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In the space of mere weeks, Wilfrid Laurier University found a back door out of having to host a controversial speaker and thereby rendered toothless the “draft statement on freedom of expression” a university task force released on Monday.

In fairness, the draft statement is so filled with pro forma bows and nods to diversity, the marginalized and the “distress” that some individuals might feel if exposed to certain viewpoints, it is essentially meaningless anyway.

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(This is undoubtedly despite the best efforts of the best of the task force members, who likely made the case again and again for an unequivocal statement.)

Laurier, you will recall, became infamous last year when two professors and a gender violence bureaucrat brought teaching assistant Lindsay Shepherd in for a good old-fashioned brainwashing after she dared show a class an excerpt of a televised debate featuring the controversial University of Toronto psychologist (and now bestselling author) Dr. Jordan Peterson.

Alas for the gang of three, Shepherd audiotaped the hideousness, which revealed their breathtaking arrogance (she was accused of the equivalent of “neutrally playing a speech by Hitler” by not first denouncing Peterson), intimidation tactics and all-round ghastly behaviour.

A subsequent independent investigator later fully vindicated Shepherd.

In the wake of all that, she formed a free-speech group called The Laurier Society for Open Inquiry.

One of the first events it planned was a speech by Faith Goldy, a controversial alt-right figure.

Originally, the idea was that Goldy would debate a professor about her anti-immigration views, but every one Shepherd invited refused. So the LSOI launched its Unpopular Opinions Speakers Series, with lots of time for a robust Q and A after Goldy spoke.

It was scheduled for March 20, but on the evening in question, there were tons of protesters and, as one of them later put it, the night ended with “a fire alarm being pulled.” (Note the lovely passive voice.) It was cancelled.

The LSOI, after some internal debate, decided to reschedule the event.