A British Psychologist's Victim Ponzi Scheme, ii
Jess Taylor’s VictimFocus Trafficks in Grooming Survivors of Sexual Assault
Publication note: When I started researching this piece over a year ago, many women feared coming forth due to reprisal. I had to put this project on the back burner until several weeks ago when many more women and professionals who were willing to speak out and be named contacted me. Each day while writing this article over the past weeks, so many people have come forth with their stories that this project is now impossible to contain within one article. Hence, this article represents the second of a multi-part series on this scandal.
<— parti i
Shona Priddey, a 43-year-old criminologist, became aware of Jess Taylor through Twitter within months of joining the platform in 2017, having noted her online presence. She was not enamoured by Taylor's rhetoric. Priddey explains: “I was always highly suspicious of Jess from the beginning. Then the first lockdown, Rachel Williams had a weekly Zoom conference with speakers and Taylor was one of them one week. I wasn’t impressed—I told Rachel Williams that I didn’t trust her and as time has gone on, many others have understood that she is not who she says she is.”
I push Priddey to find out what aroused her suspicions of Taylor and she references one of the many scenes I have heard echoed dozens of times over the past month from the mouths of Taylor’s former followers, employees, and colleagues in the field: “She makes claims of doing x,y, and z, but if anyone questioned anything, she would block or demoralise them on Twitter as a troll, etc.” Priddey refers to Taylor’s frequent, inaccurate references to Satanic ritual abuse, personality disorders, and what she calls Taylor's various “false narratives.”
Priddey grew more suspicious when Taylor rolled out her atomic-paced damage control narratives on 22 March 2022. Priddey had been following Robinson's claims on Twitter from 18 March onward where she laments having had stories of her experiences of childhood sexual violence printed in Taylor’s first book, Why Women Are Blamed For Everything: Exposing The Culture of Victim Blaming (Constable, 2020). Intimidated by the onslaught of messages after first posting to Twitter on this subject, Robinson removed her original accounting of what happened to her, a story that never named Taylor or VictimFocus. Robinson then returned on 20 March to post followup comments explaining how many women had since contacted her because they too had found their stories of sexual violence in Taylor’s book, also printed without their consent. Many have not been willing to speak out publicly because of concerns over their privacy having already been violated.
When Robinson resurfaced on Twitter to explain why she removed her first tweets several days earlier, expressing adamantly that Taylor had never asked for her consent to publish her story of childhood sexual violence in her book, Taylor was hastily putting together a copy and paste defence on Twitter to mitigate reputational damage. With each and every charitable response to Robinson—even or a mere “like” or retweet—Taylor sent out protestations of innocence to everyone who responded sympathetically in order to slate Robinson as being “misinformed.” Taylor's protestations grew more vexatious and defamatory as Taylor shifted from characterising Robinson as “misinformed” to claiming she was a liar. In her private Twitter messages to women, Taylor would intermittently express concern for Robinson whom she repeatedly stated was “being put at serious risk” by the people who, Taylor maintained, were whispering false claims into Robinson’s ear. This, in addition to Taylor exclaiming all over social media—both public posts and private messages—that she had consent forms from every single woman in her book.
Priddey was not taken in by these deceptive damage control tactics—she recognised that Taylor was merely attempting to protect her reputation from public scrutiny. Priddey had observed how Taylor operated over the years and she was able to decipher Taylor’s public theatre by following the incongruences in her statements. For instance, when Taylor made ostensibly scientific claims about personality disorders or sexual assault statistics, she never gave evidence for her assertions nor would she be able to stand up to questions from other professionals in the field. These and other bizarre claims that fall far outside Taylor’s training and expertise can be seen throughout her Twitter feed. Priddey remarks how when Taylor would be questioned or challenged on social media or when she would be asked to provide data, reports or even evidence of clinical training, the answers became vague. It would go something like this: the public asks for Taylor to back up a claims with data and Taylor responds with something about how her “staff” have been working on the data “for months” and that the data will soon be released. And then the data is never released.
Just take Taylor’s 2021 study on sexual violence which begins on a completely bogus foundation: at one point she claims that her study on the experiences of women and sexual violence includes its “absence, presence, frequency, type, perp, detail.” That was a claim made in May 2021. However, this was revealed to be factually incorrect as Taylor’s sample of 22,419 women who took part in the study was methodologically flawed. By Taylor’s own admission, she set up a study group of women who had been “subjected to any form of violence and abuse since birth” as she advertised her study’s launch: “I am pleased to release this new study which seeks to collect experiences of UK adult women subjected to any form of violence and abuse since birth. We need the biggest sample possible.” Taylor obtained a large sample size but it was non-representative of women in the UK. Despite this, Taylor still released these ill-conceived results: “99.7% of our sample had been repeatedly subjected to violence including assaults, harassment and rape. Only 0.3% of women had only been subjected to one violent incident or less.” On page 19 of her report, Taylor fails to demarcate her sample group as being entirely comprised of women who have been victims of sexual violence.
Between her bogus claims on Twitter, her flawed studies, and her failure to release data and analysis, Priddey has been justifiably distrustful of Taylor. Then from Robinson’s first announcement on 18 March, Priddey had all her suspicions about Taylor confirmed. Not only did the accusations levelled against Taylor disturb Priddey due to the deeply deceptive tactics and gaslighting employed, but what nailed Taylor’s unethical behaviour for Priddey was how Taylor chose to manage the damage to her public image. Priddey explains how she saw the cracks appear in Taylor’s story from the moment Robinson revealed that her story of sexual violence that had figured into the pages of Taylor’s first book. Keep in mind that Robinson never disclosed the name of the book or author when she first tweeted about this deception on 18 March 2022.
Then just four days later, after it was revealed that Taylor was the author in question, numerous women who supported Robinson openly on Twitter were contacted by Taylor who propagandised, managed and gaslit them in her efforts to convince them that Robinson was lying and being handled by an unethical support worker. Taylor had recycled the same messages to numerous women after 18 March onward, copying and pasting from one private chat to another, laying out how Robinson was “vulnerable” as she expressed worry for her mental health while paradoxically also tarring Robinson as a liar. Priddey recognised the dissonance between these messages where Taylor was desperately trying to get herself out of a situation that promised to sully her reputation within the field while shoring up a mammoth social media campaign of calumny against a woman whose best interest she claimed to have at heart.
Priddey immediately deciphered Taylor’s conflicting tactics of concern mixed with contempt and she observed how Taylor was simply “flat out lying” even while being able to temporarily save face. Taylor's feigned concern for Robinson seemed to convince some women who had stood with Robinson to switch over to supporting Taylor:
When I went to Taylor months ago about Rosie and Sally-Ann, I called her out straight away. Another lady, Rose [Latham] was initially contacted by Jess who said that I was wrong and Sally-Ann was wrong. Rose then contacted me to say that we got this wrong, and I replied, “No we haven’t.” Rose took her tweets down and she apologised and left me on my own. I thought “Bring it on.” I knew that I was right. I had support from lecturers and academics where I studied and they got wind of Taylor and they neither trusted nor respected her.
Latham, like many other women, wanted to give Taylor the benefit of the doubt, given that social media often creates a hall of mirrors. Where Latham and others had decided to lean towards supporting Robinson while removing tweets critical of Taylor reserving judgment until the facts came to light, Latham discovered less than two weeks later that her friend, Flatman, had been included in Taylor’s second book, Sexy But Psycho: How the Patriarchy Uses Women's Trauma Against Them (Constable, March 2022). Latham, along with many other women, realised they had been duped by Taylor on every single facet of Taylor’s version of the story. From the moment Flatman added her name to the list of women who divulged how their personal stories of sexual violence were printed in one of Taylor’s two books without their authorisation, many more women started to listen up and dig for evidence readily found within Twitter.
For instance, Taylor’s photos of her and Flatman having a meal in a restaurant in Manchester’s Chinatown were highlighted as being evidence. These images and tweets were quickly deleted by Taylor although the screen caps of Taylor’s account demonstrate that the scene Taylor describes in great detail within her book is in fact Flatman’s story. Taylor’s constantly shifting narrative about this dinner makes no sense to even her most fervent acolytes. It was Taylor who publicised the original Chinese restaurant story that she first tweeted on 29 October 2018 wherein she attached three photos from inside the restaurant that clearly show Taylor and Flatman dining. The third photo shows a block of text from Chinese menu. Taylor again tweeted two of the three original photos on 31 December 2018, recalling the event: “Hahaha we just ate so much food we might both burst. And just realised we talk for almost 4 hours and didn’t even stop lol @RosieFlatman...Thanks for a lovely evening!” Since Robinson’s and Flatman’s public outcry over their stories showing up in Taylor’s books earlier this year, Taylor set out to erase all evidence. What Taylor failed to realise is that many had already grown suspicious of her and had already screen-capped most everything she had tweeted.
Taylor’s lies became more glaring with her every defence as did her desperation to wriggle out of her misdeeds. For instance, after learning that Taylor had taken her story of childhood sexual violence from their dinner conversation that October 2018 evening and turned her story into part of her book, Flatman immediately wrote Taylor on 5 April 2022 asking for answers as to Taylor’s unethical and unauthorised use of her story. After receiving no reply from Taylor, Flatman starting decrying Taylor’s action on Twitter from 13 April to include posting a picture she believed to have been of their dinner together in Manchester’s Chinatown. In the fury of having learned that her story of sexual violence was stolen from her and published in Taylor’s book, Flatman tweeted this picture of her and Taylor, mistakenly believing that this was the image that Taylor had twice tweeted in 2018 as proof of their dinner together—a dinner conversation that Taylor narrates in detail within her book. Flatman tells me, “I got confused and thought that photo was from our dinner in Chinatown because my hair was similar in the photo I posted.” While Flatman’s is an understandable mistake, especially given the circumstances, Taylor who had since removed her tweets with the actual photographic evidence of the dinner where she hustled Flatman’s story from her, denounced Flatman’s photo through private messages writing, “[T]hat pic of [Flatman] and me is from a lecture I gave where she attended—it’s not from [that] night hence the fucking daylight.”
