Unpacking Pandora’s Box in the Lindsay Shepherd case
It’s exam time at universities. As the academic workload intensifies for both students and professors, there’s usually less energy for political discussions on campus.
But not at Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, which is roiled by a free-speech-versus-transgender-rights controversy that shows no sign of fading away.
Lindsay Shepherd, a graduate student and teaching assistant, was reprimanded last month after showing students a few minutes of video portraying both sides of the debate on whether people should be compelled to use gender-neutral pronouns like “they” or “ze” instead of “he” or “she.”
Shepherd was told someone had complained and she had created a toxic classroom environment. She was threatened with losing her teaching job. Shepherd was in tears at times during the meeting, which was recorded and later released publicly.
After an uproar across Canada, the university president and one of the professors involved apologized to her.
But Pandora’s Box had already been shaken wide open. Rallies and petitions have taken place. Debate on social media has been hot — and sometimes hostile.
Here is my take on what’s happening and why.
Why are some people making an issue of Shepherd’s race?
Both left-wing and right-wing activists have displayed an enormous interest in this case, and to some extent have hijacked the discussion.
For example, Shepherd sees herself as left-wing, but noticed to her dismay that news media on the right-wing side of the spectrum (such as Rebel Media, the Toronto Sun and the National Post) were keenly interested in championing her case. The left-of-centre media seemed less interested.
Many professors in the humanities identify with left-wing politics. They are keenly interested in the power issues of race. And while that is often a helpful way to see many issues, it clouds one’s judgment in this particular case.
Shepherd has been the target of criticism such as being accused of “canny deployment of White Lady Tears,” as University of Waterloo English professor Aimée Morrison said in a post on her blog, “Hook and Eye.”
Free speech on campus has been used as a tool in a “culture war” on campuses that has been used to “say really cruel, hurtful, harmful things” about black, Indigenous and trans people at university, said Rinaldo Walcott, professor at Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, during a debate on the public affairs TV show “The Agenda.”
“Some forms of speech are intolerable,” said Walcott, who is black.
Later, on Twitter, he said: “Many of us know some of our white TAs attempt to undermine our authority as profs.”
Shepherd is white. Nathan Rambukkana, the supervising professor to whom she reports, is not. Yet in this situation, Shepherd is the one without power. She is the precariously employed teaching assistant.
Is this about academic freedom, or freedom of speech?
These two things overlap, but are not the same. Most professors agree that teaching assistants are too low on the totem pole to enjoy academic freedom, which is the freedom to study, learn and teach as you see fit. They’re there simply to help the professor.
In Shepherd’s case, the issue was muddied because she got no direction from her professor about how to teach these issues on language. So she did what she thought was right.
In her meeting with Rambukkana and others, she was told that holding a debate on whether people must use gender-neutral pronouns might violate university policies protecting minority groups.
Shepherd and many other people were unhappy about that, because they expect
universities to teach students how to think, not what to think. That can’t happen if exposure to different ideas is limited, they argue. This is the heart of the issue, it is about freedom of speech, not academic freedom.
What’s next?
There was a rally this week on campus in support of trans students, who have felt vulnerable through the whole controversy. Three or four young men came to heckle and film the protest. University officials don’t think the hecklers were Laurier students, said Laurier representative Kevin Crowley.
Both Shepherd and the university have lawyers. University lawyer Robert Centa has admitted there was no written complaint about Shepherd’s tutorial. That’s not a surprise. At the meeting, Shepherd was told it had been an informal complaint, not a formal one.
But even if the complaint had been made verbally, to Rambukkana or another campus official, there are apparently no notes made about it. The lack of documentation does not inspire confidence.
Stay tuned.