In my time in higher education, it’s hard to think of a more contentious, sector-wide issue than the challenge of balancing our commitment to free speech and academic freedom, with our desire to provide an inclusive place for everyone in our university community.
Whenever subjects are divisive, politically sensitive, complex, and hotly discussed in wider society, it’s crucial that the academic community is thinking, questioning, and debating. Ensuring academic freedom is fundamental to us as a university and – like freedom of the press – it’s a cornerstone of an open society.
But that doesn’t mean that we don’t acknowledge the challenges that some discussions create.
Complex issues
One subject exemplifies the challenges that colleagues at the Open University and across the sector experience: as institutions we are committed to protecting the academic freedom of researchers who take a gender-critical perspective, but we also know that there are staff and students who feel their very existence or identity is being questioned through this work.
Holding different beliefs, expressing different views, and discussing contentious ideas isn’t the enemy of equity, diversity and inclusivity (EDI) policy. Education and research promote tolerance and understanding, through the creation and sharing of knowledge which informs debate – with our colleagues, our students, and with society. Policymakers, sports’ governing bodies, and politicians are struggling with these issues. The recent debate on women’s prisons in Scotland is one example.
As a university, the OU is committed to supporting academics who have gender-critical or trans-positive research perspectives to continue their work, publish, develop their careers, debate, and influence wider thinking, at an institution that takes care of their needs as individuals.
As part of that care, we are committed to ensuring that all colleagues and students feel accepted, included and supported to do their best work. But when people feel strongly, debate is rarely comfortable; and understanding, as institutions, where we draw the line in particular situations can be a challenging and complex task.
Higher learning
While we’re not alone in facing the challenge, we will be at the forefront of where the discussion goes next, with a high-profile employment tribunal due to start today. This is the latest in several cases that employers have faced, but we believe the first case of its kind in higher education in the UK.
We don’t know how the tribunal will rule on the many specific details in the case, but we believe that we’ve acted lawfully, appropriately, and in good faith, as we navigated our way through a previously untrodden path. Nevertheless, as an organisation we will learn from this case, and we will welcome any clarity and guidance to the sector that this may bring.
Whatever the outcome, now is the time to work together to turn our energies to creating an environment where contentious viewpoints and beliefs can be explored, and knowledge created in a way that’s compatible with the safety and security of all those working and studying in universities. And we must find a way of bringing civility back to the table, not just in universities, but across society.
Will you be inviting the other party in these legal proceedings to present their case? This article refers to an active case that is before the tribunal right now. Are you not a little bit concerned that publishing the employer’s case without any opportunity for the employee to comment might just be shockingly abusive?
How is this appropriate to be publishing, given the timing of the tribunal? Women are being widely discriminated against and losing much fought-for single sexed spaces. Yet you are focussed on protecting against reputation damage? When an individual can not state biology is a fact, there is something rotten at the core. I question your motives behind this article and its timing.
Surely if you were going to have an article about this case, it would have been far more appropriate to have it written by somebody not actually involved in the case?
You are confusing Wonkhe with an organisation with integrity.
Article itself is written by the deputy VC of the OU – organisation involved in the tribunal.
This is prejudicial to a current tribunal case. It’s up to the tribunal now to judge how much “support” you gave trans-crtitical researchers, not you.
We do indeed need to bring civility back but more crucially, the ability to say something without being bullied or vilified when it’s an uncomfortable statement, which is clearly not in the OUs agenda. But like the others here, I’m quite certain that the timing of this piece is highly questionable and looks like someone is trying to cover ones own back. On a more general point, I wonder if a re-think of the language used is needed: instead of “gender-critical” and “trans-positive” (which arguably makes one look more negative than the other) consider swapping the negative and positive attributes – say, instead of trans-positive we use “sex-critical” or and instead of “gender-critical” we say “sex / biology-positive” then perhaps the role of ‘bad guy’ changes… the rhetoric that supporting notions of biological sex (and the reality of human chromosomes) is somehow “critical” is in itself, a method of weaponizing language.
Even the title of this piece suggests that its a choice between academic freedom (free speech) and inclusivity, which it simply isn’t, since you can still be perfectly inclusive without needing to adhere to this ideology – in fact, it’s the ideology which creates the divisiveness!
Change comes with language. Agreed with your proposed language shift.
Perhaps OU could have looked to change the narrative of the public discourse rather than act in this back-covering questionable approach.
These academics have asked to be called “gender critical”, despite the fact that the school of thought they disagree with has its foundations in the criticism of “gender” (see the work of, for example, Judith Butler, Sandy Stone, Susan Stryker, C. Riley Snorton, or Marquis Bey). If this terminology is a problem, why don’t we revert to “trans exclusive” and “trans inclusive”? That phrasing at least got to the heart of the disagreement here.
It is interesting that in using the term “trans inclusive” effectively excludes women
I prefer Biology Positive
How so? Not sure I follow your logic there. I imagine “biology positive” might cause some issue for “trans exclusive” feminist scholars who work in science and medicine, as it implies they are simply “positive” about biology, when historically (and still), these fields have been/are riven with sexism and misogyny.
It really isn’t that complicated. There are men/males. There are women/females. That is steeped in fact that has enabled humans to procreate since our time began.
Then there’s feelings. You may feel you aren’t man/woman, but all the feelings in the world do not change biological facts.
Trying to sound smart really undermines your point.
