As veteran pro-life demonstrators, Blaise Alleyne and Katie Somers expected to be harassed when they gathered with fellow members of Toronto Against Abortion (TAA) to protest near the Ryerson University campus on an overcast day in October 2018.
If history was any guide, the pair could expect to be screamed at, have their placards covered, and even be spat on as they spoke with passersby about the horrors of abortion and displayed graphic images of fetuses, which they refer to as “victim photography.”
But that day, things took a turn into outright violence.
Without provocation, Gabriela Skwarko — a member of a pro-choice student group called the Ryerson Reproductive Justice Collective (RRJC) — approached Alleyne and forcefully kicked his poster. Skwarko then shoved Alleyne into Somers before grabbing a nearby dolly and hurling it at them. The activist then charged Somers, tearing her backpack, and bumping her chest into Somers’s face.
“This is my campus!” Skwarko said triumphantly before pushing the clearly shocked Somers once again. “Let’s go! Come on! Let’s do it!” she boasted.
“I don’t think I’ve told anyone this, but at some point during the assault, I was heartbroken because I was thinking I’m not gonna be able to do this anymore,” Somers told National Review. “During the attack, people were making fun of me when I was crying afterward. I was just so damaged by the cruelty of humanity.”
Skwarko’s conduct wasn’t surprising. Months earlier, she had harassed Somers – taunting her, screaming in her ear, and dangerously waving a sign inches from her face. When the troubling behavior was reported to Ryerson administrators, the university, since rebranded Toronto Metropolitan, deemed “no offense” had been committed, Alleyne said. Not until Toronto police filed criminal charges of assault and assault with a weapon against Skwarko did Ryerson finally sanction her.
The following May, Skwarko pled guilty to assault and still boasts of her role with RRJC on her LinkedIn page. “Bringing awareness to violence against women and trans folks, and ensuring student safety on Ryerson campus,” is how the liberal-arts student describes her activism. Skwarko’s legal team did not respond to a request for comment.
Toronto Metropolitan, formerly Ryerson, declined to comment on the specifics of the case and instead reaffirmed its commitment to diversity.
Somers distinctly remembers the attack because it came just one day after another pro-choice activist in Toronto, Jordan Hunt, infamously roundhouse kicked a female pro-life demonstrator in a clip that went viral and made international headlines.
Violence could have been averted, Somers and Alleyne maintain, if Ryerson hadn’t ignored a clear pattern of harassment and abuse by pro-choice protesters, many of whom were leaders in the student union and other campus groups.
“How many times did we alert campus security to issues of theft? Minor assaults? Incidents like throwing water or damaging property? So many times. And it was never responded to until there were criminal charges laid,” Somers said.
A Pattern of Violence
In April 2017, less than a year before Somers and Alleyne were attacked, RRJC co-founder Paige Galette shut down an approved pro-life event without consequence. Business-school student Talia Battista had invited two women to speak about abortion, including a fellow sexual-assault survivor. She followed school policy to the letter, submitted the appropriate paperwork, and booked a spot in the Student Learning Centre.
However, when Galette discovered the event, she immediately sought to silence Battista and her fellow students. Asked by a campus observer to stop, Galette responded with righteous indignation.
“My disruptive behavior? They’re being disruptive! They’re absolutely being violent. So, your silence is still violence, by the way.”
“I’m not having it. My triggering behavior is disrupting this bullsh** violence–” Galette says, before turning her attention to the table of pro-life students. “Pack it up, pack it up, pack it up!” she screams as she runs her hand across the table filled with pamphlets before throwing some of the literature into the garbage.
Told she is being uncivil, Galette shoots back: “I’m being uncivil because I’m triggered by this bullsh**!” Asked to leave, the union employee insisted, “absolutely not. I will not leave until they leave. That’s what’s happening.”
For over 30 minutes, Galette livestreamed the entire incident to the rapturous digital applause of RRJC executives and student-union employees. “Yes gurl,” a fellow student-union worker wrote. The group spokeswoman added: “F*** it up Paige. ‘Uncivilized’ we love you!”
Screenshots obtained by NR show other RRJC members supporting Galette’s actions precisely when she turned to destroying the booth. “Yessssss,” one commented, while another added: “Kinda pissed I’m in Chicago,” “YES PAIGE,” “DO IT,” “YOU CAN DO IT BOO.”
Toronto police declined to press charges for destruction of property and instead issued a “formal caution.” Similarly, Ryerson eschewed any disciplinary actions whatsoever against the club or Galette. RRJC remains in healthy standing.
