By Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger

Seems the far Right just can’t stay out of  – or quit throwing – the muck. The Huffington Post reports that  University of Rochester econ professor, Steve Landsburg, has launched his own attack on Georgetown law school student, Sandra Fluke, who had the temerity to speak her mind to a congressional committee discussing contraceptive services.  Landsburg apparently dabbles in English grammar when his dismal graphs and computer models become tiresome. In his off-hours, he seems quite content to edit Rush Limbaugh’s right-wing attack pieces, adding some of his own insights. On his blog he felt compelled to share:

[Limbaugh] wants to brand Ms. Fluke a “slut” because, he says, she’s demanding to be paid for sex. There are two things wrong here. First, the word “slut” connotes (to me at least) precisely the sort of joyous enthusiasm that would render payment superfluous. A far better word might have been “prostitute” (or a five-letter synonym therefor), but that’s still wrong because Ms. Fluke is not in fact demanding to be paid for sex. (Not that there’s anything wrong with that.) She will, as I understand it, be having sex whether she gets paid or not. Her demand is to be paid. The right word for that is something much closer to “extortionist”. Or better yet, “extortionist with an overweening sense of entitlement.” Is there a single word for that?

But whether or not he chose the right word, what I just don’t get is why the pro-respect crowd is aiming all its fire at Rush. Which is more disrespectful — his harsh language or Sandra Fluke’s attempt to pick your pocket?

Seems he may be on to something etymologically speaking but he fails

miserably in the free speech/separation of church-state class. I’d think he’s also getting a “D-” for comprehension in my class. Fluke made no claim on the public funds and instead merely advocated that private insurance cover contraceptive services to further women’s health rather than cater to religious convictions of a particular sect.

While Professor Landsburg doesn’t get it, the University’s students did. Thirty of them dressed in black and made a rather dramatic entry into his classroom passing out summaries of the professor’s musings and then opted to stand between him and his charges staging a pedagogical wall of separation between scorn and student.

Landsburg called security to disband the protest, but the students left of their own accord making their point for both civility and free speech. “We are appalled by how often women and their bodies have been used for political theatrics, and we refuse to remain passive on this issue,” Kelly Rickert, a Rochester student who was a part of the protest, told The Huffington Post. “To do so would be to condone the actions of Professor Landsburg.”

University of Rochester President Joel Seligman acknowledged his employee’s right to the academic freedom to express unpopular opinions but added:

“I am outraged that any professor would demean a student in this fashion,” Seligman said in a statement. “To openly ridicule, mock, or jeer a student in this way is about the most offensive thing a professor can do. We are here to educate, to nurture, to inspire, not to engage in character assassination.”

Well, Dr. Segilman some of you are. On the other hand, seems some in the ivory tower like to attack from the comfort of their office. Landsburg was undeterred, “[Fluke] deserves only to be ridiculed, mocked and jeered,” and “Rush stepped in to provide the requisite mockery” with a “spot-on analogy.” And in one of the most ironic statements I’ve heard from the academe in a long time said of the protestors, “in their contempt for the free exchange of ideas, they appear to be comrades-in-arms of Sandra Fluke.” 

Comrades-in-arms by personal ridicule and thus chilling the free speech of another? In Rochester, it seems it takes one to know one.

In keeping with our academic theme, in a hundred words or less, pick the victim(s) and defend your answer:

a. Sandra Fluke

b. Professor Steve Landsburg

c. The University of Rochester

d. First Amendment

e. Academic Freedom

Source: Huffington Post

~Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger