University of Edinburgh bans Trans and Non-Binary Liberation Officer from protesting on campus

[IwantToRetire]

The Student has learned that the University of Edinburgh has banned Robyn Woof, Trans and Non-Binary Liberation Officer at Edinburgh University Students’ Association (EUSA) from attending or being within 200 feet of any protest on any subject on the university’s campus.

The ban is a precautionary action put in place by the Deputy Secretary and a Vice Principal whilst Woof is undergoing a criminal investigation for an alleged assault which took place during an attempted screening of the film ‘Adult Human Female’ on the university’s campus on December 14.

The screening was shut down by protestors over claims that the film was transphobic. Edinburgh Academics for Academic Freedom (AFAF) – the event’s organiser – argued in a recent statement that “[w]e think the points of conflict between rights on the basis of sex and rights on the basis of gender identity need to be carefully and respectfully discussed”.

Report continues at studentnewspaper.org/breaking-university-bans-trans-and-non-binary-liberation-officer-from-protesting-on-campus/

Yes!

Hurray! Banning a violent thug is a good start.

I agree with the right to protest, it’s an important right. However, not disruptive stuff like pounding on windows or aggressive behaviour. And certainly not this violent criminal who allegedly assaults people.

Good to know.

Excellent news.

This really demonstrates how trans activists think the law doesn’t apply to them.

Threatening intimidating harassment is not a lawful protest, it’s a crime.

There's footage of this person blocking the doors and spitting at others - how can they say they were there to watch the film!

"Liberation officer"? What does that mean?

Like the people who release caged laboratory animals might call themselves?

It's funny when you read things like this "“The university is trying to portray both sides – those organising the screening, and those who challenged it – as equals, when in fact one side is an extreme fringe group which openly calls for the removal of existing rights, and the other is merely a group of people trying to exist, and exercise rights which they hold in countries all round the world and which they have held here in Scotland for decades. This is not the university being neutral; this is enabling radicalisation against a vulnerable community of students and staff.”"

And realise that the person writing this is so in a bubble chamber that they don't realise that the extreme fringe group who are trying to stop others (women) exercising their rights It is the women who are the vulnerable community and the TRAs who want to enable radicalisation. It's childish journalism but thank god men are no longer getting a free pass to assault women just because they've branded them as TERFs.

Good, he's a horrible little gobshite.

Good! About bloody time.

I don't know how accurate the reporting is, exact words matter, but read this carefully.
"Woof has also been banned by the Student Conduct team from attending or being within 200 feet of any event approved by the university which includes the screening of the film ‘Adult Human Female’."

To me this means he's not just banned from protests, he's banned from any approved event. To me this means he can't go to any event, even events he agrees with. Am I missing something?

Fucking good. He's a thug.

Can you link to this? I like to have the evidence to show what TRAs mean by 'peaceful protest' when this comes up in discussions.

University of Edinburgh is one of several Scottish Universities to cut ties with Stonewall. They've also pulled out of Stonewall's equality league tables.

I linked through to the event organisers statement: blogs.ed.ac.uk/edinburghafaf/2023/02/20/eafaf-statement-screening-and-discussion-of-adult-human-female/

It looks as though the university managers have managed to piss everyone off with their fence-sitting. Woof seems to be under police investigation, so the ban is probably to do with that. And the piece says the university is investigating "at least one" other student. What's taking them so long? Shouldn't they have finished their investigations by now and issued some final written warnings? From what the organisers say, managers are prevaricating about taking action and only doing the minimum, leaving the organisers dissatisfied. Woof and friends will be satisfied with nothing less than the university cancelling the event completely. The uni managers should come off that fence, outright condemn the bully-boy tactics, hire some decent security and get the event to go ahead open to the public as originally intended.

I don't think that's correct, sadly. They said they were staying in diversity champions, but not submitting to the workplace equality index every year. I think the year they didn't do a submission it got everyone's hopes up that they were leaving until the uni clarified. Their LGBT+equality page suggests they're still involved. www.ed.ac.uk/equality-diversity/inclusion/lgbt-equality

How depressing. You know what they say, when it seems too good to be true it usually is.

Woof has said Woof is not under investigation, and has said Woof has not been banned from anything.
Woof also stated that Woof has offered to attend discussions with both the police and university, but no meetings have been offered.

I wonder what the reality is when 2 groups insist opposite things are true?

Trans and non-binary liberation officer? Women's liberation officer? Students are one of the most privileged and pandered to demographics in society! What do they need liberating from? going to lectures? Behaving like adults? Treating other humans as their equals?

I suspect like the most interesting poster who has been explaining the patriarchy to women this week, this liberation officer would explain to us all in a flood of passionate word salad that spitting on women is righteous and merely retaliation and harmed victim would make against those women aggressively and brazenly trying to watch a film in a public screening. It's not a reality easy to connect with. Which is the problem when you start working on reality being an individual thing, and it being a crime to disagree with someone's identified reality or persist in mentioning facts that make that reality wobble.

All these little steps up the garden path add up.

Quite right too. If he's under police investigation then he should be banned from the university full stop. What's to say he won't kick off again?

I can't help but feel sorry for this generation of students. Yes, they are pandered to, but in doing so they are being sold a pup.

When I was a student we were carefree; okay we didn't have much money and most of us had jobs, but then again the same applied to everyone else. Other than that the worst we had to worry about was our next set of marks and attending lectures, in between an endless round of parties, nights out down the NUS and leaving traffic cones where they shouldn't be. We were all interested in our courses, and would go for a pint with the lecturers post-seminar to continue chewing the fat over whatever we'd been talking about in the teaching session.

How different things are now I'm the lecturer. No pints with the kids, that's strictly frowned on, but while appropriate boundaries are necessary it does stymie the kinds of easygoing relationships we had with ours. And we also respected them - more than we as lecturers are respected today. I receive emails from students I'd never have dreamt of sending to my professors. I also got a far better quality of education than my old university is now offering its undergraduates.

This group are being sold a pipe dream wrapped in rainbow flags. Going by what many of them tell me, they are far more isolated, have less of a sense of community within their department of study, and don't seem to socialize with each other the way we did. We had an English society and a night down the union with our course-mates - ran trips to the theatre etc, all done on the initiative of the students themselves. Our NUS had a newspaper and a radio station. These days, university departments have to arrange these things like school trips under the banner of 'enrichment activities'.

There are student experience officers everywhere yet no student experience. When students talk to me they say less about their fun times and far more about the state of their mental health. It can become draining. We are not trained counsellors. As for critical thinking, it's dead in the water if it hasn't already sunk. Teaching the humanities is a minefield, especially issues surrounding gender, in which one 'wrong' move could see you put out of a job.

I wouldn't change places with this generation of students for any inducement.

I'd be hard pushed to point him out. There are more and more of these populating this site.

That's my feeling too.

There is video evidence of his thuggish behaviour and the police investigation.

Why he hasn't been told to leave the university altogether is beyond me.

I'm glad the University are taking action. For too long there has appeared to be double standards where some TRA protesters could get away with harassment and intimidation with no accountability.