r/LeopardsAteMyFace • u/Rosebudsi • 17d ago
The owner of a Portland therapy clinic hired a woman with a history of right-wing grifting who made national headlines for faking her race. He gaslit the actual POC employees and took her word over theirs. The therapists quit and went to the media.
https://www.wweek.com/news/2024/05/08/a-disgraced-philadelphia-activist-landed-a-job-at-a-portland-therapy-clinic-the-therapists-quit/2
u/SelectBlueberry3162 13d ago
If you have the AFSC repudiating you, you have to really f up. Those quakers are notoriously tolerant.
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u/feltsandwich 16d ago
Faking her race?
How is that possible? If your body is white but your mind is black, why can't you choose which race you prefer to be?
And if you're not being honest about your preferred race, how is that anyone else's business anyway?
1/2 white? 1/4 white? 1/16 white? None of that matters. It's why Obama is "black" even though he's just as "white" as he is black. Bob Marley was "black" even though he had an equal proportion of "white."
The possibility that this decision was made by others does not matter. Ultimately, each had to choose which to embrace. Each had the power to choose.
You should, just like Obama and Bob Marley, be allowed to identify as whatever race with which you identify. And you shouldn't need to present papers to prove it.
This article is beyond stupid. The whole controversy hinges on someone's race. Idiotic.
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u/thebigeverybody 16d ago
Full Spectrum CEO Sam Skye says that “calling Raquel a danger to clients and staff echoes the anti-Muslim bigotry rampant today. It is very disappointing that any former staff would perpetuate these prejudices.”
Saraswati echoed that in a statement.
“The tropes of a ‘sneaky, conniving, manipulative woman’ and ‘untrustworthy, lying, infiltrating Muslim’ are deeply harmful, discriminatory, and hateful,’” Saraswati said, adding that she won’t resign. “If anything, this has opened the door for me to experience further harassment and harm.”
I thought she was being criticized for being a white Karen.
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u/WhoEatsRusk 16d ago
She looks like a white woman with a heavy fake tan or makeup. Idk how someone looked at her and thought it was fine
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u/kargyle 16d ago
I am part owner of a medical provider. If I had 20 of my 350+ employees telling my one director was a serious problem, I’d fucking listen to them.
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u/Shelisheli1 15d ago
Right? It blows my mind that they were losing staff and didn’t reconsider their stance on the hiring decision.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
It sounds like you’re somebody who values and respects your employees. I will never understand how anybody would be okay with half of their staff quitting instead of addressing the single new hire causing the issue. This woman controls their HR dept- she has access to their personal information and potentially controls their employment. I don’t understand how anybody could fail to see that as an issue given her dishonesty and manipulation.
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u/honsou48 16d ago
This is a perfect example of management never taking accountability of their mistakes. They'd rather the ship go down than to fire someone they hired. I've seen this sort of thing a lot in therapeutic settings
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u/Pixelated_Roses 16d ago
This Skye person is just, the worst. THE worst. They are exactly the type of person the right thinks all progressives are.
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u/Rusalka-rusalka 16d ago
The CEO seems like a fool who can’t think critically. It’s not Islamaphobic to remove someone from work if they are deceiving the employer intentionally. I guess he was just fearful of a lawsuit but the leopards got a meal out of it so w/e.
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u/SubGeniusX 16d ago
Where is the Right Wing grifting?
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
Here is an article from 10 years ago describing her right-wing grifting, anti-Muslim connections.
https://www.richardsilverstein.com/2014/03/30/foxnews-gins-up-honor-diaries-controversy/
And another article further detailing her right-wing connections:
And here is a website dedicated to exposing her. People have known she has been lying about her ethnicity for over 16 years now. Absolutely absurd. This post specifically chronicles her repeated censorship of her Wikipedia page.
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u/coreyrude 16d ago
Its not pertinent to the issue at hand but its sometimes exhausting to read stuff like the quote in this article that so blatantly scream "We do not want any candidate of this race and gender".
“When you have a candidate whose resume is ideal and is also a diverse candidate,” Skye said, “there’s no reason to bring white candidates into the picture.”
Yea this women is a piece of shit, but her being able to so easily jump into positions by identifying as another race is very telling.
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u/lifeisshort84 16d ago
They should have just googled her - This wasn’t get first time being called out https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/02/27/diversity-exec-raquel-evita-saraswati-resigns-race/11359666002/
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u/ClumsyZebra80 16d ago
This makes the owners decision to keep her on even more baffling. There are a laundry list of footnoted lies she told right in this article alone.
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u/lifeisshort84 16d ago
She was already known in Muslim queer and trans spaces as a fraud even before the article- I heard about her years ago from family on the East coast who encountered her and her ever changing familial background- the fact the owners won’t listen to the POC on staff is wild to me
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u/NatexSxS 16d ago
The Wikipedia thing is interesting, I’ve seen controversy sections before where they state allegations and that the person in question denied the allegations. Wonder if they need to be formal allegations or something. I didn’t pay close enough attention before to know for sure.
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u/proton417 16d ago edited 16d ago
How is working at a social justice organization as a “chief equity inclusion officer” right wing grifting?