Flatman spoke with Latham about Taylor’s deleted tweets. Both women searched for the evidence of their dinner together that Taylor documents in her book but neither had screen-capped these tweets before their removal. Just over two weeks later an IT friend of Latham’s was able to find the evidence that Taylor had erased from social media. On 3 May 2022, Flatman published the screen-caps of the tweets Taylor had deleted demonstrating the evidence that Taylor had personally documented twice having dinner with Flatman in Chinatown in 2018. So, instead of creating a perfect cover story, Taylor had unwittingly shown her hand as someone who is remarkably good at deceiving the public—until she is caught. By blatantly lying about an event she had tweeted about twice in 2018, Taylor began to lose the trust of many supporters who previously had been willing to stand by her despite her research imperfections and outlandish scientific hokum.
Priddey considers how since March Taylor was managing her fan base through a series of lies, often through private messages on Twitter. She was cognisant that women were being handled because Taylor had asked at least two of these women to “stop” Priddey from making public statements critical of Taylor (eg. her messages to Latham and Williams: “Please will you stop Shona[?]”). These women contacted Priddey and sent her screen-caps of Taylor’s messages to them from which Priddey was able to detect a gaslighting campaign orchestrated by Taylor. Priddey was also mindful that these women were being played hard, some of whom later deleted their tweets until they felt more secure with what was being claimed by all parties. Williams and Priddey did not budge, as Priddey muses:
Fast forward to when she sent messages to Rose to inform her that I was wrong, telling them to inform me that I was wrong. Rose finally sussed out the truth, when I told her that she was being played. Jess even did it to Rachel Williams who is a very good friend of mine hoping that Rachel would weaken and that all these women would remove their posts. Rachel told Jess that I wasn’t wrong and then she attacked Rachel with more accusations like, “She’s a racist.”
Priddey, like every other person with whom I spoke, gives multiple examples as to how Taylor responds to anyone not enamoured of her. “Whenever anyone challenges Taylor, she blocks, insults, defames and then calls those individuals homophobic or racists,” Priddey observes. “Taylor was stuck and instead of simply apologising and admitting wrong doing, she continued to claim that her first book only contained stories of women from her PhD thesis and that she had consent forms from all the women whose stories she printed.”
The evidence to support the women stepping forward is astonishing because there is so much evidence furnished by Taylor’s own social media presence, and it beggars belief that this person has any credibility left—even on social media. In Sexy But Psycho, Taylor writes precisely of the conversation that Flatman and she had during dinner in a restaurant situated in Manchester’s Chinatown:
I once sat in a small restaurant in China Town with a young woman who had been sexually abused, trafficked, addicted to drugs by the perpetrators, and had been in and out of care for years. She was sat in front of me in a different stage of her life. Safe, recovering from the addictions, processing her traumas and studying for her degree. We talked about the sensationalisation of the concept of “resilience”. The fact that the longer you stay in abuse, the “stronger” you must be. The way professionals tell women and girls that they need to “build their resilience” when they are being abused by men. The “resilience” workshops and worksheets. We both hated the misuse of the word “resilience”.
Flatman relates to me how this discussion was a perfect replica of both her personal story and professional criticism of resilience. In Section I of this article, I interviewed Flatman whose story appeared in Taylor’s second book, Sexy But Psycho. However, this story grows more gruesome when analysing the defamatory narrative that Taylor established around Sally-Ann Robinson.
Taylor’s claim about having obtained consent for printing all these women’s stories in her books is easily refuted—Taylor’s lies evidence themselves at each and every step. Take, for instance, Taylor’s face-saving private messages she sent out on 22 March 2022 wherein she repeatedly states that she had consent from all the women in her books (“Every single woman in my books is someone I’m still in contact with, I have full consent forms etc...”) as well as her public announcement on 20 March expressing the same: “Yes I have full consent, written and still ongoing with every single woman in each book, they know every single extract and each of their own experiences and they all support the content, message and title of SBP and are proud to be part of it.” Then take Taylor’s statement made to multiple women who have shared their private messages with me wherein she defames Robinson, repeating that it is “impossible” that her story appeared in Why Women Are Blamed For Everything because, as Taylor writes, “[I]t’s based on PhD interviews.”
I have combed Taylor’s PhD thesis and nowhere within this document is the story of Sally-Ann Robinson, who appears as “Faye” in Why Women Are Blamed For Everything. Yet, similar to Flatman’s story being recognised by her friend, Latham, Sally-Ann Robinson’s friend recognised Robinson from her story that was contained within Taylor’s book. The fact that Taylor denies that Robinson appeared in her book is directly contradicted by Taylor’s introduction which states: “All my PhD research is contained within this book, in addition to other research projects I have undertaken in the last 10 years.” Robinson was never a research project for Taylor’s PhD thesis, yet Taylor repeatedly denies Robinson’s presence within her book. Notwithstanding Taylor’s denial, Robinson’s friend still discovered her story within the pages of Why Women Are Blamed For Everything earlier this year.
I have spoken at length with Sally-Ann Robinson who chronicles what led up to her having discovered her story reproduced within Taylor’s book on 18 March 2022. Robinson recounts how she came to know Jessica Taylor (then Jessica Eaton) through her #nomoreCSEfilms campaign and furnishes evidence to prove each one of her statements contained herein. She begins:
I contacted Jessica on 7 January 2018 using the VictimFocus submission form after seeing Jessica’s campaign on the use of CSE (child sexual exploitation) films. I recounted my own tale of sexual violence as a child. She responded the same day writing, “Wow, Sally, thank you so much for this” followed by a request to publish my experience in her free, online blog. She then shares with me the real identity of someone else who has shared their experience within this blog.
I have read the communications between Taylor and Robinson—time stamps and all—and Taylor did, in fact, name another woman as an example of her choice to use a real name (the woman she named) or to opt for a pseudonym. This detail does not escape those of us from the social sciences and journalism who are trained in the accuracy of data and the importance of privacy.
On 8 January 2018 Robinson gave Taylor permission to use her story specifically for her blog and later that day Taylor posted Robinson’s letter within a blog post with her location redacted and her name changed to “Faye”:
Hello Jessica, I have recently seen your campaign on Twitter #nomoreCSEfilms and would like to share my personal experience of this. As a child I worked with an organisation in XXXX and was shown the film ‘Sick Party.’ I remember the worker coming to my home, she brought her laptop and set it up on the dining room table. We began to watch the DVD. I remember it being approx half an hour long, during this time I became very upset and panicky…
I will stop here because this passage of Robinson’s letter serves as the evidence to join the dots from Robinson’s letter to VictimFocus, Taylor’s request to publish her letter on the VictimFocus blog, and then Taylor’s later unauthorised use of her letter within Why Women Are Blamed For Everything. I have also seen the VictimFocus confirmation email sent to Robinson which copied back to her the letter she had sent through the VictimFocus online form only seconds before. I have studied all correspondence between Taylor and Robinson which demonstrates that this letter was written by Robinson, that Taylor responded to her asking for permission to put it on her blog, and that Taylor had re-published Robinson’s sexual abuse story in a report and her book. It is paramount to keep in mind that Robinson only authorised Taylor to reproduce her letter on Taylor's blog on CSE film and her permission was clearly stated and limited to that.
After Robinson’s consent allowing Taylor to publish her letter on Taylor’s blog, Taylor failed to advise Robinson that she had published her blog post on 9 January. However, Robinson found it posted shortly after it was published, noting there was an issue of privacy within the blog post itself. She immediately wrote Taylor to request the removal of Robinson’s contact with the CEO of an charity that would have identified her. Robinson tells me, “I stated clearly that I was not ready to be identified.” The same day Jessica confirmed she had removed this information even though Taylor failed to remove the image of the organisation that linked back to Robinson, a detail that Robinson did not notice until the summer of 2022:
It was only upon reading this blog this summer that I have now realised Jessica Taylor posted an image of a promotional poster from the organisation used to promote the DVD I was referring to. As this organisation is a local charity, this identifies my location (there’s an area code on the phone number listed). It also identifies me to the organisation and possibly anyone else who knows me. I specifically told Jessica Taylor I was not ready to be identified and that it links a charity that deals with exploitation and abuse to me in Leeds.
Robinson relates how she had received no further information from Taylor until 29 January 2018 when she read a VictimFocus newsletter to which she was subscribed. “I received an email about a report on CSE,” Robinson tells me explaining how she discovered that her letter made its way into a report that Taylor published on ResearchGate and Academia.edu. “I had no idea that my experiences were going to be used in a report. I specifically consented to Jessica’s online blog but Jessica also posted my experiences in her report,” Robinson confesses, adding, “At this time I was unaware of the procedures which must take place in order to allow for informed consent. I was unaware of the ethics involved to use consent for other publications.”
I have read this “report” entitled “Can I tell you what it feels like? Exploring the harm caused by child sexual exploitation (CSE) films” and what becomes immediately apparent in perusing its “Executive Summary” is that this “report” is neither academic in nature or in any way evidence-based. Taylor has made a career of lamenting that CSE films are used without any “data or proof of evaluations and pilots” and that “Independent empirical evaluation of the impact of the films have never been conducted” while paradoxically offering no data on this subject within her own “report.” Instead of undertaking a qualitative study on this subject, Taylor has produced a “report” which attempts to fake its strengths upon unknown academic achievements (eg. “Throughout my research and academic work...”) while offering no theoretical framework, methodology, significance to current knowledge, and few references to relevant scholarly literature. One of the hallmarks of Taylor’s “research” is that she rarely gives credit to the work of other professionals in this field which allows her to position herself as being the only psychologist to have ever discussed these issues.
