John McAdams, the Marquette University associate professor of political science who posted demonstrably false and damaging statements about philosophy graduate student Cheryl Abbate and her teaching on his blog (see here, here, and here), has been told that the university is starting the process to revoke his tenure and fire him.
The Dean of Marquette’s Klingler College of Arts and Sciences, Richard Holz, sent a letter to McAdams explaining the decision and its basis, condemning his “unilateral, dishonorable and irresponsible decision to publicize the name of our graduate student” and his “decision to publish information that was false and materially misleading about her and your University colleagues.” He writes:
[Y]our conduct clearly and substantially fails to meet the standards of personal and professional excellence that generally characterizes University faculties. As a result, your value to this academic institution is substantially impaired.
Tenure and academic freedom carry not only great privileges but also vital responsibilities and obligations. In order to endure, a scholar-teacher’s academic freedom must be grounded on competence and integrity, including accuracy “at all times,” a respect for others’ opinions, and the exercise of appropriate restraint. Without adherence to these standards, those such as yourself invested with tenure’s power can carelessly and arrogantly intimidate and silence the less-powerful and then raise the shields of academic freedom and free expression against all attempts to stop such abuse.
As applied in the current case, it is vital for our university and our profession that graduate student instructors learn their craft as teachers of sometimes challenging and difficult students. Great teachers develop over time; many benefit from experienced mentors who share hard-earned insights. Thus, graduate student instructors should expect appropriate and constructive feedback in order to improve their teaching skills.
Multiple internal avenues of review were available to you if you believed a situation had occurred between a graduate student instructor and an undergraduate student that called for a corrective response. Instead, you chose to shame and intimidate with an Internet story that was incompetent, inaccurate, and lacking in integrity, respect for other’s opinions, and appropriate restraint.
The University has called McAdams out on misleading his readers about what happened in Ms. Abbate’s class, her interactions with the undergraduate who secretly recorded her, and even in his claim that the undergraduate dropped the course. Holz continues:
Had you exercised due care and standards of professional responsibility in keeping with University faculty, you would have found that critical information was stated falsely and/or omitted in your blog post. By way of example, you implied that as a result of the exchange you had recounted the student had dropped the class. You wrote as follows in your November 9 blog post: “She went on: ‘In this class, homophobic comments, racist comments, will not be tolerated.’ She then invited the student to drop the class. Which the student is doing.”
That is false. As you knew or should have known [redacted], the student told the University three days after withdrawing that he had done so because he was getting an “F” at mid-term. He further specifically agreed that his grade fairly reflected his performance and had nothing to do with his political or personal beliefs.
Similarly, by leaving out any reference to Ms. Abbate’s follow-up class discussion in which she acknowledged and addressed the student’s objection to gay marriage, you created a false impression of her conduct and an inaccurate account of what occurred. You either were recklessly unaware of what happened in the follow-up class, or you elected not to include these facts in your Internet story.
Likewise, when you criticized the Department Chair for not taking action — “The chair, Nancy Show [sic], pretty much blew off the issue.” — you once again either were recklessly unaware that the student did not give Dr. Snow the same information he gave you—namely a tape of the conversation—or again you elected not to include these facts in your Internet story. Further, in asserting that the Department Chair “pretty much blew off the issue,” you either were recklessly unaware of, or you ignored, the fact that two days after meeting with the Chair, the student wrote to thank her and the Assistant Chair for their time and attention to his concerns: “I would like to thank you for the time you devoted to my complaint on Tuesday, in both of our meetings. I would like you to know that I intend to heed your advice and stay enrolled in the course. Thank you again for your time, and I wish you nothing but the best of luck with your research…”
Moreover, you stated in your Internet story only that the College of Arts & Sciences “sent” the student to the Department with his complaint. Once again you either were recklessly unaware of, or you ignored, the fact that the student was expressly told he could come back to the College if he was “dissatisfied” with how the Department handled his concerns.
For these and other reasons that follow you have done a great disservice to Marquette, its faculty, students and alumni.
Interestingly, Holz recounts previous incidences in which McAdams disclosed the names of students on his blog to ill effect, and about which he had been reprimanded by the University, arguing that McAdams knew that by posting Ms. Abbate’s name, he would be encouraging an abusive campaign against her. He writes:
Instead of being an example of academic excellence and competence as a tenured, senior faculty member, your inaccurate, misleading and superficial Internet story lacked any measure of the due diligence we expect from beginning students.
Instead of being a mentor to a graduate student instructor learning her craft- including how to deal with challenging students -you took the opportunity publicly to disparage her, in a manner that resulted in her personal safety being put at risk, and you did so without knowing key facts surrounding the events about which you wrote.
Instead of respecting Marquette’s objectives to develop graduate student instructors and to process student complaints properly, you wrote your story without first checking with any of your colleagues about what the student had told them.
Instead of listening to Marquette’s repeated requests and cautions not to put student names on the Internet, you applied your own inconsistent rationalizations about whose privacy is entitled to protection. Based upon your years of Internet postings, you knew or should have known that your Internet story would result in vulgar, vile, and threatening communications to Ms. Abbate.
And instead of recognizing Ms. Abbate as a person to be treated respectfully and with dignity, you used her as a tool to further your agenda.
Your Department Chair recently detailed for the Dean of Arts & Sciences how your conduct has contributed to a culture of intolerance, threatened the practice of academic freedom, and often targeted women and those “in a lower position of power in academic standing at Marquette” than yourself. It thus is the consensus of your Department peers that you do significant damage to the University community.
