Fiasco: Marquette Discussion of When Life Begins Has No Abortion Opponent

At any university, a discussion on “When Does Human Life Begin” would be an excellent idea. And at any university, at least somebody on the panel should espouse the view that life begins at conception.  This should be utterly obvious at a Catholic university.

But what happens when a pro-abortion feminist office at a “Catholic” university organizes the discussion? You can guess.

The discussion was sponsored by Marquette for Life, Empowerment (a feminist student organization), the Campus Ministry, and the Marquette University Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies. That latter one is just what it sounds like.

The discussants were Theology professor Conor Kelly and Monique Liston, who is an adjunct instructor of Gender and Sexualities Studies. One might expect a Marquette Theology professor to defend the Catholic position. But he did not. According to the Marquette Wire:

Because the Catholic Church is unable to pinpoint the exact moment personhood begins, Kelly said the church has developed an assumption that human life begins at the moment of conception. He said this is to protect all potential human life.

“In theology, there’s an ongoing conversation about how to identify exactly when personhood begins as a better way of describing not just life in the biological sense, but life in the moral sense,” Kelly said. “The Catholic Church says it doesn’t know when life begins in the sense of personhood.”

Liston, of course, played the race card, and talked about women making “choices.”

Liston said individuals should consider when a soul into enters the body and when a soul leaves the body at the time of death.

She said individuals should recognize the community contexts that contribute to individuals’ views on this topic. Members of the Marquette community are privileged to be given the opportunity to attend a panel like this, she said.

“We’re not on 30th and Wisconsin having this conversation,” Liston said. “We’re on 13th and Wisconsin having this conversation.”

Kelly added that historical implications of race and class continue to impact today’s populations.

“When we kind of see that reality, it very much complicates this picture and puts a lot of the onus, I would say, on our society to rethink what we’re doing and how we can be supportive, even if we want to affirm the autonomy of people to make choices,” Kelly said.

How the “historical implications of race and class” affect when life begins is something she did not explain. Does life begin at some different point for blacks and the poor? Or is blathering about race and class simply a way that the politically correct avoid discussing issues they don’t want to discuss?

As we shall see, Marquette for Life had to distance themselves from the whole affair.

Conor Kelly’s Views

We wondered if Kelly was actually as favorable toward abortion as he seemed, so we wrote him and asked him the following:

It appears you were supposed to “represent” Marquette for Life, and they weren’t happy with your “representation.” I understand that faculty aren’t lobbyists and neither you nor I would agree to “represent” a view other than one we actually hold.

But just a couple of simple questions: do you believe that “elective abortion” (leaving aside rape, incest, etc.) should be legal or illegal?

Do you in fact believe that life begins at conception, or at some other point?

I ask two simple questions because I don’t want to impose by expecting a long explanation of your views. If you’ve written on this, feel free to point me to what you have written.

On the record, unless you tell me otherwise.

Kelly did not respond to our e-mail, nor to a follow up phone call. The reader can infer what this means.

Some light on how Kelly actually feels is found in an article he wrote titled “The Role of the Moral Theologian in the Church: A Proposal in Light of Amoris Laetitia.” From the abstract:

Pope Francis’s apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia recast pastoral decisions in terms of conscience and discernment and asked moral theology to do the same. Such a request invites reforms for moral theology, requiring a shift from the traditional role of the moral theologian as an external judge to a more personalist role as a counselor for conscience. This change entails prioritizing the process of discernment ahead of the definition of rules, specifying the place of the ideal in Catholic morality, and attending to the ethics of ordinary life.

The word “discernment” has a synonym. That synonym is “rationalization.”

Once you decide to junk the rules and “discern” what should be done, it’s almost trivially easy to “discern” that you can have an abortion, or a sex change operation, or a homosexual relationship. “Discernment” is for those people who want to cast off all those nettlesome Catholic rules, and do what they want.

