IF I WERE STEVE LADURANTAYE’S LAWYER, I’D ADVISE HIM TO SUE THE CBC FOR CONSTRUCTIVE DISMISSAL.

the same way an employer can require an alcoholic whose problems affect his employment to attend a clinic.

But Ladurantaye did not breach the Human Rights Code, endanger anyone or damage his employer. The CBC announcing that it would require Ladurantaye to undergo “training as to unconscious bias” and to “reach out to indigenous and other communities as part of his learning process” instead reveals shades of Maoist China.

The problem is especially serious since we’re not talking about privately owned organizations. The CBC, McGill and The Walrus are all taxpayer-funded institutions, and the Writer’s Union a taxpayer-subsidized nonprofit, that are silencing dissenting opinions.

While Niedzviecki and Potter supposedly “resigned” over their personal views, it’s unclear how voluntary the departures really were.

Undoubtedly, Ladurantaye’s demotion was not. Legally, if someone is given the choice of resigning or being fired — as it appears might have occurred in at least one of these cases — that is a wrongful dismissal, whether the employee chose to resign or not.

It’s true that in Canada, any non-unionized employee can be fired for any reason — or for no reason. The only issue is whether there was “cause” for the firing or not. If an editor had never been warned not to express certain views, then there is no “cause” for dismissal when they do.

It’s true there are circumstances where expressing offensive views that could damage the employer can be cause for discipline or discharge, such as the Hydro One worker who was dismissed after he was caught on camera shouting misogynistic obscenities at a female TV reporter. But it’s part of the job of an opinion writer or think tank director to be provocative and to sometimes defy political correctness. In none of these cases does legal cause for discipline or dismissal exist.

Canadians need to ask whether we are prepared to permit our publicly funded institutions to use our dollars to suppress free speech. If we don’t push back and stop allowing the scolds at CBC, McGill and elsewhere from applying their own values of political correctness to impose their ideological intolerance, they will grow more empowered in their purge of any and all thought-provoking ideas.