In 2014, a group of female students in the dentistry program of Dalhousie University, a Canadian university in Halifax, Nova Scotia, file a sexual harrassment complaint against male members of their cohort. According to the complaint, the men had maintained a private Facebook group where they routinely made sexualized and degrading jokes about their female peers. The Canadian media picked up on the case and it quickly became a national sensation.

 

Mary McNally, a professor in the School of Dentistry at Dalhousie University was charged with appropriately responding to this high profile complaint. Amidst the widespread media coverage and vociferous debate about how best to respond to sexual and gender-based misconduct, Mary was faced with considering two very different points of view. On the one hand, the female students who filed the complaint asked for a restorative justice approach to address the issue. On the other, many in the wider community were demanding swift punishment by expelling the male students.