Unsilenced Project

Yvonne is a counsellor and psychosexual therapist in private practice in Scotland. She treats individuals and couples with sexual and intimacy difficulties; erectile dysfunction, premature ejaculation, vaginismus, loss of desire, compulsive sexual behaviour - work she finds rewarding because these conditions are often curable. She has also worked with young men with porn-induced erectile dysfunction, couples shattered by a hidden sex life, and partners affected by cross-dressing. She was already seeing what she later recognised as trans widows.In January 2021 she attended the online conference Do Not Adjust Your Set, chaired by Dr David Bell. Heather Brunskell-Evans described an affirmation model designed by identity politics and trans activists, not clinicians: therapists were to treat a girl as if she were already a boy. “This isn’t clinical, it’s not researched and it’s not evidence based. So I have to say this was shocking to me.” That day she peaked.What followed was a new lens on her profession: NHS training she later saw as a push to get clinicians on board; a 19-year-old detransitioner who booked three times, didn’t turn up and then wrote that she did not trust therapists; group supervision that met the subject with silence; partners required to bury the person they loved and accept an “authentic self”; older men’s private fetish becoming public; professional bodies supporting unevidenced affirmation; and rape-crisis practice that denied women a male-free environment. She has never said “trans women are women.” She uses the name a client gives. She wants to work more with detransitioners and trans widows, and to peak others teetering on the fence.Do Not Adjust Your Set: Sex, Gender and Public Policy.https://www.youtube.com/@dnaysconference5590Dutch Protocol​​https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0092623X.2022.2121238Behind the Looking Glass - Vaishnavi Sundarhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Frffv2sB8zE&t=3994sMridhul Whadwahttps://sex-matters.org/posts/updates/damning-judgment-wake-up-call-for-womens-sector/Exulansichttps://exulansic.substack.com/
Warrior Teacherhttps://edijester.substack.com/
MJ Murphyhttps://x.com/hothingsgirlsay
WPATH fileshttps://environmentalprogress.org/big-news/wpath-files
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In this Unsilenced story, forensic artist Chris Rynn talks about the decade spent enhancing images and videos for police investigations into child sexual abuse. Beginning in 2007, he developed techniques that helped identify offenders from hand and body details, working on around 100 cases. One of the earliest and most widely publicised was the 2009 LGBT Youth Scotland case involving a ring of eight men and an 18-month-old child.Chris describes how the work, which no one else was doing, gradually destroyed his health. Night terrors, repeated vomiting that caused a hiatus hernia, a severe spinal injury sustained while working on a case, and flashbacks triggered by the sound of children playing left him with a formal diagnosis of severe PTSD. His employer provided no ongoing monitoring or counselling. He was eventually signed off and later dismissed.The impact has been permanent. He can no longer be around children, including those of friends and family. Plans to foster were abandoned. The damage has extended to his wife and their shared future. Chris’s account shows that the harm of child sexual abuse reaches far beyond the primary victims - it scars the families of those who investigate it and the professionals who try to bring offenders to justice. His story is included because of the direct link to the LGBT Youth Scotland case and the wider safeguarding questions it continues to raise.Chris on Xhttps://x.com/dr_rynnChris on LinkedIn​​https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-christopher-rynn-43984314Chris facial reconstruction projects:https://www.instagram.com/chris_rynnCrowd funder for Punin2 Facial Reconstruction Projecthttps://ko-fi.com/punin2
 
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Kelly Oliver Dougall is a counsellor and care-business owner from the North East of England. A teenage parent who built her own companies after years in the voluntary sector, she was focused on keeping her new domiciliary care service afloat when lockdown arrived in 2020. What began as simple questions about the rules quickly brought name-calling, staff reports to the CQC, and the stress of vaccine mandates that clashed with the fundamental right to refuse treatment.Those experiences of institutional pressure opened her eyes. At a Let Women Speak event in Newcastle she heard women describe the cotton ceiling, the erasure of lesbian spaces and the medicalisation of distressed girls. She peaked. Further research, attendance at more events and the WPATH files deepened her understanding. When Party of Women sought candidates she stepped forward, campaigning in a snap election while still running her business.The cost was real: social pushback, professional complaints, a suspension by her counselling body (later overturned with help from the Free Speech Union) and an ongoing fight for her own data. Through it all she has built a specialised counselling practice for trans widows and women whose families have been caught in gender ideology — women experiencing ambiguous loss, DARVO and multi-directional abuse with almost nowhere safe to turn.Kelly’s story is one of ordinary resilience: a woman who refused to stay silent, who turned personal cost into practical support for others, and who continues to insist that women must be allowed to speak the truth.Kelly’s counselling website:https://kellyoliverdougall.co.ukKelly on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@Kelly.OliverDougall
Kelly on X:https://x.com/KODPOWKelly on LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellyoliverdougall
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In this story from the Unsilenced Project, Brooke shares her personal journey from a “nice cult” upbringing in America to becoming a banner-maker for women’s rights in Scotland.Brooke describes how, during COVID, she began noticing what she saw as troubling developments around children’s safeguarding and women’s single-sex spaces. She explains why these issues felt deeply personal - recounting her own difficult experience of puberty and her long-standing instinct to protect children.She speaks openly about her initial resistance to being labelled a “TERF,” her trans friends, and the gradual shift in her thinking. Brooke then shares the story of how she began creating banners for protests and groups like the Scottish Feminist Network - turning simple felt letters and fabric into visible, creative acts of resistance.She reflects on the emotional weight of learning about safeguarding failures and the inspiring women she has met who are working to protect the rights of women, children and gay people. Brooke ends with quiet determination, explaining why she chooses to focus on what she can do: stitching banners and connecting with others who refuse to stay silent.
