I'm going to lose my job this week. In the seven years I worked at Tyneside Cinema, I always naively believed their intention was to do the right thing. I can't believe just how wrong I was.

A thread:

1/17

Despite their botching of HR processes, their total mishandling of finances, their under-resourced and unsupported staff, their lack of adequate training, their near-annual restructures, senior leaders always managed to convince me that...

2/17

...their heart was in the right place. They meant well. They, and subsequently their staff, were victims of unfortunate circumstances, lack of funding and a few ill-advised decisions. And you know what? I believed them.

3/17

I worked for one of the most respected independent cinemas in the country; it's been going for over 80 years; they're a charity; and they seemed to be doing a lot of good work for the community - who was I to question them?

4/17

This is who I was: a low paid customer-facer who'd already had his confidence knocked by a bully of a manager. I gave them every chance. Like with most abuse survivors, I can only now look back and see how misplaced my trust was.

5/17

When I started working for Tyneside, it was in a call centre, raising money to build a gallery art space and a bar/cafe.

6/17

Years later, I was foolish enough to put my face onto an advert for a brand new campaign raising funds for better access facilities at the cinema, all the while believing I was doing a good thing. I even volunteered to be fundraising champion for the marketing department.

7/17

Yet, unknown to me, what was being done to our own staff behind the scenes, my colleagues and friends, was monstrous. Abuse being covered up, abusers being promoted and allowed to abuse even more, victims receiving little to no support, and those hard-earned donations...

8/17

...being spent either covering up their own mistakes in tribunals and settlements and, as of 2020, giving tasty redundancy packages to rapists. And I could never have imagined the extent to which it went on.

9/17

This is not what I signed up for. This is not the Tyneside I've loved since I started working there. This is not the Tyneside the public have adored and donated to for 80-odd years.

10/17

After seeing what's been revealed in the last month, and the shocking scale of it, I now realise just how wrong I was. I thought Tyneside were incompetent, and that might well be true. But it's more than that.

11/17

It's wicked, it's selfish, and it's the behaviour of a group of people who will turn a blind eye to bullying, abuse, harrassment, all the way up to actual rape, in order to save their own money, careers and reputation.

12/17

To this day, I don't believe those leaders would want to condone this kind of behaviour. But by responding the way they have, by dismissing the allegations, by ignoring the cries for help from their staff, that's precisely what they have done.

13/17

Since the moment I joined the team, all I ever wanted to do was try and make Tyneside a better place for staff to work, and a better place for customers to visit. It was all in vain. I never stood a chance against such a corrupt system.

14/17

Even now, in the face of everything that has been exposed to the public, the leaders still refuse to acknowledge their mistakes. Instead of stepping aside to let justice be done, it seems they'd rather drag the Tyneside Cinema down with them.

15/17

So, to all my colleagues that I let down with my naivety, when I misunderstood what you were going through, and to all the donors who I convinced to part with their money to support what I believed to be a good cause, I am so sorry. I was an utter fool.

16/17

After all is said and done, all I want is justice for those affected, and for a cinema I've grown to love to get rid of the monsters properly, and be the amazing organisation we all want it to be. Even if, sadly, I won't be working there to see it happen.

17/17