While you claim simply to be ensuring the exercise of academic freedom, your irresponsible conduct has the opposite effect. The AAUP’s 1994 Statement on Freedom of Expression and Campus Speech Codes stressed the faculty’s major role in preserving the freedom of thought and expression that is essential to any institution of higher learning: “their actions may set examples for understanding, making clear to their students that civility and tolerance are hallmarks of educated men and women.”
By contrast, your conduct creates fear in your colleagues and students that their actions and words will, at your unilateral “discretion,” be put on the Internet in a distorted fashion. Consequently, faculty members have voiced concerns about how they could become targets in your blog based upon items they might choose to include in a class syllabus. Your conduct thus impairs the very freedoms of teaching and expression that you vehemently purport to promote. Again, the AAUP has called upon University governing boards and administration to exercise their “special duty not only to set an outstanding example of tolerance, but also to challenge boldly and condemn immediately serious breaches of civility.”
For all of the above reasons, your value as a member of Marquette’s tenured faculty has been seriously and irreparably impaired.
There is a brief article about these developments at the Marquette Wire.
UPDATE: Inside Higher Ed reports on the story here.
This is an absolutely chilling attack on academic freedom, and I hope the philosophy community will condemn it as such.
It is nothing of the kind. McAdams is not being disciplined because of his research, his teaching, his academic views, nor his political views. He is being disciplined because he recklessly, libelously, and obnoxiously used students and colleagues at Marquette in an attempt to advance his own agenda.
The real chilling attack on academic freedom is the misogynist abuse that Cheryl was subjected to as a direct, foreseeable consequence of John McAdams’s false and defaming statements that he *repeatedly* spread about her (not just on his blog, but to any right wing news source that would listen). She has shared the horrifying emails and online mob attacks against her on her blog: https://ceabbate.wordpress.com/2015/01/20/gender-based-violence-responsibility-and-john-mcadams/. To say that Marquette’s decision to fire McAdams is an “attack on academic freedom” is to imply that tenured faculty have the “right” or “freedom” to spread false and defaming statements about graduate students at their own university (which predictably will lead to violent responses). I hope we can all agree that strong action should be taken against tenured faculty who act as McAdams has and that “academic freedom” should be limited when a graduate student’s reputation is wrongly jeopardized and her safety is threatened. Thankfully, there is at least one university that is taking the safety of women graduate students seriously. Good job Marquette!
I hope other university admins follow Marquette’s lead.
I think we should always be a bit wary when a tenure revocation comes up as academic freedom (and extra mural activities) deserve and require considerable latitude.
However, the case seems pretty prima facie reasonable and is hitting the right bits: 1) he published stuff that was factual yet false (about multiple people and situations), and knowably so by him, 2) his publication of the falsity had predictably harassing effects on a student, 3) it was part of a pattern for which he’d been warned in various ways about before, and 4) there’s no attempt to mitigate the harmful effects of his publication or to effect his “criticisms” in other ways that would be less damaging.
Given that the behaviour was severe enough to cause a student to leave, that seems to meet a severity status sufficient to raise tenure revocation. Since it’s part of a pattern which he robustly defends, it seems like alternative measures are unlikely to be effective to curtail the behaviour or mitigate the effects thereof. So, sadly, if the elements are shown (which it’s hard to see how they won’t be from the public and admitted record alone), it seems like a revocation will happen and be justified.
Which is sad, but good.
This is pretty shocking.
I can see that a case compatible with academic freedom could be made for firing McAdams, on fairly narrow and specific grounds. Academic freedom doesn’t license intentional and harmful dishonesty, and possibly also doesn’t license intentional incitement of behaviour by others that collectively amounts to harassment, though I think that’s a more difficult case. (That it’s wildly immoral to incite that behaviour is of course not a difficult case.)
Fragments of that case are contained in Holz’s letter. But it’s wrapped in an overall framework that mixes a cavalier disregard for academic freedom with an Orwellian reconstrual of it. Right at the top we have:
“a scholar-teacher’s academic freedom must be grounded on competence and integrity, including accuracy at all times, a respect for others’ opinions, and the exercise of appropriate restraint… you chose to shame and intimidate with an Internet story that was incompetent, inaccurate, and lacking in integrity, respect for others’ opinions, and appropriate restraint.”
Accuracy, maybe (though it had better be understood in a narrowly factual sense). But respect for others’ opinions? The exercise of appropriate restraint? Competence? Last time I looked these weren’t part of any sensible construal of freedom of speech.
Then later we’re told that “you wrote your story without first checking with any of your colleagues about what the student had told them”. I don’t think there are any pre-clearance requirements for exercising academic freedom.
Then this: “And instead of recognizing Ms. Abbate as a person to be treated respectfully and with dignity, you used her as a tool to further your agenda.” Which sounds quite correct, and pretty reprehensible on McAdams’ part, but there’s no “using people as means rather than ends” exemption in usual definitions of academic freedom.
And then we finish with two quotes from the AAUP’s “On Freedom of Expression and Campus Speech Codes”, used to justify Marquette’s action
– “[the Faculty’s] actions may set examples for understanding, making clear to their students that civility and tolerance are hallmarks of educated men and women.”
– the AAUP has called upon University governing boards and administration to exercise their “special duty not only to set an outstanding example of tolerance, but also to challenge boldly and condemn immediately serious breaches of civility.”