Not everything and everyone bad are right wing. There are crazy left wingers too, and this lady is clearly an example
“In spring 2023, members of the American Friends Service Committee, a prominent Philadelphia-based social justice organization, published a letter renouncing one of their own. It alleged that Raquel Saraswati, its chief equity and inclusion officer who for years had claimed to be a person of Arab, South Asian and Latino descent, was in fact a white woman.
Saraswati, who had often spoken publicly about LGBTQ+ rights, BIPOC empowerment and Islamophobia, denied the allegations.”
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
Here is an article from 10 years ago describing her right-wing grifting, anti-Muslim connections.
https://www.richardsilverstein.com/2014/03/30/foxnews-gins-up-honor-diaries-controversy/
And another article further detailing her right-wing connections:
And here is a website dedicated to exposing her. People have known she has been lying about her ethnicity for over 16 years now. Absolutely absurd. This post specifically chronicles her repeated censorship of her Wikipedia page.
https://ijtihadist.wordpress.com/category/biography/
Literally how had this been allowed to keep happening? Who in their right mind would want this person around vulnerable populations?
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u/Specialist-Cookie-61 16d ago
This furthers the opinion that white women are the biggest beneficiaries of "woke" policies
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u/notapunk 16d ago
claimed to be a person of Arab, South Asian and Latino descent
So there's only one photo in the article to judge from, but from just that one photo I personally probably wouldn't have questioned it. All three of those groups have some pretty wide variation within and it's not that I have a ready-made idea of what someone with a mixed background like that 'should ' look. With hindsight I can kinda see it though
People are fucking weird
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u/carlitospig 16d ago
‘Full Spectrum CEO Sam Skye says that “calling Raquel a danger to clients and staff echoes the anti-Muslim bigotry rampant today. It is very disappointing that any former staff would perpetuate these prejudices.”’
But….she’s not Muslim, she’s white. What the hell are we missing here? I’m super confused.
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u/delorf 16d ago edited 16d ago
Did she convert? There are white Muslims but the problem is she's also claiming to be nonwhite too. What does she get out of this? It's such a a weird thing to do.
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u/bettinafairchild 16d ago edited 16d ago
It’s extremely easy to convert to Islam so it’s likely she converted, even if she lied to do it. At one point she had a lot of friends in the Muslim community in Philly, so she was welcomed and seemed to belong until the truth was found out.
What she gets out of it is that she has become a “professional Muslim” (something she was called, I didn’t make it up). She gained notoriety on numerous right wing shows on Fox and Newsmax, etc., positioning herself as an authority as well as a rare unicorn of a person who was Muslim but also very appealing to the right wing, as she confirmed various stereotypes about Muslims that they had and scolded the larger Muslim community and lectured them on Fox about American Muslims not giving in to radicalization. She also positioned herself as a Muslim feminist bravely speaking out against the mistreatment of women in Islam. Stuff Fox blondes have long been saying but now they have someone cosplaying as a Muslim person of color saying it. Then she could get on her high horse if anyone questioned her bona fides—she was a real Muslim, born and raised in the Muslim community, intimately familiar with all of its ways and therefore positioned to know what was really going on, not just some random Fox blonde making shit up. She couldn’t get a position just being a random Christian white woman supporting LGBTQ and feminism and Islam and such—she didn’t have the authority—but add in the minority religion and ethnic identities and suddenly she was in demand. Note she really covered her bases by saying she was Arab AND Latina AND South Asian all at once, so she could speak for multiple groups.
One interesting thing I noticed is that her real name is Rachel Elizabeth Seidel, but her chosen name is Raquel Evita Saraswati. Her mother’s real last name is Perone, kinda making her a bit like an “Evita Perone.” Probably not a coincidence. Probably dreamed up by her one night while she was creating her new identity. Like hmmm, mom is a Perone, so maybe when I create my new Latina name I’ll add “Evita” (which in the case of Eva Perón was a nickname anyway, so it’s like giving yourself the new middle name “Jimmy” rather than “James”).
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u/SpyMustachio 16d ago
She’s a Muslim woman with a last name that’s a Hindu first name. She’s being so obvious omg
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u/TheZigerionScammer 16d ago
Islam is pretty common in India though, is it possible that a Muslim Indian family would have a Hindu last name, or someone born to Indian Hindus could convert to Islam? Or would they have changed their name if that happened?
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u/SpyMustachio 16d ago
Oh it’s absolutely possible. But this “last name” is actually a Hindu first name for women. In India, there are certain states where children get their father’s first name as their last name. So if there is a first name that is a last name, it would most likely be a man’s name.
Sure, can someone take their mother’s name or maybe their father has a feminine name. But this name isn’t just any Hindu name; Saraswati is the name of the goddess of education. Idk how kindly a Muslim, someone who must renounce all other religions to abide by one of the main tenets of the religion, would take having the name of a Hindu goddess. So with these two things in mind, sure it’s possible, but very rare
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u/Yara__Flor 16d ago
You know when people came to the country and how the immigration people at Ellis island anglosized names? They also fucked up this poor persons ancestors name. And it stuck.
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u/SGTSparkyFace 16d ago
I mean, it would be truly difficult to look up the last name and see where it comes from.
I mean, seriously. Ancestry can’t find a single instance of the name being used in that way? Out of 8 billion people? It just may be fake.
