Why I am pukeko: Why I am Chris.

I respect those who fight the good fight, regardless of which church they belong to. The strategy is to remain faithful and do good. But this can come at a cost: one I may face personally.

I almost lost an authorship on something I have just sent in because I disclosed all my conflicts of interest… including giving paid talks for a drug company before I became an academic. When I took the university salt, I stopped doing this: by the time I submitted that the period in question was more than five years previous, and the authorship stands (the paper is now in a pre publication queue: the wheels of research grind slowly).

And I have had HR people saying they would never hire me. My response is simple. At my level, HR is kept well out of the loop.

I never cease to be amazed at how many people write on this and many other blogs and simply put their name there. Some of them may be pensioners or housewives, but for many others it may really not be the prudent thing to do.

Go back only ten or fifteen years and reflect whether you thought, then, that today people could be publicly lynched merely for donating money to a cause that fifteen years ago was simply seen as understood, and shared by every decent person. It is happening today, and it is happening on a massive scale, with the accusation of “homophobia” levelled at everyone who does not comply with the demands of the Gaystapo.

Now follow the timeline, and imagine what might easily happen ten or fifteen years down the line. The screening company working on behalf of your potential employer will fish (the Internet is an awfully open space) all the comments and statements you have left in the public space. If you run a blog, they will find it. But even if you simply write comments on blogs and fora, they will locate them without difficulty.

Their report to your perspective employer will then express “concerns” about the “hate” nature of your statement, and forecast “difficulties” of “integration” in a “diverse” environment. You will, then, easily be rejected.

Most of the time I sign in here as Pukeko. That is because that is how I set up the wordpress site (which is not on a big corporate server, but on server I pay for). My name is obvious: and there are but two academics in my field in my town. As part of my job I talk to the press about research findings, and have now (unfortunately) become familiar with reporters.

I’m easy to find and fairly easy to take down. [At some cost: finding someone who will do my job is a challenge — we have been recruiting for an open academic post for about five years but not many people will eat the pay cut that happens when you move from clinical to academic work].

This is from an editorial in my professional journal, and outlines the problem.

Our trainees are by then in their late 20s or older, have graduated in medicine, worked 1 or 2 years as an intern, then completed the obligatory 5 years of training for the Fellowship. They often have a partner and dependents and will probably have accrued substantial debts and a mortgage. A few recognise that they are strongly attracted to research, but have little understanding of how to get started. Concurrently, the alternatives of well-paid salaried appointments or the autonomy of private practice are compelling attractions, while the alternative of a path in academic psychiatry offers the prospect of a relatively poorly paid training post, followed by a disparity in pay and conditions compared with fully clinical posts for the remainder of the career.

In both our countries, it is at this critical stage that the present academic career path is both uninviting and unhelpful. The National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC)1 offers Clinical Research Postgraduate Scholarships for medical graduates at a salary of AUD40,057. For the single applicant who is ranked highest, there is the special Gustav Nossal Stipend of AUD47,008. For trainees in general medicine, the Royal Australasian College of Physicians has 14 ‘Research Establishment Awards’ for its trainees to gain a foothold in research, offering supplementary stipends from AUD20,000 to AUD70,000 for 1 year. Our own College offers New Investigator Grants of up to AUD6000, a Research Scholarship of AUD50,000 over 2 years and a number of smaller awards. For more formal research training, an alternative entry point is an NHMRC Early Career Fellowship. These have been established ‘to foster career development at the postdoctoral level by encouraging the beneficial experience of a different research environment’. They are offered ‘to a limited number of persons of outstanding ability who wish to make research a significant component of their career’.2 The salary is about AUD70,000 plus a AUD15,000 loading for medical graduates. A successful applicant typically starts a Fellowship already with a PhD, an average of 12 publications, has had previous NHMRC funding, has presented at international conferences and has more than once been interviewed or written for the media. The success rate for applicants is around 25%. A newly minted FRANZCP would have little possibility of obtaining such an appointment, even if they found the stipend acceptable.

I would add that the salary for a newly minted FRANZCP in public practice in both countries is at least 120 000 if full time, and often a lot higher. As a result I’m still considered one of the younger academics, and I’m in my mid 50s. It’s interesting that it is in the non STEM fields that the thought police run untrammelled through the halls of academia. In STEM, most academics can get a job fairly easily, doing their job.

Which is why I don’t mind people knowing I’m Chris Gale. I like what I’m doing, and I like this town. It has helped my boys. I have a loyalty to my employer, and I keep the boys and the photog and the parents and the Canadian progeny’s names well off these pages.

But I will not fear this elite. Among the academics, I add a certain spice, akin to cayenne pepper, to the blandness of the left. But if the university does not want me, I can return to the island that raised me and trained me, or move to another place to serve. And serve I will, as long as my health lasts, and I am permitted to do so.

But let not fear silence you. Fear is the mind killer, and the elite show that by their stupidity.