The Martlet

Nearly four months after they hosted an event called “Echoes of the Holocaust” on campus, pro-life club Youth Protecting Youth (YPY) are seeing consequences. At their Feb. 7 meeting, the UVic Students’ Society (UVSS) voted to censure the club for violating the UVSS harassment policy in promoting the event.

The UVSS also voted to mediate a solution with YPY to “help prevent further issues,” engage legal counsel to look in to how policy can be changed to address concerns regarding off-campus speakers and groups, and have the UVSS’ Political Action Committee hold a restorative justice event.

Several complaints were filed against YPY after they held “Echoes of the Holocaust” on Oct. 26. A UVSS Complaints Committee determined that the event’s name “allowed for people to be misled about the nature of the event” and that doing so was in violation of the UVSS harassment policy.

“This is not about the content of the presentation at all,” said UVSS Chairperson James Coccola at the Feb. 7 meeting. “This is simply about how the event was marketed.”

But YPY President Anastasia Pearse says it’s unclear what, precisely, the decision was about.

“It didn’t actually say … what [it was] about the advertising. It was just that the way we advertised constituted harassment,” she said after the meeting.

“Judging from the discussion, it was because we used the terms holocaust and abortion, or genocide and abortion together in our advertising.”

Pearse says that there is nothing preventing the use of such terms.

“There’s debate in our society as to when and when not it’s appropriate to use those terms [holocaust and genocide] and in the past, it has been deemed appropriate to use the term holocaust to refer to modern day genocides. So there’s nowhere that says that we can’t use that to refer to abortion.”

There was much debate over the motion at the meeting, most of which centered on whether or not YPY’s actions constituted harassment.

Raizy Marmorstein said that, as a Jewish student, she personally felt harassed by the event’s title.

“I felt that using the word ‘the’ was targeting Jewish students and other students who were affected by the Holocaust,” she said, referencing the title “The Holocaust” as opposed to simply “a holocaust.”

UVSS Director-at-Large Rob MacDonald said that he knew people who saw the materials on campus and broke down crying and therefore he felt that the advertisements constituted harassment.

Other Board members disagreed.

“We have to make decisions as a board of directors for a diverse campus . . . there will be times in a public sphere where people will be exposed to content that they will be offended by,” said Kelsey Hannan, director of finance. “We have to let content that can be offensive be debated.”

Pearse says that while YPY disagrees there is basis for mediation and holding a restorative justice event, the group is open to dialogue. They are, however, cautious.

“We hope the goal of this dialogue and mediation isn’t to get us to apologize or something. Or to get us to say that we won’t do it again, because that would be censorship,” she said.

Still, they’re unhappy about the censure.

“We’re glad it’s not censorship. But still, the Board is going to be saying that we contravened the harassment policy, which is not the case,” said Pearse. “We understand that some women have been upset by seeing our posters. We understand that they feel that way. But just because they’ve seen something they dislike does not mean that they’re being harassed.”

At the meeting, several board members said that acknowledging that several people had felt harassed was important.

“YPY caused emotional anguish,” said UVSS Director-at-Large Dylan Sherlock. “We’re simply saying ‘you hurt some people’s feelings.’” Sherlock added that several people felt that the punishment YPY was receiving was not harsh enough.

UVSS Director of Services Remy Hall noted that the motions regarding YPY had come from a Complaints Committee that was being used for the first time.

“There are a lot of holes in the committee,” said Hall at the meeting, adding that amendments should be made in the future.

YPY’s club status and funding have been hotly contested and denied several times in recent years. In May 2010, YPY filed a petition with the B.C. Supreme Court against the UVSS demanding that, among other things, the club’s status and funding be reinstated, including funds that were denied in past years. YPY and the UVSS settled out of court on July 13. The court petition is being held in abeyance, meaning YPY can resubmit the petition in the future.