Most remarkable about this “report,” is how Taylor takes the responses to her #nomoreCSEfilms campaign and cannibalises them as data failing to adhere to any rigorous—or even gelatinous—methodology whatsoever. Ultimately, Taylor does a great disservice to this field by cheapening what are serious issues for survivors of sexual violence by haphazardly turning a PR campaign into “research.” To call this a “report” would indeed be inaccurate as it denigrates any quasi-scientific attempt to represent this subject objectively or fairly. Published just a month after running Robinson’s letter in her blog, this document represents a mishmash of whatever Taylor decided to throw into her “report soup” that day. One can only wonder how many other emails Taylor dropped into this “report” leaving the sender without the right of consent.
Part 2 of this , “Evidence of harm: Real stories of harm caused by CSE films and resources” contains word-for-word Robinson’s email that Taylor published in her blog, now republished within her “report.” Here is the beginning of what Taylor ran under the pseudonym “Faye”:
I have recently seen your campaign on Twitter #nomoreCSEfilms and would like to share my personal experience of this. As a child I worked with an organisation in (area name) and was shown the film ‘Sick Party.’ I remember the worker coming to my home, she brought her laptop and set it up on the dining room table. We began to watch the DVD. I remember it being approx. half an hour long, during this time I became very upset and panicky… (pp 13-14)
This section of the “report” contains the stories of four other women who were victims of sexual violence, a statement from a former police officer from a Child Abuse Investigation Unit, and then Taylor’s musings of a conversation she allegedly witnessed between “four young people of different sexes and ages.” It is followed by “Comments from professionals”—in essence, just a collection of positive endorsements for Taylor’s campaign—as each campaigner, trainer or psychologist is quoted briefly followed by their name and title. This is followed by “Comments from parents” and another section, “Signatures of people supporting the removal of CSE films from practice in the UK,” listing approximately 300 names. There is little substance here and nothing that would qualify it as a professionally valid report. What this document does, however, is to shed light on how Taylor operates by conflating her professional claims and projects with her social media campaigns, professional links, and marketing of VictimFocus such that each domain bleeds into the next. Ultimately, Taylor takes what resembles a petition to change the use of CSE films, mislabels it a “report,” and gives the impression that there is an evidence base behind it. Given that there is no serious qualitative or quantitative study to be found, and it contains little more than Taylor’s cherry-picked quotes and testimonials rebranded as “data” for a “report,” it reads more as advertising copy for Taylor’s #nomoreCSEfilms campaign.
Initially, Robinson did not know how to react after reading Taylor’s “report” with her letter sandwiched inside. Between her desire to help other women, and having no idea at the time about Taylor’s obligation to observe informed consent, Robinson chose to say nothing to Taylor about her concerns and instead she thanked her for the “time and effort” she had put into creating the document. Robinson explains:
I read it and I felt uncomfortable, but I didn’t say anything. I was just convincing myself I was okay with it because it would be helping other people. I felt out of control knowing that my story was out there. I knew it was like an official document and I didn’t have the confidence to say anything—she was a powerful doctor and I was just me. I didn’t think I’d be able to do anything about it. How could I stand up against her?! So, I just thanked her for including it and told her I felt okay with it and was happy that my story would help others. Thanking her was my way of trying get some power back and of trying to convince myself I was okay with it.
Since 2018, however, Robinson has gained perspective into what Taylor has effectively undertaken in her “report” proclaiming: “She posts findings from her ‘campaign’ where she has turned the findings into a report. Again, I was unaware of what she had done with my ‘consent’.” Robinson has effectively put her finger on a type of intellectual “Ponzi scheme” that many other professionals with whom I have spoken have similarly noted. It goes something like this: Taylor launches a campaign, encourages people to email her their reactions to said campaign for which she has already ideologically framed the ideal respondent, then curates their responses and dumps them into a document rebranded as a “Report.” While these tactics have duped many of Taylor’s supporters, this is unethical from both an academic standpoint of how research ought to be conducted and from a public-facing confidence perspective. If members of the public are responding to a campaign and are not informed that their response will be fed back into a fake research document, then there can be no public or academic confidence that these “reports” are performed with any sort of basic research ethics—and this includes informed consent. Ensnaring participants who double as respondents, endorsers, and study subjects, and then presenting cherry-picked opinions solicited via a public campaign as “general consensus” constitutes a form of fraud. Laugh or cry?
Robinson underscores that in her dealings with Taylor, she had never consented to anything more than the reproduction of her letter in Taylor’s one-off blog article, as demonstrated by her 2018 email. Moreover, Robinson admits that at the time, she was unknowledgeable of Taylor’s ethical obligation towards the consent process, an ethical and legal requirement for research involving human participants. A well-conducted informed consent process should ensure subject autonomy and address potential vulnerabilities such as those facing survivors of sexual violence. Taylor never explored this with Robinson. Instead, Taylor further beguiled the field of psychology by throwing together a carefully-chosen collection of aphorisms in response to a public-facing campaign and sprinkled them amidst the narratives of sexual exploitation to tender a “report” that fudges as an academic document on the effect of CSE films.
Robinson iterates, “I didn’t appreciate all the issues involved—my mental health, the risk to me, my complaint to the BPS.” She refers to the British Psychological Society’s “Code of Human Research Ethics” which lays out the pyschylogists the “need to consider the costs to the individual participant versus potential societal benefits” and where the risks for participants “are minimal and neither have lasting effects nor induce prolonged personal discomfort.” Despite this incident, Robinson continued to support Taylor and she went to a conference Taylor held in 2019 in Durham for The Little Orange Book. “I was appreciative of the ongoing work she was doing before her book was released,” she remembers, “I took her some of my artwork to thank her for the work she does.”
Then on 6 May 2020, Robinson purchased Why Women are Blamed for Everything and the scales quickly fell from her eyes about Taylor when she saw her story within the pages of the book:
As a child I worked with an organisation in (area name) and was shown the film ‘Sick Party.’ I remember the worker coming to my home, she brought her laptop and set it up on the dining room table. We began to watch the DVD. I remember it being approximately half an hour long, during this time I became very upset and panicky…
This and the rest of Robinson’s story, taken from her letter, is the exact same account Taylor published in her “report” and later reprinted in her book. Robinson responds to what she discovered that day:
When I saw my experience printed, I noticed that she has named my experience as a “Case Example” and stated that I had “provided” an example. This is misleading and suggests I was interviewed and was given informed consent about the use of my story. I knew I had sent my experience to Jessica Taylor, it was my understanding it was going to be used in her blog. This is what was specified to me. It was nowhere specified to me my story was going to be used in this or any book or research report. When I read the experience in there I froze. I felt my power completely drained from me. I was in complete disbelief she could do this. Because of my own mental health effecting my self-esteem, I convinced myself that I must have said it was okay. I told myself it didn’t matter because “at least I was helping others.”
Robinson notes that she had bought the book to support Taylor’s work adding, “I felt empowered by Jessica since at the time I didn’t understand what she had done to me.” She remarks the conflicting feelings she experienced in realising the betrayal Taylor had committed against her while also expressing that she didn’t want to rock the boat on what seemed to be a widely supported book that she had previously believed championed the awareness of the structural injustices that are committed against survivors of sexual assault. She advances:
I felt proud “my stuff” had been recognised by her. Initially, I was in awe. At this point, I felt empowered. I just accepted it. During my childhood abuse I was so used to my choices not mattering, someone else being in control of me and my stuff. I always felt my feelings didn’t matter and I was still in this mindset when I read my experiences within her book. Like my thanking Jessica was a trauma response to help me feel in control of the situation. So, I didn’t react immediately. In fact, I stupidly thanked her. Just like with her using my story in her report I didn’t realise what had happened and I didn’t have the confidence to say anything against her, to question her. I just told her “thank you” because it was helping other people.
Since 2020, Robinson has rethought everything given the distance from the incidents of her privacy having been violated twice by Taylor. Earlier this year she even reread Taylor’s book and is able to frame her opinions of the book through a more analytic perspective. She examines Taylor’s dishonesty that extend far beyond the issues of research ethics and consent pointing to a section of the book entitled “Learning from feedback” which states:
As part of the commitment to centring women’s voices throughout this research, all women were contacted when the transcripts were being analysed to invite them to read through the initial findings and themselves before they were written up for this book. All ten women were contacted with copies of the findings and five of them replied to give their thoughts about my interpretation of their talk.
All women agreed with the findings and said that taking part in the study and reading the findings had been a valuable experience.
One woman said that she was happy that someone was presenting research about women’s experiences of victim blaming and self-blame as she felt it was under researched and not talked about enough. All five women said that they felt their thoughts were accurately represented.
Robinson explains her dismay concerning the multiple levels of dishonesty within Taylor’s “research” with regard to this above statement: “This section indicates I should have been contacted to check over the transcripts before they were written for the book. This did not happen. I did not have contact with Jessica Taylor about my experiences since she published her blog article until I saw it printed in the book.” Robinson tells me that in June 2022, she emailed Taylor to provide her with a copy of this “contact” that Taylor pretended took place, stating, “She claims that her asking if I had any comments to share after asking to use my experience in the blog was this contact.”
Robinson also notices that the book claims that “all women were receiving support from specialist organisations at the time the experiences were obtained,” noting that she was not receiving help for her trauma experiences, “nor did Taylor bother to check to see if I was receiving support.” It is clear to almost every professional with whom I have spoken that Taylor failed in basic research ethics towards Robinson, her unwilling subject: Taylor failed to ask Robinson if she had received support for her trauma or to ask basic questions which might inform her as to whether or not Robinson’s story would be appropriate to include in her book given the BPS guidelines on the risks for participants. This is a critical detail because by not questioning Robinson on matters related to her safeguarding and mental health, Taylor entirely missed out on the fact that just before writing her letter to Taylor, in November 2017 Robinson had been sectioned for two months:
I contacted Jessica Taylor in a distressed state complaining about treatment from an organisation. It was clear I reached out to Jessica as I was not being heard or understood in my personal life. In late 2017 I made an attempt on my life leading to a section 2 under the Mental Health Act. My disclosure to Jessica Taylor was in January 2018. Due to the nature of my experience shared, I would have been deemed as a vulnerable person as I had suffered significant physical and psychological trauma. In the experience I shared I said I struggled with my mental health and self-harm.