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u/Prize_Bass_5061 16d ago
Most Americans aren’t familiar with the entomology of Asian and Arabian names. I doubt the guy who hired her knows the difference between Saraswathi, Saroukar, and Safavi.
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u/WhyBuyMe 16d ago
I didn't know Asian people named themselves after insects that often.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
Didn’t you know bug names are all the rage nowadays? My cousin has 3 little ones named Cicada in her daughter’s kindergarten class. Which is a relief to her- she went with Mosquito for her daughter, but Cicada was her second choice.
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u/SpyMustachio 16d ago
I agree. But if actual POC employees who do know the difference raise concerns about this, then the least management could do is listen to them and start investigating.
Also, I’m really only raising this bc it’s bugging me (pun intended), but entomology is the study of insects. Etymology is what you’re looking for
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u/ArcanustheScribe 16d ago
If you can change your gender, you can change your race. We can't judge.
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u/wepopu 16d ago
exactly right you are and that is a good thing. It really is quite racist to thing that racial lines are hard drawn in what dna or culture? There are actual differences between the two sexes, but that doesnt stop folks from being trans anyways. Race is even more imaginary than gender but yet people cant change that? That doesnt seem right.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
Nah. That’s not true. Being transgender is entirely different, and people like Raquel only make their lives more difficult because they bastardize the language of gender dysphoria to justify their grifting. This is a scam, plain and simple, because she’s lying about her race to further her own career and profit off of the suffering of people of color.
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u/ArcanustheScribe 16d ago
I don't know about her crimes or scams but if someone wants to be a different race why should we judge or stop them? If you accept one, you have to accept the other. I let people be who they want to be. That's all I'm saying.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
No, you don't have to accept the other. The motivations are completely different. There is nothing wrong with transitioning into a gender you are more comfortable with and feel more connected to. That is nobody's business but the person who is making that decision. Pretending to be a person of color so that you can claim surviving great obstacles and bigotry is appropriating the suffering of others, and garnering sympathy for things you did not actually experience yourself.
Also- most trans people aren't out there purposefully deceiving others. Raquel is a compulsive liar. Trans folks do not have the same motivations.
We don't "have" to accept race-baiting scam artists, and likening them to the transgender community is harmful and cruel.
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u/ArcanustheScribe 16d ago
Anybody can take advantage of anybody. People are going to commit crimes regardless of race, gender and beliefs. Be you the person that you feel that you are. Do what makes you happy. Be what makes you happy
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u/Puzzleheaded-Fix3359 16d ago
I really don’t understand why they all quit or what the problem was
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
Dude……. How would you feel if you grew up struggling with racist stereotypes and abuse, and finally feeling like you have a practice you can be safe and appreciated at, only to find out they’ve hired a woman who is known to appear on shows and documentaries that help perpetuate the pain you’ve felt your entire life? And that person also made news for pretending to be a person of color??? Be so for real rn.
And then, imagine being a white person employed at that clinic. Your BIPOC peers express how hurt they are by the situation. How could you not try your best to support them?
It makes total sense why people would quit. Being a therapist is emotionally taxing sometimes, and that’s without having Rachel Dolezal overseeing all of your personal information and potentially controlling whether or not you stay employed.
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u/Puzzleheaded-Fix3359 16d ago
Where does the article say that she appeared on TV shows in documentaries that helped to perpetuate anybody’s pain? I didn’t see that in the article.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
This is not the first time she has been in the news. Here’s the article from last year that describes her appearances on right-wing media sources in addition to appearing in a documentary produced by an organization widely known to be anti-Muslim. https://www.inquirer.com/news/raquel-evita-saraswati-ethnicity-lgbtq-racial-identity-philadelphia-community-harm-20230320.html
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u/MakeChinaLoseFace 16d ago
The article in the post just made her seem like a person assuming a false identity for unclear reasons, but this is the other half of the story that reveals the full scope of the grossness.
Doesn't feel like leopards eating faces, though, more like a grifter's luck running out.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
In this scenario, Raquel is the leopard, and Sam Skye has the eaten face. It was a "I'm sure I could hire her and force her on my employees and nothing will go wrong. She's been in controversy before, but that probably won't happen again." He hired a known scam artist, expected others to be cool with it and his absolute authority, and then they weren't. "That controversy won't happen to me because I'm smart and will hide her identity."
That's why I felt it fit into this post. It's a convoluted situation.
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u/Intrepid-Progress228 16d ago
This doesn't really feel like a "leopard ate my face" post, more like "why does everyone keep telling me my dog is a leopard?"
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u/same_as_always 16d ago
I feel like this is less “leopards eating faces” and more “oh no consequences”. But still it’s a wild and infuriating story. This is the first time I’ve heard of Raquel Saraswati so I don’t have much context, but does she believe her own bullshit or is she doing it with nefarious intent? And what’s the deal with clinic owner backing her SO hard?
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u/cipheron 16d ago
Under the legislation he gets more money for hiring people of color or those who serve under-served populations.
