Esther Crawley talk at TEDxBristol, Thurs 2nd Bristol - "Disrupting Your View Of ME"

If I should be ironic here, I must point out that Prof. Crawley uses guilt by association to make all ME patients responsible for the actions of a few. However, since there are no police reports, no evidence, and no information about the perpetrators, how do we know that they in fact have ME? When patients self-diagnose, the prevalence is five times higher than when patients are clinically assessed (Johnston et al, Clin Epidemiol, 2013). It has been suggested that people who write hate mail and make threatening phone calls probably have psychiatric diagnoses rather than ME. If Prof. Crawley wants to use guilt by association to blame the entire ME community—which of course is a fallacy anyway—she must present evidence that the perpetrators really have ME. It should be emphasized here that since most ME associations use the Canadian consensus criteria or the International consensus criteria, a diagnosis of the wrongdoers with CFS according to the Oxford criteria is not good enough to establish guilt. ;)
 
Skycloud said:
Why was she holding her hands in that position throughout?
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Classic preacher pose........I was waiting for the 'I have a dream' moment (no disrespect to MLK intended)...........

The other 'shock revelation' after she'd told everyone who the picture of the little girl in bed was, how long she'd been ill etc was to tell them that actually it was all a lie...........the reason for this.........
fear of attacks on the girl by those nasty 'anti-research' activists..........

She is really pushing this message (see also the radio 4 interview on Lightning process) and getting her patients to believe/say the same.

So now she's done the TEDx talk I wouldn't be at all surprised if a documentary is planned.....
clearly trying to replicate/counteract Jen B's success with Unrest................watch out for the merchandise.......free Stop poster with every DVD.

Dame Esther Crawley(?):emoji_scream:
 
JohnTheJack said:
I haven't read the whole of this thread on here, but can say the following:

Someone else contacted Gill. That person prefers not to be named. They forwarded me an email from Gill that said (direct quotation):

This is a photo illustration I created for an article that was published in The Sunday Times Magazine in 2013.

I created it using the wording from threats Simon Wessely had received at the time (it certainly is disturbing!)

Prof Crawley contacted me asking if she could use the image in her presentations. I gave her permission in good faith.

I’ve read your tweets and responses about Prof Crawley’s presentation (I had a quick google when your email arrived). I was a bit concerned about how she presented the image - the context of the image is clearly important and not disclosed! Ive dropped her an email asking her to be clear in her presentations that the image was an illustration published in the ST Magazine.

I have had no dealings with Gill, but I know someone else has. Understandably I think, Gill has said that he does not want to become involved further in the dispute.
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@JohnTheJack

I appreciate you may not be able to answer this - but do you know if the person who forwarded you the correspondence intends to draw Gill's attention to the fact that Esther Crawley has misrepresented the image again, despite his request to her?
 
Obermann said:
If I should be ironic here, I must point out that Prof. Crawley uses guilt by association to make all ME patients responsible for the actions of a few
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I haven't watched the TedX talk. I had my fill of EC with her previous talk to the Open data conference where she spent the entire talk hinting and implying that a group of dangerous anti science activists are constantly harassing her and trying to stop her research. She presented herself as a plucky scientist soldiering on because her patients love and need her.

She did not, however, as far as I can remember, ever point the finger at ME patients in particular as the source of the harassment. She seems to be very careful to use innuendo and hints, without coming out and actually accusing us.

At least one person in the audience, who tweeted about her talk, seemed to think she was talking about militant anti-science campaigners, not necessarily patients.
 
Trish said:
She did not, however, as far as I can remember, ever point the finger at ME patients in particular as the source of the harassment. She seems to be very careful to use innuendo and hints, without coming out and actually accusing us.
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You are absolutely correct that she is not directly pointing fingers at ME patients. She is talking about those who are against research—her research—and she is representing them as a small(?) group of militants with an anti-psychological agenda. However, as most ME charities and most patients in the UK object to her research and to the methodology in her studies, I think it is fair to say that ME patients in general are vilified here.
 
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Stewart said:
@JohnTheJack
I appreciate you may not be able to answer this - but do you know if the person who forwarded you the correspondence intends to draw Gill's attention to the fact that Esther Crawley has misrepresented the image again, despite his request to her?
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My understanding is that they will not be.

As I said, a third party contacted Gill and Gill has said that he doesn't want to be involved in the dispute.
 
I were particularly impressed at her astronomical self-delusion that she is doing 'The Right Thing' despite 100s of researchers and 1000s of patients telling her otherwise.

If I was a psychiatrist I'd be especially interested in that story she told about her father putting her life at risk and her accepting that endangerment to try to win his approval. I'd relate it to the way that now she is the powerful adult she chooses to ignore the protestations of her young patients and decides what is and isn't 'for their own good'.
I'm wondering if she believes she is helping vulnerable children - as she clearly was a vulnerable child herself, but is instead repeating power and control patterns she learnt from her own childhood.

