Do not hurt our students or A letter to UofT President Meric Gertler
This letter was sent to Meric Gertler in response to his May 24, 2024 Message regarding the encampment at the St. George Campus. My email was carved using the template of another colleague, who I am grateful to. It is only one of a large number of emails sent to UofT high admin by faculty, librarian, staff, and other members of the university community.
Dear Meric,
I read your memo and must say that I am completely devastated by it.
As you know, Black, racialized, Muslim and Indigenous faculty and staff are overwhelmingly supporting our students. These include the fire keepers on-site, who make the Circle a sacred space. These folks are part of the UofT community too and your letter ignores all of them.
Your letter did not mention any of the anti-Muslim and anti-Palestinian racism that exists on the campuses. Why? It is so pervasive that Harambe, a Black and Muslim feminist collective, was created to tackle this issue.
You probably saw that a colleague at Rotman, Prof Ramy Elitzur, who happens to sit on the Governing Council, wrote and published a hateful commentary about Jewish students and faculty who stand up to genocidal revenge. It was so harsh and painful to read. Why did you not address this type of threat and antisemitic language in your memo?
The People’s Circle is not at all as you or your team describe it. It is so inaccurate it is shocking. As a mother, a teacher, and a tenured faculty, I support our students at the encampment — and this is to say that we are not trespassing. How can we? This is our work and study place, and one that sits on Indigenous Land.
What do First Nation, Inuit, and Métis students, colleagues and community members think of the colonial violence your memo contains? This approach is not at all in line with UofT’s supposed commitment to “reconciliation”. On the contrary.
Yesterday’s memo also has me and so many others confused and worried as to whether I can use my University grounds, or will I be arrested and fined. The threat of mass termination the message contains is unheard of, both at UofT and, as far as I can tell, among universities where encampments for Palestine have been erected. This is alienating. I foresee it will have long-lasting impacts on your brand, as well as on the morale and engagement of your faculty, staff, and students.
As a historian of the longue durée, I know the students are on the right side of history. I urge you to look at the bigger picture, from a moral perspective, as well as from a legacy one.
I therefore appeal to you and the senior administrators:
Please do not call the police in.
Do not hurt our students.
Do not hurt us.
It would on this matter be tremendously helpful to your legacy, as well as to UofT’s international standing as a beacon of academic freedom and collegial governance, to actually show up at the Circle, to meet in person with the student negotiators, and to humbly listen to and abide by their demands.
Meric, again on behalf of so many of us, I am begging you not to hurt our students who are engaged in peaceful assembly. Do the morally right thing. I am ccing my chairs, deans and UTSC’s Principal, to keep them in the loop.
***
UofT Vice-Provost, Faculty & Academic Life Heather Boon, who I had not cced, responded swiftly to my email. Here is my reply:
Dear Heather,
Thank you as well for sharing the institutional perspective of Simcoe Hall.
I am however puzzled to receive an email from you since you were not a recipient of my message. I also note President Gertler is not cced anymore in your reply. Why is that so?
I take due note of the response I received. I find it all the more enlightening that I happen to work on British colonialism. Indeed, the language and rhetoric used fit strikingly with available evidence we have regarding the habitus of colonial administrators, from the Raj to Egypt to Oxbridge to, it now appears, UofT.
Throughout one’s life, all that one does involves at least a certain measure of choice. As Hannah Arendt has masterfully shown, to hide behind procedure as a way to dissociate oneself from one’s contribution to the enaction of institutional harm is a morally vacuous strategy that inevitably fails. As a 12th generation French settler, I am humbly striving to live my life, including my working life, in a way that abides by the Seven Grandfather Teachings (humility, bravery, honesty, wisdom, truth, respect and love). I am immensely grateful to all of the members of our community who do the same. It is certainly the case of the students advocating for UofT to disclose, divest and cut ties with companies and institutions that benefit from apartheid and genocide. Whether it is the case of all members of UofT’s higher administration remains to be seen.
Time will, in any case and as it always does, make everything crystal clear.
***
Psst: You can find a report on UofT’s Investments in Israeli apartheid here. Also: Did you know the development of partnerships between UofT & Isrseli institutions is one of the key features of Meric Gertler’s Presidency? This is what transpires from available evidence, which Girish Daswani and I have compiled in an open-access timeline, which you can access here.
