Family Therapy Student Was Fired For Exposing A Pornographic Assignment At Santa Clara University

Naomi Epps Best is a 26-year-old Marriage and Family Therapy student at Santa Clara University. She says she was fired from her internship just one day after publishing a Wall Street Journal op-ed on June 6th. In the op-ed titled “Santa Clara University’s Crazy Idea of Human Sexuality,” she criticized SCU’s required coursework, which she described as “pornographic and coercive.”

According to her, students were forced to watch an explicit BDSM pornographic video in class and submit an 8–10 page sexual autobiography detailing personal sexual experiences, fantasies, and masturbation habits. They were also supposed to share what they disliked about their genitals in group settings. In a multicultural counseling course, students were told to "name their whiteness” and discuss traits like being rational as a part of “white culture."

She asked for alternative assignments, contacted the department chair, Title IX, the dean, and the provost, but was told she’d have to switch tracks or withdraw if she didn’t comply. The university removed the course syllabus from its website shortly after she went public.

Naomi was fired from her internship on June 12, the day after her op-ed circulated widely. SCU has confirmed the class content was part of a state licensure requirement, but denies that students were “forced” to disclose anything. Naomi argues that, in practice, the disclosures were mandatory and unethical, citing APA guidelines that prohibit this kind of required personal information.

“Maybe it was a crass joke to break the tension,” she wrote, after her professor showed a bondage video and asked the class if they wanted to try it. “But I didn’t want to find out if a live demonstration was next.”

The assignment was an 8–10 page “comprehensive sexual autobiography” with instructions to include early sexual memories, masturbation, current experiences, and “future goals with an action plan.” Students were told they weren’t required to share anything that caused “extreme discomfort,” but as Naomi stated, that disclaimer “rang hollow.” If that weren’t enough, all of it was to be uploaded to a third-party platform for grading.

Her request for an alternative assignment was denied. When she asked why it was necessary, the department chair called the course “an inoculation of sorts,” writing that it was meant to expose students to what they might encounter as therapists. If she had such an issue with it, she was told, she could just pursue a different license. Her options were clear: comply or get out.

The next time around, the course was taught by a different professor, Chongzheng Wei. He promised professionalism, she said, and assured her she wouldn’t be expected to disclose anything personal. Instead, she was shown another bondage video featuring a submissive in a “gimp suit,” while songs like “WAP” and “I Beat My Meat” (racial slurs included) played during class. A transgender guest speaker described being sexually aroused while looking at himself in the mirror, and told students, “only trans women have p—s that can blow up the world.”

One exercise required students to write down something they disliked about their genitals or breasts, which would then be read aloud by another student.

She asked to complete the class remotely, an exception that, according to her, had been granted before. She was told no. Her only option was to drop the course or be dropped. In the end, she was allowed to withdraw, but had to pay for a separate continuing-ed course and take three extra units to be eligible for graduation.  

“I even sought short-term therapy through campus mental-health services, which I was denied,” she wrote. “A staff psychologist told me that my department has a history of demanding intimate self-disclosure from students—a practice he regards as unethical.”

“Therapists are no longer trained to be neutral,” Naomi wrote. “They’re trained to be agents of political change.”

In another required course, Multicultural Counseling, Best says students were taught that concepts like “objective, rational, linear thinking,” “delayed gratification,” and “planning for the future” were all traits of “white culture.” She had to preface mock therapy sessions by “naming her whiteness” and warning that she might misread clients because of her race. In Human Sexuality, she says students were taught that children with six months of “gender distress” should be “affirmed” in their gender identity without further assessment, even when trauma or autism was present.

It’s not just Santa Clara, she warned. “These ideas are being promoted by the field’s top bodies.” She cited the APA, the ACA, and CACREP—national accreditation and licensing institutions—as endorsing frameworks that aren’t grounded in clinical neutrality, but in ideological advocacy.

When those frameworks shape how therapists are trained, it affects how gender transitions are handled. How family custody is decided, and how children are disciplined. Even how people are sentenced in court.

Her story is only gaining traction now, but the underlying structure that allowed it is nothing new. “The entire field of educating therapy has been hollowed out and filled in with critical theory,” she said.

Naomi is a newly married mom with a one-year-old daughter, just a few credits away from graduating. She said she tried everything to no avail. “Speaking up comes with risk,” she wrote. “But in a field where dissent is discouraged and students are coerced, I’ve chosen to say: No more.”

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