Both quotes are indeed from the AAUP statement. They’re both calls for speech, not coercion. And they’re items in the list that immediately follows this sentence:
“Moreover, banning speech often avoids consideration of means more compatible with the mission of an academic institution by which to deal with incivility, intolerance, offensive speech, and harassing behavior”. Interpreting the AAUP statements this way is either culpably careless or intentionally dishonest.
I don’t see how it’s possible to read this letter carefully without concluding that Marquette’s administration doesn’t know what academic freedom is, and/or doesn’t care. Remind me never to work there.
First of all, I have read the university’s letter, and -respectfully – it does not make a strong case for libel against the professor – it is a kitchen sink document that will definitely come back to haunt the school because it will have to live with every word in court as will the various professors and administrators who supplied the factual claims recited therein. Particulalrly problematic is that the tape which is the only unassailable item of evidence appears to have been accurately reported upon by McAdams. Second, particularly slimy is the effort to defame the undergraduate student involved, including by featuring his failing grade, etc. The sliming tactic is particularly dumb, since the entire thesis of the letter is that putative students – even those who look and act like professors – require eztraordinary solicitude and reputatational coddling, even when and if they make grave errors. Third, while I hold no brief for the Prof’s political views, I think the university has established a strong case for libel against itself by making absurd claims including to the press that the professor is a potential physical threat to students. Finally, it was a stupendously bad idea to invoke AAUP standarda in support of the employment action, since those standards expressly protect the “extramural” expression at issue. Personally, I question the substantive merits those standards in some respects. They are the reason Salaita would have been potebtially been protected – at least under the AAUP standards if not law – to engage in personal and group libels if he had in fact been an academic employee. Here Marquette is implicitly conceding that the standards apply, even as it audaciously violates them.
Hi David,
I think it was. But even there, it’s possible to take an acceptable academic position which is anti-factual honesty. It’s just hard to so so well without straying into academic malpractice.
Respect for others’ opinions is a tricky one, but appropriate restraint and esp competence seem related to academic freedom (though not necessarily freedom of speech). Incompetence at teaching, admin, or research is not itself protected by academic freedom, though it’s best to construct competence in a very restricted way. E.g., clearly never showing up for class is a strong form of incompetence. But we have to allow for SOME content related judgements of content. If I *can’t* correctly integrate a formula that is a first year calculus textbook easy problem, I don’t get to claim academic freedom as a defines of that inadequate per se (I might claim that my interests have shifted, but if I use integration in my research or teach calculus, then I’m in trouble).
I think you misread this: It’s not saying “pre clear” but “do due diligence”. Check with colleagues about *what the student told them* instead of presuming it or going with what the student told you. That seems unexceptional.
Er…research on human beings has to be cleared with an IRB and past ethical muster. As just one example. In any case, I don’t think that alone would suffice but 1) he (potentially) had mentorship duties or other duties of care toward any student, 2) he was factually careless, and 3) faculty have a general duty to promote a reasonable learning environment. Actually, I suspect there’s some FERPA issues involved.
As for the AAUP statements, I have to think so more. And read the whole letter (I didn’t realise we had more than excerpts).
This much is clear to me as a nonacademic observing events like: (i) Leiter’s and the AAUP’S anger at U of I administrators for denying Salaita a job opportunity after he blogged about Israel’s purported joy in killing children, (II) Leiter’s threat of legal action for a blog post that he viewed as an (extremely) veiled personal criticism of him, and (iii) now the solicitude of many academics, if not active endorsement, for the firing of Mcadams (not to be fair, by Leiter) for being a right wing gadfly and all around pain in the behind — well I guess consistency is the hobgoblin of . . . . For my (nonacademic) part, I am happy that the Salaita and Mcadams cases are going to head to the legal realm – simply because it will remove the cases from an academic echo chamber in which personal vocational concerns and political alleigances apparently (though to be fair somewhat understandably) have impaired the exercise of analytic abilities by many concerned . If the Mcadams and Salaita cases do go to federal court, they may end up before the very same appellate court on which the two greatest academic judges sit – U of C professors Posner and Easterbrook. It would be funny if either of them end up writing a decision in one of these cases. At least each of them writes very well.
Anonymous Lawyer, surely one can have a split judgement between Salaita and McAdams without it being problematic. The cases differ quite a bit (e.g., Salaita’s were wholly extra-mural and whereas McAdams fall into some slightly odd area; Salaita has had no due process, while McAdams is being afforded due process, etc.).
I’m prepared to believe that revoking McAdams tenure would be incorrect either on the direct merits of the case or because of chilling, but the case isn’t entirely bonkers on its face, as far as I can tell.
I have so far seen at least four distinct ways of framing this situation, each leading to very different ethical and legal implications:
1. This is a matter of free speech: Under the U.S. Constitution, and all else being equal, McAdams ought not to be constrained from writing or saying whatever he wants.
2. This is a matter of academic freedom: In order to foster open, critical inquiry, McAdams ought not to be constrained from writing or saying whatever he wants.
3. This is a matter of civility: Those engaged in free intellectual inquiry or in deliberation in the public square ought to treat one another with respect and decorum.
4. This is a matter of professional responsibility: Someone in a position of power and authority is obligated to be mindful and careful of those within the same institutional structure who are subordinate or vulnerable.
I have a feeling I’ve missed a few, including some subheadings under one or another of the above.
