Heres my current stance. Im not saying this is final, and Im not claiming that anyone should particularly care. Im open to being corrected and educated. 1. If the characterisation of the student protest as largely non-disruptive, and mainly consisting of first sitting in, and then jointly walking out at a pre-determined time, then I think this is clearly an acceptable form of protest. 2. I remain convinced that the consumer / provider model of student -- faculty relations is not useful here (even though I agree, that relationship obtains _as well_). Students have a responsibility to uphold and support a universitys efforts to educate and carry out research. I take academic freedom to belong in the sphere of considerations relevant to these goals, and so I think Leiter is correct that academic freedom is _relevant_ to the evaluation of the student protest. But I think that, given that the students didnt prevent the class from continuing in a meaningful fashion, academic freedom is clearly overridden here by other concerns. 3. I also think Leiter is correct that due process concerns clearly are relevant here. 4. Ludlows reply (if the one Ive read is not fake) makes it even clearer that there are due process concerns here. 5. Im surprised that Ludlow did not take legal action to try to compel the university to carry out the investigative procedures that are outlined in his reply. This is a smidge suspicious to me, given that (it appears) he certainly has the means and general inclination to do so. But I dont place much weight on this suspicion. 7. I think that _none of the above_ forces a stance on the question of whether the Universitys response, given its findings, were proportionate. I am disinclined to characterise the steps taken as a slap on the wrist (as is Leiter), but this is a merely verbal dispute. 8. It is perhaps possible that the Universitys reaction partially reflects not only what it concluded had happened, but the certainty with which those conclusions were held.
Posted on: Sun, 09 Mar 2014 00:46:36 +0000
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