GRR Bill Scotlandhttps://www.holyrood.com/inside-politics/view,time-for-selfreflection-how-public-bodies-got-into-a-mess-over-sex-and-gender
Deep Green Resistance labelled TERFshttps://derrickjensen.org/2013/06/deep-green-resistance-interview-rachel-ivey/James Rennie of LGBT Youth Scotland & the Hogmanay imagehttps://www.scotsman.com/news/horror-upon-horror-that-unfolded-in-worst-ever-abuse-trial-2443859Marion Miller arrested for a tweethttps://lilymaynard.com/the-curious-case-of-marion-millar/
 
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Women built vital single-sex services like Rape Crisis centres from nothing - with no money, little support, and in the face of a society that offered survivors almost no help. They created protective spaces because they knew exactly what was needed. Those hard-won provisions were wrecked once trans ideology appeared and dismantled crucial single-sex services with no thought to the effect on women.This is a story repeating itself across women’s single-sex spaces and services - Rape Crisis Centres, Domestic Violence shelters, prisons and more - that were once acknowledged as important for safety and recovery. Trans ideology meant safeguarding was thrown aside. Rather than working to create a third space for trans people, women’s mental and physical wellbeing was disregarded and spaces were seen as fair game.In this episode of the Unsilenced Project, Rosemary Whyte shares how she co-founded Glasgow’s first Rape Crisis centre in the late 1970s exactly on that protective model. Motivated by horrific rape cases in 1974-75, she and two others started with nothing more than a living-room meeting in spring 1977 after spotting a Spare Rib advert. They built the group through word of mouth and challenged victim-blaming myths while operating in an era when married women had no financial independence and marital rape remained legal until 1989.From the very beginning they made the centre women-only because, as Rosemary explains, “if women were traumatised, seeing the embodiment of their attacker could re-traumatise them.” The transcript records that this clear protective principle was not questioned until Sandy Brindley was in Rape Crisis Scotland. Rosemary reflects on the practical support they provided, the emotional demands on volunteers, confidentiality, and leaving after three years knowing the collective would carry the work forward.This is the story of what women achieved when they put survivors first - and why that foundation still matters.Edinburgh Rape Crisis Employment Tribunalhttps://sex-matters.org/posts/updates/damning-judgment-wake-up-call-for-womens-sector/Philip / Pips Buncehttps://www.dailymail.com/news/article-6197705/City-workers-hit-gender-fluid-banker-works-days-Philip-Pippa.html
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In this episode of the Unsilenced Project, psychotherapist and author Sue Parker Hall shares her 31 years of clinical experience and why she stepped away from gender clinic referrals almost immediately. Sue describes being restricted to superficial “tick-boxing” work - checking clothing, makeup, and ‘passing’ - rather than the deep, exploratory therapy she was trained to offer. As a supervisor to gender-critical therapists, she highlights the intense pressure and fear of conversion therapy accusations that prevent even basic questions about trauma or history, especially with young people. 
