The pandemic derailed our sport's long overdue reckoning with its male power imbalance and culture of abusing women's bodies. We can not allow institutions to continue to fail us
I know this isn’t the focus of this article, but I’m so tired of articles and other media stating that Boyd was fired for speaking up. Boyd was fired for what amounted to cyber-bullying; after several polite requests to stop, and even one from his employer, he continued to do so.
(Michael Doyle here) I hear what you're saying, however I'd like to make a couple of key points: according to the reporting I did at the time for the Globe, there was one request by the school, at which time Boyd stopped posting (I checked and he halted all public communication after the warning). I also reviewed all the correspondence (past and present) regarding his online activities. Something doesn't add up with the way Queen's (mis)managed this. I don't condone elements of what Boyd said, but the reason why there's this conflation between what Boyd said and the idea what he was "speaking up." I appreciate your perspective, as I think it's possible to both condemn some of Boyd's rather insensitive analogies (perhaps they were suspendible offences, and certainly the school should have demanded he make a public apology), yet also demand transparency from institutions like Queen's. If they have a documented history of Mr. Boyd's bullying behaviour and warned him numerous times, why not just make that information public?
I know this isn’t the focus of this article, but I’m so tired of articles and other media stating that Boyd was fired for speaking up. Boyd was fired for what amounted to cyber-bullying; after several polite requests to stop, and even one from his employer, he continued to do so.
(Michael Doyle here) I hear what you're saying, however I'd like to make a couple of key points: according to the reporting I did at the time for the Globe, there was one request by the school, at which time Boyd stopped posting (I checked and he halted all public communication after the warning). I also reviewed all the correspondence (past and present) regarding his online activities. Something doesn't add up with the way Queen's (mis)managed this. I don't condone elements of what Boyd said, but the reason why there's this conflation between what Boyd said and the idea what he was "speaking up." I appreciate your perspective, as I think it's possible to both condemn some of Boyd's rather insensitive analogies (perhaps they were suspendible offences, and certainly the school should have demanded he make a public apology), yet also demand transparency from institutions like Queen's. If they have a documented history of Mr. Boyd's bullying behaviour and warned him numerous times, why not just make that information public?