Pushing back against MacKinnon's awful article

The University of Saskatchewan has been in the news lately. It's where I worked for much of my career, so of course I'm interested in how they are getting along.
Very well, overall -- but with evidence lately that some don't want to get with the tour and join the rest of us here in the 21st Century.
First, ever since Trump started babbling about it, the North American right wing has concluded that DEI is just awful in every way. Somehow, trying to be fair and equitable and thoughtful to people of all genders, colours and religions by learning about different cultures and being willing to listen better is now a very terrible thing -- its particularly mean to those rich white guys like Trump who apparently don't get hired first anymore. 

And here in Canada, the right-wing is just following along with the DEI hatred. Thus, on May 2, the National Post published this derisive piece:

Tristin Hopper First Reading, Canadian politics newsletter / National Post

FIRST READING: Saskatchewan professor blogs his way through mandatory anti-racism 'boot camp'
Participants told that 'meritocracy' leads to 'inequities'
A University of Saskatchewan law professor provided a unique window into the equity mandates now ubiquitous at Canadian universities by blogging the details of a compulsory anti-racist “learning journey.”

Hopper's article begins by describing the workshop content, then continues with the point of view of one participant, a U of S law professor Mickael Plaxton who posted dismissive tweets about his experience on X beginning here and ending here. 

Hopper continues:

....Michael Plaxton, an expert in criminal law and statutory interpretation, alternately called the course a “mandatory DEI bootcamp” and a “forced march of self discovery.” He noted that it began with a declaration of “we’re not here to debate.”
....Plaxton told National Post that he wasn’t any kind of “crusader on the whole DEI thing,” and that he didn’t think any of the course leaders “were anything other than earnest, well-meaning people.”
“No one was rude to me,” he wrote in an email, adding that he mostly felt “awkward” about the whole affair....

Yeah and you should be embarrassed now, fella, because you got played right royally, by a national media that now has adopted Trump's anti-DEI agenda and will seize on any excuse to echo it.
As the article goes on, Hopper just continues to make hay out of this chaff - no one at the National Post apparently bothered talking to anyone else at the U of S about the workshop nor did they interview any of the organizers. The National Post was apparently just delighted about how Plaxton's description confirmed their own feelings about DEI and allowed them to trash academics:

...But Plaxton’s experience is now the norm. Academia has been at the sharp end of a wholesale Canadian institutional embrace of the doctrine of “anti-racism,” and everything from grant funding to hiring to promotion now hinges on a candidate’s willingness to accept the tenets of “equity, diversity and inclusion.”...

Yeah, yeah, yeah, cry me a river...
And another National Post columnist soon also got into the act:

The University of Saskatchewan is telling its professors to view everything through the lens of Power and Privilege, to assume that institutions are rife with racism, and that merit is bad. Yet people on here will insist that universities have no ideological biases. https://t.co/y3gusOTtRV

— Jamie Sarkonak (@sarkonakj) April 30, 2025

But then, two weeks ago, it got immeasurably worse.

That's when Peter MacKinnon, who used to be the president at the University of Saskatchewan, decided he had to follow up on Hopper's piece by writing a awful article published in both the National Post and the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix. 

I won't quote all of it, but this will illustrate what he said:

Peter MacKinnon: The University of Saskatchewan is on an ideological mission. It needs to end
Mandatory DEI training for academic staff merits a public outcry and action by the government
....The purpose of the [Anti-Racism/Anti-Oppression and Unconscious Bias Faculty Development Program] is indoctrination and there is no room for dissent.
The program is part of an ideological crusade within our universities, one that includes identity-based admissions and faculty appointments, and discourages those who differ from speaking out or taking issue with its direction. It is not present to the same degree in all of these institutions, but it is visible in most and prominent in many. It disparages merit, distorts our history and rests on the proposition that a white majority population has perpetrated a wide and pervasive racist agenda against others. It takes its conclusions as self-evident and not requiring evidence. It is authoritarian and intolerant, and should have no place in institutions committed to excellence and the search for truth.
The question, of course, is what is to be done. There is a view that “this too shall pass;” it is a fad that will recede in time. But, we must note, these are public institutions supported by tax dollars, and by the contributions of time and money by alumni and supporters. We should not tolerate their politicization and sidetracking of the academic mission in favour of the ideology on display here. The pushback should begin with governments and extend to others who care about these vital institutions....
Resistance must come from outside the institutions: governments must insist that the propaganda must end, and they should be joined by alumni, supporters and the general public. The credibility of our universities depends on their willingness to say no.

(And on a side note, I must note that at Canadian universities its called EDI - Equity, Diversity and Inclusion.)

