As Carleton celebrates its 75th anniversary this year, a group of three Carleton students are shedding light on a dark episode in the school’s history.
Fourth-year criminology students Farzana Bashar and Skyler Gubbels, and fourth-year law student Helen Zan are working on a project about the “Fruit Machine,” a report published by Professor F.R. Wake in 1962. It was officially known as the “Special Project,” when Wake worked on it. Wake worked in Carleton’s psychology department for several decades.
According to their research, the students have uncovered that the Fruit Machine was meant to be a scientific method of determining one’s sexual orientation by—among other methods—measuring changes in the dilation of the subjects’ pupils when shown homoerotic and neutral images. At the height of the Cold War, the Canadian government was believed homosexuals were subject to weakness in character that made them vulnerable to blackmail, according to Carleton professor Patricia Gentile.
Gentile co-authored “Canadian War on Queers: National Security as Sexual Regulation,” a historical analysis of the systemic purging of LGBT+ people in the Canadian government from the late 1950s to the late 1990s.
Wake’s method was used from 1962 to 1967, but in total the the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) collected approximately 8,200 names of alleged, suspected, and confirmed homosexuals in the Ottawa region over decades, according to Gentile.
The group said they are not only demanding an apology for what happened in the past from the university, but that changes are also to be made in the present.
Although the Fruit Machine was only one part of a larger initiative set in place by the RCMP and Security Panel to identify and prosecute homosexuals, the students said they believe Carleton needs to take responsibility for its part.
“We hope to erect a memorial as acknowledgement for Carleton’s involvement in the purge of homosexuals and to give recognition to current issues facing [LGBT+] students on campus in the present day,” Zan said in an email.
Christopher Cline, Carleton’s media relations officer, said in an email that “the university is unable to confirm details of this particular project and has no additional comment at this time.”
Zan said she believes a veil of invisibility exists and that the school needs to take more action to show they are not just claiming they are progressive and inclusionary.
“While many laws have passed, there still exists deep rooted social issues of representation, invisibility, sexual assault, mental health, disproportionality in employment, and legal representation,” Zan said.
She added she believes Carleton needs to recognize its involvement in the human rights violations of that past. The group also said they would also like to see the Fruit Machine and more LGBTQ+ issues added to the curriculum and access to sensitivity training and education tools for students and staff alike.
Bashar said her group has amassed a collection of government documents on the actions involving the governments purge of homosexuals through the access to information act, and are optimistic that the people and institutions involved will acknowledge their involvement and offer apologies.
With Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s plan to review the practise of prosecuting LGBTQ+ people and pardoning about 6,000 men, Zan said she believes Carleton should follow suit.
