While searching for “Leon Redler – Obituary”, I came across this web profile on an alternative therapy website:
Leon Redler is a physician, practising as a psychotherapist in London and engaged in ongoing researches. He was engaged with the Philadelphia Association’s (PA) residential community at Kingsley Hall (1965–1970 ) and co-founded the Archway communities (shown in the Asylum film, 1972). He’s a former chair and life member of the PA; a founder of Diorama Arts (now ODAC) and of the Diorama Zen group; a Trustee of ODAC and a Research Associate at SOAS. He’s the author of several papers, including ‘Open, Empty and Other’ and ‘We All Go Astray’ and co-author, with Steven Gans, of Just Listening: Ethics and Therapy. [1]
I don’t know if it was supplied to the site by Redler, or they wrote it themselves. Either way; it contains the usual hype-inflation.
“physician”. Well; as far as I can tell Redler passed an undergraduate medical degree in the US many years ago. He himself tells a story of how he did undertake some post-graduate training. I am not sure of all the details but, in his own telling, he ran into problems when he violated policies around patient contact, (hardly a good omen for someone who claims to help people with their ‘mental health’). He is not registered with the GMC in the UK, where he works. (At least, he was not some years ago he was advertising ‘physician’ on his calling card).
I love the “engaged in ongoing researches”. Whether or not Redler wrote this, it is a characteristic little spin. ‘Research’ is generally used in the singular, (even if you are researching multiple topics). Why the use of the plural here? It disguises the grandiose claim by a kind of obfuscation. Redler has limited academic credentials. He is not a Professor and, as far as I know, not an author of any serious books. (There seem to be one or two small efforts with his friend Steve Ganz – a narrow expostulation of his own niche view on therapy. At least one of these does have an ISBN and appears to have been published, though I cannot actually locate it on any of the major Booksellers I tried). I am not sure what the Research Associate at SOAS means. It seems to be something new. It is not a full-time teaching position as far as I can see. The ‘papers’ have been published on the Internet and, possibly, (I don’t know), in various print contexts. In this sense I too can claim to have published ‘papers’. In short the claims to academic status and the status of being an ‘author’ made here by the website ‘Mad in the UK’ reflect the usual generous treatment. There seems to be some kind of a need to present a mainstream, professional and academic profile, whether by Redler or by people bigging him up for their own ends.
The less said about Redler’s pretensions to ‘Zen’, probably the better. (I did attend a ‘mindfulness’ workshop of his once. It was extremely expensive. Buddhism, real Buddhism, is generally available free, or on a very small donation basis. In the hands of Redler “mindfulness practice” is sold at a premium. I have since been involved with a European Zen Buddhist organisation with links to the main Soto Zen organisation in Japan. I can assure readers that Redler’s “mindfulness practice”, whatever it is, and, to be fair, he did not explicitly claim it to be Zen mediation at the workshop I attended, is definitely not Zazen, or Zen meditation).
This is a career of someone on the fringes. It gives the unfortunate appearance of someone scrabbling, or people scrabbling on their behalf, to make claims to academic or professional status, from a rather thin basis.
Notes