You Can’t Say That! This Is a University!

I sure picked a great day to travel to Chicago for the 50th anniversary of the Philadelphia Society, for which I was privileged to be president a few years back.  The theme of this year’s meeting is “The Road Ahead: Serfdom or Liberty?”  To which the answer is: Yes.  Unfortunately.

Even as John notes the politically correct ousting of Brendan Eich as CEO of Mozilla because, as Glenn Reynolds points out, he held the same view about gay marriage as Barack Obama in 2008 rather than the view Dick Cheney held in 2008, this morning the story broke in Boulder that your humble Power Line correspondent is a bigot, an oppressor, and all around bad person:

CU-Boulder student leaders speak out against conservative scholar Steven Hayward

Subhed: Students say they’re concerned by recent statements about sexual harassment, gender identity

By Sarah Kuta

Student leaders at the University of Colorado are speaking out against Steven Hayward, the university’s first-ever visiting scholar in conservative thought, for statements he made in a recent interview and in a blog post.

Chris Schaefbauer, CU Student Government president of student affairs, and Caitlin Pratt, student government director of safety and inclusion, said they’re concerned about Hayward’s “oppressive and discriminatory” ideas.

Schaefbauer and Pratt said statements Hayward made in a March 17 interview on Colorado Public Radio and in an October blog post cause the Boulder campus harm and do not promote inclusivity and respect.

“We realized after thinking about it that somebody had to say something,” Schaefbauer said.

Schaefbauer and Pratt wrote their criticisms of Hayward in an opinion piece published in the Colorado Daily titled Bigotry is not Diversity.”

The student leaders pointed to a post Hayward wrote on the blog Power Line in October titled “Off on a gender-bender,” in which he described his discomfort and confusion after attending an orientation for new faculty members about gender identity.

There’s more in the story, but this is enough for an introduction.  There’s more: the chairman of the Boulder Faculty Assembly says my comments “border” on “hate speech.”  Why stop at the border?  In any case, they’re welcome to fire me if they want.  As good a time as any to let Power Line’s readers know that as of next fall, I’ll be succeeding James Q. Wilson as the Ronald Reagan Distinguished Visiting Professor at Pepperdine University’s Graduate School of Public Policy, with the plan to strike the term “visiting” from the title at some point soon.

And FWIW, this tweet making the rounds this afternoon:

Tabin copy

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