Media commentators love to rip on Canada’s “politically correct” universities, which they say are full of hyper-sensitive, elitist, privileged liberal students and faculty. So when a libertarian group put up a free speech wall in the atrium that was later torn down by a left-leaning activist, newspaper columns practically wrote themselves.
Rex Murphy of the National Post blamed Arun Smith’s actions on the university environment he studies in. Jonathan Kay used the opportunity to attack every liberal-arts major beyond their fifth year. The ever-articulate Ezra Levant used his show on the Sun News Network to call Carleton a “politically correct swamp of a university,” and express his indignation that we have an equity department.
What most of these self-proclaimed defenders of free speech forgot is that the free speech wall came back up the next day and stood for the rest of the week. It received the approval of both the undergraduate students union, whose space it occupied, and the university administration, who allowed it to stand despite the potentially offensive remarks on it. Free speech is not threatened at Carleton. In fact, it is thriving.
Levant brought up the arrest of an anti-abortion group’s members on campus in 2010. Carleton Lifeline, however, was never banned by Carleton. It was simply asked to take its graphic displays, which are triggering for many students, to a less public location. Lifeline’s right to spread their message was limited, but never completely removed.
We live in a new, more diverse Canada, and our universities reflect that. The reason we have equity departments, and the reasons we have to be careful about what is allowed on campus, is because we have to create a cohesive environment despite our wildly diverging views.
A cursory view of Levant’s show would suggest he didn’t get the memo. Luckily our university did.
