are 'born trans' - a proposition for which there is no evidence whatsoever. Instead, we should offer children clarity about the basic reality that they are born male or female, and that is stable (for the vast majority). Seeking to normalise the abnormal is irresponsible and dangerous. Of course there are exceptions, and they should be dealt with on an exceptional basis.

I return, finally, to my father's dictum, about the good reason and the real reason.  Why is the trans agenda being pushed so hard?  The good reason is that there are genuinely a small number of people who, for reasons we don't know, but most probably springing from damaged psychosexual development at an early age (and again we know the research about Adverse Childhood Experiences...) have a profound sense of dysphoria with regard to the sex they were born - and we should do nothing to make their lives harder. And I am sure that for many, that is also the real reason.

But for others, particularly some of the activists and activist groups (and their financial backers), I do wonder, what is the real reason?  Is it the huge profitability of this market, as some suggest?  Is it the need for those who have gone down this track (for themselves or their children) to validate their choices?  Is it the need for progressives to be progressive, to show that they are at the cutting edge; and for others to try to keep up, so that they are not perceived as lacking in 'inclusion'?  Is it the need for transgressives to be transgressive, come to that? Or some other reason I can't discern? Or some combination of the above?  I don't know - but I think the questions should be asked.

Of course, I could be wrong about any or all of this, and if you think that I am, I would be very interested to hear why you think so.  As I say, one of my major concerns is that we should be able to discuss these contested issues with clarity and charity.

A Visit to the Doctor

The other day, I had to go to the doctor's: I had a lump, where previously I had not, so thought it wise to get an expert view.

Needless to say, I consulted the internet, too, and decided it was probably a inguinal hernia, and therefore benign (so I liked that idea...). But I didn't look to see what cancers might cause similar symptoms, though that was, of course, my fear (not least as both my parents died of cancer, my father at a younger age than I am now.)

The doctor was very good: he asked if I had any ideas about what it might be, so I told hem. Then he examined me, and said my diagnosis was in fact correct. Which was a relief.

But it was only a relief because I believe that he is telling the truth - that based on his training and experience, he is sure that the lump is indeed an inguinal hernia.  

However, if he was practicing the new 'patient affirming care' that seems to be the fashion, at least in some aspects of medicine, that would be a problem. It might feel kind to tell me it's only a hernia, and that I am clever to have diagnosed it correctly; but if it is in fact a cancer, that is not a true act of kindness.

It would be equally bad the other way about, of course: if I had decided it was a cancer when it was in fact a hernia, and had demanded chemo and an operation - and he had affirmed my diagnosis and decisions and put me on the road to full cancer treatment. 

Absurd! you may say.

And yet, this is what seems to have happened at the Tavistock; and this is what many lobbyists and activists are continuing to demand now, for people who self-diagnose as trans. And just as I didn't want to look at what other explanations there might be for my lump, there is always a risk that others undertaking self-diagnosis may prefer to avoid explanations that they are less happy with...

The Tavistock's reputation, historically, was built on its exploratory approach: really working with patients to reach a deep understanding of the complexity of their lives and experiences. But at some time that was abandoned, and (according to one clinician, quoted in Hannah Barnes' Time To Think) the gender unit there took on the characteristics of its clients (in a bizarre example of parallel process) becoming strident advocates for puberty blockers etc on demand.

Given the large proportion of the Tavistock's patients who presented with complex conditions, (often including autism), this unquestioning affirmative approach seems appallingly negligent.

Yet it is understandable: there was a real desire to be kind and supportive to these troubled children. But love without truth is as dangerous, in its way, as truth without love. And I think that all those who enter this polarised conversation would do well to remember both halves of that proposition!

And I really, really hope that my doctor was being truthful!

On the provisionality - and knowability - of truth...

This morning as I approached the summit of Heughscar Hill in the mist and pre-dawn semi-darkness, I noticed a shape where no shape normally was.