Like Skwarko, this wasn’t the first time Galette had behaved this way.
The month before, she struck a sign held by Alleyne and hounded Battista, telling her: “people tell you f*** off. So why are you still here?” The previous academic year, Galette had videotaped herself throwing water at pro-lifers. Once more, Ryerson declined to address the situation despite the pleas of Battista and Alleyne.
Ban Pro-Lifers
Alleyne provided detailed accounts to NR highlighting over two dozen additional episodes dating back to 2016 in which pro-life demonstrators experienced a spectrum of abuse on campus. For example, in November 2016, Galette and Cassandra Myers, another union executive and employee, stole pro-life signage; later that same month, the latter destroyed a placard; in March 2018, bystanders stole pro-life signs as RRJC members blocked Alleyne from recording the incident.
Institutional disregard was a feature, not a bug, of the university’s official response to pro-lifer students on campus, pro-life students said. Myers repeatedly stole and destroyed pro-life signage around campus for years without consequence. Predictably, when pro-life students escalated their concerns, Ryerson administrators hid behind technicalities like reporting time limits.
For pro-life students at Ryerson who spoke with NR, the message from on high was abundantly clear: administration had no interest upholding the student code when it came to pro-choice activists.
The bias of Ryerson administrators was on full display when RRJC members urged the university to ban pro-lifers from campus entirely during a student-union townhall meeting.
During the meeting, a senior administrator performed a tight-rope walk, assuring the activists that she and the broader university community were on their side, while conceding that their hands were tied on the issue of banning pro-lifers from campus since the protests were conducted on public property.
“One thing that is really important that I wanted to say to you is that you and I – I as an individual, Heather – am not ideologically opposed on this issue. I do not suspect that any of my university colleagues that are here with me are ideologically opposed on this issue with you either,” the administrator said. “But that does not change the fact that we cannot do what you are asking for and we cannot make them go away,” the administrator sheepishly added.
The administrator’s words of support did not satisfy the pro-choice activists.
“I trusted this institution to provide a safer space than the last university I attended,” Claire Davis told the school newspaper afterward. “I should never have to fear attending class or work because of the possibility I might feel vulnerable, triggered or unsafe on campus because of these protesters.”
Held to a Different Standard
Throughout the years that pro-choice activists were given free rein to intimidate Ryerson pro-lifers, the group held itself to a high standard. An exhaustive video catalogue of incidents can be found online because organizational policy dictates that from the moment pro-lifers set foot on campus to the time they safely commute home, a camera is always rolling.
“There’s a reason we film every moment that we are out. We have a policy of filming from the moment we leave our vehicle until the moment we return to our vehicle,” Somers, now the Director of Outreach for Toronto Right for Life, said. “It’s not just for our security. It’s also to protect ourselves so that if anyone ever wants to accuse us of breaking that code of conduct or our non-violence policy, we are able to say we did not. We have every minute of our activities recorded.”
However, the bar they set for themselves – alongside a compulsory pledge all members must sign to treat everyone with respect – only seemed to harden the hearts of Ryerson administrators and executives. “We are very careful to always follow the law and treat people with respect because those are our beliefs. We believe in the dignity of every person. We want to treat even people who disagree with us with respect,” Alleyne said.
“We often encounter bias from the authorities where if we step out of line, we get cracked down right away. Even if we don’t step out of line, we have to defend our conduct. We feel like there is a double standard. Often, though, not from everyone. But often enough that we are always very careful to be beyond reproach.”
The opinion is widely shared among the loose constellation of pro-life advocates who demonstrated on campus at the time. Nabiha Hoque, a 28-year-old Muslim woman who worked alongside Battista and Alleyne, said that she had been personally assaulted at Ryerson. “Mostly verbal assaults. People have spit at us. I had students throw rocks at me directly from their university windows,” despite her being “eight months pregnant,” Hoque wrote.
Matthias Nunno, a Ryerson political-science alum, remembers his time on campus plagued by “an environment that was incredibly intolerant.”
“Though the official stance of staff and programs was inclusion, the preferences and options expressed were always pro-abortion as opposed to pro-choice,” the self-described “pro-life Indigenous student,” said in an email. “This made me very afraid to express my pro-life [beliefs] as it was obvious that it would have resulted in discrimination from those in positions of authority.”
“I can honestly say that I was afraid of being assaulted, harassed, or unfairly treated by staff and so I didn’t bother putting myself in a position to be bullied.”