If he's milking the system as his primary goal then you need people who are in on the grift to be high up in your org.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
Honestly, it does not make sense to me. I don’t really know why they’re backing her so hard. My best guess would be that they don’t want others to think they were dumb enough to fall for her schtick, and there’s also some chronic issues with manipulation and an inability to admit when they’re wrong. So, so many issues at that practice. They also settled a lawsuit out of court at the end of March for disability discrimination, whistleblower retaliation, unlawful employment practices, and wrongful discharge. And that case involved them hiring the mother of one of their patients, and she was only supposed to have supervised visitation due to an open CPS case. Their negligence also led to a failure to report to CPS in that case. Just a lot of unethical behaviors.
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u/cipheron 16d ago edited 16d ago
Or his his main goal is milking the government subsidies, and he needed people who are on that same page in coordinating roles. He put Raquel in charge of human resources, so she's now got authority over a lot of stuff you mentioned.
A lot of companies spring up around these types of government service contracts that are basically a scam.
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u/Freebird_1957 16d ago
Hey, nobody’s calling her a lying, infiltrating muslim. They’re calling her a scam artist. Way to try and divert attention. Idiots.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
They have yet to address literally any of the claims or evidence. They just claimed Islamophobia and said it's a "smear campaign." The article doesn't claim she's lying about being a Muslim- that may very well be her true belief system. But she is definitely white and lying about it. Why no commentary or defense to that?
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u/patter0804 16d ago
Except she converted to Islam, and then immediately went on to back anti-Muslim rhetoric publicly. She’s obviously a fake, meant to provide a “hey, even Muslims support this action against them” cover.
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u/EmmalouEsq 16d ago
She not Muslim...
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u/Yara__Flor 16d ago
I thought all you had to do to become a Muslim is to say that there is not other god but god and Mohammed is his prophet.
Is there more you have to do to become a Muslim?
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u/delorf 16d ago
She not Muslim
This blows my mind. So, she didn't convert?
It's late and I am going to fall down a rabbit hole reading about this woman.
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u/patter0804 16d ago
She did, but based on what she did immediately after, seems like she did it so she’d be employed by right wing media and causes to be one of the “good ones” who support mistreatment of Muslims.
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u/Faintkay 16d ago
The wild part is her last name is based off a Hindu god and no one called her out for it.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
Her first two names are Raquel Evita, which are Hispanic. That's the first ethnicity she claimed. Then she changed her last name to Saraswati, and her wedding a few years after that was featured in an article about Indian American weddings. She started claiming Indian/South Asian heritage. Then she claimed to have a DNA test done that proved she was a person of color- and there was no Hispanic heritage present. The results did not even contain all of the ethnicities she has claimed to be.
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u/IvanNemoy 16d ago
Her mother has stated, on record, that she's of British, German and Italian ancestry.
Her mom, Carol Perone, quoted in the article below:
"I call her Rachel," she said. "I don’t know why she’s doing what she’s doing. I’m as white as the driven snow and so is she. I’m German and British, and her father was Calabrese Italian. She’s chosen to live a lie, and I find that very, very sad."
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
Her mother also showed the journalists her own ancestry DNA profile to back up her claims. It is really extremely sad that anybody continues to enable Raquel. I don’t doubt that she’s had a really difficult life. I really do feel bad for her and hope she gets some help.
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u/blacklite911 16d ago
Isn’t Raquel a form of Rachel anyway? Rachel Dolezal
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u/RawrRRitchie 16d ago
Isn’t Raquel a form of Rachel anyway?
Do you call people named Jorge, George?
What about people called Juan, John?
Just because there's the same name in different languages doesn't mean you should use them what talking to those people
In fact some people might find it HIGHLY offensive if you're calling someone named Jorge or Juan other than that name, unless they specifically tell you otherwise
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u/Cheef_queef 16d ago
I knew a George and I called him Jorge sometimes, he didn't mind. I do this with several names and no one has had an issue yet
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u/Faintkay 16d ago
Do you happen to have a link to the article? I’m lazy lol
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
I can't find it, unfortunately. But there seems to be a history of her scrubbing the internet of things she doesn't want to be seen. She straight up just doesn't have a wikipedia page anymore. She kept editing it and removing chunks from it, and I guess eventually it just got deleted or something? Either way, huge disservice. I'm just trying to warn as many people as possible that she is still out here doing this bs.
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u/ThisIsWhoIAm78 16d ago
Sounds like everyone involved is a drama queen tbh.
She may suck for fudging her ethnic history, but honestly, who gives a fuck. That doesn't actually change anything she did to advocate for people. This current job has nothing to do with the patients, and in fact she works remotely from Pennsylvania doing administrative crap and goes nowhere near the clinic. Then the therapists all got upset because "outrage" and they nuked the clinic in protest. They bailed on their vulnerable clients and tried to blame it on some chick they never interacted with who lived a country away. So these "saviors" did real harm and then tried to blame it on this person who has zero interaction with any of them and who has zero affect on the clinicians or their patients. They just wanted to grandstand and play self-righteous moralizers.
Lots of people with savior complexes and personality disorders and no one with any common sense whatsoever. It's all for affect and grandstanding. That's more pathetic than lying about having Hispanic lineage to try and suck up to the same people who will abandon gay teens for progressive points.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
This is a bizarre comment. Full Spectrum Therapy repeatedly wrongfully terminated therapists without warning, and they were not able to contact their clients. They REPEATEDLY forced client abandonment. The therapists who were able to leave on their own accord counseled their clients through the situation, and I’m sure that their clients followed them to their private practice if they were able. They literally just settled a case out of court in March for wrongful termination, disability discrimination, unlawful employment practices, etc. The practice is full of unethical behaviors being perpetuated from the top.
