People Can Disappoint You; Bureaucrats, Almost Always

In my post of June 2, ‘People can Surprise You’ I had a number of complimentary things to  say about a statement put out by the University of Western Ontario’s president, Alan Shepherd, regarding the protest encampment on the university campus. I said at the end of my post that I would wait with hope to see if the university would actually put into action the principles put forward in that statement.

I expected to be disappointed, frankly, and I am.

First, included in the President’s statement was this:

“These commitments – to the extent that they are new and not already in place – are contingent upon organizers agreeing to dismantle the encampment and not return, and to not disrupt Western’s convocation ceremonies out of respect for their fellow students.”

And this:

“What’s more, individuals participating in the encampment have several times crossed the line. They are intimidating visitors including high-school students on campus tours. They are harassing our campus community members, including students and caretaking staff. They are committing acts of vandalism. And some have even engaged in assaultive behaviour towards our staff.

This is unacceptable and cannot go on.”

UWO’s convocation ceremonies are about to wrap up, and the encampment remains. I suppose that all the first quote above requires is that whatever ‘new commitments’ the University had made might now not be honored.

Further, there was a photo (no story) in the  June 21 London Free Press with the following caption:

“GRADUATES FACE PROTEST: Western University graduates are met by about 200 loudly chanting pro-Palestinian protesters in front of the Ivey school of business during convocation ceremonies Thursday afternoon.”

The photo shows two security personnel walking from the left side of the picture toward the right, where the protestors can be seen chanting into the faces of the graduates walking along in their graduation gowns.

As I said, there is no story beyond the quoted caption in the Freeps, and I do wonder why not.

So, here on June 21, the encampment remains, graduates – and I expect others – are being harassed, the Free Press appears to have no interest in reporting this beyond a photo caption. I fully expect that next week the encampment will remain and people on campus will continue to be shouted at by the campers.

I have to conclude that all of this is in fact perfectly acceptable to the UWO Admin, despite their noble words.

I am disappointed, but not surprised.