Getting back to the story, within a few days the usual suspects were also posting tweets about how the article was just great - here, here, here, here and here.
It made me ashamed that I ever worked there -- not only the intolerant, ignorant, and racist attitudes, but the demand that the Saskatchewan government should "push back", to interfere with how the university undertakes important anti-racism initiatives.
Over the last week, the University of Saskatchewan has "pushed back" - against MacKinnon and the rest who support these attitudes.
Here is the article was written by Peter Stoicheff, University of Saskatchewan president:

Opinion: Response to recent anti-EDI opinion piece
... The University of Saskatchewan, and all 21st-century Canadian universities, have become learning and research environments of tremendous and concentrated diversity. Faculty, staff and students from over 130 countries around the world are now part of our community. Together, we are home to people from multiple international, ethnic and racial backgrounds. We are participants, not bystanders, in Canada’s journey to reconciliation, and we have adopted the principle of manācihitowin or leading with respect.
... A university that aspires to excellence must ensure that it attracts the very best faculty and retains them. Far from diminishing the importance of excellence, the session, co-led by a faculty member, is intended to help ensure that recognizing excellence is not impeded by racism or unconscious bias. Hiring the best faculty we can from Canada and around the world is critical for student success and our research mission, and also for the future prosperity and productivity of Saskatchewan and Canada. This approach of inclusive excellence is stated well in our 2020 EDI Policy: “The university believes equity, diversity, inclusion, and a sense of belonging strengthen the community and enhance excellence, innovation, and creativity in all domains.”
...Attending the session does not quash a faculty member’s ability to dissent or express contrary views. It is after attending the session that faculty members serve on the hiring, appointment, promotion, salary review, and tenure committees where decisions are made, and I have every confidence that faculty will preserve their intellectual autonomy and critical skepticism while serving on these committees. I am equally confident that attending the session increases, not decreases, the informed perspectives from which a committee member can draw when later serving on the committee itself.
A Canadian university’s commitment to welcoming diversity, supporting inclusion and seeking equity while ensuring academic freedom and excellence requires a delicate and careful balance. Canadian universities are on the front lines of finding that balance, and they are doing it well.
And the University of Saskatchewan is doing it well. The fact that we have leapt in recent international rankings, increased our enrolments year over year, seen five Rhodes Scholarships awarded in the last three years alone, account for a disproportionately large percentage of federal research funding, enjoy a high national and international profile, and are reaching our ambitious $500-million “Be What the World Needs” comprehensive campaign goal, tells us that our EDI Policy and our EDI Framework for Action are enabling excellence, not diminishing it.
This is neither simple nor easy work. It takes a careful mixture of patience and impatience, and it takes time. After our three collegial governing bodies adopted the EDI Policy, they adopted our EDI Framework for Action, “a living document requiring constant questioning, validation and refinement. It invites us to engage and to learn.” It states, in other words, that we can always improve how we do this important work. More than 400 faculty have attended these sessions so far and their response has been overwhelmingly positive. We will continue to monitor and receive feedback on all we do in this regard.
I thank those who take on the daunting task of leading this complex and difficult work, and the entire University of Saskatchewan community engaging with it.

Other reactions:

There was an excellent statement from @usask.bsky.social President Peter Stoicheff sent to the campus community today on the importance of EDI training in today's universities, including at the USask. It was an important defence of diversity, inclusion and openness in higher education.

— Charles Smith (@profsmithsask.bsky.social) May 12, 2025 at 6:13 PM

🇨🇦 I am surprised and disappointed that a former University of Saskatchewan President wrote this.https://t.co/Gx4ZASjCKL (The same 🇨🇦government did a good thing of implementing mandatory judicial training on gender-based issues, like assault). pic.twitter.com/wJp0zXKU45

— James Oloo (@JamesAlanOLOO) May 14, 2025

BAM!
Opinion: Faculty, staff rebuke University of Saskatchewan ex-president

What Peter MacKinnon characterizes as an “ideological mission” is actually the University of Saskatchewan becoming more inclusive and more just.https://t.co/qweu8WvcZx