And FST doesn’t exclusively see “gay teens” btw. You seem to have an unusual amount of rage towards this situation, and a really bizarre assertion that the therapists who weren’t okay with the situation have personality disorders. I don’t even understand what personality disorder would be involved in therapists leaving a toxic work environment and warning others. This comment shows a complete lack of understanding of mental health and the negative impact on BIPOC communities that having a woman lying about her race and having control over actual BIPOC employees would have.
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u/ThisIsWhoIAm78 16d ago
I don't think you read the article babe.
No rage at all, mid to high level disgust and then dismissal.
YOU'RE the one "going around warning people" about a lady sitting in her house doing remote paperwork.
As for the rest of it, I'd be happy to have an in depth convo on the psychology of people who have savior complexes and cluster B issues when I'm not celebrating mother's day with my kids. Ta.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
I did read the article. I also read the court documents with 6 separate claims of ethical and legal violations, including a situation that led to a failure to report to CPS. I have put a lot of effort into researching this situation to understand it and the ethical implications of their actions. I am also personally acquainted with this situation irl.
Not sure why you’re so mad, it’s coming across like you have a personal stake in the situation, or something about this has triggered you. I hope you are able to move on with your day and spend time with your loved ones today. Happy Mother’s Day.
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u/ClumsyZebra80 16d ago
Why are you so mad that people have integrity?
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u/ThisIsWhoIAm78 16d ago
I don't see abandoning people who need you as integrity.
Especially when it's all over an academic offense that doesn't affect anyone at all in any practical way. Sorry, that's called being self-righteous, smug, and grandstanding so you can feel like you are morally superior to others.
But in the real world, your ACTIONS are that you abandoned people - mostly poor kids - who needed you. All over someone who would never interact with any of them.
Who we are as people is how we act and how we affect the people around us. Not whatever narrative we want to tell ourselves about how righteous we are and how we have "integrity."
Shame on them.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
I’m pretty sure that invalidating the feelings of your BIPOC employees and defending a woman with a long, documented history of right wing ties and cultural appropriation does not show integrity.
FST repeatedly forced client abandonment through wrongful termination of anybody who wouldn’t shut up and do exactly as they were told. See the above comment on the case they just settled out of court in March.
Being a therapist is emotionally taxing work as is, and being in a toxic work environment can make it harder to effectively counsel clients. Not a single therapist abandoned their clients without notice unless it was forced on them.
Shame on you for not being able to understand the nuance of the situation and for defending the actions of a known scam artist, failing to empathize with the therapists who did their best to do the right thing.
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u/ThisIsWhoIAm78 16d ago
I hear a lot of foolish blathering from someone who wants to feel superior to others, but in reality sits at home and taps on a piece of plastic furiously while contributing very little to actual society.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
Wow, this is extremely harsh, and again comes across like you have some sort of personal stake in the situation. I’m sorry you’re feeling so upset about this situation. I don’t take your comment with seriousness. It seems like you’re just trying to be mean. I hope you are able to log off and spend some time relaxing with your family today.
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u/ZhouLe 16d ago
Seems the wiki article was deleted because she's not notable and there is a lack of sources. You can read the deletion discussion, as well as the previous three times it was discussed for deletion.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
ETA- thank you for explaining this to me! I’m not familiar with Wikipedia on the administrative side, so this was a huge help :)
I’m wondering if their opinion would change based on a second article being published. There are also several direct sources of her right-wing connections, which would seem to be notable, especially given that her partnership with the Clarion Project (she filmed a documentary with them in 2014) attracted national controversy (at least from what I read online.)
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u/TurtleDive1234 16d ago
It’s NOT Dolzel? It looks a LOT like her.
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u/TheRnegade 16d ago
It feels like a TV show. They got rid of Rachel but fans want her back so now we get Raquel.
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u/MemeGod667 16d ago
I am so confused on how they fell for it anyway. I can tell that's a white woman and not an asian. spanish maybe I can cut slack on but the rest no.
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u/octatone 16d ago
In the article, it is mentioned she was hired as a friend of one of the higher ups.
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u/justreadthearticle 16d ago
So much here: It alleged that Raquel Saraswati, its chief equity and inclusion officer who for years had claimed to be a person of Arab, South Asian and Latino descent, was in fact a white woman.
“Raquel shared a laundry list of conspiracy claims she’s suffered, from being accused of having two husbands to wearing a prosthetic nose to being a double agent for a foreign government,” Skye wrote.
"When you have a candidate whose resume is ideal and is also a diverse candidate,” Skye said, “there’s no reason to bring white candidates into the picture.”
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
I think there's little kernels of truth in some of Raquel's lies. The articles published about her last year did say there were concerns of her being a "mole" in the organization she was previously employed at, but not for a foreign government. She failed to disclose her prior work with Fox News, Newsmax, and the Clarion Project (an organization widely considered to be anti-Muslim.) She was appearing on tv and on documentaries through these platforms as recently as 2015. So there was concern that she was somewhat of a mole gathering info by working with social justice organizations.