My own take on the McAdams case is still forming, as I discover more about it. My current inclination is to cast this as a matter of professional responsibility, above all: I wonder whether McAdams has been culpably reckless in his treatment of a graduate student at his institution, in relation to whom he is in a position of power. I am also inclined to think that, if he can indeed be held to have been reckless and unprofessional, it would trump any claim to academic freedom, just as it would in the case of other kinds of unprofessional conduct, such as plagiarism.
I think David W nails it, and I share his concerns: Its possible there is a case to be made against McAdams here, but the letter is pretty shocking in its disregard for academic freedom, and we all ought to be damn careful about rejoicing in this.
I also agree that one could have a split judgment between Salaita and McAdams, but not on the basis of that letter. If all the presupposition of the letter, that “respect for the opinion of others and appropriate restraint” are relevant standards, then Salaita is SOL.
Look closely at the letter:
Had you exercised due care and standards of professional responsibility in keeping with University faculty, you would have found that critical information was stated falsely and/or omitted in your blog post. By way of example, you implied that as a result of the exchange you had recounted the student had dropped the class. You wrote as follows in your November 9 blog post: “She went on: ‘In this class, homophobic comments, racist comments, will not be tolerated.’ She then invited the student to drop the class. Which the student is doing.”
That is false. As you knew or should have known [redacted], the student told the University three days after withdrawing that he had done so because he was getting an “F” at mid-term. He further specifically agreed that his grade fairly reflected his performance and had nothing to do with his political or personal beliefs.
This part of the letter is supposed to be a central example of what the professor did wrong. But, it doesn’t demonstrate any falsehood on McAdams’ part. McAdams claimed the student was dropping the class, which the student did. McAdams’ other claims in the first paragraph and the information in the second paragraph are quite compatible. The student could have been lectured for inappropriate comments and been invited to drop the class, but also had been failing the class and chose to drop the class due to his performance. There is no contradiction here. Where’s McAdams big lie? The University better have a good lawyer, because they need to make a better case than this.
Ye, one can split hairs. Heck, I do that for a living.
One thing though, if you think Mcadams has received due process to date, your definition thereof accords with that of the House Committee on Unamerican Activities.
Anonymous Lawyer @9: on what grounds do you think McAdams might sue, and if he sues, might prevail?
Why must termination be the penalty for McAdams’ conduct rather than some less draconian punishment? Those of us who support tenure and academic freedom ought, I think, to support termination only as a last resort. I realize that, according to Holz’ letter, McAdams has been “warned” in the past about publishing students’ names. However, (a) I cannot see why that activity is, in itself, objectionable, (b) even if it were morally objectionable, it seems pretty clearly within McAdams’ academic and free speech rights, and (c) no formal adjudication of the previous events occurred.
I hope it goes without saying that I am not defending McAdams’ conduct nor unconcerned about the abuse to which Ms. Abbate was subjected by the more unhinged of McAdams’ readers.
(It is, by the way, worth reading the letter from Holz in its entirety. The transcript of the recorded conversation reveals that Abbate’s conception of the bounds of appropriate philosophical discussion is depressingly narrow.)
One of the reasons Marquette gives in moving to fire McAdams is that he had been warned before about the sort of thing
Page 14 of the Dean’s letter (https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B4jS38HQ3f8dSDhNX1FQRnlpcTQ/edit?pli=1) mentions this 2011 blog post, in which he PRINTS THE NAME OF THE UNDERGRADUATE WOMAN he emailed (with signature line “Department of Political Science / Marquette Warrior blog”) and then CALLED AT HOME about her role in the MU Vagina Monologues. And then BLOGS ABOUT HOW TO FIND HER PHONE NUMBER. http://mu-warrior.blogspot.com/2011/03/marquette-warrior-blogger-harassed-by.html
So is this academic freedom or harassment? You could say here that the phone call was harassment it seems to me.
But what about the misogynist emails Abbate received? McAdams didn’t write them. I have to say I find that pretty thin gruel in the age of internet misogyny. I daresay commenters who claim only direct responsibility holds here would not themselves enjoy the experience of having their female friends virtually doxxed in a way that reasonable predicts the sort of treatment McAdams’ targets received.
Despite all this, I would have preferred punishment of McAdams short of beginning the firing process.
1. Anonymous Lawyer writes that: “particularly slimy is the effort to defame the undergraduate student involved, including by featuring his failing grade”; I am not sure why Anon Lawyer believes that Marquette meant to “defame” the undergraduate student, given that the letter from the Dean was meant to be a *private* document that John McAdams took it upon himself to share with the public. In case anyone else is confused: defamation requires 1) that the “defaming” statement be false, and 2) that the statement be made in order to damage one’s character. First, the statement about the student’s grade presumably is not a lie. Second, since the identity of the student is unknown, I am not sure how his reputation can be damaged. As a side note, the information about the student’s grade is completely relevant given the student explicitly told someone from the Marquette administration that the reason *why* he dropped Abbate’s class is because of his grade. On his blog, McAdams clearly insinuates that the reason the student dropped the class was because Abbate is “intolerable” because of her so-called “uber-liberalness.” That, anon lawyer, is defamation.
2. Anonymous Lawyer adds: “{Marquette] has established a strong case for libel against itself by making absurd claims including to the press that the professor is a potential physical threat to students”; yet, it’s clear that McAdams IS a physical threat to Marquette students given the history he has of inciting misogynist violence against both women undergraduate students and graduate students at Marquette. If you think that the rape threats that Ms Abbate received, which were a direct, foreseeable consequence of McAdams’s inaccurate reporting and defaming statements about Abbate, do not constitute a real threat then… shame one you (for lack of better words). I am just astounded and deeply troubled that there are academics and lawyers out there who continue to act as though the safety of Ms Abbate was not jeopardized because of McAdams’s actions, especially when she has taken the time to provide the public with numerous examples of the misogynist violence she was met with. It is no wonder that violence against women is so widespread in our society when there are presumably “informed” and “educated” individuals dismissing the reality or seriousness of it when it is right in front of their faces.