Robinson maintains that Taylor did not explore “how having my experiences printed could impact my mental health.” She continues, “Jessica states in her book all case studies were receiving support from sexual harm services. Jessica did not know this information because she never asked me.”
Robinson retains that Taylor did not consult with her to ensure that she was safe, reiterating some of the violations of privacy that Taylor had already committed against her such as Taylor’s 2018 blog post where she included the name of a charity and a photo of its marketing flier which compromised Robinson’s anonymity and location, “She posted information about me online sharing my location. It was like putting a big pinpoint on me. I didn’t understand the impact of having this online, she didn’t explain anything.”
Then in March 2022, a friend of Robinson’s recognised her story in Taylor’s book and something shifted radically for her. This revelation hurtled Robinson to that initial moment of anger from 2020 when she first discovered her story in Taylor’s book. She went through the emotions of betrayal all over again and began to understand what had been done to her by someone she trusted: “I got angry about it again and wondered if any of my stuff was in Sexy But Psycho too. I was also worried for other survivors reading their own stories back like I did.” This rehashing of Taylor’s unauthorised publication of Robinson’s story through her friend having recognised her within the pages of Why Women Are Blamed For Everything is what led Robinson to change her course of action regarding what she and many others deem to be a breach of professional conduct and publication ethics.
Robinson tells me, “When my friend spotted me this year in the book, I felt anger. That’s when I tweeted about it.” Robinson posted twice to Twitter on 18 March 2022, tweets she removed less than a week later due to the massive number of responses and retweets. Robinson recalls her first tweet which didn’t name the book or Taylor: “I wrote that I was angry an author had used my story of sexual violence without my authorisation.” Within minutes of posting her first tweet, Taylor contacted Robinson both on Twitter and Facebook messenger writing, “Hey you I just saw your tweet about the person who has used your experiences. Is there anything you can do? Xx.” Robinson recounts her response to Taylor: “When she messaged me, she had just released her new book at the time. It all made me really angry. I didn’t have the confidence to speak to her directly about my anger. So, when I answered her, I implied it was my support worker who told me about my stuff in the book.” She continues:
I also didn’t want to tell her about my friend discovering my story in case she started in on her. I knew if I told Jess it was my friend she would likely look through my friend’s list to find her in order to abuse her. I didn’t want her going after my friend. I knew she’d have been less likely to go after a professional. After I sent my reply, I blocked her on Facebook as I knew she was going to start manipulating me.
That same day Robinson put a screenshot of Taylor’s message up on Twitter after having blurred Taylor’s name and profile photo enough to be unrecognisable from the screen-cap—or so she thought. Robinson explains:
I put a screenshot up of Jessica Taylor’s message saying the author had been in touch with me. I was clueless and I thought I’d blurred her name out of the screen-cap but I hadn’t blurred it out enough so you could still make out her name. People worked out it was her. After this, I blocked her on social media. I’ve had no contact with her, only me contacting VictimFocus and an email asking her to remove my testimony from her blog and book.
Taylor never responded to Robinson.
After removing the original two tweets from 18 March regarding Taylor’s appropriation of her story, Robinson continued to post on Twitter from 22 March onward about Taylor’s unethical behaviour providing screen-caps of the evidence. I have studied this evidence and evidence from others in order to write this article. Immediately, Taylor came under heavy criticism from many to include specialists across the fields of psychology and criminology. Robinson also received private messages from seven other women who were also in the book without having consented to their inclusion. One confided to Robinson that she couldn’t speak out because she couldn’t afford to be taken to court, a reference to Taylor’s frequent threats to take legal action against various of her detractors.
Taylor first addressed the accusations made by Robinson through various tweets on 20 March 2022 on Twitter:
I am aware that there are posts circulating that suggest someone believes that I have used their ‘story’ without permission in my books. This isn’t true, all women involved in my books have full participation, I still speak to all of them, their safety & anonymity is paramount.
Having sought advice, I am writing this to make it clear that I have never used a woman’s story without full express permission and ongoing support and that the allegations being made are untrue and harmful to those women who are actually involved in my work.
The individual posting these things has been misinformed by someone else, and I would welcome reassuring her that I have never included information without consent and proof. My work has to be absolutely ethical, and is put through advanced legal read before publishing.
Yes I have full consent, written and still ongoing with every single woman in each book, they know every single extract and each of their own experiences and they all support the content, message and title of SBP and are proud to be part of it. Thanks for asking.
On 21 March, Taylor makes further claims that Robinson is lying, professing: “None of this is even possible or true. If I had to stand in a court room and name every single woman behind every single extract I could do that and none of them are her, she even messaged me herself to say that she doesn’t know and someone else told her. She hasn’t been truthful.” One of Taylor’s followers aptly notes that her tweet directly flies in the face of her “believe the victim” mantra.
Taylor continues her defence on 21 March claiming that people are committing “character assassination” of her posting this tweet which is a bit of foreshadowing for what is yet to come: “What they are doing will not work. I know this game and I’m not going to play it with anyone. I’m not gonna wheel out the lawyers or the police. I’m not gonna give anyone the validation of being able to come on Twitter and be like ‘she’s threatening me with lawyers/police!’” There is one tweet, however, raises chutzpuh to a new stratosphere: “People been waiting for something they can hang their hatred on for so long and now they all think they have something I’ve done wrong. Person has actually deleted almost all of her accusations now after causing chaos.” The sinister spirit behind Taylor’s tweet is two-fold. First, Robinson removed her first two tweets from 18 March and on 20 March explained why she had deleted her first two tweets—and it wasn’t because her removal of these tweets was somehow an admission of Taylor’s innocence. Second, while Robinson had received overwhelming support from scores of women on Twitter, Taylor had been busily engaged in abating damage to her reputation. And by “damage control” I mean Taylor set out to damage Robinson’s reputation by surreptitiously writing women that Robinson’s claims were untrue and that her mental health was in the balance. Robinson would not learn about this campaign of defamation until 28 April at which point she posted on Twitter to denounce Taylor for having attempted to discredit her and for disclosing the name of the organisation supporting her via private message which is itself a grave violation of professional ethics.
I have been sent evidence from many other women that demonstrates how Taylor serially private messaged them from 18 March onward—many messages employing the same precise wording copied and pasted from one person to the next—to accuse Robinson of lying while intimating that Robinson was “in danger” in what is a flimsily cobbled together narrative to get these women to not believe the victim. Robinson tells me, “There were people commenting and saying it was obvious I was mental and crazy.” Throughout the following weeks and months, there are myriad tweets by Taylor and her followers which utilise similar tactics—they accuse Robinson of bullying and harassing Taylor, of being mentally unstable and of “incessantly harassing and driving a hate mob against a lesbian couple.” The allusions to homophobia are consistent even though Robinson has never referenced or cared about Taylor’s sexuality. Instead, Robinson has persistently denounced Taylor’s dishonest and unethical handling of her private data, the unauthorised use of her personal story of sexual violence, and the serial messaging of multiple people on social media while supplying them with confidential information about Robinson.
Soon things started to heat up when more prominent voices from within the fields of psychology and criminal justice started to openly support Robinson and criticise Taylor. On 22 March, Taylor tweeted to Priddey and Latham who had publicly demonstrated their support for Robinson’s original 18 March tweets. Taylor writes: “This is so disappointing to see you both react like this when I haven’t done anything wrong and this isn’t true. Have you thought about asking me? [Robinson] messaged me herself to say she hasn’t read my books and that this is hearsay from someone she knows, not that she’s tweeted that.” Robinson laughs at Taylor’s assertion and says to me, “How could I have thanked her in 2020 for having written the book if I hadn’t read it?”
By 5 April, Latham tweeted the betrayal she felt from Taylor having learned of her friend’s inclusion in Taylor’s second book, Sexy But Psycho. Latham also openly supported Robinson writing on 7 April: “You are not the only one….I recognised someone close to me in the book sent the pages to her and she’s horrified she did NOT give permission snd wasn’t even asked if it was ok. We both messaged the author a few days ago…..neither of us got a reply.” Flatman also spoke out on Twitter discussing what Taylor had done to her: “Imag[i]ne a known psychologist who says she is trauma informed writing about you in her book without your consent. Both my past experiences of trauma and professional thoughts. I am not Sexy But Psycho.”
On 28 April, when Robinson had learned from other women, including Latham, that Taylor had engaged in a stealth copy-paste campaign of defamation against her to include breaking confidentiality by naming the organisation supporting Robinson, she began to see how Taylor operated to keep her lies afloat. She criticises the messages where Taylor, a psychologist, messages strangers on social media claiming that her “case study,” Robinson, is her friend. “How can a psychologist have subjects for her studies whom she also considers friends?” Robinson queries, continuing, “She claimed she has consent forms when she doesn’t for me. She disclosed information about me which could put me safety at risk—Jessica Taylor knew I was a victim of sexual exploitation and chose to share private information with people on social media!” Robinson also vituperates the campaign of defamation and harassment orchestrated by Taylor utilising Robinson’s risk of sexual exploitation publicly on Twitter.
On 29 April, Taylor posted this tweet which manifests what she had subtly menaced in her 21 March tweet: “After taking advice, I have decided to respond to the accusations on social media with the statement below. I have so far refrained from taking action, but lawyers and police will deal with this from now on. Thank you to everyone who has supported me during this time.” Attached to the tweet is a screen-cap where Taylor repeats that Sexy But Psycho—incidentally, not the book that Robinson’s story appears in—only features women’s voices who “gave written consent.”
