A nonprofit organization is calling on Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota, to be stripped of its accreditation after an adjunct professor was dismissed after displaying an image of Muhammad while instructing an art history class.
“The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) has garnered the support of thousands of educators and concerned citizens, in the wake of Hamline University's decision to fire an art professor who reportedly showed an image of Islam's prophet Muhammad in class.
Through personal letters and social media posts, more than a thousand people have joined in the campaign to convince Hamline University, based in St. Paul, Minnesota, to reverse its decision of terminating the art professor.
In addition, FIRE has condemned Hamline for hiding any social media posts criticizing the school's termination move.
In a statement, FIRE also requested the university ‘immediately reinstate the instructor and reaffirm its commitment to academic freedom’ and formally respond to its call to action by January 9th — a date that has since expired.
Consequently, the organization will reportedly exhibit a mobile billboard throughout the university's campus, speaking out against the notion of artistic censorship and limited freedom of expression.
In its response to claims of ‘Islamophobia’ and limiting First Amendment rights, Hamline said in a statement that its ‘respect for the observant Muslim students in that classroom should have superseded academic freedom’.
FIRE countered by arguing that Hamline violated the instructor's academic freedom, and also helped foster a ‘chilling effect’ among the other faculty, who may now choose to ‘avoid discussion of difficult subjects’, rather than risk nonrenewal if someone complains.
‘Hamline has both violated the academic freedom of this instructor by nonrenewing them for their pedagogically relevant teaching and created an impermissible chilling effect among all faculty, who may choose to censor their teaching rather than face nonrenewal’, read the FIRE statement”. -Jay Clemons, Newsmax
Yet another example of free speech advocates being utterly petty and unwise. Why on earth would anyone expect any university to continue to employ an adjunct staff member who was too stupid to avoid having a fatwa issued on him or herself for foolishly drawing an image of Mohammad in an art class?
The so-called free speech absolutists demanding immunity against every form of religious blasphemy would deliberately ignore and even go as far as to defend disemploying people for racism, sexism, xenophobia, antisemitism, and Holocaust denial.
I strongly presume that the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression would hesitate to raise a fuss over a history professor getting fired for questioning the validity of the supposed extermination camps during the Holocaust or someone like Dr. Larry Summers getting fired from being the president of Harvard for claiming that men outperform women at maths and sciences because of biological difference such as men having approximately six and a half times the amount of gray matter related to general intelligence than women.
And for those claiming that “It’s just a drawing”, does anyone truly believe there would be any nonprofit organizations willing to speak out against the call to fire the professor if the illustration in question featured something like this instead of the Muslim prophet?
