Commentary: Academic freedom matters even for jerks

ST. LOUIS Mike Adams is a tenured associate professor of criminology at the University of North Carolina-Wilmington. He is also a regular contributor to TownHall.com, and the author of such august tomes as Feminists Say the Darndest Things: A Politically Incorrect Professor Confronts Womyn on Campus and Welcome to the Ivory Tower of Babel. He seems to me, in his public writings and attitudes, to be a virulently right-wing jerk.

Mike Adams is also extraordinarily popular among students, and he has many peer-reviewed scholarly publications. Nonetheless, Adams application for promotion to full professor in 2006 was allegedly denied on the basis of his public engagement. Despite my distaste for Adams dumb ideas about feminism, diversity and homosexuality, Im glad that Adams sued the university, and am delighted that last month he won, in an important ruling that (for now) preserves a vestige of academic freedom in this country.

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Commentary: Academic freedom matters even for jerks