The Times- There is a culture of fear in universities, say ‘cancelled’ Jo Phoenix and Rosa Freedman

 There is a culture of fear in universities, say ‘cancelled’ Jo Phoenix and Rosa Freedman

Last week Jo Phoenix received a phone call from the vice chancellor at the University of Essex who wanted to personally apologise to her for an attack on her freedom of speech.

Anthony Forster then picked up the phone to Rosa Freedman, one of the UK’s leading human rights lawyers, and said sorry all over again.

Both Phoenix, professor of criminology at the Open University and Freedman, professor of law at the University of Reading, had been invited to give talks at Essex. But both had had their talks cancelled after they were accused of transphobia. Phoenix had also been the target of a flyer circulated by a student with an image of a gun and the words “Shut the F*** up”.

“Anthony Forster said that he was very sorry both personally and on behalf of the university,” said Freedman. “But an apology is only the start. On its own an apology does not repair the reputational damage or distress caused.”

Freedman, who was reinvited to speak after she complained, also faced attempts to block her from getting a job at Essex and was accused by another academic of being a Holocaust denier.

Both academics are speaking out to highlight what has been described as a “culture of fear” at Essex and to demand that the university donate at least £100,000 to a women’s charity and discipline or sack the students and staff involved in their abuse.

In a joint statement they say: “We feel very sad. It took 18 months to investigate what happened to us, which included a violent threat against one of us and the other being called a Holocaust denier. We welcome the apology . . . but we also want to see . . . the students and staff responsible disciplined. We also, because of the damage to our reputations and the stress caused, want the university to make a six-figure donation to a women’s charity. The culture of fear on campus at Essex . . . is very real.

“People are afraid to speak out and voice their views.”

Forster’s apologies came as the University of Essex published the damning report of an 18-month-long independent inquiry by barrister Akua Reindorf. It found that Essex had failed to uphold free speech after both Phoenix and Freedman were dropped from events they had been asked to speak at. They were labelled transphobes and subjected to mass complaints in what Phoenix has described as a “mob atmosphere”. The two professors believe that men cannot become women by surgery and that it is important to protect women-only spaces in institutions such as prisons and refuges, views that are anathema to some trans activists.

The pair were this week sent unredacted copies of Reinhard’s report and were shocked at the detail in it. Phoenix discovered that a flyer was circulated with “violent and profane” imagery, including the image of a gun, and the words Shut the F*** Up TERF (trans-exclusionary radical feminist), a pejorative term for someone considered transphobic.

The unredacted report says that witnesses described a “culture of fear” on campus at Essex which made them fear for their jobs if they “stuck their heads above the parapet.” It also said that the university should consider its relationship with the LGBT campaigning group Stonewall and the wording of the university’s policies on supporting transgender staff.

The row started in 2019 when Phoenix was booked to give a talk at a seminar being held by the centre for criminology at Essex university about jailing in women’s prisons transgender women who were born men. She had already given a similar lecture at a Canadian university without incident yet the centre at Essex cancelled the event before it was due to take place following protests. Phoenix said that she had felt “afraid” when she learnt about the flyer, which she said should have been reported to the police.

“They never disciplined the student for putting out the flyer. They did nothing about it. There was even an attempt to blacklist me permanently from Essex I discovered from the Reindorf review. That would have been a clear breach of the law. There was a departmental vote about whether I should speak.”

She believes that the Stonewall policies the university had adopted “set everything up so that . . . it created the space for a mob. I did not realise that what was at stake was me being blacklisted permanently or a poster flying around inciting violence against me. The apology is a start but it doesn’t really address the harm done. There are four staff members who I believe defamed me and whose tweets remain in the public domain. I want them to discipline the student responsible for the flyer.”

She continued: “I have been called the racist uncle sitting at the dinner table by colleagues at work. Complaints have been made about me at the Open University. Some activists now want trigger warnings placed before lectures containing gender-critical views. They lobby the OU daily to distance itself from me and other like-minded colleagues.

“Do I feel thankful for the apology from Essex? Yes. Do I feel like a pariah? Yes, but I also feel furious and most of all I feel old. This university culture I was so in love with, where endlessly discussing ideas was the main point of academic life, now there is a cavernous silence.

“The climate of fear the review talks about is real.”

Professor Freedman, who is Jewish and an adviser to the UN, was “disinvited” from speaking on a panel on antisemitism at Essex to mark Holocaust Memorial Week because of her views on transgender issues. A member of the university staff later tweeted comparing her to a Holocaust denier. She complained to her MP and to the universities minister about being “silenced, blocked and gagged”. Freedman, who has previously endured rape and death threats on social media because of her research, told the Reindorf inquiry that she felt that she had been “charged without trial because some people have called me a hate figure. It is similar to burn the witch.”

She added: “Essex [university] did nothing about the academic who compared me to a Holocaust denier. When I read the unredacted report it confirmed to me what I already knew, which is that there were complaints about me being interviewed for a job at Essex. It is supposed to be confidential when you apply for a job, yet there were complaints to try to stop me getting the job there . The undercurrent of vindictiveness and nastiness made me feel I was going a bit mad. Of course it has had an impact on my family life and mental wellbeing.

“The fact that this all occurred around Holocaust Memorial Day caused great distress to my family and members of my community.”

The report found that the university should apologise on four counts to Professor Phoenix, including for infringing her freedom of speech and for failing to investigate the flyer “containing violent and profane imagery targeted at her” and on two counts to Professor Freedman including for threatening to infringe her freedom of speech. It made more than 20 recommendations aimed at protecting free speech.

Vice chancellor Anthony Forster said that he accepted the report’s recommendations. “The report makes clear that we have made serious mistakes and we need to do our very best to learn from these and to ensure they are not repeated,” he said.

The women hope that their ordeal will lead to change not just at Essex but across the university sector. Theirs is the latest in a series of campaigns against respected speakers blocked from giving talks because their views are deemed too controversial. The government has published a bill threatening institutions and student unions in England and Wales with fines of £500,000 if they bar speakers with contentious opinions.

“It is really important to recognise that Essex has taken this issue so seriously. The review process was robust and the report is evidence-based,” said Freedman.

“And the university has been transparent about its failings and mistakes. We need other institutions to follow suit.”