TORONTO

A free speech conference to be hosted by two university student groups Saturday has received “pretty explicit, somewhat violent threats” on social media, organizer Aaron Gunn says.

The executive director of Generation Screwed said he’s concerned about security as his group partners with Students in Support of Free Speech (SSFS) to co-host the 2017 Toronto Action Forum at University of Toronto.

“Hopefully they have something better to do on the Saturday than come to our event but you never know,” Gunn said, of possible protesters.

Generation Screwed usually focuses on fiscal issues – government debt and mismanagement – but it has become increasingly difficult for its student organizers to form clubs or book rooms at universities, he said.

Student unions and universities have either placed outright restrictions on the campus-based advocacy group, or thrown up so much red tape that it can’t operate, he said.

The group decided to co-host with SSFS to address fiscal and free speeches at the same conference, he added.

“Political correctness...to the point where it’s really muzzling free expression,” Gunn said Friday. “It’s gotten to a point where it’s even impeding us from doing what we’re trying to do, and we’re just talking about fiscal issues – hardly the most controversial.”

The keynote speaker for the event is University of Toronto professor Dr. Jordan Peterson, whose views about gender neutral pronouns and the impact of political correctness on free speech in post secondary institution drew praise and ire from around the world.

Catch Executive Director of @GenScrewedCdn & more at the 2017 Toronto Action Forum! Tiks and more info at: https://t.co/zGzcbDWSpt#onpolipic.twitter.com/z5dcFKkWXv — Generation Screwed (@GenScrewedCdn) February 1, 2017

Peterson’s YouTube videos have drawn well over 100,000 views.

The professor has become “the focal point, whether he wanted to be or not” of the free speech debate, and students are coming from as far away as Ottawa and Montreal to hear him speak, Gunn said.

Other speakers include the national columnist for Sun newspapers, Anthony Furey, Canadian Taxpayers Federation Ontario Director Christine Van Geyn, retired banker Parker Gallant and The Rebel Media’s Ezra Levant.

aartuso@postmedia.com