'Ah, a tent,' I thought. People do occasionally camp near the summit, where there is a fine view down Ullswater towards Helvellyn. Strictly speaking, I don't think they are meant to, but who could blame them? And they normally leave no trace behind.

Then the shape moved: a head appeared upwards from it, and I realised it was one of the fell ponies. It's not that usual to find them on the summit in the early morning, but not unknown.  A second head emerged, and I revised that: not one of the fell ponies, but at least two.

Then, as I cycled closer, and the image became clearer, I realised it was, after all, a tent, and two people had emerged from it.  I bade them a cheery good morning as I cycled by, and down off the hill.

As I cycled home, I reflected. There are several tracks off the summit. Had I taken the first, I would have thought I'd probably seen a tent in the distance.  Had I taken the second, I would have been pretty sure I had seen something that had initially looked like a tent, but had, in fact, been a few of the ponies.

Indeed, had I done that, and then met someone who said "I see some people were camping on the hill this morning" I should probably have replied; "No, actually, I thought it was a tent at first, but as I got closer, I saw it was actually the ponies."  And I would have been confident that my information was better than theirs, unless they had said: "You're mistaken: I went right past, and I spoke to them!"

All of which made me think on how provisional our knowledge can be. We think that we know something, but we may often be mistaken, and be convinced that we are right. But also, that the truth is knowable: finally, it is true to say that there were people camping on Heughscar this morning and the ponies were not on the summit of the hill.

And it's that balance, recognising that truth is knowable, and also that we need to be cautious in our assumption that what we believe to be true is in fact true, that I find so fascinating.

--

It was (possibly) Aeschylus who said, some 500 years before the time of Christ: In war, truth is the first casualty.  Plus ça change...

Further reflections on the EDI Agenda

In a previous post I commented on the ill thought through guidance on Trans inclusion, published by the CIPD. My point was that their naive approach didn't work, as it wasn't - indeed couldn't be - reciprocal across all the different groups with protected characteristics under the Equality Act (these are: age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, and sexual orientation).

I have been reflecting further on this, and think that the EDI challenge is profound, if not intractable.

It has been brought into sharp, and tragic, relief by the events of the weekend. How do we (and indeed should we) create an organisational culture that includes the most radical supporter of Hamas and the most radical Zionist?

Will the CIPD be publishing inclusivity guides?  Based on their recent track record, they should say:  authenticity – empowering Hamas militants to express their authentic self in the workplace, and showing outward acceptance when they do. and likewise, of course: authenticity – empowering Zionists to express their authentic self in the workplace, and showing outward acceptance when they do.

One problem I have with the EDI agenda is that I don't think anyone really believes it: not all the way through. Would anyone argue for equality and inclusion for the sake of diversity extending to those we believe to be advocating evil, or supporting genocide?

And it is an intellectual cop-out, I think, to say that it doesn't extend to those who express themselves outside what is legally permissible. We cannot outsource our consciences to the law; nor can we assume that the law is always just, as even the most cursory look in a history book - or indeed survey of current legal systems around the world - will confirm.

Or do we really mean, EDI (for those whose opinions I value)?

Because I am interested, too, in whom we seek to shame. It's a useful barometer of the moral atmosphere. People often talk as if shame is some evil that enlightened people have left behind. It is deemed quite wrong to fat-shame or to slut-shame, for example. But in fact, what has happened is that the targets of shame have changed. All the vogue words that end in -phobe (for example) seem to me designed to shame those who hold views that we now deem shameful (and possibly rightly so). Shame is, in fact, a useful and important moderator of undesirable behaviour. It would be a good thing if politicians were ashamed to lie, or celebrities ashamed to indulge in sexual exploitation. But we seem incapable of being honest about this; or even talking about it openly and clearly.

So where am I on all this?

My current thinking, and it is somewhat provisional, is that Equality, Diversity and Inclusion are not absolute goods (though we are invited to reverence them as though they are) but rather that they are, in reality, useful indicators. Where one or other of them is lacking, it should cause us to stop and take notice. And what we should take notice of, I think, are justice and truth and compassion.

