
HATE
SPEECH:
Sacred
Scripture and Church Doctrine
in the Academic
of the Storm
The University of
Illinois at Urbana
Champaign vs. Professor Ken Howell,
the Federalist Papers, Scholarship,
et alia
“Now, see
here ...
despite what James Madison stated in the Federalist Papers
1, I wish to believe otherwise,
and in fact hold it to be not only an effrontery to me were I a pacifist,
but in and of itself an incitement to violence — and must, therefore,
be deemed “hate speech” specifically directed against pacifists. I demand
that we amend the Federalist Papers to reflect this by either
omitting the text or revising it to accommodate pacifists. That failing,
I demand any course on the Federalist Papers be removed from the curricula,
or so taught as to omit or revise this statement, among others, which
I, together with the pacifist community, construe as hate-speech offensive
to pacifists.”
The University of Illinois
at Urbana–Champaign appears to side with me against Madison, the Founding
Fathers, and the Constitution itself. What is more, any professors of
Law who, “violate university standards of inclusivity”,
will be summarily terminated for any breach of this standard that supersedes
every other standard including truth and scholarly objectivity —
even if the university's Academic Staff Handbook states
that faculty "are entitled to freedom in the classroom in developing
and discussing according to their areas of competence the subjects that
they are assigned."
Any takers for a degree in Constitutional Law from the University
of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign?
There is a
queer, if consistent resonance between the above two paragraphs — and
the university's firing of Professor Ken Howell who was brought on board
to teach Introduction to Catholicism and Modern Catholic Thought
— only to be dismissed for doing so:
“My
responsibility on teaching a class on Catholicism is to teach what
the Catholic Church teaches,” Howell said in an interview with The
News-Gazette in Champaign. “I have always made it very, very clear
to my students they are never required to believe what I’m teaching
and they'll never be judged on that.”
2
The reason
for his summary dismissal? He taught authentic Catholic doctrine
concerning homosexual activity as intrinsically sinful and disordered
— a 2000 year old doctrine — that offended the “sensitivities” of a
homosexual student:
“An unidentified
student sent an e-mail to religion department head Robert McKim
on May 13, calling Howell’s e-mail "hate speech.”
The student claimed to be a friend of the offended student. The
writer said in the e-mail that his friend wanted to remain anonymous...“Teaching
a student about the tenets of a religion is one thing,” the student
wrote. “Declaring that homosexual acts violate the natural laws
of man is another.” ... Ann Mester, an associate dean at the College
of Liberal Arts and Sciences, said Howell’s e-mail justified his
firing.” 3
This is both
troubling and frightening. Not only does it violate the free and
critical examination and exchange of ideas upon which the enterprise
of higher education is presumably predicated — as distinct from indoctrination,
or the promotion of “acceptable ideas” — but it makes
ideological coercion a matter of policy. In other words, the
coupling of ideology with policy supersedes the primacy
of education, co-opts it, eventually supplants it, and then rigorously
enforces it. Education, in a word, is the extension of ideology, and
ceases to be the free and critical assessment of ideas. The distinction
between ideas and ideology is more than morphological
— it is stringently punitive. Associate Dean Ann Mester, for one, is
clearly an advocate of this rigorous enforcement.
What is more,
if the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign's principal focus
— as an institution of higher learning — is enforcing “standards
of inclusivity” to the exclusion of historical
and objective truth and refuses to teach what is in fact the case,
and not what it would prefer the case to be, then its academic
credentials are worthless and the diplomas it grants (at least vis-à-vis
the world of actual scholarship) are so many pieces of toilet tissue
on a single ply roll at about $25,000 per sheet. We hope the analogy
does not make you flush ...
This, at least, is the background
for the actual state of affairs — rather than the state of affairs
that we would prefer to be the case. We ourselves would
that the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign turn out scholars
rather than ideologues, that a genuine correspondence exist between
“learning” and primary sources, and that facts superseded sensitivities.
But what we wish were the case really doesn't matter, does it?
After all, we are not employees of the university, and are exempt from
fictions-by-policy.
Sacred Scripture and Church
Doctrine as “Hate Speech”
The most urgent
question at hand is this: does, in fact, the enunciation of an
historical or even a hypothetical doctrine (ecclesiastical or otherwise)
which conflicts with my sensitivities and personal beliefs eo ipso
constitute “hate-speech” because it does not accord with my own sensitivities
or beliefs?
Of course I am free to believe
that the 19th Amendment 3 infringes on my sovereignty
as a male. I may insist that it displeases me, and that its legislative
articulation implicitly makes me a "male chauvinist" with all
the negative connotations and social sanctions that attend it.
Shall I then insist that the 19th Amendment never be invoked in a scholarly
inquiry into Constitutional Amendments? Do I have the right — by “standards
of inclusivity” — to demand that the Amendment be amended to accommodate
my sensitivities as a male? Or that failing, demand that the 19th Amendment
be expunged from any study of Constitutional Law? Shall I deem the primary
source “hate speech” because it implicitly disapproves of (and legally
infringes upon) my presumed male chauvinism? Is the Constitution itself
implicitly a body of “hate-speech”?
That the Catholic Church and
Sacred Scripture teach that homosexual acts are intrinsically and gravely
sinful in all circumstances and at all times is a teaching with an historical
continuity of 2000 years is incontestable. If you dispute this, we suggest
that you return to primary sources” (e.g. Sacred Scripture, and authentic
Catholic teaching) that have apparently been concealed from you “by
policy”. Of course you are free to believe that Holy Scripture
and Catholic Doctrine do not teach this. You are also free to believe
that the Moon is made of Green Cheese. Neither, however, are corroborated
by primary sources. It may enrage you that astronomical research and
empirical evidence reveal that the Moon is composed of basalt rock and
other minerals rather than Green Cheese. It infringes upon your illusions
and “damages” your childish imagination — so much so, that you go to
the head of the Physics Department at the University of Illinois at
Urbana–Champaign and proclaim your indignation and your insistence that
such things, damaging to your sensitivity and that of others who choose
to believe that the Moon is made of Green Cheese, be excluded from study,
and that any faculty member who indulges in primary sources be dismissed
for transgressing “standards of inclusivity”.
In the real world (that is
to say, the world outside the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign
— and other green-clad pretensions to disinterested learning), you
would be dismissed as cognitively-impaired and quite possibly insane.
But at the Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, your “sensitivities” — not
your academic aptitude — would prevail, and any study of the Moon would
systematically exclude any suggestion that its composition is anything
other than Green Cheese. Of course you can believe what you wish,
— but wishing it does not make it so.
Any volunteers for the next
Space Shuttle with a graduate in Physics from the University of Illinois
at Urbana–Champaign behind the Cheese Wheel?
Geoffrey K. Mondello
Editor
Boston Catholic Journal
Printable PDF Version
Comments? Write us:
editor@boston-catholic-journal.com
_____________________________
1
“Is the power of
declaring war necessary? No man will answer this question in the
negative. It would be superfluous, therefore, to enter into a proof
of the affirmative.” James Madison, Federalist Papers No.
41
2 http://www.foxnews.com/us/2010/07/09/university-illinois-instructor-fired-catholic-beliefs/
3 “The right of citizens of the United
States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States
or by any State on account of sex.” (19th Amendment.)

Totally Faithful to the Sacred
Deposit of Faith entrusted to the Holy See in
Rome
“Scio
opera tua ... quia modicum habes virtutem, et servasti
verbum Meum, nec non negasti Nomen Meum”
“I
know your works ... that you have but little power,
and yet you have kept My word, and have not denied My
Name.”
(Apocalypse 3.8)
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