University of Colorado Professor fired over Essay comparing 9-11 victims to Nazis

nods, which is why I'm ok with it in my initial post.

 

I don't think the right to Free Speech means you can't get fired for what you say. It just means the government can't shut you up.

Also, anyone ever consider that he was fired for being an ass? Maybe his bosses just didn't like him anymore, didn't feel he was contributing positively to the university and found a reason to can him. It happens all of the time.

 

In most cases yes, but academia is a unique animal. The idea of firing someone on speech grounds is in contradiction to the very idea of tenure. Free speech and the ability to say and research what you want is the core of academic freedom and this freedom is the heart of universities and institutions of higher learning.

Academia is supposed to function like an oasis, where researchers are free from any outside pressure and hence have the ability to do any work that they want to do. Regulating speech effectively kills that unique characteristic and would be IMO a bad move.

 

That is the crux of the debate. Hopefully all of us non-cavemen agree academia is indeed unique. But does tenure 100% inoculate people from any accountability whatsoever for their words, no matter how those words affect the university that employs them?

 

Tenure doesn't innoculate them completely as while the university can't fire a professor publishers might not want to publish them, they might not get grants and they might not be invited to speak.

 

I can live with that...