Disturbing new audio depicts the second a beloved gay high university principal was shamed for standing up to an anti-racism coach – whose bullying served drive the instructor to suicide.
Richard Bilkszto, 60, was found lifeless on July 13 after two many years of emotional turmoil stemming from the face.
He was devastated when Kike Ojo-Thompson turned on him all through a session in April 2021 soon after he challenged her declare that Canada – where by equally lived – is far more racist than the US.
In the audio of the session, received by The Free Press, Bilkszto can be heard declaring that it’s possible Canada was not ‘the bastion of white supremacy’ that Ojo-Thompson had produced it out to be.
He pointed out that community educational institutions serving Canada’s poorest students are generally far better funded than their equivalents in the United States.
Ojo-Thompson turned on Bilkszto, telling him in entrance of all of the other folks collected: ‘As white people, you will find a entire bunch likely on that is not your own experience. It will in no way be. You will never know it to be so. You will by no means know it to be so.
‘So your work in this get the job done, as white people today, is to think.’
Ojo-Thompson – who was paid $7,500 an hour for eight hours of seminars – laughed in a subsequent discussion in excess of the problem designed by Bilkszto, who was explained as a deeply progressive male hailed for his emphasis on ‘equity’ at function. The anti-racism trainer was afterwards branded ‘abusive’ by an formal government investigation into her antics.
Kike Ojo-Thompson, a Toronto-based mostly range trainer, cited Bilkszto as an case in point of ‘white supremacy resistance’
Richard Bilkszto, 60, took his very own existence in Toronto on July 13 following two decades of turmoil subsequent an April 2021 face at the college where by he was principal. He submitted an formal criticism and gained, and had just filed a different match
And she referred to him once more in the next session as an case in point of ‘white supremacist resistance’ in freshly-produced audio clips which also display her laughing while producing an case in point of him.
The late principal’s relatives say his distress was only heightened when the superintendent of his faculty district, Sheryl Robinson Petrazzini, further shamed him in a tweet suggesting he was a racist.
The tweet, since deleted, hailed Ojo-Thompson ‘for modeling the distress administrators may well need to have to experience in buy to disrupt ABR,’ or anti-black racism.
The week just after his dying, Kike Ojo-Thompson, the diversity trainer, issued a defiant assertion which did not apologize for her part in Bilkszto’s dying – and even implied that she was the victim.
‘This incident is remaining weaponized to discredit and suppress the get the job done of absolutely everyone committed to diversity, fairness, and inclusion,’ she reported.
‘We will not be deterred from our operate in creating a improved culture for all people.’
Now, the college board and Ontario ‘s education minister are investigating Bilkszto’s death and regardless of whether the obsession with woke insurance policies could have contributed to it.
Bilkszto, who was homosexual and single, was reported by pals to have devoted his life to teaching, and spent time in a difficult the greater part-black college in Buffalo, New York.
He experienced not long ago retired, hoping to journey a lot more, but was persuaded to appear out of retirement to work as principal of Burnhamthorpe Collegiate Institute in Toronto.
In April 2021, the faculty district hired Kike Ojo-Thompson, a range trainer in Toronto, to have out four two-hour periods for school leaders – with her firm, the KOJO Institute, charging $15,000 for each session, in accordance to The Free Push.
The 1st session was uneventful, but in the course of the next session Ojo-Thompson claimed that Canada was noticeably extra racist than the United States.
He disagreed, but no a single stood up for him.
Immediately after the assembly, Sheryl Robinson Petrazzini, the executive superintendent of education and learning, thanked Ojo-Thompson for enlightening them.
Sheryl Robinson Petrazzini, the government superintendent of education, thanked Ojo-Thompson for the session which so upset Bilkszto
‘When faced with resistance to addressing Anti-Black racism, we can not continue to be silent as it reinforces harm to Black students and families,’ Petrazzini wrote.
‘Thank you @KOJOInstitute for modeling the discomfort administrators could want to knowledge in get to disrupt ABR,’ or anti-black racism.
She has given that deleted the tweet.
Petrazzini has not long ago been in the headlines, in her new position, for arranging a non-whites only ‘celebration of belonging’ for ‘racialized staff’.
