‘I wouldn’t use a policy like that’
Professor who helped create McMaster’ University’s first sexual violence plan rebukes the existing one
A McMaster University professor who helped create the school’s first standalone sexual violence policy says the current policy is so flawed that, if she was assaulted on campus, she wouldn’t ask the university to do an investigation.
Amber Dean, an associate professor in McMaster’s Department of English and Cultural Studies, is speaking out about the policy amid a Spectator investigation into McMaster’s handling of sexual violence. Student survivors have told The Spec the university fails them and protects perpetrators.
Dean believes them.
In 2016, she was a member of a steering committee tasked with developing the university’s first standalone sexual violence policy in accordance with a new provincial law. The first draft, she said, applied survivor-centric, equity and intersectional lenses to sexual violence — acknowledging that forms of oppression such as racism, homophobia, transphobia and ableism are interconnected with sexual violence.
“But then, when the university’s lawyers and policy people got involved, the policy transformed into something much more legalistic,” Dean said. In doing so, “it replicated some of the same problems we see with how the courts handle sexual violence.”
Specifically, the revised rubber-stamped draft took on a “colour-blind and neutral perspective,” providing no assurances the university will track or address equity issues, she said.
The university disagrees. “The policy ... approach to complaints and support is trauma-informed, follows procedural fairness, and recognizes that socially marginalized individuals experience disproportionately higher incidences of sexual and other forms of violence,” said McMaster spokesperson Wade Hemsworth in a statement.
Dean, in some ways, sees McMaster’s existing policy as doing a worse job at tackling sexual violence than the legal system. For instance, at McMaster survivors are rarely told what consequences their perpetrators face. At least in the courts, that information is public. The university says it can’t share that information with a survivor unless it directly affects them — such as a no-contact order — due to privacy law.
“If I experienced sexual violence as a member of the McMaster community and knew that I could go through this whole process and still not be entitled to know the outcome of it, then I wouldn’t use a policy like that,” Dean said.
Additionally, McMaster’s sexual violence policy has no provision allowing survivors to appeal an investigation outcome, nor the sanctions applied. A respondent, on the other hand, does have the right to appeal an investigation’s outcome and, in many cases — such as a student being suspended or expelled — the respondent can appeal sanctions.
In response to Dean’s criticism, Hemsworth
said the policy was developed “in collaboration with a large working group with broad representation” and that recommendations were “shaped by extensive consultations with the McMaster community and the policy was approved by the university senate and board of governors, which includes students, faculty and community members.”
Dean thinks the existing policy needs a new review, one that actively seeks out feedback from those who’ve been negatively affected by the policy and addresses their concerns.