I am not a racist! And neither are my fellow surgeons.
I will discuss my lifetime ban by the American College of Surgeons for speaking out against the claim that I and my fellow surgeons are racists.
In April 2021, despite being a Fellow in good standing for over thirty years, I was banned for life by the leadership of the American College of Surgeons from any engagement with my fellow surgeons on the ACS online discussion forums, from access to the membership directory, and even from my own private messages. Why? Why such a unprecedented, Draconian measure?
It was because I objected publicly and vociferously when the ACS leadership called me and my fellow surgeons racists, claimed that the ACS was structurally racist, and even went so far as to allege that sugery itself was racist. Mind you, no evidence of any of this was given. The fact that there were disparities in minority representation in the ACS was accepted to be due to racism. Disparities in outcomes in surgery for minorities were also due to racism. No other explanation was considered.
I refused to shut up and continued to object to this and so I had to be silenced. The ACS leadership threw its own rules and bylaws out the window to silence and isolate me. I was accused of continuously using disrespectful language and posting comments related to DEI and antiracism on the clinical forums against newly promulgated rules of the forums. My repeated requests to be shown what posts got me banned were ignored. My request for a hearing, as is my right as a Fellow of the ACS in good standing was denied. I was even told my lifetime ban was not truly a disciplinary action! I was denied due process at every turn. As a result, I took my fight public to inform my fellow surgeons what has happening in the ACS and to show the public how radicalized and politicized medicine, including the practice of surgery, has become.
To claim that surgeons are racists and do anything other than their very best for every patient, regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, or other immutable factor is despicable and a slap in the face to every surgeon who practices Hippocratic medicine. It is a radical, ideological turning from the historic mission of the ACS to “Serve all with skill and fidelity (trust).”
Founded in 1913, the ACS accepted its first black Fellow surgeon and first female surgeons that same year. The diversity of the ACS is unquestioned. Its current Executive Director, Patricia Turner, MD, FACs and its newly installed President, Henri Ford, MD, FACS, are both black. The fact that minority representation in the ACS does not perfectly mirror the proportion of blacks in the population is undoubtedly a result of multiple factors and I doubt that racism plays any role in this. Such a contentious and controversial subject should be discussed and debated among the membership. Instead, the leadership has chosen to rule by fiat and silence dissent. It has installed DEI and antiracist initiatives into the ACS, including a whole new Department of Diversity, and training for leaders, staff, and members in antiracism. Antiracism is the brain child of Ibram X. Kendi, a pseudointellectual firebrand and author of How to be an Antiracist, who cannot even define the term coherently (go to 34 minutes on the video and just listen). He was the ACS’s keynote speaker at its leadership retreat on diversity in June 2021 and is now under investigation for misuse of millions of dollars donated to his Center for Antiracism Research.
The ACS has stonewalled for a year and a half, refusing to engage me or the general membership in a discussion on DEI and antiracism. The leadership has not allowed me a hearing, as is my right as a Fellow in good standing for over thirty years. Although DEI and antiracism are now in the retreat as more and more businesses, corporations, organizations, and institutions recognize the toxic, divisive ideology of critical race theory that it is based on, the ACS continues to double down on DEI and antiracism, and promoted these in several of its educational seminars at the recent annual Clinical Congress in Boston last month.
Tomorrow, Thursday, November 9, at 7 PM EST I will be featured on a webinar hosted by the Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism (FAIR) to discuss my ban. I hope you will join me. You can register at:
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_rNRX5dUST0CEcF-NpD3HfA#/registration
I hope you will join me to learn what is happening to medicine and surgery in our country today.
Richard T. Bosshardt, MD, FACS (Fellow of the American College of Surgeons)
Dr. Bosshardt - I just read a very similar post by you, but on Sensible Medicine's substack. As I'm not a paying member there, I could not submit a comment, but will do so here, despite being a non-paying new member here.
Excellent post, BTW! And, you are absolutely correct (in the SM post) - the ACS, and every other institution and organization that caves to this damaging & divisive ideology, "...has ceased to be a legitimate professional organization... and has degenerated into just another institution captured by the DEI/antiracism/CRT ideologues. My ban is as clear proof of this as one could ask for." 100%. My profession, the Geosciences, and twice-over alma mater, the Colorado School of Mines, has caved, too. But, I understand the origin of this, and who and what are really pushing this ideology. It goes above such groups and institutions, it goes above NGOs, it goes above governments. You understand a great deal more than many of your colleagues, but you're not yet there as to understanding it's true origins and purposes. You'll get there, though - I have no doubt. You have courage, and have crossed the most important lines of all - you are not afraid to question, and to question in public.
I have some questions for you to consider. Why do you wish to be readmitted to the ACS? Is it to get a hearing, which was your right as a member and wrongly denied you? And/or to try to help ACS change this damaging & divisive direction? If they took such a drastic action as kicking you out, do you really believe they'll allow you back in? And, allow you to make any changes to their structure and/or functionality? Where do you think the extremely damaging & divisive DIE (as Jordan Peterson refers to DEI) and such really come from? What do you think are the true goals of these damaging & divisive ideologies?
I ask these questions not just for your situation, but also for many others, who are wondering what can be done about this, like perhaps many of your colleagues, who are "treading water" and pretending to go along with it, but are NOT for it. Not just to ease and relieve the needless tension and damaging expectations, but also to hopefully salvage these institutions and organizations, and hopefully restore them to what they started out as, and were for so long.
I also have a suggestion for you to consider. What about starting a NEW organization with the same intentions and goals as the (original) ACS??? You are NOT alone in being kicked out, or remaining "in" by the skin of your teeth, with an organization that has taken a radical turn for the worse, like the ACS has. MANY (if not all) institutions and organizations have been infiltrated and turned inside out by radicals and radical ideologies. There may be enough folks that have been "sidelined" or at the least disgusted beyond measure by now, that you can form a new group which will absolutely live up to the goals the ACS used to. Do you think that might "fly", as they say???
If you can't fight 'em, or join 'em, start your own...? There are many folks out here on the "sidelines" who are starting new groups, organizations, and institutions. You'd be in good company. Welcome to the "resistance"! God bless!