Ottawa professor threatens to sue Alberta university if it abandons DEI hiring
University of Ottawa professor Amir Attaran is threatening to sue the University of Alberta if it dares to stop its race-based DEI hiring policies.
Author: Clayton DeMaine
University of Ottawa professor Amir Attaran is threatening to sue the University of Alberta if it dares to stop its race-based DEI hiring policies. Attaran claimed in a letter that abandoning DEI would violate the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Attaran, known for his staunch support of controversial COVID health measures, including vaccine mandates and lockdowns, threatened the University of Alberta with legal action if it eliminated its current race-based hiring policy.
Attaran has no known official affiliation with the University of Alberta.
University of Alberta president Bill Flanagan announced the move away from the university’s DEI hiring practices in the Edmonton Journal at the beginning of January. In his article, Flanagan referred to the practices as EDI, an alternative acronym that stands for DEI. He argued that “the language of EDI has become polarizing, focusing more on what divides us rather than our shared humanity.”
Flanagan said the university would instead refocus on a strategy of “access, community, and belonging.”
“It is not the university’s role to take ideological positions but rather to create an environment that encourages dialogue, mutual respect, and the pursuit of knowledge,” Flanagan wrote.
The current university recruitment policy recommends that when two candidates who are “similarly qualified” for a position are vying for the same job, hiring panels should favour the candidate from “historically underrepresented groups.” The proposed change would also remove references to the university’s commitments to “correct employment disadvantages.”
In his letter, Attaran described the move away from DEI hiring as “deplorable” and said he will be “examining all available steps” to have the university “defunded.”
“The University is a recipient of Canada Research Chairs. Under a legal settlement that the Canadian Human Rights Commission and I reached with the federal government in 2021 and which has since been made an order of the Federal Court,” Attaran wrote. “The University must employ EDI criteria when hiring its Chairs. Failure to do so will lead to the University losing its federal funding—deservedly.”
Attaran accused Flanagan of capitulating to “bigots.”
“I am not given to sympathetically parse the University’s poor excuses, because you are pandering to the lowest common denominator, or should one say the greatest bigot denominator, of the Danielle Smith government, which is neither legally wise nor morally interesting,” Attaran wrote. “Show some courage, would you please?”
“A worthwhile university, of which Alberta’s may or may not be one under your leadership, draws on all the best brains society has to offer, including those in black, brown, female, Indigenous, or disabled bodies,” Attaran continued. “Excellence is not achieved by systemic discrimination which places barriers before those brains. It is folly and un-Canadian to think otherwise.”
In his opinion column, Flanagan acknowledged that some view DEI policies as an “ideological bias at odds with merit,” signalling that he views the change as necessary to ensure the best brains of society are given a fair opportunity.
Attaran’s letter claims to put Flanagan on “notice” that he would be “signalling” the Canada Research Chairs Program secretariat to “obtain a close watch” on the University’s next steps, stating that he’s sure they would do so “proactively.”
One Albertan, with the user name “Alberta First,” commented under a post on X about the letter that the Canadian Human Rights Commission settlement and the posturing from elites in Ottawa was yet “another example of why Alberta needs to be independent.”
This professor is a racist, seriously
you shud reconsider Amir..we're gonna be a little busy there very soon, and had it with "new Canadians" being a little pushy..our turn now..