It may not be obvious to you, but he has other options.
- Campaign to have the Regulated Health Professions Act and the Psychology Act repealed – or just to repeal the Psychology Act and remove all references to psychology from the RHPA – so (assuming the democratically elected legislative assembly is somehow persuaded to do it) he’ll still be allowed to treat patients even if he loses his license.
Pro: The authentic Small Government solution! ![]()
Cons:
(1) It won’t satisfy him, because at this point he doesn’t have any patients and wants to keep his license for symbolic reasons (possibly including the commercial effect of being able to say that he’s licensed).
(2) All kinds of quacks and charlatans will instantly flood the market, resulting in a gigantic public shitstorm with angry mobs (including health professionals) demanding regulation, which the government will give them in some form or other, and that form will most likely resemble the current one, so probably back to square one.
- Campaign to have the RHPA and the Psychology Act amended to include some kind of an “anti-woke” clause, so the College can’t clip his wings when he makes transphobic or male chauvinist comments and so on.
Pro: Save the world (or at least the province) from wokism! [insert black and white rainbow]
Cons: It won’t work, because the College will simply point out that the decision to require remedial training did not depend on the supposed “wokeness” of the code of conduct (see explanation a few posts up).
- Campaign to elect people to the College’s Council who are more sympathetic to his boorish behavior. (Note that if they’re simply “anti-woke” they’ll still have a hard time justifying not taking action against him for bad behavior in general, when that behavior has a detrimental effect on the entire College’s reputation.)
Pros: Avoid gigantic shitstorm, avoid involving the government, keep license and bragging rights.
Cons: Allowing bad behavior will unfairly damage the reputations of all the nice, polite psychologists and probably lead to a mild shitstorm sooner or later. Oh, and it might be necessary to involve the government after all, because in the bastard hybrid system of Big & Small Government, the government appoints some of the members of the Council (though not a majority), and he probably won’t be able to persuade people to elect enough members who would side with him.
- Campaign to have the judiciary stacked with judges who would bend over for him by reopening the case, reversing it, and taking whatever action against the College is needed to keep the decision reversed and avoid any future action against him.
Pro: Sure, that would work. ![]()
Con: Shittify the province and country into an American-style shitty little shit circus (sorry Yanks) where judges are appointed based on the government-du-jour’s notion of ideological purity rather than actual competence in the field of law.
- Open his own mind, take the training, try to, idunno, maybe actually learn something, and if the training is really that shitty, explain to people what’s wrong with it in an adult way like he used to do, and on the other hand if it’s actually decent training, use it.
Pros: Might learn something, will keep license (plus might expose bad training).
Cons: Oh no! Help, he’s being repressed by wokism! He’s not allowed to have any political opinions at all! (Except that it’s not true, as explained in the earlier post.) In other words, basically it would bruise his ego. Oh, plus he’s supposed to pay for the training himself. (TANSTAAFL, eh?)
- Just quit the College already.
Pros: Can get on with his life and his new career.
Cons: Cannot brag that he’s a licensed (in Ontario) psychologist, cannot treat his non-existent patients (in Ontario).
- Get licensed somewhere else.
Pros: Can get on with his life and new career, plus will divert the money that would have been wasted on training to some other jurisdiction where the rules are laxer, plus can brag that he’s a licensed (somewhere) psychologist.
Cons: Cannot brag that he’s a licensed (in Ontario) psychologist, cannot treat his non-existent patients (in Ontario).
Number 3 could also, in theory, be done legislatively by amending the relevant laws to prohibit codes of conduct that prohibit boorish public behavior by members. It would have basically the same cons, plus it could become a political football, which I reckon most of the College’s members and even a large portion of the general public wouldn’t want, even many conservatives, as it would mean the government bossing the College around, which could easily be characterized as bigger, not smaller, government.