Tom Flanagan is a professor emeritus of political science at the University of Calgary.On September 29, I was one of two panellists at an event organized by the Calgary branch of Canadian Students for Free Speech. The other panellist was Drea Humphrey, a noted reporter for Rebel News. It was a Charlie Kirk-style event. We sat at a table in a high-traffic place on campus with large posters inviting students to come and debate with us whether Indian Residential Schools (IRS) constituted a genocide. Everything was set up with university approval.We started about noon, and for the first hour and a half, everything was calm, as a few students stopped by to debate. They all took the position that the IRS were genocidal, and Drea and I tried to supply evidence to the contrary. Nobody got nasty or overexcited.Then a student I will call Loudmouth suddenly appeared, backed by a crowd that seemed to materialize from nowhere. Loudmouth started strutting around, shouting obscenities. His favourite was “Get the f...k out,” which he repeated over and over. Drea and I tried to continue our student discussions, but his noise made it impossible.Then another protester, whom I will call Waterboy, came up behind the table and poured a bottle of water on me. Most of it drenched me, but a little also spilled onto Drea. That was the end of the event.The Director of Campus Security was present from the outset, but he did not have other staff with him. If staff had been physically present rather than observing from a distance by camera, they could have detained Loudmouth when he started his disruption. They could also have set up a perimeter around the table that would have prevented Waterboy’s assault on Drea and me.I don’t want to be too hard on Campus Security. They were very helpful when they finally arrived in force. But I do think a bigger presence from the beginning could have allowed the event to proceed. It’s something to think about for the future..One of Drea’s security people briefly detained Waterboy until they could pass him on to Campus Security, which held him until a Calgary police constable arrived. The police were called because the courts have repeatedly determined that pouring or throwing water on someone constitutes an assault prohibited by the Criminal Code.Drea and I both signed complaints against Waterboy, but police subsequently declined to pursue charges and gave no explanation. I have asked the police for their reasons, but that won’t be a quick process.In the meantime, I submitted a university complaint against Loudmouth and Waterboy. In my opinion, both violated the Student Code of Non-Academic Misconduct, which expressly prohibits the disruption of meetings and physical assaults upon other people. Again, this will probably be a time-consuming process.This incident is not a trivial water fight that the university can ignore. It was a deliberate and successful attempt to disrupt an approved event. As such, it is a direct challenge to the university’s policy on free expression posted on its website: “The right to free expression does include the freedom to critique and contest the expression of others — but it does not extend to efforts to obstruct or prevent the free expression of others.”This excellent policy statement will become meaningless if it is not enforced. Failure to discipline Loudmouth and Waterboy under the relevant code of conduct will send a signal to others that it’s OK to disrupt meetings and harass speakers whose message they disagree with.So far, the university’s reaction has been weak. Senior administrators have bemoaned the alleged harm done to the indigenous student community while saying nothing about the obvious harm caused by the disruption. The day after the event, Dr. Verity Turpin, the Vice-Provost of Student and Campus Experience, told the Calgary Herald in reference to our event: “It was both deeply hurtful and harmful. As a member of the senior administrative team who was present at the event, directly saw the impact and experienced the impact, I wanted to just say that we stand with our Indigenous community.”Dr. Turpin also said the university would be reviewing its rules around freedom of speech, which sounds rather alarming. The free expression policy is crystal clear as it stands. An attempt to review it probably means an attempt to fudge it to censor “harmful speech,” i.e., speech that some activist group doesn’t like.The university has not yet made a clear statement supporting its free expression policy. It must enforce the student code of conduct against Loudmouth and Waterboy to send a signal that mob disruption and violence are not acceptable at the University of Calgary.Tom Flanagan is a professor emeritus of political science at the University of Calgary.
