5 years and counting
Somehow the anniversary of when I and colleagues set up The Open University Gender Critical Network passed me by this week. It was 16th June 2021. Hard to believe that was 5 years ago. The launch podcast is still available to listen to here.
I would like to celebrate the anniversary by making available a couple of documents. These documents formed part of the cross-examination either of myself or the many Open University witnesses. First up is the Open Letter that appeared more or less five years ago today. If you want to see exactly who signed that no infamous letter, have a look!
It is worth remembering what the Employment Tribunal said about this letter:
Next up is the first time I made a complaint to the university about the open letter - and especially about the conduct of the then Faculty EDI lead who, at that point, went by the name Julia Downes but is now Leigh Downes. If you want to remember just how bad things on X were around that time, please have a look. If you want to read the bilge that academics from the LSE wrote about the OUGCRN, please have a look as well. But, before you do, I want to remind you of what the Employment Tribunal had to say about several of the academics they encountered in my hearing:
Just to finish this short anniversary post, I might remind you about what the Employment Tribunal said of Leigh Downes:
The summer of 2021 was an awful summer. The actions of my colleagues - academics most of them - changed the entire course of my personal and professional life. Now, though, all these years later I am still amazed that I had enough support from everyone to make a stand that resulted in a judgement that still gives me a deep sense of pride and joy.
Publicly naming the signatories of the petition against you brings to mind Gisèle Pelicot’s words: “Put the shame back where it belongs.” Bullies cause real harm, and their actions should be exposed.
Still so grateful to you Jo for holding your nerve - despite everything - and leading us GCRN members through a very very difficult period, culminating in your tribunal, the judgment of which which stands as a terrible inditement upon so-called academics who hide behind a vaneer of “progressiveness” to smear and censor speech they don’t like. We cannot tolerate the intolerant - they do not deserve to call themselves academics. Their speech was not academic. It also stands as an inditement of the pathetic cowardly management at the highest level of the OU, an institution whose own “open to ideas” mission and policies were obviously flouted by these activists. The apology you received was hardly fulsome, and the rest of us have never had any apology from the VC nor from any of the letter signers including those colleagues who took to social media against us (including members of my own department).
It actually makes me feel mentally unwell re-living /re-reading it