A nurse has claimed the NHS is “forcing racist ideology” on students through its promotion of Critical Race Theory as she brings legal action against an NHS trust in the first case of its kind. Amy Gallagher is suing the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust alleging discrimination on the basis of race, religion and philosophical belief, as well as victimisation and harassment. The Telegraph has more.
The mental health nurse, who is in the final stages of a two-year course in forensic psychology at the trust, objected to a lecture titled “whiteness – a problem of our time” in Oct 2020, where attendees were forced to confront “the reality of white privilege”.
In another race lecture the following month, Ms. Gallagher claimed she was told that “Christianity is racist because it is European” by a talk leader.
The case escalated in March this year when an external speaker at the trust complained to the Nursing and Midwifery Council, alleging that Ms. Gallagher could not work with “diverse populations” and had “inflicted race-based harm”.
Paul Jenkins, Chief Executive of the trust, told her that it “has committed itself to an explicit ambition of becoming an anti-racist organisation”.
Ms. Gallagher claims it is the first legal case for “lack of belief”, arguing that as a white Christian woman she cannot believe Critical Race Theory – an ideology that says racism remains institutional and rejects a colour-blind approach.
“They are forcing Critical Race Theory onto people – you’re not allowed to disagree with it, or they will bully you for two years,” Ms. Gallagher told the Telegraph.
“I’m bringing this legal case to protect my career but it’s also the first test of woke ideology in the courts. The NHS is forcing someone to adopt a racist ideology and it needs to be stopped.”…
Amy has raised £21,000 so far via GoFundMe (risky) and is being supported by the Bad Law Project, the anti-woke group established by Laurence Fox and Harry Miller.
Dr. Anna Loutfi, Head of Legal at the Bad Law Project, said:
The ‘lack of belief’ draws attention to something that people are not talking about in the free speech world in the West, which I think is covered by the Equality Act under lack of belief, which is you have the right not to be forced to sign up a set of values or ideology with which you do not agree. It’s quite one thing to censor somebody for wanting to say things that people find objectionable or offensive, but it’s really another thing substantively to force somebody to articulate a view that they do not hold, as if they hold it. That is what has happened to Amy.
Frankly, if subjecting people to lectures that tell them their race is “a problem of our time” and their religion is “racist” because it comes from Europe (though it doesn’t of course) – and mistreating them when they complain – is not unlawful discrimination then our anti-discrimination law is not fit for purpose. If the Equality Act does not protect ‘white’ people from race-based harassment as much as anyone else then it is misnamed, dysfunctional and needs replacing. Double standards are not equality. Let’s hope the courts agree.
Worth reading in full.
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A vital challenge. I will be putting a few bob in the kitty for her costs…
I doubt if GoFundMe or PayPal allow this sort of transaction, though I see the site has found alternative channels.
My grandad would be proud of what the Tories have done to Britain. But then he was in the SS.
Dear Adrisha , that comment nearly made me piss myself laughing.
Sad but true great point …
Don’t talk like that, my granddad died in Auschwitz. He fell off a watchtower.
LOL – brilliant.
The SS wasn’t exactly famous for their unwavering support for the Black Lives Matter ideology …
Although the Tories can be blamed for many things, most of these ‘woke’ organisations are run by card holding members of the ‘Bliar is great’ party. Living in a democracy means that we have to put up with this sort of crap.
Which ‘democracy’ would that be?
This is great but there has to be another way to fund it apart from Go Fund Me. If this gets really popular and gains traction, knowing what these tyrannical little imbeciles did to the Canadian truckers they’ll just yank the rug.
Go into the Bad Law Project website and click on “cases” & select Amy. There they have a link to donations via GiveSendGo (I think the Canadian truckers moved to them after GFM cancelled them).
Thanks.
Thank you, I did this and also donated a bit to GSG.
Ah cheers. Yeah I seem to remember Give Send Go stepped in as the alternative when GoFundMe robbed the truckers of my 30 quid! Thanks for the steer.
I agree. GFM are a liability in this case. considering their treatment of the Canadian truckers. And let’s not forget PayPal only recently decided to hold on to £600 of Toby’s money prior to assessing him for ‘damages.’
These organisations are quite at ease acting beyond the law.
A damn brave woman. I would like to donate to her cause but I won’t use GFM.
The outcome should show the people of this country where they stand. With a bit of luck all hell could break loose if this case generates the publicity it deserves. The BLM mob will surely rev up for this.
Good luck Ms Gallagher.
Make them live up to their own standards. Wasn’t that one of the Alinsky Rules? Well, played Madam, well played!
