By SHANNON O. WELLS
An anecdote involving the forced resignation of a diversity officer at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine following criticism on social media launched a discussion about academic freedom and free speech at the April 12 meeting of the Equity, Inclusion and Andi-Discrimination Advocacy committee (EIADAC).
Ally Bove, EIADAC co-chair, said a fellow committee member brought to her attention articles about how Sherita Golden, the chief diversity officer at Johns Hopkins Medicine, was pressured into resigning after she received external criticism from a “random” user of X (formerly Twitter), who apparently had no affiliation with Johns Hopkins.
The criticism centered on the diversity officer’s definition of the word “privilege,” which Bove said is “probably the definition that most people in this room would be comfortable using.”
She said EIADAC members expressed concern to the effect of, “ ‘I do work in this space. What if a random person not affiliated with Pitt decided to start a campaign against me? What supports would there be for me?’ And things like that. So we thought we should have a chat about it.”
In response to Bove’s queries, EIADAC co-chair Bridget Keown met with John Wallace, vice provost for faculty diversity and development, and Lu-in Wang, vice provost for faculty affairs, to discuss the topic, which also includes a recent series of controversial campus speakers supported by conservative advocacy groups including Turning Point USA.
“Essentially what they said was that there are protocols in place if someone specifically is speaking … on behalf of the University,” she said. “So if it’s a private Twitter/X/whatever account or this is something that is said with you just wearing your private citizen hat, it’s a different matter entirely.”
However, she added, in circumstances where someone is speaking on behalf of the University, any harassment that comes in as a result would be directed to the Office of University Communications and Marketing.
Bove explained that University Communications said that they are “ready and willing to offer support to individual faculty members or departments or schools that receive any such type of pressure,” she said. “They did say they were circling back to the provost’s office, to be able to offer some more specifics (beyond that) they will support both the department and the individual if something like that were to occur.”
Clyde Wilson Pickett, vice chancellor for the Office for Equity, Diversity & Inclusion, said the National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education, of which he is board chair, is engaged in discussions about this incident and its impact on senior diversity officers as well as faculty and other community members. “So that’s a big conversation we’re having right now.”
Pickett said Pitt faculty and community members have been targeted “for some of the things that they’ve said, and in those instances,” from an administrative standpoint, the Office of Communications and others have provided support in terms of outreach and engagement.
This includes “making recommendations as to the ways in which our faculty should go about a locking down their social media, trying to make sure that they’re protected and putting their safety first.”
He said discussions through groups like EIADAC provide an opportunity to bring together resources and input from departments including the provost’s office, communications and the Schools of Health Sciences.
“One of the things that I would recommend as a takeaway that we put together and strategize is working with the Center for Teaching and Learning to put together some form of resource from (communications) to say, in the event this were to happen, ‘Here’s a resource, here’s a tool that we can point to.’”
Pickett added that the strategic Plan for Pitt 2028 continues the University’s commitment to supporting “inclusion and inclusive excellence” and has not “backed away from that work.”
“If you look at the new Plan for Pitt, it’s clear that engagement and a welcoming community are priorities, and we’ve continued to have offices to support that,” he said. “So I think that’s a good sign, and one that emphasizes our commitment.”
Free speech vs. hate speech
Victoria Grieve, assistant professor in the Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies Program and in the School of Pharmacy, mentioned Professor Watchlist, which she called a “hit list” that currently targets four Pitt faculty members for anti-DEI-fueled harassment. “Actually, we need to get those numbers up,” she quipped. “I don’t have any social media accounts anymore, because they’re bad for you.”
Grieve took issue with the way Pitt’s administration handled a string of controversial campus speakers including Michael Knowles, a right-wing commentator who engaged in a transgender rights debate at Pitt in April 2023.
“The communication from the administration, specifically around the hateful and bigoted speakers that have been a plague on our campus for the last two years, especially beginning with the Michael Knowles event, where he spoke about the eradication of people like me, is disheartening,” said Grieve, a transgender woman. “Because it is a specific kind of centrist opinion that sees no difference between free speech and hate speech.
“And any administration that doesn’t make a statement that is supportive of the people being harmed by these events is not supportive of creating an environment of belonging,” she added. “It’s part of the paradox of tolerance, because tolerance is a social contract. If you fail to provide tolerance, you no longer fall under it.”