— Marc Spooner (@drmarcspooner) May 14, 2025

Rachel Loewen Walker, professor / Saskatoon Star Phoenix

Opinion: Faculty, staff rebuke University of Saskatchewan ex-president
What Peter MacKinnon characterizes as an “ideological mission” is actually the University of Saskatchewan becoming more inclusive and more just.
Former University of Saskatchewan president Peter MacKinnon recently published an opinion piece in the National Post and the StarPhoenix, attacking the university’s implementation of anti-racism and anti-oppression training.
Nearly 80 faculty and staff members have signed a letter in response — not only to counter his mischaracterizations, but to reaffirm our support for a university that is committed to equity, diversity and inclusion efforts.
MacKinnon calls the training “authoritarian,” “ideological” and “propaganda.” These are familiar buzzwords in a growing backlash against equity work, but they reveal more about the discomfort of those resisting change than about the content of the training itself.
Critics of equity, diversity and inclusion often frame such efforts as threats to neutrality, truth and reason.
In reality, these programs are grounded in decades of research and evidence and they exist to expose the flaws in so-called “neutral systems” that have historically privileged certain identities (white, male, heterosexual, able-bodied, neurotypical) while marginalizing others.
Notably, the University of Saskatchewan’s training was not imposed from above. It emerged through collective bargaining between the university administration and the faculty union, a reflection of mutual agreement.
Contrary to MacKinnon’s implication, no one is excluded from collegial processes if they have not completed the training. This is not about silencing dissent; it is about building a shared foundation of cultural awareness and humility in a diverse public institution.
MacKinnon claims that anti-racism training threatens academic freedom. Academic freedom is not the right to reject accountability or to deny the effects of discrimination. It is the freedom to engage rigorously with the world, including with the systems of power, privilege and exclusion that shape it.
It is also the freedom for historically underrepresented scholars to pursue their work in environments free from hostility and exclusion.
At the core of MacKinnon’s argument is his claim that anti-racism training “rests on the proposition that a white majority population has perpetrated a wide and pervasive racist agenda against others.” The irony here is that he’s right; deep and sustained racism is alive and well in Canada.
The problem lies in his dismissal of this reality and his decision to publicly critique a training he has neither experienced nor meaningfully engaged with...
Ultimately, what MacKinnon characterizes as an “ideological mission” is actually a university doing the work of becoming more inclusive, more just and more responsive to the communities it serves...

Susan Gingell, professor emeritus / Saskatoon Star-Phoenix

Opinion: Op-ed backs Trump-style coercion at University of Saskatchewan
Peter MacKinnon seeks government intervention in University of Saskatchewan affairs, at a time when U.S. universities are being coerced by the Donald Trump.
...MacKinnon calls for government intervention in university affairs, thus powerfully undermining the institution’s wisely cherished autonomy. And this at a time when prestigious U.S. universities are being economically coerced by America’s bully-in-chief to bend to his racist will.
MacKinnon’s article says not a word about the harms done to fellow human beings by racism, sexism, heterosexism, transphobia, ableism, classism, Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, and other such powerful forces. Yet his article argues the U of S program lacks balance.
Additionally, MacKinnon dismisses the idea that who gets ahead in academia and life more generally has anything to do with factors other than conventionally assessed merit.
I’d like respectfully to offer a different perspective from his, one principally grounded in personal, academic, and community-based learnings. ....Having lived my whole life in contexts saturated with racism, I lack confidence I will ever be free of racist responses and behaviours. And I have both the motivation and education to help me get there.
I thus ask the following questions. Might current university leaders have valid reasons for instituting mandatory antiracist, anti-oppressive, and unconscious bias programming for faculty? Without it, can dominant group members participate fully fairly in collegial processes? Is requiring faculty to spend a few hours grappling with difficult truths of how dominant group members contribute to oppression an unreasonable ask? How many would do so if not required?
Could the university’s recurrent failures to retain Indigenous professors indicate that the institution has a serious problem with anti-Indigenous structural and interpersonal racism that the university’s well-meaning reconciliatory and diversity, equity and inclusion programs have failed to address effectively?
Can the mandatory program be understood as evidence of firm commitment to broadening recognition of, and working energetically towards eliminating, the harms done to oppressively racialized students, faculty and staff by university employees who have by osmosis absorbed from their contexts unconscious biases against Indigenous and other non-white peoples?
Does the program indicate the university is taking seriously its ethical responsibility to provide the kind of environment in which teaching and learning, research and administration allow all to thrive on something more closely approximating equal footing than now exists? Might we learn from Canadian academics Ajay Parasram and Alex Khasnabish, who in their book Frequently Asked White Questions contend that the way racial politics in Canada works means that whites have been discouraged from thinking or talking about race?
Such people unsurprisingly have difficulty seeing racism operating around them, let alone in them. Can we “whites” acknowledge that we contribute, albeit usually without malice, to racist harms? And can we then act together to ensure that racist and other oppressions stop?

I expect to see more reactions soon - there was a University Council meeting today, and the Board of Governors will be meeting in mid-June.