It is no accident that Taylor pretends that Robinson claims that her story appears in Sexy But Psycho. It’s a purposeful lie. Throughout her protestations, Robinson has been unambiguously clear: she has constantly confirmed that her story is featured in Taylor’s book, Why Women Are Blamed For Everything. She never made a claim to have appeared in Sexy But Psycho. Taylor is engaging in a rather nasty form of pubic stage manoeuvring here by hedging on a statement whose conclusion will necessarily remain in her favour. Taylor lies publicly, switching around the accusation in preparation for a later step wherein she will, of course, be victorious within the public scrutiny of Twitter demonstrating that she is vindicated as not having published Robinson’s story in the book for which Robinson never claimed to have been narratively catapulted into its pages.
Taylor also makes her public claims in bad faith: she knows quite well that Robinson has insisted that her story appeared in Why Women Are Blamed For Everything as demonstrated by Taylor’s 22 March recurrent private Twitter messages to both Latham and Williams wherein she names the correct book. Remember from Part I of this article that Taylor had serially tweeted private messages to women, including Latham and Williams, writing them individually, “I can’t do this publicly but she messaged me on Friday night saying that someone has told her that they think her life story is in WWBE [Why Women Are Blamed For Everything], and I told her that’s impossible because it’s based on PhD interviews.” Taylor is lying to cover another lie, a manoeuvre I call “musical lies.”
By June, Taylor was rebutting accusations throughout Twitter in a frenzied attempt to mitigate damage to her reputation responding to negative tweets about her with dismissive comments like this on 19 June: “That’s not true and I’m frankly incredibly tired of dealing with utter rubbish on the internet.” However, her reference to involving the police from 29 April was repeated on 21 June when Taylor tweeted: “…She’s fixated on me. I will just keep reporting it to police.” This is a follow-up post to a thread where she announces, “I’ve now deleted a thread of evidence that proves I’ve been telling the truth this whole time, as I don’t want it getting too big. I trust enough people have seen it. I hope the harassment and abuse of myself & my family will now stop.” The thread to which Taylor refers was a Twitter thread with 19 posts on it, including screenshots of Taylor’s and Robinson’s email conversations claiming that Robinson’s consent to run her story in Taylor’s blog covered all uses of her story. “She posted this as a way to show she was telling the truth and had done nothing wrong. She posted this as ‘proof’ I consented her to book.” Robinson confides. Taylor, unwittingly or not, had admitted that she had published Robinson’s story in her book.
Let’s recap here briefly: Taylor, a psychologist who has built a cottage industry on “believe the victim” has co-opted stories of sexual assault from multiple women unbeknownst to them, published these stories in her book without their consent, and then when these two of these women were recognised within Taylor’s book by third parties, Taylor claims that she has written consent from all women in her books to publish their stories despite being unable to produce said consent forms while also claiming that Robinson was never in her book. Then when these women wrote her privately to ask why she betrayed basic ethics in publishing their stories, she ignored them both and has since used social media to publicly and privately monster and threaten the most vulnerable of these women with the police—even claiming to have reported Robinson to the police. Then two months after the first whistleblowing of Taylor’s nonconsensual publication of Robinson’s story came to light, Taylor U-turns and gives evidence that she actually had Robinson’s consent using her 2018 consent to publish Robinson’s letter in her blog as “evidence” of this. All this while Taylor spins Robinson as “fixated” with her and slates both Flatman and Robinson as liars. After Taylor ignored their requests by email which asked for an explanation as to why she chose to behave unethically, these women used social media to raise awareness as to what happened to them warning women about Taylor. Taylor then reacted to the pressure she faced on social media for her to come clean and tell the truth by characterising these women’s voices as “harassment,” “abuse,” and “trauma.” Taylor even claims her “family and home” have been put “at risk.” This entire story beggars belief on multiple levels.
Buckle your seat belts, for this story proceeds towards far more disturbing dimensions.
A former employee of Jessica Taylor contacted Robinson on 18 August and expressed how she was uncomfortable with the contents of their WhatsApp work group chat at VictimFocus led by Jessica Taylor. She emailed Robinson a series of discussions and private chats where all the participants’ names have been redacted except for Taylor, Taylor’s wife, Jaimi Shrive, and Shrive’s mother, Mandy Shrive. These screen-caps tell a story of a mythomaniac who is completely unaware of how easy it is for outsiders reading to stitch together the bigger story from the scintilla of truth Taylor attempts to obfuscate in constructing her lies.
On 22 March 2022, Taylor writes in a private WhatsApp chat to a VictimFocus staff member:
I can prove my innocence but it would mean putting her a[t] risk and she could kill herself and then I’ll be blamed...I need Sally Ann to tell the truth and stop what she’s doing. I found out today that she’s claiming a story about a woman I interviewed is actually her. I am really worried about how C will actually feel when she sees it (the real woman is named beginning with C).
I smell BS. (The real word I am thinking about begins and is infixed with these two letters). I have spent weeks poring over Taylor’s writing and it is a master class in manipulation. From her threats of police visits, letters from her “legal team” to this attempt to “save” Robinson’s life by not telling the truth, Taylor’s machinations are easily perceptible. Her above comment is almost a spin on the old spy joke: when someone wishes to avoid answering a question, they respond, “If I tell you, I’ll have to kill you.” Reality in the world of Jessica Taylor is elusive. We must believe all victims unless they are her victims. Taylor claims to worry about the suicidality of a woman whom she predated less than a month after being released from a psychiatric ward, about whom she lied repeatedly in both private and public, whose vulnerability she exploited repeatedly while telling the biggest lie of all: I can’t tell the truth or my victim might kill herself.
On 28 April, the VictimFocus WhatsApp work group chat focuses upon an online event later that day that addresses the psychological and psychiatric practices that work within the confines of diagnosis and disorder, “A Disorder 4 Everyone!” Robinson was to attend this event to speak about her experiences as a survivor of sexual violence while others from the field, such as Gabor Maté, lent a professional lens. In this discussion, several VictimFocus employees demonstrate a grotesque lack of professional dignity as they availed the workgroup chat to denigrate Robinson. Some group members planned to attend Robinson’s webinar later that day and they discuss fake names they could invent for their attendance. Throughout this lengthy discussion, Taylor fails to ask her employees to cease a rather disturbing commentary which included calling Robinson a “turd” and a “liar” with one participant suggesting a rather gruesome act of harassment: “Let’s find her address and send alternating envelopes of glitter and shit…” Taylor allows this level of discourse to continue under the auspices of a work chat space for VictimFocus without even subtly attempting to put an end to any of the ad hominem attacks and the threats to harass and harm Robinson.
Reading through the transcripts she was sent, Robinson expresses dismay, “She doesn’t condemn the actions of her staff to go ‘undercover’ at an event I was due to speak at. Jessica acknowledges my vulnerability and poor mental health and does not condemn her staff members planning to intimidate me.” Robinson decided not to attend the event because of the attention her comments about Taylor’s books were garnering on Twitter proclaiming, “I didn’t want any unwanted attention.”
Then in the VictimFocus WhatsApp work group chat on 29 April, Taylor announces, “I am going to have to make a public statement about the accusations on social media and I am going to have to go to police today. You don’t have to do anything, but wanted you al to know before it happens.” This coincides with her announcement on Twitter intimating that the police and lawyers “will deal with this from now on.” Taylor reported Robinson to the West Yorkshire Police after this announcement.
By 2 May in the WhatsApp work group chat, Taylor claims Rachel Williams shared private information about her including her “house details.” Then Robinson suddenly switches from Williams to the third-person plural maintaining, “...they know where we live and are offering that info to MRAs (men’s rights activists) on DM.” Who is this “they”? Then on 3 May, Taylor shifts course from why she can’t give proof of her innocence to why she is obliged to file a criminal complaint against Robinson as detailed within a WhatsApp voice message she sent to a VictimFocus staff member. In this message Taylor details that she has made a complaint with the police and her “worries” about what may transpire:
I don't think, honestly...the only reason that I've allowed the police to go ahead with...taking action is because I can't risk the amount of information that they're given out about the house and the kids and stuff like that.
And I've got to protect Ja[i]mi and I've got to protect the house, I've got to protect the dogs and the kids… I've got a responsibility as a, as a parent, and as a partner… I can't just be like, “Oh, just ignore it. It's on Twitter”. But I don't think it's gonna go down... I don't think it's gonna go well,... I think the major risk around Sally Ann being arrested today is that she'll kill herself…. I'll be honest, that's my concern that she's gonna... or she's going to deliberately post that she is going to kill herself and then not….and then I'm going to get blamed for it. The police have told me that their plan was to remove all of her electronic devices and to bail her with bail conditions and...a restraining order.
There's a load of stuff that I've not told you yet, but it's just a lot more than it looks like and I just [had] not realised.
I had to give the police all the messages that she'd ever sent me and stuff like that. And it's just way worse than I could have even…
In other WhatsApp work group chats, Taylor refers to the fact that Robinson had asked Taylor for her address, “I feel dead stupid but like there's loads of messages from her that I've not seen or I have not noticed over the months and years asking for my home address, saying she wants to send me presents, saying that like I'm her role model and like that she wants to meet me and she wants to see me.” In her tweets and replies to others, Taylor maintained that Robinson was “fixated” on her. She references emails she claims to have overlooked from the past where Robinson had asked Taylor for her address so she could send her artwork from her project “Socially Distant Hugs,” pyrographic art pieces, which Robinson had started during Lockdown 2020. “I asked for her address to post one to her, but she did not give me any information,” Robinson confirms. “I made loads and I sent a generic message out asking people for their addresses,” she recounts. She shows me the Facebook message she had sent to Taylor on 3 June 2020: “Hey, I’ve been sending something out through the post for those who I’ve met through the drop the disorder, I’d love to send you one but don’t know how you’d feel about giving address? I can always send to Jo to send on if that’s better x.” When she hadn’t received a response from Taylor, Robinson wrote her back on 7 June: “Hi, I’m so sorry if that last message overstepped the mark! I’m literally just sending out something to people I’ve met through speaking out and didn’t want to exclude you but completely realise asking for a postal address wasn’t right xx.”