I will close by saying this: when I see comments such as the ones from the first commenter “This is an absolutely chilling attack on academic freedom, and I hope the philosophy community will condemn it as such” (and the 17 “likes it has at this point), it makes me truly appalled to know that I am part of a profession whose members are willing to prioritize a tenured male’s freedom of speech over the safety of women graduate students and their reputation.
I have mixed thoughts about this. But one thought that is not mixed is that people should quit jumping up to laud Marquette. Marquette had the opportunity when this broke to support Abbate against McAdams in a public way that enabled her to continue at Marquette and made clear that McAdams’s shenanigans were vile. This does not look like anything near the best way for universities to deal with cases of this sort.
Hi Bob, I think your categories are pretty good. One twist is that the letter asserts that McAdams is somehow damaging other people’s academic freedom by engaging in mob harassment. I’m not sure what to think about that, but something seems off about it.
Eric, there are several things in the letter that support a split judgement: Salaita’s comments were whole extramural and independent of his campus role; Salaita didn’t target any individual member of campus; there was no mob attacking any individual as a foreseeable result of the tweet (except perhaps Salaita himself); the locus of concern (teaching) has counter evidence; finally, you could think that Salaita ought to removed, but clearly his due process rights were ignored. Also, apparently McAddams has made factual errors and been warned about naming students. Salaita may have expressed strong opinions, but, afaik, there’s nothing factual in dispute.
I think the letter isn’t awesome, but I don’t think “respect for the opinion of others and appropriate restraint” are the foundation of the case.
Hi Carnap:
“Why must termination be the penalty for McAdams’ conduct rather than some less draconian punishment? Those of us who support tenure and academic freedom ought, I think, to support termination only as a last resort.”
I think a less draconian punishment should certainly be considered (as does John). I do think there’s a prima facie case for revocation, but I’m not sure there’s a good all things considered case.
“(It is, by the way, worth reading the letter from Holz in its entirety. The transcript of the recorded conversation reveals that Abbate’s conception of the bounds of appropriate philosophical discussion is depressingly narrow.)”
I did read the whole thing, and I don’t think that’s fair at all. If you look how the student started, it’s easy to see how one might not be at one’s best (it was rather hostile and confused and confusing).
Second, her considered reaction, even after the student taped her then lied about it then said they were taking it to here “superiors”, was to have a class discussion about the issue which seemed perfectly reasonable and, indeed, laudable.
David Wallace says:
“Accuracy, maybe (though it had better be understood in a narrowly factual sense). But respect for others’ opinions? The exercise of appropriate restraint? Competence? Last time I looked these weren’t part of any sensible construal of freedom of speech.”
This isn’t a free speech issue, for the same reason that Duck Dynasty being taken off the air for a while was not a freedom of speech issue. Marquette’s relationships with it employees is not governed by the same rules that the relationship the state must keep with its citizens. This is an academic freedom issue.
The AAUP says:
“College and university teachers are citizens, members of a learned profession, and officers of an educational institution. When they speak or write as citizens, they should be free from institutional censorship or discipline, but their special position in the community imposes special obligations. As scholars and educational officers, they should remember that the public may judge their profession and their institution by their utterances. Hence they should at all times be accurate, should exercise appropriate restraint, should show respect for the opinions of others, and should make every effort to indicate that they are not speaking for the institution.”
http://www.aaup.org/report/1940-statement-principles-academic-freedom-and-tenure#6
Now the footnote to that section does raise doubts about how this section applies to the case at hand (it says that in general extramural activities should not reflect on their competency), but respect for others’ opinions, exercise of appropriate restraint and competence have been part of the standard account of demands placed on academics since 1940.
@Patrick Mayer:
On “academic freedom” vs “freedom of speech”, I could say something about the intimate relation between them and the use of First Amendment jurisprudence in interpreting contractual academic-freedom clauses, or about how academic freedom and first-amendment rights are special cases of a general principle of freedom of speech – but to be honest I was just varying usage for stylistic reasons, probably unhelpfully.
The AAUP’s material seems to me to make it crystal clear that this would not be the sort of thing they regard as justifying action (and judging by the various correspondences and essays on their blog they seem to agree – http://academeblog.org/tag/john-mcadams/) but as a UK resident I don’t really know anything much about AAUP so I won’t press the point – other than to stress again that Holz’s letter radically misconstrues the point of the AAUP document that he quotes from.
Bijan Parsia,
Thanks for the reply.
[1] I suppose I wouldn’t want my own “conception of X” characterized on the basis of a few comments I might make about X, especially if I were flustered or felt under attack when making the comments. Abbate did clearly suggest that certain views ought not be raised if they might be found offensive and *that* suggestion is what I was concerned about. It may not (and I hope it does not) represent her considered view.
[2] I’m not sure I agree with your second claim. From the text of the letter, it doesn’t appear that Abbate had *a discussion* with the class about the issue, but rather that she “explained to” her class why the student’s concerns were irrelevant to the topic at issue and to be based on a dubious factual claim. (I don’t mean to suggest that she was mistaken in either of these.)