OU should not have published this as the tribunal is getting underway. Wonkhe should have delivered a rounded picture, not a backside covering “we are so reasonable” essay.
The comment that ‘we also know that there are staff and students who feel their very existence or identity is being questioned through this work’ is I believe a manipulative and dangerous trope. It demands we are mandated to accept, on pain of censure, another’s worldview or self perception. It excuses “no debate” and the undermining of academic freedom. What other identity claims are there that cannot survive disagreement but must be endorsed by all? None I can think of. In general the ability for frank appraisal of other’s worldviews is the very essence of a free and pluralistic society. One man’s freedom fighter and all!
What about those who advocate racist pseudoscience, anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, the forced sterilisation of disabled people, or the death penalty for same-sex sexual activity? There are loads of issues like this where the existence, humanity, or right to existence of a group is placed in question. There are obviously people who do research critically examining these positions to understand their history and their proponents, but surely university communities can agree that those who actually argue in favour of these positions are not welcome on campus?
Please do show where Jo Phoenix has argued for a position even any where near the examples you suggest. We’ll wait.
I’m not saying she has. But Jan Rivers asked “What other identity claims are there that cannot survive disagreement but must be endorsed by all?” Rivers couldn’t think of any, so I offered some examples of positions we’d probably all agree are unacceptable, certainly in a university setting.
But those examples aren’t identity claims, are they? We are talking here about the idea that a person’s claim to a specific gender identity overrides the sex that they were born as. If a person doesn’t agree that that is possible and/or desirable, the notion should be open to debate, even if some people feel their identities are threatened by the idea. Those individuals should be supported to deal with those feelings, rather than have the power to suppress the debate entirely.
If the best you can do is equate the position that sex is important in policy, law and science with the position that Jews or gays are sub-human vermin, you don’t really have a very strong argument, do you?
It really isn’t that complicated. There are men/males. There are women/females. That is steeped in fact that has enabled humans to procreate since our time began.
Then there’s feelings. You may feel you aren’t man/woman, but all the feelings in the world do not change biological facts.
Trying to sound smart really undermines your point.
OU should not have published this as the tribunal is getting underway. Wonkhe should have delivered a rounded picture, not a backside covering “we are so reasonable” essay.
She is taking ‘her’ university to tribunal, not ‘their’ university
So how much did the university’s PR crisis-management company charge the OU for this statement, which translated into plain speak says, “We’re about to get our arses handed to us on a plate, and the national and international media is about to broadcast in excruciating detail in just how much contempt we hold our female staff.”
Publishing this vacuous piece on the opening day of the Tribunal shows that PR-management is much more important to OU management than respect for female staff, or indeed for the judicial process. Classy.
I too question the wisdom of publishing this while legal proceedings against you are live.
However, in the ‘Equal Opportunities Form’ section of the OU job application form, you ask a mandatory question about the ‘gender’ of applicants with options:
Male
Female
Unknown
Undisclosed
Others [sic]
Prefer not to say
You then ask the mandatory question, “Is your gender the one you were assigned at birth?”
This is a complete mess and a failure to understand the protected characteristics under the Equality Act 2010, your Public Sector Equality Duties and possibly UK GDPR.
This could also indicate an institutional bias towards an ideology to which not everyone subscribes and this may impinge on their protected beliefs under the Equality Act: see Maya Forstater v CGD Europe and others
Are you sure you’re acting in good faith here?
You have engineered the removal of an academic for the crime of holding a view with which you disagree. Logic dictates that you should lose this tribunal.
It is absolutely extraordinary that one of the first things the judge at the hearing this morning asked was what pronouns Counsel used.
This is gender ideology’s Masonic Handshake, the response to which identifies the loyal and faithful and marks out the gender heathens.
Considering the issues being heard, this shows the extent of the reach of gender ideology.
A judge that succumbs to this central tenet of the ideology has shown herself to be partial and not fit to preside over this case.
Interesting as this ET commences that just a few days ago another ET (Coby v ACAS) found against an over-woke employer not accepting that an employee need not sign up to its CRT based policies – and that having a carefully considered view disagreeing with CRT is a protected belief under EqA10. And that was in a normal organisation where the academic freedom aspect does not apply. Agree that it is a misuse of the WonkHE platform to have this article/propaganda penned by the OU in favour of the OU.
Shocking that you would publish this on the first day of her (not “their”) tribunal. I thought THES had gone downhill, but Wonkhe is fast becoming the Simon Jenkins (always wrong, always confident) of HE journalism. Shame on you.
This debate seems to have become polarised in a way that helps no one. The fact is that there are some people who come to feel that their gender is at odds with their chromosomal make-up. This process often occurs over many years and the decision to seek gender re-assignment is never taken lightly. My concern is that, by some taking such entrenched views, the lives of trans people is being made immeasurably harder.
I think this comments section demonstrates quite nicely why every tom dick and harry isn’t capable of “debating” such a sensitive issue and why, as she said in the article, it needs to be monitored closely so it does not fall into a rabbit hole of transphobia and abuse. I am in fact an OU student unlike all the people here who have been sent over from twitter, and I’m very pleased that they have drawn a line between “acceptable debate” and “being a coward who uses whataboutery to get away with bullying others”
Trans women are woman, trans men are men, and I say this as a middle aged cis lesbian, thankfully this ain’t the 1970s anymore and the world has moved on. Get a hobby, maybe even join the OU, if you have so much time on your hands that you spend all day on the internet “debating” things that don’t effect you in the slightest.