Sue reflects on her own ideological evolution - from adopting 1980s feminism to recognising the same rigid, one-lens thinking in critical race theory and trans ideology - and her decision to stand for chair of the UKCP to preserve genuine psychotherapy principles. She speaks movingly about the loneliness and grief of parents of transitioning children, the shaming of male clients, and the professional cost of refusing to affirm ideology over curiosity. Throughout, Sue’s story is one of quiet courage: protecting the therapeutic relationship, prioritising young people’s wellbeing, and refusing to let political ideology replace evidence-based care. A powerful testament to the importance of ethical practice and giving voice to those silenced.
UKCP Chair Shenaniganshttps://criticaltherapyantidote.org/2025/02/09/ukcp-chair-election-2025-shenanigans-slurs-and-a-vision-for-the-futureTim Bond Ethical Guidelineshttps://www.bacp.co.uk/media/1959/bacp-ethical-guidelines-researching-counselling-psychotherapy.pdfDr Christian Buckland Resignationhttps://www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/f2c770aedcd157f1Memorandum of Understanding on Conversion Therapyhttps://www.psychotherapy.org.uk/news/ukcp-withdrawal-from-mou-on-conversion-therapyManMaid podcast by Sue ParkerApple podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/manmaid/id1528776531Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4X1w1Dh9rC8CLxZwcpD6vkOpen letter to the UKCP on the election of its Chairhttps://openletter.earth/open-letter-to-the-ukcp-on-the-election-of-its-chair-27c5c47f?limit=0Ways of pushing backhttps://open.substack.com/pub/fair370/p/defending-psychotherapy-from-ideologicalThoughtful Therapistshttps://www.thoughtfultherapists.orgTo Hell in a Handcart post:https://open.substack.com/pub/fair370/p/to-hell-in-a-handcartSue’s Substackhttps://substack.com/@sueparkerhallSue on Xhttps://x.com/SuePHallAnger, Rage and Relationship: An Empathic Approach to Anger Management - Sue Parker Hallhttps://amzn.eu/d/0c8xAaYx
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In this Unsilenced Project story, the anonymous woman behind the Just Say Mother campaign shares her personal story of fighting for clear, sexed language in women’s health.Concerned by the removal of words like “women”, “pregnant women”, “mothers” and “breastfeeding” from NHS materials, schools and policies, she explains how these changes were made without research and how they exclude and confuse the very women they claim to help.With a learning disability, she describes how terms such as “pregnant people” or “birthing people” make health information inaccessible to her: “if you aren’t actually putting ‘women’ or ‘woman’ or ‘mother’, I don’t believe that’s for me. So I won’t read it.”She recounts the trauma of baby loss, where “they only saw my baby, they didn’t see me”, and how speaking up led to cancellation from women’s groups, accusations of privilege, and being told to use “addictive language”. “I’m not just a person. I’m a woman,” she states.Through examples from NHS signage, Group B Strep literature, breastfeeding support and school materials, she highlights the double standard with men’s language and the resulting loss of trust in healthcare. Her message is a clear call to protect women’s words, safeguard vulnerable mothers and girls, and support research so that clear, accurate communication can be restored.Please sign the petition & sharehttps://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/748663Just Say Motherhttps://x.com/justsay_mother
Reem Alsalem UNSR Violence Against Women and Girls quotehttps://x.com/UNSRVAW/status/1863493277510476180
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In this episode of Unsilenced Project, Ellenor Hutson shares how gender ideology first fractured a feminist group and later tore through her tenants’ union work in Glasgow. A lifelong socialist feminist who believed in material reality and women’s solidarity, Ellenor watched “really nice” women fold when two sexist men identified as non-binary and demanded entry. “These people have really painted themselves into a corner,” she says, describing the moment she saw the contradiction between claimed women’s spaces and actual practice. When her estate’s residents association affiliated with Living Rent, the same dynamic exploded. After she and her husband expressed measured gender-critical views on their personal social media, trans activists launched complaints, abused them on Slack, attempted to remove them from the organisation and associates were doxxed via a suspicious outsider account - just as they prepared to fight the demolition of four social-housing towers. Despite their unpaid hours defending tenants, the union prioritised ideology over class struggle and women’s safety. Ellenor powerfully defends women’s only spaces, the welfare system that protects women and children from financial abuse, and the right of working-class women to organise without being silenced. Her story gives voice to those punished for noticing that “women isn’t a social category” is a fundamental attack on women’s rights.Wynford Estatehttps://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2025/mar/24/battle-for-glasgow-wyndford-estate-photo-essay
Living Renthttps://www.livingrent.org/Secret Gender Fileshttps://malcolmrichardclark.substack.com
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