Students and faculty at Wilfrid Laurier University are slamming the graduate students association after its sudden decision to close a popular campus café this week.

The apparent reason? A tongue-in-cheek help wanted ad that asked for a “slave” to help run the café.

On Monday, Veritas Café operator Sandor Dosman was brought into a boardroom and told the recent advertisement he’d posted online had ruffled some feathers.

In the ad, he joked he wanted “a new slave (full-time staff member) to boss (mentor) around Veritas Cafe.” The ad was clearly intended as to be humorous, with jokes about man-buns, tattoos and food safety because “we try to not kill our customers.”

But Dosman says he was told his contract with the student group was being terminated as a result, and soon he was being escorted off campus by two security officers.

“This came completely out of left field. I’m still in shock,” said Dosman, who had run the café for four and a half years. “It was just black and white, ‘You are done.’ Now I’m out of the job and I have no idea what I’m going to do next.”

The sudden closure drew criticism from many of the café’s customers. Laurier ethics professor Byron Williston penned a scathing open letter to the graduate students association, accusing them of acting like “spoiled children.”

“I suppose it’s a sign of the times, especially on university campuses whose student bodies — undergraduate and graduate — seem to have been taken over by the terminally thin-skinned and self-righteous,” Williston wrote. “Perhaps you should direct your moral outrage at some of the many real problems in the world rather than behaving like petty bullies.”

Williston said the termination was a gross overreaction to a joke, even if it was in poor taste.

“I wrote the letter because I think the operator has been morally wronged. I think it’s important for somebody to speak out for him,” he said in an interview.

Samantha Deeming, president and chief executive officer of the GSA, said the association would not be commenting further on the situation, but did confirm that the café employees who wanted to work this week have continued to do so, and have been offered hours next week. On behalf of the GSA, she said the association is working “diligently” on a plan to re-open the café next month.

A statement from the university said that “Given the importance that Laurier places on being an inclusive, welcoming and respectful community,” it supports the GSA’s decision. “The university appreciates the challenges of dealing with confidential personnel and contract matters and we support the GSA in its efforts to re-open the café and re-hire the affected employees.”

Dosman, meanwhile, is left trying to figure out how to pay his bills. His living room is stuffed with equipment and food that he was given just hours to remove from the café. The future of his food truck, which used the café to prepare meals, is also up in the air.

Running the café was his primary source of income, and a paycheque for his 11 employees.

He says he tried to have some fun with the help wanted ad after posting multiple ads that drew little response. It worked — he got dozens of applications from people who wanted the job.

Dosman wonders why the student group chose to end his contract so quickly, instead of giving him a reprimand, asking for an apology or demanding a retraction. He said he deeply regrets his attempt at humour.

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“I decided I’d try something a little different, but maybe it was a little too outside . . . I apologize if I offended anyone, that certainly wasn’t my intention,” he said. “I wouldn’t have done it if I knew this was going to happen. I have no job now.”

— with files from Megan Dolski