Kelly, of course, can believe what he wants. Dan Maguire has been around Marquette for decades supporting abortion, gay marriage, and all the rest. But nobody would pick Maguire to present a pro-life view on abortion.

Try to imagine, for a moment, how an environmentalist group would feel if they cosponsored a debate on global warming and all the participants hemmed and hawed and expressed all kinds of doubt, with nobody presenting a robust case that the earth faces a possible “climate change” catastrophe.

Marquette For Life Responds

Marquette for Life responded by, in effect, distancing the group from the entire affair. In a statement they noted that the event “seemed to cause more confusion than it did clarity.” They made it clear that “the faculty assigned to represent us” in fact did not. They insisted that “human life begins at conception.”

What Was Marquette for Life Thinking?

Good for Marquette for Life. But we have to ask, what were they thinking allowing people who flatly reject Catholic moral views to organize an event they co-sponsored?

Let’s begin with Empowerment. These are the students who vandalized an anti-abortion protest in the fall of 2016. Not only did they vandalize it, they were proud of the act, and demanded that Marquette refuse to allow such a display in the future. Marquette gave them a minor slap on the wrist for their vandalism.

They issued a bitter, intolerant screed, objecting to conservative Ben Shapiro speaking on campus.

The “Gender” Center

The Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies is another hotbed of political correctness. The first clue is obvious on their list of staff: each one lists her “preferred pronouns.”

The Director, one Angelique Harris, was a member of a study group of leftist feminists who supported cop-killer Assata Shakir, and planned to meet to discuss the deep thoughts of communist Angela Davis, and an essay on “The Whiteness of Police.”

Another staffer, one Chrissy Nelson, tried to undermine the talk of Ben Shapiro by advising people who disliked Shapiro to get a ticket, and not show up, depriving people who wanted to see him of an opportunity. This at the suggestion of an (unidentified) “director of diversity.”

How did Angelique Harris punish her when her plan was revealed? She was “repremanded” and remained on the staff.

And just who led the vandalizing of the anti-abortion display in the fall of 2016? Yet another Center staffer, Brianna Hawkins.

The Center is, quite simply, a center of politically correct intolerance.

A Lesson

Hopefully, Marquette for Life has learned a lesson. Don’t team up with people who despise all that you stand for, and probably hate you.

But at a genuinely Catholic university, an anti-abortion student group should not have to learn that lesson. Yes, there might be people who would disagree with them, and there might be debate and discussion. But in a genuinely Catholic university, they would have allies among the campus bureaucrats who would help see that their view was, at least, heard.

Stunning Success: Ben Shapiro at Marquette

It was an event the campus left hated: Ben Shapiro, an actual conservative speaker at Marquette.

Not only did a staffer from the Center for Gender and Sexuality Studies attempt to sabotage the event by advising leftists to get tickets and not show up (depriving a student who wanted to see the speech of admittance), but the campus feminist group Empowerment circulated a deranged letter accusing Shapiro of racism, xenophobia and hateful rhetoric.

But in fact, the event went off without a hitch.

Given the history of leftist mobs disrupting Shapiro events, it seemed that extra security would be needed. Initially, Marquette suggested that the Young Americans for Freedom, the group staging the event, would have to pay for the extra security. A terrible idea, this tactic (often used by universities hostile to conservative speech) amounts to a tax on any speech the campus left dislikes. Happily, Marquette backed down.

There were private security people at the event (paid by Marquette) and several of the campus police. Further, Shapiro has his own body guard. And the security people were instructed to remove anybody who caused any major disruption — in marked contrast to many universities where leftists are allowed to shut down events with impunity.

So far, two news outlets have published stories on the talk:

• Marquette Wire
• Channel 6 Milwaukee

Shapiro addressed various bogus liberal themes. For example, poverty. If you don’t want to be in poverty, he said, do three things: (1) don’t have babies until you are married, (2) finish high school, and (3) get a job. Sound social science, but not things the left wants to hear.

But according to Shapiro “facts don’t care about your feelings.”

Invited Questions from Leftists

Shapiro answered questions for an extended period, and especially invited questions from leftists. Several leftists challenged him, all in a civil way. And Shapiro, who is often caustic in his speeches, responded in an earnest and respectful way.

In an epic exchange, one leftist challenged Shapiro about “institutional racism.” Shapiro responded by demanding to know what that means, and offered to fight it, if the questioner could specify exactly what should be fought. The questioner could not, an implicit admission that he had accepted vague rhetoric in the absence hard facts or analysis.

To his credit, this same leftist told Channel 6 that “By the end of the back and forth, I think we both had been respectful. I think we both learned something.”

Extremely gracious, Shapiro accepted requests from questioners to shake his hand and even to have a selfie made with him.

Conclusion

All this, of course, is exactly the sort of discourse that ought to take place on a college campus. But it is significant that a conservative student group, and not the Marquette administration, arranged it.

All that the Marquette administration has produced is the dour, race baiting moralists.

The contrast is stunning.

In the News: Marquette Staffers Plot to Sabotage Ben Shapiro Speech

We have already blogged about media coverage of a plot, by a staffer in the Center for Gender and Sexuality Studies, and an (unidentified) “director of diversity” to sabotage a speech on campus by Ben Shapiro by having leftists each grab one of the limited number of tickets, and then not show up, depriving an interested student of an opportunity to see the speech.

It seems the issue continues to have “legs.”

A search of Google News now turns up the following stories:

• Binghamton Press & Sun-Bulletin. The article notes, with irony, “They told me if Donald Trump were elected, voices of dissent would be shut down by fascist mobs. And they were right.”
• Washington Times.
• PJ Media. Notes: “Students at Marquette University really don’t want conservative Ben Shapiro to speak at the school later this month. Really, they don’t want conservatives to be allowed to speak anytime, anywhere — but since it’s February, they’re going with “no opposing viewpoints during Black History Month.”
• The College Fix.
• MacIver Institute. The author notes the irony of a statement from Marquette President Michael Lovell who said the university “welcomes and benefits from the diversity of seekers within our ranks.”
• Accuracy in Academia.
• Independent Journal Review.
• National Review.
• Fox6Now. Good (but short) interviews with Mark Seeberg of the Young Americans for Freedom, and Ethan Hollenberger (advisor to the group).
• Marquette Wire.
• The College Fix.
• Heat Street.
• Marquette Wire. Opinon piece seems to come down in favor of free speech, asking “If we start taking away people’s ability to have an audience for their opinions, like, for example, the controversy with the Ben Shapiro event being hosted at Marquette this week, then how can compromise or the exchange of ideas ever happen?”
• Watchdog.org. James Wigderson established that one staffer will be “reprimanded.” Yes, that’s all. Just reprimanded.

Of course, these are all conservative outlets. Why aren’t liberal outlets interested? One explanation is that they don’t like publishing stuff that makes the left look bad. But it may be worse. A lot of mainstream media people, in their hearts and hearts, don’t really, really mind having conservatives shut up.

Mere “Reprimand” for Marquette Staffer Who Encouraged Fraud to Undermine Ben Shapiro Speech

It is yet another example of intolerant political correctness at Marquette: a staffer of the Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies encouraged fellow leftists to go online and get tickets to the upcoming Ben Shapiro speech, and then fail to show up, to “take away a seat from a student that would be interested in going.”

In fact, she encouraged people to lie about their student status, since “they can’t tell, quite honestly.” This was after the staffer had talked to a “director of diversity” who recommended that tactic.

The Young Americans for Freedom, who sponsored the talk, found out about this on Thursday, January 26, and brought it to the attention of Corey Lansing of the Office of Student Development. Neither Lansing nor anybody else in the Marquette administration did anything about it until Young Americans for Freedom went public this past Monday.  Thus, Marquette allowed the post, urging fraud to sabotage an approved event, to remain up for four days.

