Monday, November 12, 2018

Comfortable Dystopians and Their Comfortable Friends: An Update


A small follow-up to my January 2018 entry on Margaret Atwood: Steven Galloway, the author and (ex-) professor whom Atwood defended in the Globe and Mail, has sued the woman who accused him of sexual assault and about two dozen other people (at least some of them students or people of limited means) who supported the accuser’s claims in writing. Galloway was partially exonerated* by a 2016 legal investigation, and paid 200,000 dollars by his former employer. His current suit alleges that his accuser and critics are inflicting expensive and legally actionable damage on his reputation. Galloway’s critics argue that he is using the court filing to silence people without the financial means to contest the suit.

Perhaps. If so, Galloway has reckoned without the power of Internet-based crowdfunding. A Gofundme campaign has raised (as of this writing) over $US 67,000 to pay the defendants’ legal fees. Some of my readers may believe Mr. Galloway has been hard done by; for the rest, I offer a link to the campaign website.


 
* The investigator, Hon. Mary Ellen Boyd, determined that Galloway was guilty of harassment and an inappropriate relationship with a student. Others have accused him of bullying behavior and slapping a student.