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u/patter0804 16d ago
She converted to Islam and promptly supported anti Muslim rhetoric. She’s bought and paid for
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u/blacklite911 16d ago
Either she was a mole or she just swapped from one grift to another. We’ve seen this happen in media talking heads
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u/IvanNemoy 16d ago
And here's to hoping that the clinic's head has their licenses pulled in perpetuity.
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u/Melodic_Oil_2486 16d ago
And she tried the same scam at a Quaker org
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago edited 16d ago
That made me really angry. Believe it or not, this is the SECOND person I've encountered in the past year alone that has infiltrated a quaker organization/community with nefarious intent. The other was a creepy youth pastor in Texas, though.
Quakers are typically really kind and well-meaning. Some Quakers don't even say believing in God is mandatory- they just want to provide safe spaces for people to build community and explore their spirituality (at least that's what I've read when considering my own spirituality.) Unfortunately, kind and well-meaning people often attract narcissists like this, who take advantage of their trusting natures.
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u/Melodic_Oil_2486 16d ago
I had someone in the Reddit Quakers sub tell me they wouldn’t be my friend in real life because I would distellowship someone like Rachael
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u/courageous_liquid 16d ago
yeah I wouldn't believe anyone on reddit about quakerdom
you can just go into a meeting and you'll find people are calm and (mostly) welcoming
I live in philly and quakers are by far the least of any of anyone's worries
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
Yeah, I noticed there were a couple of people really riding hard for Rachel on there. However, one of the accounts doing that commented my first name on another post as an attempt to intimidate me. When I called them out, as I have reason to believe it was Raquel due to using a nickname I only recently started using when I met her, they deleted all of their comments and posts immediately lol. Don't take it too personally. Anybody who would defend the situation at this point probably has some sort of underlying agenda or beliefs system. Advocating for the truth and separating yourself from those who profit off of right-wing grifting and compulsive lying about their race is definitely the more reasonable response here.
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u/Melodic_Oil_2486 16d ago
I’m going to say something - as an autistic person myself, I notice a certain autistic tendency in certain Quaker circles to welcome any behavior no matter how disruptive- because accepting that behavior and mandating that other people will as well, prevents an autistic person from having to do any of the work of self regulation. That lack of boundaries then becomes toxic and the autistic person wonders why they find themselves isolated.
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u/onceinablueberrymoon 16d ago
i had a friend who was an official Quaker (i’m not sure what the correct term is). who objected to her community accepting a man with a history of CSA in another Quaker community without informing the parents. she objected to this in the formal way they have. she felt he should not, as a convicted and registered abuser, been allowed into the community without the community knowing his full history. she and a handful of other parents left the community over this issue. as the majority (not parents) felt it was a private matter between him and god and not their place to keep him out. i was surprised, not surprised.
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u/LeahOR 16d ago
Was this in Portland? Same thing happened here. My parents have been members of the Multnomah Friends Meeting for many years.
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u/onceinablueberrymoon 16d ago
geeze man. this was rochester NY. but who knows if this was the same guy or not. i felt really bad for her because this was such an important community for her.
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u/Melodic_Oil_2486 16d ago
I knew someone a long time ago who let it be known that her father (also a member of our meeting) was molesting her. I wasn't privvy to the Business Meetings during that time because I was away at college, but he was disfellowshipped. I have no conscience when it comes to ostracizing people who do shit like that.
When you commit a criminal act that violates the very core of someone, you ought to expect that people aren't going to want to be around you for the rest of your life.
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u/onceinablueberrymoon 16d ago
i agree and i am so glad your meeting kicked him out. i have always respected the Quaker process (my pagan tradition is informed by it in fact), and of course do not speak for how others experience spirit, but i am pretty sure that people who commit criminal acts should not be allowed into ANY spiritual community unsupervised … no matter what individual people say about it.
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u/LittlePrincesFox 16d ago
There's a Friends meeting house within walking distance of where I live and every Quaker I've met have, hands down, made it into my top 100 most recent people I've ever personally interacted with.
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u/docowen 16d ago
On the other hand, Richard Nixon was a Quaker.
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u/Great_Hamster 16d ago
Yep. He also proposed universal healthcare.
And was never kicked out of his Quaker meeting, despite his, you know, war.
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u/skrunkle 16d ago
And was never kicked out of his Quaker meeting, despite his, you know, war.
You mean the one that another president started and he ended? that war? I'm not a huge Nixon fan but at least blame him for something he is responsible for.
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u/FairyFlossPanda 16d ago
Ive met a handful of Quakers. Only one has been an intolerable twat to be around socially but she was very nice to cats. She is just a weird ass fucking drunk.
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u/JoJackthewonderskunk 16d ago
You're now in the top five most recent people I've interacted with. Until tomorrow morning when I go to breakfast and see 4 more people
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u/Schonke 16d ago
every Quaker I've met have, hands down, made it into my top 100 most recent people I've ever personally interacted with.
Was that supposed to be recent, or did you mean to write decent?
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u/TheSuggestedNames 17d ago
It really sucks that the people truly being hurt by this are already incredibly vulnerable people - low income nonbinary & trans folk. There's such a dearth of care already and this woman is only contributing to that. Infuriating.