Marquette finally went into damage control mode, with Brian Dorrington (Marquette PR guy) issuing a statement claiming “We have addressed this issue internally and will work to make sure that interested attendees have an opportunity to see Ben Shapiro on February 8.”

Slap on the Wrist

James Wigderson, a reporter for Wisconsin Watchdog, got a statement from Angelique Harris, director of the Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies:

“She [the staffer] does not at all speak for the center or for the university,” Angelique Harris, the director of the center where Nelson is employed, told Wisconsin Watchdog. “That is not at all what we’re doing at the university because we do feel and do believe in freedom of speech, etc. And so she’s being reprimanded and we’re dealing with her internally.”

That’s right. Reprimanded. Not fired. Not suspended or expelled from Marquette. Just reprimanded.

This is no surprise, given the absurdly light punishment given to members of the feminist group Empowerment when they vandalized an anti-abortion display on campus. They were required to write a three page paper confessing how they had acted “irresponsibly” in vandalizing the display. Two members who flatly refused were given probation (not suspension) for a semester.

Marquette’s failure to impose any significant punishment on people who sabotage and undermine free expression on campus speaks volumes. The university is unwilling to hold the forces of intolerant political correctness accountable when they attack free expression. How much of this is rooted in fear of leftist faculty and students, and how much flows from the fact that a lot of campus bureaucrats share the intolerance of the left is unclear. But the results are perfectly clear.

Apparently, the “director of diversity” who suggested the scheme has gotten off scot-free. At least, Harris claimed that she “had ‘no idea’ who gave Nelson the idea.”

Really?

Marquette ought to know. But if they do, don’t expect them to admit it.

Center of Intolerance

In spite of Harris’ pious words about free speech, the Center she runs has been a source of intolerance on campus. Not only was the staffer involved in this scandal working for the Center, but a student who vandalized the anti-abortion display was on the staff of the Center during the 2015-2016 school year. Even more scary is that this staffer, who bragged about her vandalism on Facebook and to a faculty “workshop” on racial issues was on the Presidents Taskforce for Diversity and Inclusion.

That’s right. “Diversity” and “inclusion” at Marquette means shutting up speech you dislike.

Thus the Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies is part of a large infrastructure of politically correct intolerance at Marquette, as the Administration adds more and more offices and staff to pursue identity politics, pandering to each and every group with a claim to victimization.

Marquette may be no worse than a lot of other universities. But it is also no better. And any notion that Marquette is a “Catholic university” is a transparent, fraudulent marketing ploy.

Terrorist Supporter to Speak on Marquette Campus

Tonight at Marquette: a speaker named Dr. Rabab Abdulhadi, who has consorted with terrorists.

From the Facebook page of Marquette’s Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies:

Today, we are excited to have Dr. Simona Sharoni and Dr. Rabab Abdulhadi present on the incredible work they have been...
Posted by Marquette University Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies on Monday, April 11, 2016

So just who is Dr. Rabab Abdulhadi?

Her Facebook page shows her to be virulently anti-Israel.

She recently made a trip to the Middle East to meet with terrorists.

A California Public Records Act inquiry revealed that multiple professors from San Francisco State University met with terrorists on a trip funded by the university. Professors Rabab Abdulhadi and Joanne Barker, along with Abdulhadi’s husband, met with terrorists Leila Khaled and Sheikh Raed Salah during the “Labor Delegation to Palestine 2014” which began on January 5th, 2014 and concluded on February 14th, 2014.

Eight organizations- the AMCHA Initiative, Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, Institute for Black Solidarity with Israel, Proclaiming Justice to the Nations, Scholars for Peace in the Middle East, Simon Wiesenthal Center Campus Outreach, StandWithUs, and Zionist Organization of America- sent a letter to CSU Chancellor Timothy White, SFSU President Leslie Wong, CSU Vice Chancellor and Chief Audit Officer Larry Mendel and CSU Attorney Carrie Hemphill Reith concerning the matter.