At the time of the Knowles event, the University issued a statement that said: “We understand these events are toxic and hurtful for many people in our University community. … These events are being organized by — and the speakers have been invited by — registered student organizations on campus. Student organizations are permitted to invite speakers — including highly provocative ones — to campus without University administration deciding what is acceptable and what is not.”
Noting that Turning Point is “very litigious, so you don’t want to compromise the placement in the state funding realm,” Grieve added that it is “just challenging and disingenuous to make comments about being supportive of individuals of a variety of marginalized status, while providing space, sometimes money, and no pushback to the events that are actively marginalizing said people.”
While stressing the importance of separating “ourselves as administrators from our personal thoughts,” Pickett said Grieve’s point is nonetheless “well taken.”
“I think we are well aware that these organizations are well funded, well-structured and well organized, and they know their intent,” he said of the “hateful nature” of some speakers. “I think they’ve been — and this is me separating myself just a bit — very calculated in terms of soliciting in certain instances.”
Public safety factors
Citing the importance of public safety, Pickett further responded to Grieve’s concerns that what she called the University’s “statement of neutrality” concerning speaker events contrasts with the “astonishing amount of police presence” around the events and related demonstrations.
“I think that the University stance would be that safety has to be the highest priority, so any expenditures related to safety are ones that we would highlight in terms of creating an environment where all parties would be safe,” he said, noting that as Pitt protects expression and free speech, “we know that these groups are organized in terms of walking the tightrope and dancing on the line — to cross the line often, in my opinion — to disrupt, to agitate and to promote their interests. … We are well aware of that.
“I think we know that they’re going to continue to come to our campus because they know that it will get attention, and that’s their intent,” he added. “In a perfect world, we would ignore them, they would go away. But that’s not going to happen. I think what we need to do is continue to be … as organized and as dutiful in our promotion and understanding of how we dismantle their weakly comprised arguments and hateful rhetoric.”
Both Pickett and Bridget Keown said they look forward to further EIADAC-led conversations about University stances and policies regarding speech, harassment, discrimination and sexual misconduct that could include representatives from the Office of Policy Development and Management and the Office of University Counsel.
“It would be great to engage in those discussions kind of sooner rather than later and make sure that that remains a priority for us,” Keown said. “So thank you for those suggestions and opening that door.”
LGBTQIA+ Steering Committee
In other EIADAC business, Grieve provided an update on the LGBTQIA+ Steering Committee and Keown on EIADAC’s related working group.
At its first meeting, the newly formed committee focused on introductions and going over a priority list of “various themes,” including creating a better dedicated space for queer students and other individuals.
“There was a lot of talk about training, something to go beyond the kind of simple allies training that has been in place for quite a while,” Grieve said, “but it seemed like the general conversation was (shifting) focus more to like structural changes or structural implementations.
“There’s a lot of conversation around healthcare being more meticulous, about how the insurance handles especially gender-affirming procedures” she added, as well as looking at benefits at all levels for staff, faculty and others.
The bulk of the conversation, however, focused on combatting “a lot of the anti-LGBTQ sentiment, especially the (controversial guest) speakers and some of the statements put out by leadership over the last couple of years in relation to those speakers and how most people felt that it wasn’t supportive.”
That led to discussion of systemic changes and accountability elements for processes on campus “that are maybe historically or structurally relegating to LGBTQ individuals … and how to change it on that fundamental level to move forward.”
Regarding the EIADAC’s LGBTQIA+ working group, Keown said members aim to plan regular events starting this fall to “provide space and activity for people in general, members of the queer community specifically, to meet, to chill out, to not have to be organizing around crisis moments or things like that,” she said.
The initial plan includes a series of film screenings “knowing that the ones that we have been able to hold in the past have been much appreciated.”
By establishing a schedule early on, “we can kind of have it happening at regular intervals that people can rely on,” she said, adding she is seeking “buy in from the deanery on that in terms of promotion and scheduling and things like that.”
“What we’ve talked about kind of puts us in a position for where we are going,” Keown said.
Shannon O. Wells is a writer for the University Times. Reach him at shannonw@pitt.edu.
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