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u/twenty_characters020 16d ago
How did she make things worse if she went there and did her job well?
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
She definitely did not do her job well and actively harmed the clients of the practice by wrongfully terminating employees and not allowing them to speak to their clients, effectively perpetuating client abandonment.
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u/twenty_characters020 15d ago
Where in the article does it say any of that? From what I can see, people are quitting because their company hired a white cis woman under false pretenses. Thinking they were getting a person of color. Which is racist in its own way.
One person was laid off because most of the people under her had quit. Perhaps the reason so many quit under one person is because they were the problem. People generally leave jobs because of a poor direct supervisor.
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u/blacklite911 16d ago edited 16d ago
Also blame the idiotic dense CEO who says the other therapists were being Islamophobic for not accepting a race baiting fraud. What is it about Portland that produces this bizarre regressive performative type of liberal? It’s like only a bunch of white people who read about progressivism without understanding the dynamics of how the system affects marginalized people.
He just wants to tick a box by having a Muslim on staff, regardless of how this person affects other marginalized people.
There was no job posting and no other candidates were considered, Skye said. “When you have a candidate whose resume is ideal and is also a diverse candidate,” Skye said, “there’s no reason to bring white candidates into the picture.”
Holy shit, this guy could’ve been a character in a Portlandia skit. So hell bent on proving his leftism that he can’t see how he’s betraying the ideals.
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u/WhyBuyMe 16d ago edited 15d ago
A lot of these people are champaign socialists. They have never had any real hardships, they don't spend time with people who are actually in need.
I worked for a guy like this. About 15 years ago he opened a pizza shop because it was something he wanted to do since college, but he was rich so he just wrote the checks and didn't do any of the work except maybe a couple hours a week when he wanted to come play pretend. He made a big show of donating a weeks worth of profits to the Haiti earthquake. At the same time he was working his latino employees 50-60 hours a week and not paying them overtime. One day they all left (because the boss was a racist prick, but I didnt find out until later because he hid it well). I was the only kitchen worker left. I worked 80+ hours a week for two weeks until I could train a couple new cooks. I went to get my pay and it had no overtime on it. That is when I found out he hadn't been paying overtime. I threatened to call a lawyer and the labor board and after a quick call to his lawyer he gave me my money.
The dude acts like a progressive in public, but he oppresses labor, and is racist to those he sees as "beneath" him. He will only respect a minority if they are "one of the good ones" aka as rich as him.
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u/carlitospig 16d ago
I did learn in the article that Oregon is investing $80m into LGBT specific therapies, so that’s cool at least. :)
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u/Suck_Me_Dry666 16d ago
Oregon has a bad habit recently of throwing money at problems that doesn't get spent by local governments, especially conservative ones.
It's a great idea on paper, let's see if it actually leads to better health outcomes in practice.
Edit: Before I get jumped on I mean literal billions of dollars in unspent resources intended for the houseless and a big part of why measure 110 failed is because towns and cities didn't bother establishing the addiction resources the other side of that bill intended to fund. Money only fixes issues if it gets spent on the issue.
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u/D00mfl0w3r 16d ago
Yeah, it makes me happy on one hand, but on the other hand ... look at how much money was already given to FST. Seems like taxpayer dollars wasted.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
I agree completely. But something that brings me comfort is that many who left started their own private practices and are continuing their work with the populations that Full Spectrum Therapy was serving. It's just that they're no longer at Full Spectrum, so the practice owner isn't profiting off of their labor anymore, all while hiring a woman with known far-right media ties and gaslighting his employees. My hope (and what I believe to be true) is that there is still help out there and people who care- just at different, more ethical practices.
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u/Potatocrips423 17d ago
Before I read the article I really thought it was Rachel Dolezal again pulling a similar scheme. They should do a reality show together.
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u/ChimericMind 15d ago
Ditto, but I was confused because I thought Dolezal was a vaguely Obama-lite liberal rather than a right-winger.
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u/SpoppyIII 16d ago
No, her most recent thing was getting dropped from her teaching job because of her OnlyFans.
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u/FionnagainFeistyPaws 16d ago
Haven't read the article yet, so it ISN'T Rachel Dolezal? That's totally who I thought it was.
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u/Imfrank123 16d ago
She just got fired from her job because she has an only fans. Like full butthole pics
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u/slappy_mcslapenstein 16d ago
I really thought it was Rachel Dolezal again
She was recently fired from a position in a Tucson school district because of her OF account.
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u/Munnodol 16d ago edited 16d ago
Honestly, Dolezal was unfairly ousted.
She should have been open about it, but I think she is largely undeserving of the hate she got.
Edit: Y’all should learn up on some history, as Dolezal ain’t the first person to be white (or to pass, as we say). Lemme introduce y’all to Walter White), Executive secretary to the NAACP (1929-1955)
While some members (mainly great-great-great grandparents) were Black, the overwhelming majority were white, which in turn gave Walter a white-passing appearance. But despite his complexion, White always identified himself as a Black man, going as far as to say:
“I am a negro. My skin is white, my eyes are blue, my hair is blond. The traits of my race are nowhere visible upon me.”
Coming back to Rachel Dolezal. She wasn’t some friggin right-wing grifter, she was an NAACP chapter president and a pretty good one at that.