Despite Taylor pretending she had not seen this message in her WhatsApp chats and voice messages, she had seen the message as she responded to Robinson on 7 June with, “Heyyy. No no. It’s ok. I just lost the message.” Robinson observes how Taylor has misrepresented her goodwill gesture: “In a tweet Jess has now deleted, she used this incident to imply I was a stalker trying to get her address.”
As more people learned of Flatman’s and Robinson’s stories being published by Taylor, Twitter became a hostile space for Taylor—especially as Robinson maintained transparency posting her evidence online and speaking back to Taylor’s prevarications. Taylor makes claims throughout this ordeal that she has been doxxed and threatened on Twitter, none of which are verifiable by evidence. Robinson tells me, “I’ve seen no evidence of threats,” noting that upon hearing Taylor’s claim of being victimised on Twitter, she readily responded on the platform stating, “I also do not condone any violence towards JT and never ever would.” Robinson has grown accustomed to the lies that Taylor uses to cover for her misconduct. Robinson maintains that hers is a critique of professional conduct and nothing more: “I have nothing to do with any private information shared. It’s not a personal attack I’ve launched against her—I’ve raised legitimate concerns about her practise. I’ve never once commented on her personal life.”
Part of the blowback against Taylor is in large part due to the involvement professionals from the fields of psychology and criminology who, like Priddey, recognise the violations of professional conduct and research ethics and who similarly noted Taylor’s campaign of harassment and defamation to deflect from the fact that Taylor printed many women’s stories without their consent in her books. Also of note is that on 21 June, Taylor made this claim: “I’ve now deleted the thread of evidence that proves I’ve been telling the truth this whole time, as I don’t want it getting too big. I trust enough people have seen it. I hope the harassment and abuse of myself & my family will now stop.” Allow me to clarify here: there was never any evidence posted by Taylor to respond to the criticism about her book. She has never demonstrated these women’s consent to be published in her books. This is more smoke and mirrors, a speciality of Taylor’s to return the social media discussion about her being always a victim. She adds in a follow-up tweet, “I have shared all evidence I needed to share that I have done nothing wrong and Sally Ann has been warned by police to stop harassing me.”
Taylor also involved her wife, Shrive, in the episodic harassment of Robinson. Shrive composed numerous tweets defaming Robinson including a series of rants the day after I sent my press query to Taylor. There was, in fact, a meltdown episode on Twitter by both Taylor and Shrive on 22 October which bears reading if you have the tiniest of doubts about VictimFocus’ ideological drapes not matching the praxis carpet. One tweet in response to a post Robinson has since removed, but which remains within Shrive’s screen-cap therein begins with: “Sally-Ann. FUCK OFF!” Some of these women’s tweets are quite abusive and inappropriate for anyone holding the title of CEO and Director of Commissioned Research of a company that pretends to support victims of sexual violence. Shrive follows the pattern of Taylor in deflecting legitimate criticism by implicitly accusing Robinson of homophobia to which Robinson reiterates, “This has nothing to do about her sexuality—it’s about her as a professional conduct.”
All the evidence I have studied indicates that Taylor has overstepped professional codes of confidentiality with her wife, involving her in the sharing of private information about and the defamation and harassment of Robinson. On 13 June, Shrive wrote Robinson a private message through Twitter expressing upset for her wife, “Do you know the state she is in? Do you know that people are now sharing our private information? Including our address our son (who was born through rape, and is at significant risk from his dad) lives?” Robinson shared this message on Twitter and promptly blocked Shrive. Meanwhile, the cocktail of lies that Shrive has created here ends up being its own sort of Schadenfreude. Robinson did not give out any private information about Taylor nor did she ask people via Twitter message to do so. However, it is very likely that Robinson perfectly understands what it feels like when people share “private information” about others.
Robinson recounts what happened after Taylor reported her to the police:
The police came on May 9th 2022. I was at work and my mum directed the police to the Community Mental Health Team. They said they’d go back and speak to my social worker in the CMHT. They told my social worker they were doing a “welfare check,” to check on my safety. They said they didn’t need to speak to me. They told my social worker that Taylor had reported me for harassment and that the police had concluded that no harassment had taken place. I haven’t heard from the police since. I’ve phoned them myself to ask them if I have complaints against me because Jess stated publicly I’d had a formal warning. She has tweeted that I had received a warning from the police and been told to stop “harassing her.”
Taylor has made not one—but three—police complaints against Robinson for harassment. The West Yorkshire Police have confirmed that these complaints have been closed stating that they are classed as “no further action” (NFA). This means that Taylor’s claims were found by the police to be unfounded. A quick glimpse through social media of both Robinson and Taylor evidence quite blatantly which party is engaging in harassment and defamation.
Robinson tells me, “Jessica has used her power and social media following to lie publicly and repeatedly about the police in order to intimidate and scare me. She has also lied about police involvement online in an attempt to discredit my accusations,” adding, “I have not had any direct contact with Jessica Taylor since March. Since then she has been blocked on all social media platforms.”
There is a backstory to Taylor’s repeated threats to contact the police and execution of three complaints agains Robinson. Elaborating how she and Taylor chatted occasionally in 2021, Robinson alleges that Taylor used the police to deflect her lies and intimidate Robinson: “She asked me about one of my perpetrators, asking for information about what he did to me. I told her how scared I am of the police because the police were involved in my abuse. So, she knew how terrifying threats of the police are to me.”
However, the monstering of Robinson has taken place not only on social media, in private WhatsApp messages, and VictimFocus WhatsApp work group chats—it has also taken place by email. On 28 June 2022, Robinson submitted a request to VictimFocus to obtain the consent form that Taylor claims to possess for all participants in her books to include Why Women Are Blamed For Everything. She also seeks the data that VictimFocus holds of her:
Please could you provide me with a copy of the consent form for the use of my experience (under the name of ‘Faye’ re. The use of CSE films in practice) for your book ‘Why Women are Blamed for everything’
Unfortunately I am not aware a consent form exists, one that is required for your publishing outlining use of my data & experiences, or that one was required at the time of publishing[.]
However I have been alerted that on your twitter you state you have consent forms for all experiences shared in your books and they have been checked by lawyers.
I would like to request a copy of my consent for the book please and all information you hold on me please.
The request for “all information” is considered a Data Subject Access Request. On 1 July, Robinson sent a follow-up email attaching an image from Taylor’s section of the book entitled “Learning from feedback” which claims that all women included in the book were “contacted when the transcripts were being analysed to invite them to read through the initial findings and themes before they were written up for this book.” Robinson wanted to push the envelop knowing that an official request for data would force Taylor to admit in writing something approximating the truth—either that she could not produce the consent form which she claimed to have or that Taylor would be obliged to admit that she had included Robinson in Why Women Are Blamed For Everything. So, Robinson asked for evidence of the alleged consent form and the transcripts having been sent to her fully aware that Taylor had no evidence for any of her claims:
Please could you also provide me with the following information.
Please see the section in WEBE [Why Women Are Blamed For Everythin] around participants receiving transcripts before the book was written.
Could I be sent a copy of this which claims to have been sent to me please?
The same day at 16:21, Robinson responds to Taylor’s and Shrive’s ongoing claims that Robinson is not in her book and is merely confusing herself with another woman’s experience. She writes: “This is my experience in book, I am Faye. I am not confused.” Robinson attached a photo showing the first page of Faye’s story from Taylor’s book. Robinson explains why she chose to break her anonymity and speak out against Taylor given her precarious situation as a survivor of sexual violence, “People have asked why I did this when I wanted to remain anonymous. I did it because I couldn’t stand Jessica making me out to be a lair. I wanted my power and control back over my story.” I ask Robinson why she chose to use Twitter as the vehicle for her testimony and she replies, “I’ve been questioned about this by Jessica’s followers as well. I put it on Twitter because it is a public platform to speak out and have a voice. I wanted to warn others about her. It was a way to get my voice back.”
At 16:44, Laura Caress, the Human Resources Officer for VictimFocus responded to Robinson’s email and her response is nothing short of astonishing. It demonstrates the depravity of Taylor’s orchestrations within her company which have emboldened her employees to treat a human in such a contemptuous manner. While Taylor peddles a narrative of “believe the victim,” it is clear from the response sent to Robinson that VictimFocuses practices the inverse, all under the guidance of Taylor’s “smoke and mirrors” months-long crusade to monster Robinson. Here are some excerpts from this email:
As you are aware, you have been asked by police not to contact Dr Jessica Taylor due to your course of harassment since March 2022, and so I will respond to your communication.
We are aware that you have also made a complaint to Dr Taylor’s publisher, and their Lawyers will respond to you separately in relation to the books specifically. If you have queries about the books, please direct your questions to the publishing house.
You were not interviewed for any of Dr Taylor’s books. All women who were interviewed or took part in her research have provided written consent.
We are aware that you have made numerous false and defamatory allegations on social media, including allegations that your ‘life story’ has been ‘stolen’ and published in Sexy But Psycho ‘for profit’. There is nothing about you or related to you in the book ‘Sexy But Psycho’.
We ask that you immediately make this clear, make a formal retraction and public apology, and stop making defamatory and abusive comments about Dr Taylor.
We are aware that you later claimed publicly that your life story was ‘stolen’ and included in Dr Taylor’s first book, ‘Why Women Are Blamed For Everything’. This is also false, and defamatory. We ask that you make this clear and make a formal retraction and public apology, and stop making defamatory and abusive comments about Dr Taylor…
As you now have the confirmation of your written permission and ongoing consent to the #NoMoreCSEFilms campaign over a period of months, we require you to immediately stop harassing Dr Taylor online or in person, stop publishing defamatory and false comments and accusations and stop inciting and sharing abuse of Dr Taylor and her family.
If you continue this course of action, we will refer this matter back to lawyers and police.