That is, we shouldn't unjustly (or dishonestly, or cruelly) exclude someone; or unjustly (etc) demand that they conform, or unjustly treat them as less than equal.  But there may be occasions when it is indeed just to do so. Men are justly excluded from women-only spaces; students are justly required to conform to intellectual rules (such as not plagiarising) and children are justly placed under the authority of responsible adults for their own protection. 

Justice and truth, then, I see as absolutes to which we can - and should - commit; and compassion a default operating system. They are not, of course always easy (or even possible) to attain, but we should commit to striving for them. And I find it interesting that the pursuit of truth is so out of fashion in some intellectual circles; and further, I wonder if it is the search for a value-base to replace the gap left by its absence that has led EDI to be promoted to the first rank, when it should, by my reckoning, be in the second.

And it is with wry amusement that I notice that it is often those who refute the notion of truth who make strident truth-claims for their own particular dogmas; and occasionally do so with a pronounced lack of compassion. 

Why is truth-telling so hard?

I was at a meeting recently with a couple of very senior people (Let's call them A & B) and an HR person (let's call him X).

X had convened the meeting to discuss a proposal I'd written at X's invitation for a piece of work in the organisation, which A & B would need both to approve and be actively involved in developing and delivering.

Early on, I asked A & B if they had had a copy of my proposal - I didn't want to go over the whole thing again if they had, but I have learned to take nothing for granted.  They both said that they hadn't and X said he would send it through to them after our meeting.

As we left the meeting, X told me that he had indeed sent the proposal through to A & B before the meeting, but had thought it better not to mention that.

And so the truth was not told.

And I get that - I am sure that I have done similar in similar situations, and may well do so again.  But I have been ruminating on it ever since and a few things strike me.

One is that X's silence is easily understood: X did not want to embarrass A & B, especially in front of an outsider; and may have been wary of the consequences had he done so.

A second is that X may have been right. I don't know the organisational culture, or A or B as individuals, and it may be that X would have been victimised for pointing out that the document was in fact in both of their in-boxes.

And what harm was done, after all? Just a white lie, to save face for busy senior people.

But actually, I think harm was done.

For example, A & B may think X is less competent than he is - he should have sent the paper in advance.  Or they may discover it in their in-boxes and realise that he had sent it - and then judge him for not saying so. They have also been denied a learning opportunity: how was it that their systems had not flagged that there was a paper they should have read for this meeting? And X's behaviour suggests, and colludes with, a culture where the truth is not spoken to senior people, which is very unhealthy.

All of which reminds me of Patrick Lencioni on trust (and the associated need for vulnerability), and also later on telling the truth (with regard to accountability) and how easy it is to excuse ourselves from doing so.

Of course, it is easier for me as an outsider, to tell the truth: I can walk away more easily if it goes wrong.  And of course, that gives me a graver obligation to do so.

And that reflection makes me think of the organisations where I am not an outsider: a couple of charities with which I work. In one, I have some leadership responsibilities, and in the other I am a pawn on the ground, as it were. But in both cases there are issues about which I am having to think carefully about telling the truth.  

And the reason in both cases is that I have raised issues or queries quite openly and with little forethought, and then found that I have been met with a very strong, negative reaction from senior people.  Which brings me back to my question: why is truth-telling so hard?  And in the organisational context, it is frequently because of the (fear of) potentially negative responses of those with power.

Yet organisations need the truth to be told; leaders need people to be able to speak honestly and openly to them; or else they are leading without complete information, and possibly without insight.  And the led (including me) need to find the courage to speak our truth, and also the wisdom to do that in a way that reduces the likelihood of a defensive response - but we need not let the fear of such a response stop us from speaking all together, or we collude with the dysfunctionality of the organisation.

On Scafell Pike

At the weekend I went up Scafell Pike with Mike (my son) and Dylan (one of my nephews). We had a great walk, despite cloud cover at the summit.
I know the mountain quite well, and had decided that we would return to Seathwaite by a different rout (Esk Hause, if you know it) to the one we had come up by (the Corridor Route).