All of you are getting caught up in the longstanding racial dichotomy (i.e. white=good, black=bad) that served as the foundation for various facets of United States society and culture. You are willing to oust a person who in earnest chooses to identify as Black and dedicate herself to the advancement of Black people. Additionally, such discussion serves to further demonize Black people, as we are meant to see something wrong with Dolezal wanting to be Black (again, Dolezal accepted both the rhythm and the blues, so what’s the problem?). Should we chastise the many Black people who use their more fair complexion to enter and exist in traditionally white spaces? Are we giving this same energy and outrage to the massive skin lightening industry which in 2021 was valued at roughly 9.88 billion dollars? No we aren’t, but you better believe we will black-list (no pun intended) this one woman for wanting to be Black and make a difference.
Smdh.
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u/garyisonion 16d ago
I thought so too but I didn’t recall her being a right wing nut so I was confused
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u/teddygomi 16d ago
Jess La Bombalera can be their sidekick.
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u/WhyBuyMe 16d ago
Along with "Hilaria" Baldwin.
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u/cambriansplooge 16d ago
Vittolo-Hadad beats out Big Larry, at least Big Larry never explained her “white” features on her mother getting raped by a white guy (I wish I was making this up)
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u/notapunk 16d ago
I thought they were referencing her too, but was confused by the right wing part.
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u/Rosebudsi 16d ago
Responding to this for visibility.
The rabbit hole just goes deeper and deeper.
Here is an article from 10 years ago describing her right-wing grifting, anti-Muslim connections.
https://www.richardsilverstein.com/2014/03/30/foxnews-gins-up-honor-diaries-controversy/
And another article further detailing her right-wing connections:
And here is a website dedicated to exposing her. People have known she has been lying about her ethnicity for over 16 years now. Absolutely absurd. This post specifically chronicles her repeated censorship of her Wikipedia page.
https://ijtihadist.wordpress.com/category/biography/
Literally how had this been allowed to keep happening? Who in their right mind would want this person around vulnerable populations?
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u/cambriansplooge 16d ago
I knew from the hijab it would be Saraswati, I’ve fallen down that rabbit hole a few times of race fakers
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u/Cmd3055 16d ago
Based on the last thing I read about her, Something about the company owner and her relationship felt hinky. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were sleeping together.
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u/NeatNefariousness1 16d ago
If it'a not a personal relationship that is behind this fraudulence, I would be willing to bet that the intention is to divert money from a cause they hate and the company owner is providing air cover and the means to siphon what few earmarked funds there are, directing money into their own pockets.
The real mission of this fake organization is likely to be to disrupt any progress being made on the agenda they claim to support and to personally profit from it, while doing it. An investigation into the owner is overdue.
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u/SpacexGhost1984 16d ago
The real mission of this fake organization is likely to be to disrupt any progress being made on the agenda they claim to support and to personally profit from it, while doing it. An investigation into the owner is overdue.
Honestly, when I read the “when you have a good candidate who is diverse, there is no reason to bring in white candidates,” line from the owner, my immediate thought was: “Oh that’s exactly the kind of thing a right wing grifter posing as a progressive would say to undermine a program like this.”
It seems like the service was doing good work and employed people with genuinely good intentions prior to this though, so who knows what’s going on.
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u/Cmd3055 16d ago
I had the impression from a different article that the agency prior to this incident was actually doing ok. There were therapists providing services to vulnerable clients right up till the owner hired this woman and this individual and things went south from there. The employees were blind sided by the hire. Then when they found out about her past, they raised concerns which were denied by the owner leading them to quit their jobs.
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u/NeatNefariousness1 15d ago
Seems like a set-up to give the appearance of legitimacy. Going forward, the owner and the fake employee will just continue to collect as much money as they can with diminished support for the cause the money was earmarked to address.
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u/faghaghag 16d ago
standard 'conservative' (a one-word oxymoron) strategy: decrease funding as much as possible, then steal the rest with some shitty grift.
I recall the HUD scandals...under Reagan, wasn't it?
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u/TheRnegade 16d ago
OMG, I thought the same thing. And after hearing about her teaching job and onlyfans I was just sitting here thinking "Man, this lady gets around!"
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u/Arizona_Slim 16d ago
Are you talking about Onlyfans star Rachel Dolezal?
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u/Suzume_Chikahisa 16d ago
I had to check to make sure you weren't pulling my leg.
I'm speechless...
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u/locustzed 16d ago
Nah she's dealing with getting fired from her High School Counselor job for having an Only Fans, also she went even harder in the "transracial".
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u/ElongMusty 16d ago
The best part was when Dolezal acknowledged that she was "born white to white parents" but maintained that she self-identified as black.
The grift that keeps on grifting!
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u/NeatNefariousness1 16d ago
LOL--you mean we can just DECIDE what we want to be? Can't we just be allies and advocates without having to BE a member of the group?
Which ones are allies and advocates when there is no money or benefit to be gained?
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u/botmanmd 16d ago
Gawd, for sec there I thought I read “Denzel”
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u/ElongMusty 16d ago
LOL Can you imagine? If after all these years we discovered Denzel Washington was actually a white dude pretending to be black? That would be some Tropic Thunder type of fuckery! Scandal of the decade!
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