This response continues to dig in with more lies, not least of which is the claim that Robinson has “the confirmation” of a non-existent permission for Taylor to have reprinted her story outside of her blog. None of the examples Caress cites constitute consent to publish a personal story of sexual violence outside of Taylor’s blog. However, Caress, perhaps unintentionally, gave up the ghost.
Since March, Taylor has repeatedly claimed in public posts and private chats that Robinson was not in her book with the exception of the deleted 19 post thread where Taylor admitted to having Robinson’s consent to publish her story in Why Women Are Blamed For Everything. Suddenly, Caress, speaking for VictimFocus, has switched course: she furnished an admission that Robinson is the person in Taylor’s book. Note the shifting of the goalposts throughout. Taylor has also gone to great lengths since March, given that other women have come out decrying their involuntary inclusion in Taylor’s books, to frame any woman who has recognised her story in Taylor’s books as necessarily confusing their own life story for the one they read in print. Taylor manipulates the public stating that “many women have already written to me and said it was like reading their own life back to them,” giving an illusion that her book’s narratives can apply to anyone and easily be confused for their own. It’s the ultimate in gaslighting while conveniently the basis for creating the perfect alibi. Well, almost perfect.
Robinson promptly responds to Caress the same day stating that her consent was explicitly and uniquely for Taylor’s blog and she attaches screen-caps of the BPS “Code of Human Research Ethics” that shows clearly the ethical framework for obtaining consent. On 4 July, after not hearing back from Caress, Robinson writes a follow-up email stating, “Following on from your last email, I now have verbal & written confirmation being sent to me from West Yorkshire Police that all police reports Jessica has made were NFA’d and reports were not viewed as harassment. This is through contacting them myself for confirmation.” Indeed, Robinson had contacted the West Yorkshire Police on 21 June 2022 to ask them if any allegations had been made against her. “Jessica Taylor posted online she had taken action against me, she confirms, “The West Yorkshire Police told me two allegations were made against me and both had been closed due to No Further Action. I asked for written confirmation of this.” There has since been a third complaint also closed with No Further Action.
On 4 August, Caress writes Robinson regarding the Data Subject Access Request:
We have considered your Subject Access Data Request and can confirm that the only information VictimFocus holds are emails between yourself and Dr Jessica Taylor of which you already have copies as you were party to these emails. These include the emails in which you give your account and written consent for use of your account. There are also several other emails sent from you to Dr Jessica Taylor thanking her and asking for further advice, or asking to share further experiences with her and offering to public speak for her, which she did not take up. Again, you have demonstrated that you already have copies of these emails as you were the sender, and therefore party to the emails. There is no other data held by VictimFocus about you or pertaining to you.
Furthermore, we have a right to refuse to satisfy SADR requests in certain circumstances where we consider that the request is malicious in intent and has no purpose other than to cause disruption or where an individual is targeting a particular employee against whom they have a personal grudge.
In light of current circumstances we believe that your request meets this criteria.
Aside from the fact that Caress previously told Robinson to remove her tweets claiming that Taylor had not obtained Robinson’s consent to reproduce her story in Why Women Are Blamed For Everything, the job of the officer who handles Data Subject Access Request is to supply the data irrespective of the assumption that the petitioner “already has copies ” of said data. The data officer should also not be in the business of intimating a quid pro quo: that Robinson’s removal of her tweets will result in her being supplied with the data she legally is entitled to receive. All data should have been sent to Robinson. One can only wonder why Caress fails to understand the letter of the law much less the fact that these requests are not SADR but DSAR or SAR.
Robinson tells me, “She lied about the outcome of the report, she told her followers I’d had a formal warning from police and told to stop harassing her and she told her staff at VictimFocus the police had planned to come and arrest me and to remove my electronic devices. I have also never heard from her lawyers whom she claims would contact me.” Robinson laughs about much of what she has been put through because the surreal nature of Taylor’s claims and the ongoing campaign of harassment and defamation seems to have escaped the scrutiny of her Human Resources Officer.
“She states that ‘proving her innocence’ could put me at risk,” Robinson remarks, “However, later on she sent messages to people giving personal information about me and also posted many public tweets and comments about me. She even responds to people who call out Taylor for behaving unethically where she comments she ‘doesn’t care about optics’ and inverts who is harassing whom.” Robinson’s observations about Taylor and her company are evidenced pretty much everywhere I looked—from Taylor having broken confidentiality discussing Robinson’s support worker with women in private messages, to her having failed to obtain the consent of women for their inclusion within her books, to the public defamation crusade that is still ongoing.
Taylor’s hammering of Robinson is curious since she hasn’t gone after the other women as ferociously as she has Robinson. Taylor persists in disseminating lies tweeting on 22 October “I’ve stayed quiet whilst my regulators and police investigated and built cases. I’ve focussed on my life and my family—whilst priority markers got put on our house by police, because our address and our kids were doxxed by ‘feminists’” Where Latham and Flatman noticed how Taylor went for the jugular with Robinson, Flatman was spared in large part the monstering to which Robinson was subjected. Many women assert that Robinson is the most vulnerable of the those who have spoken out publicly and for this reason alone Taylor felt empowered to attack Robinson so vehemently.
It is because of the public-facing and covert campaign Taylor has orchestrated against Robinson that so many other women fear coming forward. And there are many more who have expressed horror of speaking out precisely for this reason.
Another woman found her story included in Taylor’s Why Women Are Blamed for Everything. She was given a pseudonym for Taylor’s book, but due to her fears of retaliation from Taylor, she has requested that I use a second pseudonym, “Carol.” She also coveys other reasons why she has chosen to remain anonymous for this article explaining: “I can't afford my mental health being made worse. In particular, my family are unaware of my experiences with sexual violence and I can't risk them seeing these words as associated with me.”
Carol, in her forties and based in Birmingham, tells me how she first came to know of Taylor (then Eaton) through the Rape and Sexual Violence Project in Birmingham in August 2017. She recounts: “I’m one of the then women Taylor interviewed for her PhD thesis and whose anonymised responses are in Why Women Are Blamed for Everything.”
She discusses how she granted consent for Taylor’s PhD thesis, “The consent form I signed covered sharing my responses at conferences and in journals but not books for general consumption, that I could just stumble across, and that people I know might read.” She adds, “And I certainly wasn't expecting it to be used to make a profit.”
I asked Carol to send me the consent form she signed and the language of this form reflects precisely what she told me. Here is what is mentioned in the document which Carol signed on 16 June 2017 entitled “Info sheet for participants” instead of a more appropriate name such as “Informed consent form.” Nonetheless, this form strictly limits Taylor’s dissemination of her findings to academic publications:
The results from this study will be used in the PhD Psychology thesis of the researcher, Jessica Eaton of the University of Birmingham and may therefore be published in other journals, presentations and spoken about at conferences. However, you will always remain anonymous and anything that is discussed that may identify you or others will be removed from the transcript….
The researcher will meet with you for the discussion to take place which means you cannot be fully anonymous to the researcher. You will be asked for some basic demographic information such as your age, ethnicity, religion and your occupation so the researcher can be confident that the women who take part in this study represented as many different people as possible. Your location, name and any other identifying information will always remain anonymous when the research is written up, published or spoken about. A false name will be used along with any comments that you made during the discussion.
Carol signed a consent form that limits Taylor use of her testimony for Taylor’s PhD thesis, related academic journals in addition to related academic conferences and presentations. Taylor’s commercial book, however, does not fit the consent’s parameters. Carol maintains that Taylor did not engage in informed consent in publishing her personal story within her first book. She explains that when she had signed the consent for participating in Taylor’s PhD thesis in 2017, there was no mention of a non-academic book in the document she signed.
Then the next year on 8 July 2018, Taylor sent Carol an email asking if she wanted to read her analysis and to inform her that she is turning her thesis into a book: “I would love to have you review it before it is published to get your thoughts. I would make sure you got a free copy of the book too. Could you let me know if you would like to get involved in any feedback on my analysis or findings—it’s completely voluntary and you will remain anonymous.” Carol responded the same day telling Taylor that she wanted to see the drafts and comment on them. On 9 July Taylor wrote a repetition of her email the day before stating again, “I can send the analysis to you...its completely voluntary and is more about making sure that you all didn’t feel that I sort of ran off with your thoughts and feelings and interpreted them in a way that was disconnected to you all and what you meant.” There is no mention of consent for the book. On 17 July Carol sends Taylor her response, “Yes, that sounds perfect,” thanking her. Carol didn’t receive the raw data from Taylor until 9 October and in that email Taylor states, “The next time I get in touch with you, I will have the chapter I am writing about your interviews, so you can comment on that too.”
Carol sent Taylor her feedback to Taylor’s initial analysis of her raw data for her PhD on 27 October. Reacting to the study responses that Taylor sent her, Carol confesses, “She sent me her interpretation of the responses she had done for the study. I didn't fully agree with some of it.”
Then on 7 November, Taylor emailed Carol writing, “I will send the chapter to you too if you like? So you can see how it all worked out? Most women who responded just agreed with it all and said it made sense.No one yet has challenged anything or brought anything up which is a surprise to me as I thought they might disagree with my analysis but maybe that means I listened and got it right for them.” Carol states, “I didn't reply because she hadn't said anything about my feedback on her analysis. I still expected her to get in touch about the book before publishing. And I expected it to be an academic/training book for people in the field.”
Taylor never contacted Carol again.
Having witnessed the women coming forward on Twitter decrying their not having consented to being pulled into Taylor’s books, on 20 October 2022 Carol emailed Taylor asking if she had ever sent over the drafts from 2018 noting that she never received them. Taylor responded the next day writing:
I have checked back through my records and I sent you the drafts, and you gave me feedback on them all before the PhD was published. I got your feedback in October 2018 by the looks of it. The PhD was published in March 2019. I then cited the PhD findings and extracts in the book, which I wrote in early 2020. I also wrote to you in April 2020 to offer you a copy of the book but didn’t hear back, and I didn’t have an address for you.
