Scottish academic censored by Open University just for mentioning JK
Anger as he’s ‘cancelled’ over trans row
A LEADING lawyer has criticised Britain’s largest university after he was ‘cancelled’ – for saying that trans women are men.
Alistair Bonnington, 68, an ex-BBC legal adviser and former honorary law professor who taught First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, posted his views in an Open University (OU) online forum during a discussion about 18th century writer Voltaire, an advocate for freedom of speech.
But he later discovered his comments on planned hate crime laws in Scotland and the ‘woke’ backlash against author JK Rowling had been deleted by the university.
Mr Bonnington, an English literature student at the OU, argued that the SNP’s Bill ‘would make it a crime for anybody to deny that a “trans” woman (i.e. a man) was a real woman’, adding: ‘It looks like feminists in Scotland can look forward to incarceration. Poor JK Rowling may need to become an exile like Voltaire.’
Accusing the OU of ‘infantile and anti-intellectual behaviour’, Mr Bonnington said last night: ‘This was in a debate about free speech.
‘For the university to do what it did is an absolute joke.
‘Universities should be places where free debate can be had between people who hold different views.
‘If we’re not allowed to debate things in universities then things have got into a bit of a mess. That’s just Stalinism basically and I find it quite shocking for free speech to be treated as an expendable commodity by a university.’
Following Mr
Bonnington’s post, one female student responded with the comment, ‘trans women are women’.
While his comment was deleted by the forum moderator, the reply remained, prompting another on the course to ask: ‘Surely you have to be impartial, you can’t just take down one point and leave another standing?’
Mr Bonnington has now had a disciplinary letter stating he was in breach of forum rules. He said: ‘I’ve taught in universities for over 25 years. Admittedly I was teaching law, not English literature, but it seemed to me extraordinary that a university would be basically enforcing a particular viewpoint – that you weren’t allowed to say trans women were not women.
‘It’s an incredibly infantile approach by the Open University and very anti-intellectual.
‘Under our law we all have the right to free speech.’
He added: ‘I’ve handled a lot of free speech cases. Universities don’t seem to understand that free speech means what it says. It means you can have views with which other people disagree. I could enforce my legal right by going to a court but I would rather call it a day and come out of the course.’
It comes after free speech campaigners last week likening some campuses to ‘Maoist re-education camps’ dominated by ‘woke orthodoxy’.
The Scottish Government’s Hate Crime Bill has sparked accusations that the SNP is trying to stifle free speech.
Edinburgh-based Ms Rowling has been abused on social media after speaking out on gender issues, and has been accused of being transphobic.
Mr Bonnington said: ‘After my experience with the OU, I am particularly saddened to see that my former law student pupil, Nicola Sturgeon, and her Government are intent on introducing more restrictions on free speech.’
Last night, an OU spokesman said: ‘The Open University will not allow views to be presented in a way that is hostile or degrading to others and the decision was made by our forum moderators to remove this post.
‘Postings in response were removed on November 30. This action does not infringe our statement on academic freedom which supports academic opinions and arguments, including those that could cause offence to some, to be openly and freely expressed.’
‘It’s infantile and anti-intellectual’
Voltaire, the French Enlightenment writer, left, cited as a champion of free speech and popularly quoted as stating: ‘I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.’