I hope everyone remembers the case of Marquette University professor John McAdams. McAdams was punished severely by the “Catholic” university for blogging about a pro-gay-rights instructor (Cheryl Abatte) who told a pro-marriage student that if he disagreed with gay rights, then he must drop her class.
Here is the latest about the university’s final decision about what to do with professor McAdams from David French of National Review.
French writes:
There’s nothing like a good show trial to build confidence in the academy’s commitment to academic freedom. Marquette University is demanding that embattled professor John McAdams apologize for criticizing a colleague as a condition for keeping his job. And what outrage did McAdams commit? He tried to protect the academic freedom and free speech of conservative students:
On November 2014, McAdams, a tenured associate professor of political science, posted an entry on his Marquette Warrior blog describing a recorded conversation between an undergraduate student and the instructor for his “Theory of Ethics” philosophy course. The instructor, Cheryl Abbate, was recorded telling the student that the expression of certain opinions in class was inappropriate because those opinions may be considered offensive to other listeners. Abbate specifically cited the student’s stated opposition to same-sex marriage as a problem.
Abbate’s actions were criticized by readers of McAdams’ blog entry, and her alleged actions received widespread attention from national media. In response, Richard C. Holz, dean of Marquette’s Klingler College of Arts and Sciences, suspended McAdams.
You read that correctly. Rather than discipline the instructor who silenced a conservative student, the university suspended the whistleblower. Now it’s reportedly extending the suspension through the fall 2016 semester and demanding that he apologize as a condition of returning to work. My former colleagues at the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) are right to label the forced apology “an age-old inquisitorial tactic used to violate freedom of conscience through compelled speech.”
So, you might think that a “Catholic” University would punish the anti-marriage instructor, instead of the professor who defended the pro-marriage student, but you’d be wrong. I sure hope that none of you ever give money to Christian organizations that are not solid on issues like abortion and marriage. Because there are tons of “Christian” organizations who are aligned with the secular left on many cultural issues. It’s probably a good idea to cut off this institutions from taxpayer funding until they stop discriminating against Christians and conservatives.
David French also reports on McAdams’ response to the fascist college administators:
McAdams — to his immense credit — is not backing down.
The addition of a demand that we abase ourself and issue an apology and sign a loyalty oath to vaguely defined “guiding values” and to the University’s “mission” is obviously a ploy by Marquette to give the administration an excuse to fire us. They have calculated, correctly, that we will do no such thing.
I would say that it’s astonishing that a Catholic university punish a professor for defending the right of students to advocate the church’s teaching on marriage, but politically correct nonsense is par for the course even (especially) at many religious colleges. McAdams should be applauded — and supported — for his lonely, courageous stand.
David French also wrote an article in National Review on Friday about how universities weed out conservatives who apply to be teachers and administrators. It turns out that they are not interested in diversity at all.
French writes:
According to data compiled by the Higher Education Research Institute, only 12% of university faculty identify as politically right of center, and these are mainly professors in schools of engineering and other professional schools. Only 5% of professors in the humanities and social-science departments so identify.
A comprehensive study by James Lindgren of Northwestern University Law School shows that in a country fairly evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans, only 13% of law professors identify as Republican. And a recent study by Jonathan Haidt of New York University showed that 96% of social psychologists identify as left of center, 3.7% as centrist/moderate and only 0.03% as right of center.
He’s not kidding. Consider this article from the Cornell University campus newspaper.
It says:
Of the nearly $600,000 Cornell’s faculty donated to political candidates or parties in the past four years, over 96 percent has gone to fund Democratic campaigns, while only 15 of the 323 donors gave to conservative causes.
The Sun’s analysis of Federal Election Committee data reveals that from 2011 to 2014, Cornell’s faculty donated $573,659 to Democrats, $16,360 to Republicans and $2,950 to Independents. Each of Cornell’s 13 schools — both graduate and undergraduate — slanted heavily to the left. In the College of Arts and Sciences, 99 percent of the $183,644 donated went to liberal campaigns.
So how do we fix it? Well, I already mentioned that Christians should not give any money to universities, unless they are named Hillsdale College, Biola University, Grove City College, Patrick Henry College, etc. And I mentioned that Christians should not be voting for bigger government. We don’t want universities to get taxpayer money that has no strings attached. They should have to please customers instead of getting taxpayer money with no accountability.
In his second article, French lists some ideas for getting universities to not discriminate against Christians and conservatives. And maybe he we elect real conservatives, instead of Democrats pretending to be conservatives, then something will be done about it.
