Tenured professor is fired for saying Black Lives Matter destroyed university!

CALGARY, Canada (PNN) - April 21, 2022 - A tenured economics professor in Canada was fired for saying Black Lives Matter destroyed her university to such an extent she doesn't recognize it anymore.

Frances Widdowson, who also taught justice and policy studies, was sacked from Mount Royal University in Calgary, Canada last year.

The academic is now calling for an open arbitration hearing with the school to have it out with the institution next January - but bosses are yet to agree.

Widdowson was fired in December for saying BLM had destroyed the college to such an extent she doesn't recognize it anymore.

Activists rounded on her and called her a racist for claiming Canada's residential school program offered Indigenous children chances they wouldn't have received.

But the lecturer launched her fightback this week as she pledged to take university bosses to an arbitration.

Meanwhile, the institution refused to be drawn on any hearing, adding it will not be providing specific details on this personnel matter.

Widdowson called for it to be held from January 16 to January 27 next year in which she can air her issues with her treatment.

She said, “All of my grievances are going forward together at this time.”

The associate professor, who studied indigenization for 20 years, said she wanted it to be open so journalists could attend and report on the case.

She added, “Without upholding academic freedom, we have no ability to explore ideas and pursue the truth.”

Widdowson is being supported by the free speech group the Society for Academic Freedom, which claimed some of her old colleagues also backed her.

The academic was unceremoniously dumped from her job at the end of last year over her comments about race.

She had claimed BLM had destroyed MRU to such an extent that she doesn't recognize the institution anymore.

She said, “You're supposed to be teaching. That's your job. You can go on strike to protest police brutality but what does it have to do with you? A 'woke' faculty is now in charge. This isn't going to be good.”

She also found herself in hot water over comments about Canada's controversial residential school program.

She claimed it offered Indigenous children the chance to get an education that normally they wouldn't have received.

But she said it at a time of heightened tension after unmarked graves were found at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in British Columbia.

Her comments saw students and activists round on the professor as they called for her to be sacked.

One petition, which was hoping for 7,500 signatories but only got just over 6,000, branded her a racist.

It said, “Frances Widdowson is a racist professor who works at Mount Royal University. This is a call to demand that the university condemns Widdowson's hateful actions against the BIPOC community and that she is terminated for her racist remarks.”

In January Widdowson signaled her intension to fight her dismissal, saying, “I was generally criticizing 'woke' ideas. Basically, identity politics that has become totalitarian, and is imposing itself on the university, and preventing people from openly discussing ideas.”

But the university shot back that it unequivocally supports academic debate, but academic freedom does not justify harassment or discrimination.