Episode 18: How did Associates of the Students’ Association of Mount Royal University (SAMRU) Create a Poisonous Atmosphere for Freedom of Expression?

The first example given for why Dr. Widdowson was fired concerned the fact that “Students have raised numerous complaints and concerns regarding your conduct”, which “includes a media release from SAMRU [Students’ Association of Mount Royal University] condemning your social media comments in July of 2021”.  Many associates of SAMRU, in fact, were part of the mob that resulted in Widdowson’s firing.

The first indication that associates of SAMRU were not defenders of freedom of expression concerned the actions of Zoe Slusar, a former VP of Student Life, who demanded that a student take off a “Make America Great Again” cap on the basis that “You’re not allowed to share hate language at a university”.  When the student refused, Slusar threatened to escort him up to President David Docherty’s office.

Associates of SAMRU began targeting Widdowson in June 2017, when Shifrah Gadamsetti, the President of SAMRU, retweeted the June 2, 2017 article my Melanie Lefebvre “The Racist Rhetoric Barbara Kay Champions as ‘Courageous'” in Canadaland with the following comment “Baffled that freedom of speech is conflated with this dehumanizing rhetoric.  The #MRU community deserves better educators. #pse”.

On October 14, 2018, David Docherty, the President of Mount Royal University, met with a group of students from the Vice-President, Academic Advisory Committee of the Students’ Association (SAMRU).  In the meeting, Docherty appeared to be agreeing with three student politicians that there was too much debate at General Faculties Council and he stated that “we spent far too much time debating whether the earth was flat or round last year”.  This recording was provided to Frances Widdowson, unsolicited, by Wyatt Claypool (a student who was present at the meeting).

When it was announced that the Rational Space Network would hold an event entitled “Does Trans Activism Negatively Impact Women’s Rights?”, Aria Burrell, former SAMRU Vice-President, External, objected to it as “an ill-framed ‘debate’ painting human rights as a zero sum game”.

On March 15, 2019, the Rational Space Network event was held. At 1:13:12, Shayla Breen, SAMRU Vice-President, Student Affairs expressed “privacy concerns” about people being filmed who did not want to appear on camera. An MRU professor sitting with the students, Milena Radzikowska, asked for the cameras to be turned off because “there are vulnerable populations here and I think that the cameras should be turned off right now because these populations are asking for that to take place”.  To address these concerns, Widdowson arranged for another faculty member to hold a microphone at the back of the room so that no one would be filmed if they chose not to be.  No one from the audience chose to ask a question from the back of the room, and all went up to the microphone that was being filmed to ask a question.  This included those who had demanded earlier that all images of them be removed from the video audience footage.

Later that year, on November 20, 2019, Milena Radzikowska Tweeted the hashtags “#TransRightsAreHumanRights #FeminismIncludesAllWomen #TERFsAreBullshit” and stated that “If you’re claiming otherwise, you’re on the wrong side of history”.

In spite of Widdowson reaching a compromise with the students at the event, a representative of SAMRU “approached” Widdowson’s Dean and “asked that [Widdowson] consider not posting [the video of the event], or if you do, removing students from the video”.  Typically, administrators tell students to take up these matters with the professor in question.  Widdowson responded to the Dean by stating that there was no power relationship between her and the students, as the event was voluntary, and the video had to be posted because this had been announced and the posting of videos had occurred with all other Rational Space Network events.

On March 16, 2019, Nathan Lawley (the Assistant Vice-President, Academic) stated that March 15, 2019 was “a long exhausting day”.

On March 19, 2019, a talk scheduled for March 21 featuring the ex-Muslim Atheist, Armin Navabi, was cancelled (see Episode 13) because a vigil was being held to grieve for people shot at a Mosque in New Zealand.  As part of the vigil, MRU’s Centre for Equity and Meaningful Inclusion printed posters with the Quranic verse “Indeed we belong to Allah, and indeed to Him we will return”. This led Frances Widdowson to ask Provost Lesley Brown “Are we now an Islamic university?”

On March 21, 2019, Shayla Breen (SAMRU Vice-President, Student Affairs) supported the cancellation of the talk: “This is not about silencing discussion, it is about holding space for grief for our Muslim community…”.