Friends of Bilkszto said that Petrazzini’s tweet harm him deeply.
Robert McManus, 60, a retired teacher who experienced been friends with Bilkszto due to the fact they’d achieved at Boy Scouts camp at age 11, explained the tweet gave the effect that Ojo-Thompson’s reprimand was endorsed by the college district.
It ‘had a terrible outcome on Richard,’ McManus told The No cost Press.
Bilkszto’s community shaming was compounded at the 3rd session, where by Ojo-Thompson claimed that his responses were being a ‘teachable moment’.
‘One of the strategies that white supremacy is upheld, guarded, reproduced, upkept, defended is through resistance,’ she stated.
She then laughed, and added: ‘I’m so blessed that we received excellent evidence, a wonderful case in point of resistance that you all obtained to bear witness to, so we’re going to chat about it, mainly because, I imply, it would not get better than this.’
KOJO Institute founder Kike Ojo-Thompson. Bilkszto explained she accused him of supporting white supremacy due to the fact he challenged her comments
The day immediately after the 3rd session, Bilkszto submitted for unwell go away, and skipped the fourth and last session.
He then submitted a grievance with college officers declaring that he’d been harassed.
Ontario’s Place of work Protection and Insurance coverage Board investigated and in August 2021 concluded that Thompson’s actions was ‘abusive’ and amounted to ‘workplace harassment.’
Bilkszto was awarded seven weeks of misplaced pay out.
But good friends reported he never acquired in excess of the humiliation of remaining labelled a white supremacist, and the confrontation ate away at him.
In April this yr, Bilkszto sued the Toronto District Faculty Board, citing Thompson’s ‘defamatory statements’ and the unwillingness of administrators to defend him, regardless of formerly praising him.
‘Bilkszto has endured and will go on to endure damage to his character and reputation equally individually and professionally,’ the lawsuit states.
‘As perfectly, Bilkszto has been subjected to shame, scandal, ridicule, contempt, and serious emotional distress.’
He killed himself ahead of the situation could be concluded.
Bilkszto, 60, killed himself in July soon after suing the Toronto District Faculty Board for emotional distress
The 60-year-aged veteran trainer had labored for 24 decades and continue to volunteered as a stand-in principal. His spouse and children say he was so ‘distressed’ by the disagreement with the anti-racism coach and what occurred afterwards that he took his possess life
Jason Bilkszto, Richard’s nephew, instructed The Free Push: ‘How can you not be allowed to somewhat disagree with something without them tearing you aside for it?’
McManus claimed he past spoke to Bilkszto the working day just before he took his individual life.
‘It was definitely very clear he was not sleeping very well as a consequence of all the worry,’ McManus said.
‘He was a very optimistic person, so the wide vast majority of the time, when people would be talking to him, he would be viewed as accomplishing nicely, but his pals realized that he struggled – he struggled with what experienced occurred to him.’
Ontario’s education minister, Stephen Lecce, reported: ‘I provide my heartfelt condolences to Richard’s family members and pals, as we recall an educator that really went previously mentioned and past for his college students.
‘No employees member must ever be subject matter to harassment though in their spot of get the job done.’
Ojo-Thompson said she ‘welcomes Education and learning Minister Stephen Lecce’s review of this subject and will cooperate completely with Ministry officers.’
She included: ‘We imagine the Ministry of Schooling is finest positioned to examine this issue to get to the base of what transpired at the Toronto District Faculty Board just after our workshop concluded more than two many years in the past.’
Ari Goldkind, a Toronto lawyer, informed The Cost-free Push that DEI consultants and the institutions that use them want to comprehend their plans ‘can have horrendous, actual-environment implications.’
‘There’s a serious possibility here that, transferring forward, the DEI teaching session will become a great deal additional litigious, with attendees who really feel set upon or hurt or maligned, dangerously maligned – this means they are ostracized or rendered unemployable – striking back again in court,’ Goldkind said.
‘That’s the lesson of this tragedy, that people are unwell and weary of remaining isolated and solid out from well mannered modern society since they have the gall to ask a concern or obstacle the orthodoxy.’