Someone should also go after this CEO for obvious misuse of public funds. The NHS is supposed to be a health service and not a vehicle to obtain funds for righting general social wrongs, no matter how much someone believes this really ought to be done.
Given our legal friends capacity to pursue the money wherever possible, I would imagine that this CEO is not acting illegally; just stupidly. We have to remember that the NHS is not national, has nothing to do with health and does not provide a service. It’s a waterhole for left leaning numpties who think the country owes them a living.
It’s almost refreshing to be confronted with another instance of this American post-religion, each and every bit of which is as irrational and ignorant as the preferred post-religion of the other party (and generally as complicit in ensuring that everything stays as miserable as it is by turning every attempt at constructive communication into another discussion of hypothetical first principles).
Some necessary background information: Either your producing food. Or you’re technically living at somebody else’s expense, the more so the more removed what you’re doing for a living is from food production. A billionaire is nothing but a somehow leaning numpty who has successfully conned society into paying for a fairly lavish style of living. Apart from that, he’s just the same kind of economic deadweight as someone living from welfare, just an a lot more expensive economic deadweight.
Now back to the topic: Critical race theory is a social theory trying to explain what someone believes to be unfixable deficiencies in race relations in the USA. It’s essentially inapplicable to any other place of the world because the dichotomyy of white people who are nothing but white and black people who are nothing but black does not exist there. Africa has black-on-black race hatred. And Europe white-on-white one. If you’re living in England, you’re better not Polish (and Germans aren’t really well-liked either, especially by people originating the the older generations of Polish immigrants). The Hutu – Tutsi conflict in Rwanda would be shining example of the other: People who are supposed to be nothing but black waging a genocidal war against other people who are also supposed to be nothing but black.
Considering this, the NHS has absolutely no business teaching critical race theory, let alone demanding that its employees subscribe to it. Assigning different values to different people based on their skin colour is racist. End of story.
I work at a university. At my annual review a couple of years ago I was directed to choose from amongst a range of DEI courses offered by a firm of race and gender hucksters as this was a new expectation of all staff. I told my reviewer that, given my experiences as a gay man in his 50s, I could have written these ‘classes’ if I was so inclined but wouldn’t because I value the progress we’ve all achieved (gay, straight, black, white, women, men) together, as a society over the past decades. I also told him that this kind of coerced ideology and ‘correct-speech’ indicates that our university pessimistically believes all staff are racists, misogynists, homophobes, transphobes etc in need of correction and that a better course of action would be to discipline people on an individual basis on the very rare occasions when such beliefs manifest themselves in active discrimination against colleagues or students. I also said that some good news is that I’ve never been subject to any homophobic treatment from colleagues or students in my almost 15 years of working at my institution and being gay certainly hasn’t held me back professionally. He said, I respect what you’re saying but you’ll probably have to take these courses anyway. So far I haven’t bothered but am girding my loins for a directive from the cold, dead hand of HR. Sane responses, you see, cut no ice with institutionalised people with power.
This case reminds me of two things from the past.
First, it is the logical progression from the situation in UEA (and doubtless many universities in the UK and the US) two decades ago, in which were lectured initially about how Evil Capitalism is causing Global Warming (the product nowadays marketed as “Climate Change”) and then about how the US Civil Rights Movement could Do No Wrong in their battle against racism and the “far-right”. Dissenters were ostracised. I have been out of academia for two decades and am guessing that the situation is now even more extreme, with the concept of “whiteness” and “reparations” becoming the new credo that one dare not criticize.
Secondly, there was a case of employment discrimination based on Climate Change Beliefs. (Judge Burton held that belief in Anthopogenic Climate Change was covered under legislation protecting religious or philosophical believers) BAILII case number: [2009] UKEAT 0219_09_0311
Let this be the first of many such cases. Decent people need to stand against bigotry regardless of whom it is inflicted upon.
I wish her all the luck in the world and well done for making a stand against this political hogwash!
I think it’s high time that all the Romans started apologising for all the slavery, invasion, war and general tyranny and misery they caused over many, many centuries. I find it a personal affront that they continue to get away with their crimes against humanity year after year. On that note, I’d like to add the Egyptians, oh and the Persians, Greeks, Mongols, Aztecs and well everyone else to that list. It’d be a good thing in fact if everyone apologised to everyone else for everything. We’re all to blame. We’ve made a massive mess of it all but let’s start afresh…..jeeeze, this woke thing just won’t go back to sleep now it’s a-woke! Good luck to Ms Gallagher’s case, it could be a real landmark case.
I blame Adam and Eve. It’s them wot started it after nicking the apple.
The men in the grey suits (shareholders ie. Investors) will put a swift end to this nonsense when they knock the boardroom door.