The choice of that story was definitely revealing. I assume she wanted us to understand she wanted to be brave and 'do the right thing' like her father. But she fails to realise that just because a powerful dominant authority figure tells you something is 'The Right Thing' doesn't mean it is.

As with all the times I've heard her speak her narrative is emotionally driven. I never hear any evidence of critical thinking or reasoned argument.

Edited for grammar - was to were.
 
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EC seems to be becoming bolder in her assertions in relation to the image from the Sunday Times. This time she seems to say:

"This is an e-mail I got a few years ago. It was used on the front cover of the Sunday Times to discuss the ((unclear, possibly) research of violence) in chronic fatigue syndrome. I still laugh etc."

She does not even claim that these are edited words taken from an e-mail. "This is an e-mail" means that she received this communication in the form in which it is presented; or at least that is the way that the an audience would understand it.

It would be excusable to be imprecise on an unimportant issue, but she should well understand that her words are being noted.

It is interesting to note the care which has been taken with the sizing of the image of the front page of The Sunday Time Magazine. For some reason the words "Doctors are facing death threats simply for suggesting ME, the chronic fatigue illness, is all in the mind" have been omitted.
 
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As well as the self-delusional aspects of her talk, there is also her speaker bio page at the TEDx website which claims that Esther's "research is world leading." https://tedxbristol.com/about/person/esther_crawley . I take it that TEDx doesn't verify what their speakers claim about themselves in their bio? This looks like anyone could just go there representing themselves as an expert/"world leader" on anything, and be waved through unchallenged? Not good.

ETA: And also the bit about a "small group of activists who have dedicated their lives to try and stop her research". Really? They've dedicated their lives to this? Sheesh.
 
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I wonder what inside knowledge she has which is leading her to think this is a sensible strategy for her.

Presumably she's confident that Action for ME and the ME Association will not push for accountability over her falsehoods, and that they won't cause trouble with the CMRC or MEGA. It's possible she has given up on MEGA/CMRC, but that seems unlikely. If she wants to get more funding, she will need to claim some sort of support from patients.

I didn't see anything from MEA or AfME about Crawley's recent 'harassment' talks. Nor did I see their social media accounts mention the open letter about Wessely (never mind signing it), the recent Huffington Post piece about PACE, etc.
 
The Open Hands
The person opens arms, such that palms and fingers are visible.
bl19-300x300.png


Openness and Honesty The person wants to show that he/she can be trusted.
“Look, I have nothing to hide.”

Use this gesture in presentations and sales.

she's definitely worked on this new presentation mode.
 
EzzieD said:
As well as the self-delusional aspects of her talk, there is also her speaker bio page at the TEDx website which claims that Esther's "research is world leading."
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Like many of Esther's statements, this could be true, but not in the way most people would understand it. Can you think of anyone else in the world who does what she's doing better than she's doing it?
 
Liv aka Mrs Sowester said:
If I was a psychiatrist I'd be especially interested in that story she told about her father putting her life at risk and her accepting that endangerment to try to win his approval. I'd relate it to the way that now she is the powerful adult she chooses to ignore the protestations of her young patients and decides what is and isn't 'for their own good'.
I'm wondering if she believes she is helping vulnerable children - as she clearly was a vulnerable child herself, but is instead repeating power and control patterns she learnt from her own childhood.

The choice of that story was definitely revealing. I assume she wanted us to understand she wanted to be brave and 'do the right thing' like her father. But she fails to realise that just because a powerful dominant authority figure tells you something is 'The Right Thing' doesn't mean it is.
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WOW. I didn't watch the thing but I've read Gerarthy being horrified by it... I get it now... this is just... WOW. And it explains a damn lot. Now, is it clear she's the one with the distant trauma that is also now proyecting and trying to compensate things, right?

Poor thing...

Sometimes I wonder how these people can be this evil and keep doing that harm, specially to children in EC case... Now I see it's a defense mechanism and its not about doing harm but "defending" themselves, scaping from facing their own reallity no matter what the cost... keeping these delussional proyections and learned patterns through trauma... HEAVY.
 
It is fascinating to read the whole Sunday Times article. One could almost get the impression that things were becoming too quiet and it was necessary to whip up a controversy. One is certainly inclined to wonder about the mental health of the editorial staff at the Sunday Times who commissioned the sub-tabloid artwork. Did the Sunday Times take on a lot of the News of the World staff in 2011? I don't know-haven't bought the paper since the Dirty Digger acquired it.

I suspect that we should be concentrating on why the article was written then, and why Crawley is resurrecting that artwork now-although it is possible that she has been using it regularly over the last four years and we simply have not known about it.

It seems strange to see Blakemore involved. He had his own axes to grind, if I recall correctly. It is interesting to note that he received his long delayed Knighthood in 2014.

It is probably beyond dispute that Crawley received abusive messages. It is also beyond dispute that they were not in the precise terms in which she states them and certainly not in the form which she displays them.
 
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