Staff at a top university say they feel coerced to subscribe to a Stonewall agenda by signing a pledge to oppose transphobia and demonstrate “allyship” by sharing their pronouns.
As reported by the Telegraph, Exeter University last week asked its academics to sign the “inclusive practitioners commitment” produced by its “LGBTQ+ colleague and student” group.
The online document requests staff make six pledges to prove they are “the kind of person that LGBTQ+ people can confide in and feel safe around”.
These include promising to “affirm trans staff and students” by using their chosen names and pronouns.
They are then encouraged to seek out LGBTQ+ people’s contributions to their teaching subject and ensure when they refer to trans and non-binary experts they “respect their identities, names and pronouns”.
Lecturers are also told to “educate” themselves about how anti-LGBTQ+ sentiment can be perpetuated through “micro-aggressions, dog whistles and talking points”.
In addition, they are asked to promise that they are “firmly against” transphobia, bi-erasure, acephobia (discrimination against asexual people) and intersexism, a term for prejudice against people with variations in their sex characteristics.
Academics at Exeter – a member of the prestigious Russell Group of leading universities – have criticised the document, describing it as a tool to crush dissent against gender ideology.
Dr Edward Skidelsky, a philosophy lecturer who is also a director of the Committee for Academic Freedom, said: “Schemes like this are coercive and intended to put pressure on people who are gender critical.
“You will be made visible if you sign up because a badge will be displayed on your staff profile. So if you don’t sign it can be easily identified and mean you will possibly targeted by student activists.
“Also gender-critical people will want to be free to be able to refer to trans people by their biological sex in certain cases. If someone is a rapist then it is ridiculous that you should say ‘she’.
“Generally speaking, as a courtesy, I would always refer to someone by their preferred pronouns. But it is a courtesy, not an obligation.
Another Exeter academic, who asked not to be named for fear of being disciplined or fired, said: “I just hope that no one notices me abstaining from such things.
“If I am noticed, someone will complain about me and the university will try to sack me. Even if they don’t succeed, the process will be brutal – the disciplinary process is itself a brutal punishment.
“It’s a tyranny, with no concept that those with dissenting views should be tolerated.”
Exeter University is part of the Stonewall Workplace Equality Index, which ranks employers on how LGBTQ friendly their working environments are.
It is also a member of the charity’s controversial Diversity Champions Scheme, which has been criticised for encouraging employers to stifle free speech and debate in relation to trans issues.
