York president weighs in on religious-rights controversy, calls for discussion – The Globe and Mail

Minister stronger than York U president, who remains in the wishy-washy category:

Brad Duguid, Ontario’s Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities, said he respects the university’s jurisdiction to make its own decision, but “my inclination would be to side with the views of the prof on this.”

“It’s my opinion that … our universities should not be obliged to alter course curriculum in any way that would be seen as discriminatory with regard to gender equality,” Mr. Duguid said, calling such equity a “sacrosanct” principle.

York president weighs in on religious-rights controversy, calls for discussion – The Globe and Mail.

Professor Grayson writes a long letter to York U admin, effectively skewering the arguments of the Dean:

York University prof fires back over religious accommodation controversy | Toronto & GTA | News | Toronto Sun

Lastly, Globe editorial today better than the earlier wishy-washy editorial:

Under Canadian law, public institutions and employers have a duty to accommodate difference. That could mean accommodating a disability, for example. It also covers religion. At a university, there are many requests, like a student asking to have an exam reschedueled for a religious holiday, that can be considered and sometimes addressed without harming or disadvantaging other students, or undermining values of gender and racial non-discrimination. That has to be the key test.

So what about a student asking to be segregated from fellow students? That crosses a line.

The York case was unusual, in that the course was online, in-person meetings were rare, and some students were allowed to miss them for non-religious reasons. We disagree with the university decision, but it isn’t a slippery slope to gender-segregated university classrooms. That just isn’t on the menu. Freedom means the right to privately practice a religion, and to publicly profess it. But the right extends only so far as it does not impose those beliefs on others or on institutions. A student asking for the classroom to be curtained off, to separate him from members of another sex, race or religion should not be granted his wish, and will not be.

 When rights collide, in Quebec and at York