The New Neo

Have you ever read Shirley Jackson’s famous short story “The Lottery,” written in 1948? If you haven’t, SPOILER alert: the plot involves a tradition in a seemingly-normal town in which a person is chosen by lot to be stoned to death by the other residents. No reason is ever given. The process is merely described, in a narrative in which the Norman Rockwell-esque turns gradually into the horrific.

I’ve written two posts already about the struggle session atmosphere to which former Toronto school principal Richard Bilkszto was subjected during a 2021 anti-racism training session in Canada (see this and this). That’s what put me in mind of the Shirley Jackson story. Bilkszto ended up suing the Toronto School Board District for what happened during the session and afterwards at the Board’s hands, but shortly after the suit was filed he killed himself. It now seems more apparent to me, after reading some further articles on the subject, why the incident had such a devastating effect.

The first training session was just the beginning, although it was horrible. It was followed by some sources scrambling to show their own virtue by condemning Bilkszto, or protecting themselves from similar attack by fearfully keeping silent [emphasis mine]:

Bilkszto was particularly devastated by the fact that some of his TDSB bosses, whom he’d naively expected to defend him (or at least have the courtesy to say nothing at all), eagerly piled on with the public shaming meted out by their external DEI consultant.

On Twitter, Sheryl Robinson Petrazzini, then the TDSB’s Executive Superintendent, thanked Ojo-Thompson and her KOJO colleague for “modelling the discomfort [that] administrators” — i.e., Bilkszto — “may need to experience in order to disrupt ABR [anti-Black racism].”

For good measure, Robinson Petrazzini also suggested that Bilkszto (whom she did not name, but was the obvious subject of her Tweet) was allied with the forces of “resistance” to anti-racism, and so was abetting “harm to Black students and families.”

Bilkszto personally asked Robinson Petrazzini to delete the Tweet. She did so only eight months later, and only after receiving a letter from Bilkszto’s lawyer warning her that she’d be sued unless she did so.

According to Bilkszto, his other bosses also refused to support him, instead attacking him for his “male white privilege.” And yet, once Bilkszto filed a lawsuit against the TDSB, seeking $785,000 damages for the emotional and reputational harm he’d endured, those same administrators now began claiming that it was Ojo-Thompson who’d gone rogue.

I imagine it was especially disconcerting to Bilkszto to learn how fragile were the bonds he’d forged during his lengthy working life, how eager people he’d previously trusted were to distance themselves from him and throw a few stones themselves. When a community of colleagues appears to turn against a person or to be silent while he is persecuted, the experience generally has a powerful effect, adding betrayal to the original injury. As a liberal who may have continued up to that point to believe that the others shared his values, he probably experienced a very rude and shattering awakening.

Also, the insults launched against Bilkszto during the training session by Ojo-Thompson were even more extensive than reported in the other articles I’ve read prior to this. Here’s more of what is alleged to have been done [emphasis mine]:

“We [Canadians] are stepping on necks, we are kneeling on necks, we are Derek Chauvin-ing a whole group of people… Patriarchy is killing you, capitalism is killing you, and White supremacy is taking your soul, but what do I know?” Thompson said, according to a complaint obtained by Fox News Digital.

Ojo-Thompson proceeded to call Canada “the bastion of White supremacy and colonialism,” according to the suit. …

“I am telling you what the facts are and the truth is,” Ojo-Thompson said, while claiming Canada was worse than the U.S. in regard to embedded “White supremacy,” according to the suit.

After Bilkszto interjected, disagreeing with Ojo-Thompson in her assessment that Canada was more racist than the U.S., he was promptly reprimanded for his “Whiteness,” according to the suit.

“This is why we are in the place we are in. We are here to talk about anti-Black racism, but you in your Whiteness think that you can tell me what’s really going on for Black people? Is that what you are doing? I think that’s what you’re doing,” Ojo-Thompson said, according to the suit.

Another trainer at KOJO, interjected, claiming Bilkszto was an “apologist” for racism, in front of all his administrative peers, according to the suit. Bilkszto’s superiors and colleagues did not intervene when the alleged racial comments against his “Whiteness” were made.

Ojo-Thompson proceeded “to publicly humiliate Bilkszto and make an example of him,” going so far as to liken him to a “‘weed’ that needed to be cut down,” the lawsuit said.

So we have the leader, Ojo-Thompson, taking an aggressive tone and setting Bilkszto up as the white male villain. As is common in these trainings, any argument or attempt to defend oneself is labeled as more racism. This was done in a public work setting in front of peers, and as far as I can tell, Bilkszto was the only person who objected and the only person so treated. And then his colleagues – whom he almost certainly had previously considered friends – were silent, probably afraid that they would be the next victims and that Ojo-Thompson and her associate would get out that weed-whacker and use it on them. So he was the designated sacrificial lamb who would save the group from condemnation.

It takes a great deal of courage to stand up to that sort of tyranny and expose oneself to the possibility of such an attack, especially in the workplace where the consequences can be serious and financial. Most people will not do it.

But that wasn’t all that happened to Bilkszto. There were other professional consequences, and a further struggle session where Bilkszto was targeted again as well as mocked [emphasis mine]:

Bilkszto was then called in for professional reprimand in relation to his ideological disagreement with Ojo-Thompson. When Bilkszto attended the next KOJO training, Ojo-Thompson attacked him again unprompted, while laughing at one point, according to the suit.

“This is the operation of White supremacy and you [the audience of colleagues, that is] saw it with your own eyes,” Ojo-Thompson said, according to the lawsuit.

“It doesn’t get better than this,” Ojo-Thomson said about Bilkszto’s interruption, per the suit.

“It is rare that when teaching something that you actually get a real life of the concept unfolding right before everyone’s eyes and ears, and we had that privilege last week, so I want to open by going back to the concept of resistance,” Ojo-Thomson said, according to the suit.

“One of the ways that White supremacy is upheld… is through resistance and like I said, as I began to speak earlier we had, I am so lucky [*laughs*], who would have thought my luck would have showed up so well last week, that we got perfect evidence of a wonderful example of resistance that all of you got to bear witness to, and we are going to talk about it, because it doesn’t get better than this,” she continued, according to the suit.

Power and sadism and racism from Ojo-Thompson, and no one in the audience willing to stand up and call it what it was.

Here is a short bio of Ojo-Thompson. And here you can find even more details of her remarks to Bilkszto, including a series of audio clips of some of the exchanges at the trainings.

Also, some later remarks Bilkszto made about his own life:

“To me, being gay is a part of me,” Bilkszto said in the interview. “It’s not my identity. It’s not something I choose to put out there all the time. As a matter of fact, if people were having a conversation about, you know, ‘I don’t think there should be gay marriage,’ I’m not even offended by that if people are making rational arguments—as long as they’re not being homophobic.”

He added: “It’s about the whole cancelling and not allowing for free speech, free debate, and all those types of things. I’m a big free speech proponent.” Bilkszto said he thought Chris Rufo, the conservative activist who built his online following by spotlighting the excesses of wokeness, was spot on.

Sounds like a very reasonable guy. Bilkszto apparently had a loving family, and had previously been highly respected in his job.

While it’s certainly true that not everyone would have committed suicide in the face of this kind of pressure, the stress was formidable. I am convinced that, but for the chain of events that was set in motion by the training, Bilkszto would be alive today.

NOTE: You can read the entire story “The Lottery” here. It’s quite short.