Carol relates, “I didn't get drafts of the book, or the April 2020 email about getting a copy of the book,” adding, “I emailed her to just ask if she sent the drafts to her book since she only mentioned the thesis drafts in our previous communications. She said she emailed me to offer me a free copy of the book but I didn't receive that. And she doesn't claim to have sent me a draft of the book. She just says she cited her PhD findings in the book.” Carol explains, “She asked if I wanted to see the chapter from her PhD thesis which I didn't respond to because I assumed she would get in touch about the book later as she wrote she would like us to review the book draft before publishing.”
The process Taylor claimed to uphold in allowing the subjects of her PhD thesis to participate in reviewing their input for Taylor’s book was simply not observed. Carol expresses that this negated any form of consent from her because she was never allowed to “get involved in any feedback” of the “analysis or findings” much less approve any drafts of her inclusion within Why Women Are Blamed for Everything. She confesses, “I didn't get a response to my participation in her thesis and I didn't know if it was taken on board or how it was used. So I don't know if I was really involved or not. It's a type of book that is not covered in my reading of the consent form, or even the emails I got which said I would see the book before it was published.” A critical element for Carol to have been able to decide if she was willing or not to give Taylor her consent to re-publish her story rested on Taylor’s promise to involve her, to allow her to give feedback on her insertion within the book.
Carol conveys her distress for what Robinson has been put through in recent months by Taylor, “I'm mainly worried about Sally Ann who has been painted as lying about her words being in the book. I feel that even the women who she definitely got consent forms for, still weren't told anything about the book when they signed.” Carol continues, “You can see the consent forms she talks about for the stories in the book do not mention publication in a non-academic bestseller from which she will make money.”
Carol explains that she contacted me because she wants her experiences to reflect that the controversy surrounding Taylor is simply “not a case of only two women.” She believes that there could be more women whose stories were dropped into Why Women Are Blamed for Everything with Taylor having completely avoided her ethical duty to obtain informed consent from all of the participants in her PhD thesis and those, like Robinson, whom she dropped into her book.
She adds that when she learned of her story being printed in Taylor’s book, Carol contacted the Rape and Sexual Violence Project in Birmingham, “I let their CEO know recently that the book was out in case any of their other service users stumbled across it.” Carol has since made a Subject Access Request with the University of Birmingham to get access to any information they hold about me from the research project. Carol is nervous about this subject confessing, “Because there were so few people in the study, I'm worried about how Taylor will react, especially seeing how she is behaving at the moment.”
Priddey has observed how Taylor portrays herself on social media and interacted with others. It has become apparent to every single person with whom I have spoken about Taylor these same criticisms and observations that Priddey theorises: “She sees herself as a god, and if you see anything differently from her she accuses you of ‘victim blaming’ and will call you a racist, et cetera. It’s that kind of golden goose egg, hot potato.” Many others have echoed Priddey’s observations: anytime anyone questions any of Taylor’s ideas or advice, she blocks or accuses them of being a homophobe or racist. Priddey saw through these defence strategies from the beginning, shedding light on what has taken many others months to accept: “She has pitched her false narratives—a lesbian, a victim of violence, peddling a version of the truth, she pretended to be a doctor. I think she is a perpetrator a sociopath, if I am honest, and a dangerous person and a liar. She’s gotten away with this for so long that this is where her power lies. She’ll say she’s a lesbian and that’s why she’s being targeted.”
Analysing how Taylor reacted to her outspoken social media statements and clear support for the women who have come forth accusing Taylor of having printed their stories of sexual violence in her publications without their consent, Priddey clarifies:
She clearly realised I didn’t trust or like her. I was never one of those on social media saying, “Jess, you’re amazing, you’re the bee's knees!” She’ll have known that I am not her follower. However, she’s still not blocked me on social media. She has never confronted me and I genuinely think she realises that she won’t get anywhere. She’s not played the same games with me as she has with others. I know she plays dirty, I know she lies about people, and manipulates things.
I ask Priddey if any of what Taylor has done to her knowledge encroaches upon criminality and she replies, “Morally it’s criminal but it rests in a legal grey are.” She underscores how VictimFocus allegedly supports victims ostensibly protecting them from being re-victimised because of social and political structures and practices, ironising that “She is doing what she accuses others of doing at the same time profiting greatly.”
Priddey recounts her hesitancy to fall under the spell that Taylor has cast among many women and self-proclaimed feminists, a chapter in this story that is also its own puzzle. She perceives what every single person with whom I have spoken has also iterated about Taylor: the way Taylor pretends to hold specialities in areas far outside her training and expertise, even intimating that she is a medical doctor. “She now says she is now calling herself a chartered psychologist but it’s a loose term,” Priddey explains, “She’s not a forensic or Clinical Psychologist in the field but gives out information as if she were from that field.”
There are many more questions to be answered around Taylor’s professional conduct and her use of VictimFocus to dredge up subjects for her “studies” and “reports” that she tosses together, siphoning responses to public-facing campaigns back into a “research project” where there is no line between marketing and research and indeed where marketing and self-promotion is the research.
There are moments when one must wonder if Taylor even understands what she is undertaking. When asked about research ethics for her study in 2020, Taylor maintains that VictimFocus is an “independent research organisation” and claims that “there are no specific ethics committees for this type of indie research.” She adds, “Instead, we follow BPS human research ethics guidelines which universities also use in the exact same way, so we comply.” However, Taylor’s actions demonstrate that she simply does not observe the BPS “Code of Human Research Ethics” given what Flatman, Robinson and other women have experienced.
Taylor claims that VictimFocus has “a team of 101 registered peer reviewers, 51% are academics and 49% are survivors of sexual and domestic violence,” yet there is no evidence to demonstrate such a reality behind her words given that her research has been regularly criticised by experts in similar and adjacent fields. It would seem that words and self-promotion are Taylor’s speciality as she creates an image that is unsustained by facts or reality as she lends a public image to her “research” which barely surpasses the threshold of believability for her virtual followers to “like” and move onto the next tweet of the moment. For instance, Taylor advertises that she is “releasing a study” when she has merely posted an online survey. There is good reason to worry when she “launches” a hashtag #iwasblamed announcing, “We will collect thousands of experiences today.” Collecting precisely for what end/s? And as some have noted, when the research is completed it is unclear if women have to buy back their own experiences from Taylor. Taylor claims, “All of our studies are published for free and remain transparent.” However, while VictimFocus offers free downloads for some of its reports, not all are free.
Numerable questions remain as to how the BPS has failed in its mandate to enforce its own “Code of Human Research Ethics” which Taylor has violated on several grounds. There are also numerous ethical quagmires related to how both the BPS and Taylor’s publisher, Little, Brown Book Group have failed to investigate what are flagrant violations of privacy, professional ethics, and grooming. This, in addition to Taylor’s posing as—albeit by omission—a Clinical Psychologist, a tactic that ensnares her victims who genuinely believe that what they are asked to participate in is being run by a psychologist who holds training and competency within a field far outside her investigative expertise. Lastly, and most serious is this: Taylor runs VictimFocus by using her social media presence to cull participants for her campaigns, questionnaires, and courses by purposefully collapsing their roles into an amalgam of survey respondent, study subject, promoter of VictimFocus, and marketing tool in order to recruit more subjects for Taylor’s products and training. She treats “data” in just the same way where information she harvests for her surveys, reports, studies, and resources are arbitrarily cross-purposed and obtained unethically without clear lines of consent.
Both Little, Brown and the BPS were sent copious evidence by Flatman, Latham and Robinson documenting Taylor’s negligence in failing to obtain informed consent in publishing Flatman’s and Robinson’s stories of sexual violence in Taylor’s books. And let’s not forget that Flatman’s story was extracted by Taylor during a friendly dinner conversation where Flatman had never agreed to participate in anything more than a meal. Beyond Taylor’s professional malfeasance is her ongoing campaign of harassment and defamation against both women. While Robinson is the most profoundly targeted, she, Flatman and others are tarred by Taylor’s repeated claims about the women who maintain they were unethically hurled onto the pages of her books, as “fixated,” “obsessed,” and “homophobic”—even accusing these women of being unable to tell the difference from their own experiences and those of others, a transparent manner of calling these women “delusional.” All this is brought to you by a psychologist who claims to be anti-pathology.
These issues will be covered in later sections of this article. I wrote Taylor in October to request the consent form she claims to hold for Robinson and Flatman in addition to requesting her comments related to the accusations made by these women. I never received a reply.
How has Taylor been able to accumulate such a massive following with over 95,000 Twitter followers despite what has been evidenced since March by her victims? Both Latham and Flatman believe it is her PhD. Flatman tells me, “Because she classing herself as a doctor she is using her kudos as a professional.” Latham similarly believes so many women have been captured by Taylor’s project because of her doctorate. “The word ‘doctor’ gives her credibility and how she’s so relentless and blocks people who challenge here. She doesn’t engage anyone who challenges here so if she blocks people who challenge her, she blocks any further dialogue about that problem and that conversation is then dead,” Latham reports. Everyone I have interviewed for this article has resounded these same observations.
More serious damages extending far beyond what Taylor has already effected upon the psychological profession and enacted upon Flatman, Robinson, Carol, and other women in co-opting their stories of sexual violence within her books are yet to come. Apparently, Taylor has been able to gain a foothold in public mental healthcare. On 29 March, Taylor announced that VictimFocus is to begin training new staff teams for an NHS pilot “to create an alternative to CAMHS. A new children’s trauma service with no diagnosis, no meds and no pathologising.” Given what Taylor has perpetrated upon victims of sexual violence, it is unambiguous that this individual should have no input into mental health training, trauma services, or institutional guidance and that the paramount services and agencies within and around the criminal justice system do not affiliate themselves with her. And, most emphatically of all, there should be several barge poles’ distance placed between Taylor and the victims of sexual violence.