“Second, particularly slimy is the effort to defame the undergraduate student involved, including by featuring his failing grade, etc. The sliming tactic is particularly dumb, since the entire thesis of the letter is that putative students – even those who look and act like professors – require eztraordinary solicitude and reputatational coddling, even when and if they make grave errors.”
Can you say more about how this is slimy or defamatory on the university’s part, considering that this is a private letter to McAdams and not to the general public? This section doesn’t seem like it would be defamatory if it was only serving its initial purpose – to remind McAdams of information that he purportedly already knew. It only becomes defamatory to the student when the information is made public to people who didn’t already know it, and McAdams was the one to make it public. Isn’t the problem that McAdams failed to redact that portion of the letter when making it public?
I’m with John @ 18 (if I’ve understood him correctly): I would also have preferred a substantial punishment of McAdams short of beginning the firing process. Not so much because of any supposed violation of ‘academic freedom’ (of which there is none), but because I think that, if McAdams pursues a civil suit, he will probably win a large settlement, money which Marquette could have better used elsewhere.
That having been said, McAdams is a cyber-bully, and it sounds like he had been warned about just this sort of thing before. Clearly he’s used up whatever patience the administrators had.
Thanks, Bijan. The question of whether McAdams’ conduct might itself have a chilling effect on academic freedom may fall between points 2 and 3 in my earlier comment, with the idea that some basic level of civility is necessary to open academic inquiry.
It occurs to me that there is another way of framing the situation:
5. This is a matter of procedural justice: before serious accusations are made or drastic penalties imposed, the accused has the right of due process, or at least due diligence.
This one cuts both ways, though. McAdams is accused of not exercising due diligence in his posts about the Ms. Abbate’s alleged conduct, and Marquette is effectively being accused of penalizing McAdams without due process.
Has anyone looked into Marquette’s own policies regarding grounds for dismissal of tenured faculty? What would constitute due process in that particular institutional context?
Whatever may be said about academic freedom in general, my understanding is that tenure is a specific set of contractual obligations and/or shared understandings between a particular institution and a particular member of the faculty, though perhaps informed and supported by a wider set of professional norms and practices.
In reviewing some aspects of my own institution’s faculty governance, I’ve recently been reminded of our local procedures in such cases: a tenured member of the faculty who is subject to dismissal due to some alleged misdeed or other is entitled to a pre-dismissal hearing before a panel of peers. But that’s just the way we do things here.
Again, what’s the standard practice at Marquette?
Hi Carnap:
“Abbate did clearly suggest that certain views ought not be raised if they might be found offensive and *that* suggestion is what I was concerned about. It may not (and I hope it does not) represent her considered view”
As was discussed, I think, in an earlier DailyNous story, it’s actually part of Marquette’s policy that “The university is committed to maintaining an environment in which the dignity and worth of each member of its community is respected, it will not tolerate harassment of or by students, faculty, staff and guests or visitors…. Harassment is defined as verbal, written or physical conduct directed at a person or a group based on color, race, national origin, ethnicity, religion, disability, veteran status, age, gender or sexual orientation where the offensive behavior is intimidating, hostile or demeaning or could or does result in mental, emotional or physical discomfort, embarrassment, ridicule or harm.”
Now, I don’t think the mere discussion of gay marriage or the arguments against it would necessarily violate this policy, but if a student came to me with something like that in a pretty clear off topic and weird manner, I might be concerned about their behaviour. I don’t think that interaction was the smoothest, but I also think that it would be reasonable to say, “This class and topic are not about gay marriage per se so since that could be distracting I think we should move to a different topic that allows us to focus on the issue at hand.”
Re how she handled it. Well, it may have been a lecture. It may have been a discussion. This I don’t know. But either way seems to have been perfectly acceptable and respectable way to handle the issue. I don’t see she was required to hold a discussion per se, esp. when, frankly, the students weren’t esp. equipped to handle it (e.g., no pertinent readings, etc.)
Hi Bob,
“This one cuts both ways, though. McAdams is accused of not exercising due diligence in his posts about the Ms. Abbate’s alleged conduct, and Marquette is effectively being accused of penalizing McAdams without due process.”
How is McAdams being penalised without due process? They’ve started the process for revoking tenure, but that *is* the process due, right?
Bob Kirkman at 28: I would think that Marquette is at the beginning of its due process. It has notified McAdams of its intent, and outlined the steps it will take; it also indicates to him the options open to him; further, it CC’ed his lawyer.
Daniel O’Connell, what grounds do you think McAdams has for filing suit?
I think you are probably right about the overall issue. I want this guy punished but I am not sure that revoking tenure is appropriate. My point is more limited. Respect for opinions of others, failure to exercise appropriate restraint, are demands that academic freedom does not shield us from. I thought it was worth bringing up this detail because there is a sentiment, common to places like the comments at the Leiter Report and the meta-blog, that the right to be disrespectful to our opponents is central to sustaining academic discourse. I thought it was worth pointing out that being respectful to people we disagree with is not so extreme a burden, and a demand that most of us are already under.
I apparently cannot put together a coherent thought today. My comment should read “…The demands that we respect the opinions of others, that we not fail to exercise appropriate restraint, and that we show competence, are not demands that academic freedom shields us from…” I am sure there are other mistakes in my comment, but that one was glaring.
Both FIRE and the AAUP support McAdams.
