Disappointing But Expected

A while back I wrote this long post about self-censorship and free speech in Canada, and in Canadian academia in particular. It was long enough that I broke it into three sections, and the last section told the story – taken from a Statement of Claim from a lawsuit – of the ordeal that the Faculty of Education at UWO put one Margaret Munn through when she did not meekly ingest and repeat the views they wanted her to.

So, Ms. Munn filed a lawsuit against UWO after she graduated, and I promised to keep my eye on it and report again when and if UWO’s Statement of Defense became available.

Well, Ms. Munn did indeed file her Statement of Claim in Ontario Superior Court, No. CV-25-00000091-0000.

A friend of mine who is more used to dealing with courts actually went to the courthouse and inquired as to where one might find the associated Statement of Defense, since we could not locate it in the online system. He was informed by the nice lady at the courthouse that no Statement of defense was filed by UWO.

Well, one cannot just ignore being sued, so you don’t have to be a lawyer to figure out what happened.

I wrote that UWO and everyone in it should be ashamed at the findings from the internal SRBA hearing regarding the Faculty of Education’s treatment of Ms. Munn. It is apparent that the Powers Who Rule at UWO are indeed ashamed, at least to the extent that they had no wish to try to defend the indefensible behaviour of their employees, either on paper or in court.

So, they offered Ms. Munn a sum of money if she would withdraw her suit and – I bet – sign an NDA regarding the matter.

I can understand why Ms. Munn would do this; getting some cash out of UWO in compensation for their abysmal treatment of her must feel like some kind of personal vindication. And trying to win the suit would have taken a great deal of (expensive) legal help and a lot of her time. Lawyers at LBOs are masters of delay, and there would be no guarantee of getting more out of UWO than she did from the settlement. But of course this means that this matter will be known to almost no one. If it had proceeded to trial, UWO would have had to file a Statement of Defense which would then be on the public record. Perhaps then even our local rag might have thought it worthy of some coverage.

Better for UWO to pay Ms. Munn to go away, and to keep quiet about it, than to have all that happen.

This also allows the University of Western Ontario to post lies like this as part of their Freedom of Expression Policy:

 Freedom of expression is essential to the pursuit of truth, the advancement of learning and the dissemination of knowledge. All members of the University community, including guests and visitors, have the right to freedom of expression, which includes the right to examine, represent, question, advocate for and comment on any issue without reference to prescribed doctrine. It also includes the right to criticize the University and society at large.

Just not indigenous faculty, right? It’s not OK to criticize them or their prescribed doctrines. Or to express doubts about the notion of cultural appropriation. Or to suggest that spanking children is not a heinous crime.

Universities run mostly on hypocrisy these days. Had the Munn suit gone to court it might have shone a light on that hypocrisy for at least a bit. But instead, J Kelly Nestruck and the rest of the media can continue to assert there is nothing untoward happening on Canadian campuses. Only drama queens believe otherwise, because if there really was any abuse of people, we would all know about it. Right?

Disappointing, as I said.  But pretty much what I expected. I do at least hope Ms. Munn got a BIG bundle of cash out of this. If she did, UWO, which claims to be in dire financial straits, won’t miss it. It’s all other people’s money.