The avenues where we sought a hearing, remedy or redress followed procedures which reproduced domination and issued an improved license and authority to the white, male, university processes to name and own all speech and experience. The university's ownership right in the property and knowledge of harassment and discrimination has been upheld. Clearly, when our speech is made actionable rather than activating and knowledgeable, the university has managed dissent and reclaimed authority .

Equity Offices: Institutional Dead
Letter Boxes

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When the Chilly Climate preliminary report on how to make the department more supportive to women was presented to the department on March 29, 1993, the first objection of the tenured men was that we had overtaken the role of the equity office and breached all university policies. The next objection was that the reports of systemic discrimination and sexual harassment damaged the reputations of all the men in the department. The eight male tenured faculty (EMTF)4 demanded we report credible evidence to the equity office in confidence.

By taking our report to the equity office with their obvious expectation that we would be corrected and contained, the EMTF demonstrated their belief in the office as a territory to protect men from women's individual and collective complaints and demands for change.

When the equity office did not immediately play this role, the outraged EMTF sent a letter to the chair of the Chilly Climate Committee (CCC). On university stationery, the letter threatened legal action, demanded retractions of the report and apologies, and the submission of any "credible" evidence to "well-respected" investigators at the equity office: "If you are not in a position to provide credible evidence to substantiate the assertions detailed above, then we demand an unqualified apology and retraction in an acceptable form to be given by 4:30 p.m. on Wednesday, April 14, 1993. We have asked Professors Morley and Walker to act for all of us concerning the form of the apology and retraction. ... If this matter is not resolved, either by way of the presentation of credible evidence or by means of your apology and retraction, then it will be necessary for us to take further steps to protect our reputations. 5

Some equity professionals and law professors were quietly confident that the men's litigious behaviour would lose them credibility and that the administration would immediately support the CCC, censure the EMTF, and stop the intimidation. On the contrary, these aggressive postures gained the EMTF further institutional power, access to and favourable coverage in the media, and intimidated supportive women and men into distancing and even silencing behaviours.6



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