“Particulalrly problematic is that the tape which is the only unassailable item of evidence appears to have been accurately reported upon by McAdams.” Right…contrary to the inaccurate reporting on this website. In any case, you can’t fire a professor for being wrong or for being inconsiderate in his manner of expressing opinions on academic matters in public. A high level administrator I know at another university has observed that Marquette will make McAdams a wealthy man.
I hope this does go to court. Here is the central legal question: Do graduate student teaching assistants lose their student protections upon occupying a teaching role? McAdams alleges that by virtue of Abbate’s position as instructor, she becomes effectively a public face of the university and is therefore subject to public scrutiny. If this is so, then McAdams will have a legitimate claim. If, however, a court finds that graduate instructors do NOT lose student protections, then Marquette’s actions were appropriate and necessary because McAdams betrayed his duty of care to a student (outing a student publicly and subjecting them to public humiliation, abuse, disparagement etc). It’s a fundamental question because universities justify substandard wages for graduate instructors on the grounds that they’re additionally compensated via scholarships and an education. Basically, the reason graduate instructors are paid so poorly is because THEY ARE STUDENTS. If those protections are revoked, the basis of exploitation is undermined. Universities can’t have it both ways. They can’t pay students peanuts to teach because they are students, but then on the other hand suggest that their status as student is revoked upon occupying a teaching role.
@Patrick: I do and don’t agree. I do think that we should usually respect the opinions of others, and I do think that we should usually be restrained and civil in our interactions (I guess that’s what “appropriate restraint” means). And I agree that if I’m just unnecessarily rude, people should call me on it, and “academic freedom!” isn’t a good excuse.
But not everything should be respected, and civility is not always appropriate. Since the assessment of what should be respected and when I should be civil depends on content, whereas academic freedom needs to be content-neutral, academic freedom does mean that I should not be coerced, or punished (other than through more speech), if I don’t show respect and restraint. So in that sense academic freedom does (or should) shield me from the demand that I be restrained and civil, even though I *should* be restrained and civil most of the time.
Put another way: I think the right to be disrespectful to our opponents *is* important (I wouldn’t say central) to sustaining academic discourse. But it is a right that should be exercised with great caution.
This is Marquette protecting academic freedom. He deliberately posted factually inaccurate info on his blog, in full knowledge of the fact that it would sicc a torrent of abusers on the grad student. I have a genuinely hard time seeing how anyone could think McAdams is protected by even the barest semblance of academic freedom; I understand that people posting so here believe it earnestly, but I can’t see even the prima facie plausibility of it. Academic freedom, like all freedoms of speech etc., doesn’t mean freedom from any criticism or consequence for one’s speech. Not to make a bad pun, but the freedom to lie about and bully grad students in a consequence-free way is not a freedom worth wanting.
HK Anderson @39: no one has claimed that McAdams should be free of all criticism or consequence. Several people have said that his speech, shameful though it is, is protected by standards of academic freedom. From the AAUP blog [http://academeblog.org/2015/02/04/marquette-to-fire-john-mcadams-for-his-blog/]:
“One can conclude that McAdams is a terrible journalist, and a terrible person, and that changes nothing about the threat of academic freedom created by this dismissal, and the lack of any basis for it under Marquette’s policies.”
“McAdams’ blog is a classic example of extramural utterances. McAdams’ blog is not part of his teaching or his research. It is an expression of his own opinions.”
Of course one can disagree, but I’m not seeing why this is a crazy view.
Thinking some more, I do wonder whether *merely* having foreseeable consequences of what might be seen as a sort of protest (as awful as it was) is itself either grounds for opening the question of tenure revocation or an exacerbating consideration. For example, if McAdams organised campus rallies to protest the existence of some course he thought was incompatible with Catholicism, it seems that that would be pretty strongly protected. Not infinitely protected of course: If he disrupted the class physically, I think there’s a threshold which would be grounds for various actions by the university (e.g., having him arrested, if it rose to that level). Similarly, it’s not a violation of academic freedom per se to say that some class or topic is worthless (though it is funny ground; note that it seems that some of what let the UNC fake courses continue for 20 years were appeals to the idea that respecting academic freedom means not critiquing a course design). So the question is when do actions which have structural similarity to highly protected activities turn into non protected activities.
I think I prefer bright lines that are way on the permissive side. Otherwise the potential for abuse and chilling is really high.
As with most quantifiers, I think the one implicit in ‘respect the opinions of others’ is restricted. I agree that we should not be respectful and civil to white supremacists. It seems to me though that I have never known a fellow academic who held a view so noxious that they didn’t deserve to be treated respectfully while being told they were wrong. And when I have run into students who have idiotic beliefs (like the one who yesterday told me about how fluoride in water calcifies the pineal gland making us more docile) I have never been in a situation where ‘There isn’t any evidence of that’ worked worse for the purpose of educating them than ‘You are a nitwit’ even when the latter was true. So perhaps we just implicitly restrict this general demand to one that covers the people who we interact with professionally. I don’t think there is a problem saying that Ron Paul is a racist scumbag for example. In this case McAdams was talking about someone with whom he had a loose professional relationship, which makes me think the standard of respect ought to have applied. That it was on a blog makes me a bit uneasy. I don’t like the idea of administration taking what is said in such venues as relevant to our jobs, despite the fact that we can cause harm with what we say in such venues. I think he needs to be punished somehow, though.
Phil Mc,
I agree. I think there’s cases either way. Though the AAUP blog is pretty unambiguous that his action was extramural and strongly protected. The suspension certainly seems completely unjustified, which makes me less confident that the University will proceed with a tenure revocation case properly.