Map source

So we headed off the summit, went over Broad Crag, and bore North East to avoid climbing Great End and head for the hause. (A hause is a pass, by the way. Don't worry about the geography, if you don't know the mountain: the point I am trying to make will soon become clear, anyway).

However, it seemed to be taking far longer than I remembered to get to Esk Hause, and also the path seemed to be veering too far to the right (ie South). 

So eventually, I decided we should strike off to the North and see what we could see from the top of the ridge.

What happened next was baffling. The landscape looked all wrong. I was expecting to see the path we wanted to join and then cross with Sprinkling Tarn up to our left. But instead, a beautiful valley opened up, heading North West  - which didn't correspond to anything on my map.

Mike and Dylan both recognised it at once, but what they said didn't seem to make any sense to me. So I descended to the path and accosted some other walkers and (swallowing my pride) asked where we were, on their map.  They pointed to the Corridor Route, which made no sense at all - I realised that they were as lost and disoriented as I was. We could not possibly be there, having gone North from the east side of Great End.

However, they were right. The reason that Mike and Dylan had recognised the valley is that we had admired it on our way up. Somehow, I had managed a serious mis-navigation, and was clearly nowhere near where I had thought we were. (I still don't know how that happened, but that's not the point).

What fascinated me, once I had accepted the truth proclaimed by the other walkers, by Mike and Dylan, and (eventually) by map and compass (now I was looking at the right place) was how hard my brain had found it to adjust from what I KNEW to be true, to what was really true. For example, I completely failed to recognise the valley we had admired on the way up, as I KNEW it could not be the same one, as we were somewhere completely different. I KNEW the other walkers were mistaken when they first showed me where we were, and I completely failed to understand the very clear words of Mike and Dylan about the valley they recognised.

It was a very powerful and salutary lesson for me, as someone who coaches others to relinquish 'known truths' in search of more accurate understandings of reality; and is clearly a lesson I am keen to hang on to and continue to reflect on.  And it ties in very well with the fascinating book I am studying at present: Neuropsychology for Coaches, about which I may write more once I have finished it.

Ethics and narrative

I mentioned that I've been reading a fascinating book: Ethicability by Roger Steare.

He talks about three kinds of ethical approach:

1) Rule-based (eg deontology)
2) Social agreement based (eg utitilatarianism)
3) Values or principles based.

He points out that all three have their use, and also suggests that the first tends to make us behave as children, the second as adolescents and the third as adults.

This made me wonder if there might be a parallel with modernism and post-modernism and... whatever comes next. 

Modernism could be seen as rule-based; and when people object to my claims for the possibility of absolute truth, I think they may be objecting to this: rules laid down to be applied to all people in all places and at all times.

Post-modernism, social constructionism (the position of many in the narrative world) etc might be regarded as a reaction against that, and an attempt to replace rules with agreed interpretations that are necessarily variable depending on who agrees them.  This interpretation resonates with me as some of the academics in particular with whom I have debated this seem to be reacting against precisely that rule-bound notion of truth that 1) would suggest - and one or two also seem to me to have something of the adolescent's idealism, pride in rebellion, and impatience with other perspectives...

I (naturally!) think I am in the more mature position of 3)  I make truth claims for values, such as the intrinsic goodness of love rather than hate, of hope rather than despair and of faith rather than nihilism.


THese may need to be interpreted and mediated through social discourse (at level 2) and may on occasion need to be translated to rules (as at level 1 - for example, I would hate to meet a driver who thought the rule that we drive on the left side of the road [in the uk]  was not in any sense true and therefore not binding on him or her...)
So I think some of the conversations I have been in have been based on a series of false assumptions - both ways: I think people were assuming I was wanting to make truth-claims of type 1) and have reacted against them; and I was assuming they were reacting against what I really think and believe and reacted against that!