In March 21, 2019, Shifrah Gadamsetti (former SAMRU President) responded to Widdowson’s Tweet by calling her a “terrible…person” that was “capitaliz[ing] on the sorrow of a grieving community for your own, tired agenda”.  She then said “Have some empathy. This is so distasteful”.

Shayla Breen also responded to Widdowson by stating that “a vigil was held this morning on Mainstreet to support the Muslim community…It was great to see so many students, staff, and faculty come together to listen to students speak”.

On September 19, 2019, former SAMRU President Shifrah Gadamsetti encouraged people to attend the General Faculties Council meeting, which ended up denouncing MRU Instructor Mark Hecht with the posters “WE BELONG HERE  RACISM DOES NOT” (see Episode 14), so as to show “solidarity with communities of colour on campus”.

When @MRUAntiRacism implied that Widdowson was a supporter of hate speech, discrimination, and white supremacy (see Episode 17), this was appreciated by Nathan Lawley, SAMRU Vice-President, Academic.

After the mob began to form to try to get Widdowson fired, Nathan Lawley stated that “It’s embarassing that a person who jumps around to be an oppressive nuisance on any topic which is notable at the time…is still employed at our institution at all to be honest”.

On August 27, 2020 Kainat Javed, the SAMRU Vice-President Student Affairs in 2019-2020, stated that Widdowson “openly harasses BIPOC students, is racist and Islamophobic all at the same time” and that this was facilitated by her being “tenured = bulletproof”.  The accusation of “Islamophobia” was due to Widdowson’s criticism of the Centre for Equity and Meaningful Inclusion printing off posters with a Quranic verse.

On September 8, 2020, Kainat Javed sent a Tweet to MRU President Tim Rahilly and the executive of SAMRU accusing Widdowson of “openly harassing students, faculty and staff” and demanding that Widdowson be “held accountable for her actions”.

On September 8, 2020, Kainat Javed promoted the petition “Fire Frances Widdowson – a Racist Professor at MRU”.

On September 11, 2020, Kainat Javed did an interview with City News stating Widdowson “had done an interview with the Western Standard – within it – saying things like residential schools are a learning opportunity”.  She also asserted that Widdowson had been Tweeting “Islamophobic things” and “about residential schools, tweeting about students creating this movement within the university, mocking them blatantly.  It goes beyond academic freedom”.

On September 12, 2020, Kainat Javed posted a letter that Widdowson had written a number of yeas earlier criticizing the incorporation of prayers into the Indigenous Studies Steering Committee meetings.  Javed’s post contained an inaccurate quote.  Frances Widdowson’s letter stated “the condescending promotion of spiritually based ‘indigenous knowledge'”, not “the condescending problem of spirituality based ‘indigenous knowledge'”.  Javed then asked “This doesn’t sound racist to you [MRU]?” without providing any reasons for why she thought it was racist.

On March 18, 2021, SAMRU hosted “The Loudest Silence: Anti-Racism Commemoration Open Mic”.  Although the students were prohibited from using the names of anyone, one instance of “racism” was that a professor (presumably Widdowson) had argued that there was a developmental gap between indigenous cultures and modern nation states.  The major complaint at the session was that professors had mispronounced students’ names.  A video of the event can be watched here.

According to videos produced by SAMRU, the four members of SAMRU Representation Executive Council (REC), 2021-2022, were the following – Spirit River Striped Wolf (REC President), Yasmin Ahmed (REC VP Academic), Rachel Timmermans (REC VP External), and Joseph Nguyen (REC VP Student Affairs)

On July 14, 2021, SAMRU Representation Council Tweeted a press release claiming that Widdowson had created a “culture of fear” at MRU and shown a “tolerance for violent and lethal behaviour”.  They stated they were working to “find solutions for students who may have classes with this prof”.

On December 24, 2021, Shayla Breen responded to Widdowson’s firing by stating that she was “not the hero of that story”.

On December 24, 2021, Aria Burrell stated that Widdowson’s “antics” over a number of years meant that her firing was “long overdue”.   Burrell implied that Widdowson was trying to get fired so that she could “become  Petersonesque grifter”.