Hmm. Ok, I find the AAUP case pretty convincing. The part I’d like to see addressed is whether this is really perfectly extramural. I see a case that it is and also that critique of the university should be especially protected. I agreed with “Obviously, if any professor could be fired for any kind of alleged inaccuracy in any sentence, public or private, then tenure would be meaningless.”, but presumably this doesn’t entail that *every* kind of alleged inaccuracy is protected. Plagiarism isn’t, for example. I think plagiarism in an extramural activity (e.g., a CS professor ripped off someone else’s novel for their movie treatment) might count against you? This was a big quick by the AAUP, I think.
Interesting.
I feel the need to respond specifically to the message from “Defending Marquette” above, precisely because it is arguments like theirs which are specifically, and in my view wrongly, calculated to shut down debate.
First of all, the fact that there is much discrimination, whether based on race religion, gender or otherwise, in our society does not make it impossible for a white, male, right wing professor to be treated uunjustly. Neither does the existence of such discrimination in the world mean that we – and I mean all of us, but particularly those who have limited institutional power and therefore are particularly vulnerable to injustice – should care only when members of particular groups are the victims of injustice.
Second, I emphatically disagree with the wilfull conflation of publications of words and physical acts. The distinction is foundational to civil society, and giving it up is just not ok. Mcadams wrote a post on a blog, he did not hit anyone. Furthermore, while the law does sometimes allow for punishment of, for example, libelous speexh or harrassing speech in the workplace, that is most certainly not what we are dealing in Mcadams case. And trying make that the case here by attributing anonymous emails that Ms.Abatte received to Mcadams is just fallacious.
Finally as a matter of law: The letter to Mcadams is a publication by the university for defamation purposes, which is what is required to make out a defamation claim. Now I don’t know whether it says untruths about the student, since I don’t know all of the facts. But that is really not the point, at least in my view. The school adminatrators and faculty members who are targeting Mcadams have grounded their attack entirely an the proposition that students need to be protected even when they stumble. Now the undergraduate here is clearly not being protected, he is being quite viciously attacked by his own school. It turns my stomach, and leads to the inextricable conclusion that this is really about protecting professors and professors in training, not students.
Last thing, I am surprised that philosophers have not remarked on the irony that this particular instance of identity politics in the academy arose from a class discussion. On Rawls I am no philosopher, and I have not read Rawls for a couple of decades. But it does seem to me that he would have a real and deep problem with the proposition that whether an act is just or unjust depends largely on the race or gender of the victim.
To expand upon what several others have said: the letter from Marquette very clearly mixes potentially legitimate bases for disciplinary action (e.g., harassment of another university employee and lack of due diligence/misrepresentation of the facts) with the same sort of rhetoric regarding civility that was present in the UIUC dean’s letter regarding the decision not to hire Salaita. Flat-footed endorsement of Marquette’s response will thereby serve to legitimize the latter form of rhetoric. Because of this, I think even the people who do think that McAdams should be fired should still refrain from such flat-footed endorsements.
Anonymous Lawyer,
Well, the student is at least partially protected by not being named. If Marquette named the student, that’d clearly be way over the line.
I’m not clear that the letter between Marquette and McAdams was public or intended to be public. Surely, administrators can discuss frankly things about students without it being a vicious attack. If the student was dropping the course because they were struggling that is a very different situation than if they dropped it because they were shut down. (Of course, it could be both! That would matter.)
But yes, care should be taken to protect the student.
(With respect to hair splitting: I don’t see it’s a hair split, but that there’s a lot of differences between the cases. OTOH, it seems like they both might be on the violation of academic freedom side.)
Finally, I don’t see what irony you’re trying to claim. Whether gay marriage should/can be legal seems to be something you can straight forwarded evaluate on Rawlsian principles (I also think that it’s pretty hard to argue against it from the original position; you’d need something like what is factually unsupported (gay marriage harms straight marriage) or irrelevances (gay marriage doesn’t imply gay adoption; plus gay adoption is fine)). So?
They did name the student, Mcadams redacted the name before republishing the letter.
My point re Salaita is clear. Saying they are different cases is, well, hair splitting. It is what I say to a judge when I have nothing else to say about a case that goes the wrote g way.
On Rawls, if I was being abscure, I apologize. I was not apeaking to whether gay marriage would properly be permitted by rules established from the original position. I think there is a good argument that it would (and maybe that is why Abatte should have welcomed addressing the topic). No I was speaking to the argument that has been advanced by many – including “In Defense of Marquette” that rules of justice should be different, depending upon the race, gender, etc of the accused.
Correction (of myself): the school redacted the name. But that hardly eliminates the sliminess (or to use a legal term, potentially defamatory nature) of their statements about him
Anonymous Lawyer, you say at 45: “On Rawls I am no philosopher, and I have not read Rawls for a couple of decades. But it does seem to me that he would have a real and deep problem with the proposition that whether an act is just or unjust depends largely on the race or gender of the victim.”
Yet at 48 you say: “No I was speaking to the argument that has been advanced by many – including “In Defense of Marquette” that rules of justice should be different, depending upon the race, gender, etc of the accused.”
Those are not at all the same thing. Let’s stick with 45 for now. I am happy with saying that degrees of badness can depend upon the status of victims. Drawing the attention of Stormfront to the name of a black person is worse than drawing the attention of Stormfront to the name of a white student. Do you not agree with that?
MU’s letter is not defamatory/libelous because it wasn’t published. wtf