In President Tim Rahilly’s termination letter, #3 was that “there are indications that you continually and intentionally attempt to disrupt business at meetings”. One possible instance of this was a motion Widdowson made at Arts Faculty Council. This was the result of a sequence of events unfolding that are documented below.
Although an invitation was sent to a MRU women’s studies professor to participate in the Rational Space Network event as a critical thinking facilitator, no response was received. Instead, the women’s studies program and the Pride Centre organized a counter event on March 15, 2019, 5:00-8:00 p.m. claiming that a “therapeutic conversation” was needed to discuss the “impact on trans folks of having our identities and safety considered debatable”.
At Arts Faculty Council on December 6, 2019, the Dean of Arts invited a trans activist faculty member to make a presentation because she had “heard feedback from both trans students and faculty members about how they are not being respected at Mount Royal”.
An account of the presentation by Alexander Dhaliwal appeared in the on-line publication of The New Telegraph on January 12, 2020. Dhaliwal maintained that the trans activists asserted that it “Kind of goes with out saying, don’t post transphobic events, or share public events that are transphobic around in the classroom” and “Don’t be afraid to interrupt introductions to get people to say their pronouns if it gets forgotten”.
At Arts Faculty Council on January 24, 2020, two faculty members moved and seconded a motion “THAT AFC express its continued acknowledgement and support of the labour of [the trans activist student] and [the trans activist faculty member], and of all marginalized faculty and students, in creating an inclusive and welcoming teaching and learning environment”.
Shortly after, in the same Arts Faculty Council meeting, the Dean of Arts stated that faculty members can debate, be critical and disagree, “But it is important that we do this in a respectful way” and they should “be mindful when making choices that affect others”.
In the investigation report, it was stated that “The Complainant said that while the motion appeared to address academic freedom, ‘backed into it was a poison pill, or [Widdowson’s] ideologies.’ The Complainant described the motion as ‘trans-exclusionary’ because there were anti-transgender feminist philosophies that were not explicitly mentioned in the motion.”
