A few months ago Paul Viminitz, a philosophy professor at the University of Lethbridge (UL) in southern Alberta, invited me to give a talk on academic freedom. The talk originally intended to elaborate upon how “wokeism”—a phenomenon in which identity politics becomes totalitarian by insisting that the subjective beliefs of designated groups replace the search for an objective truth—had undermined the academic character of Mount Royal University in Calgary, where I had taught for many years. This circumstance, which resulted in my firing, was even more pronounced at the UL. Its prominence, in fact, resulted in the cancellation of my talk, underlining the threat that wokeism poses.
The university’s president, Michael J. Mahon, originally said that, while my views were “abhorrent,” my talk would be allowed to proceed because of the institution’s free speech policy. This changed, however, when Mahon came to believe that the “harm” that would be caused by my words was “an impediment to meaningful reconciliation” with indigenous peoples.
Mahon had changed his position because of intense lobbying from faculty and students. The most significant pressure came from the UL Students’ Union. The union’s indigenous representative, Nathan Crow, asserted that he was “appalled” by me being invited to speak, as his support for freedom of expression did not include “discriminat[ion against] a specific demographic” or spreading “false narratives.”
The denunciation by the Indigenous Studies Department was especially instructive because it went on to argue that the Blackfoot people and “their traditional ways of knowing” must be “honored” by all people at UL. It appeared, therefore, that my scholarly questioning of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s concept of “cultural genocide” and my critical analysis of the improbable claims about the “unmarked graves” at the Kamloops Indian Residential School were inconsistent with the “ways of knowing” of indigenous people. As wokeism demands that these “ways of knowing” must be accepted to politically support indigenous groups, any critical analysis disputing them is now forbidden.
All of this is a microcosm of what is happening in universities across the country. Starting about 20 years ago, activists began to take over the administrative machinery of universities. This reached a tipping point with the killing in the United States of George Floyd in 2020. While identity politics used to be one position among many, its totalitarian form now means that everyone must pretend to accept the views of the oppressed so that they supposedly can be empowered.
Unfortunately, it continues to be difficult to impress upon the public the importance of universities, as they are one of the main bulwarks against autocratic intrusions into society. Because wokeism demands cancellation of ideas that challenge its control, one “correct” view increasingly will be demanded. As we saw with MP Leah Gazan’s proposal to criminalize “genocide denial” in Canada, it won’t be long before people are jailed for heretical beliefs.