Leila Khaled is “a convicted hijacker and the most famous member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a terrorist organization responsible for 159 terrorist acts such as bombings, armed assault and assassinations, resulting in numerous injuries and deaths including those of more than 20 US citizens,” the groups noted.

Sheikh Raed Salah has been convicted of funding the terrorist organization Hamas and sat in prison from 2003 - 2005. In the letter to school administration the organizations also highlighted that, “In 2008, Salah was charged with incitement to violence and racism. In 2010, Salah was also arrested for his participation on the Mavi Marmara, part of the Gaza Freedom Flotilla. Salah was recently incarcerated again on charges of incitement to violence.”

Was Abdulhadi just a scholar wanting to gather information? Again, her Facebook page shows her to be a supporter of violent radicals.

One post, for example, shows her to be a supporter of Oscar Lopez Rivera.

Posted by Rabab Ibrahim Abdulhadi on Tuesday, April 8, 2014

Who is this fellow? A Puerto Rican terrorist. Rivera has been:

personally involved in bombing and incendiary attacks across the country for at least five years prior to Méndez’s [sic] involvement and knowledge, has been a prime recruiter for members of the underground terrorist group, and has been a key trainer in bombing, sabotage and other techniques of guerilla warfare. He has set up a series of safehouses and bomb factories across the country, the searches of which have uncovered literally hundreds of pounds of dynamite and other forms of high explosive, blasting caps, timing devices, huge caches of weapons and stockpiles of ammunition, silencers, sawed-off shotguns, disguises, stolen and altered identity documents, and the proceeds of the armed robberies of locations such as a National Guard Armory, Chicago’s Carter-Mondale Re-Election headquarters, radio and communications companies, as well as a variety of stolen vehicles.

Her Facebook page celebrates a “unity pact” between terrorist organization Hamas and (terrorism condoning) PLO.

And it also lionizes another pair of Puerto Rican terrorists:

Posted by Rabab Ibrahim Abdulhadi on Monday, April 21, 2014

Should She Be At Marquette?

Should Marquette allow a speaker who supports terrorism?

We have said that there is nothing wrong, in principle, with a Klansman speaking at any university. Students might learn something — although it’s more likely to be something about political pathology than about public policy.

The same principle applies here.

But what would we think of an organization that continually wants to bring Klansmen to campus? We would suspect, rightly, that they were racist.

So what are we to think about the Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies, and the organizations that sponsored “Israeli Apartheid Week,” including the Office of International Studies, Campus Ministry, and the Office of Intercultural Engagement? We have to suspect that they are anti-Israel, and aren’t too scrupulous about wanting the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians solved by peaceful means.

Should you Go?

We are late getting this post up, but we would urge anybody so inclined to go to the talk. Particularly, Abdulhadi should be asked some civil but pointed questions:

• Do you support a two state solution to the Israel/Palestinian conflict?
• Are you willing to condemn Hamas rocket attacks on Israel?
• Are you willing to condemn attacks on Jews in Jerusalem?

Her responses will be revealing.

Update

An e-mail correspondent notes the following:

It’s odd that it is group pushing gender equality and rights for gays that is sponsoring this, since Israel is the only country in the Middle East that has any sort of de facto or legal guarantees for such rights. The Palestinian territories and Gaza are plagued with honor killings (to which the authorities turn a blind eye) and diminished citizenship for women, and are hardly havens for gay rights. Abdulhadi calls such legal protections Israeli “pinkwashing” — as though the rights are instituted to provide a cover for colonialist iniquity.

Good point. And the reality is that the Center for Gender and Sexualities is, like the other centers of leftist activism on campus, not about women or gays. It’s about leftist politics. Thus, including the anti-Israel Palestinian lobby in their coalition is more important than representing the interests of gays and women.

Marquette’s English Department: Gender Neutral Pronouns

It’s the latest politically correct fashion, as explained by The Atlantic Citylab:

While younger generations and progressive companies like Facebook are more likely to embrace the fact that gender is not dichotomous, older generations and slow-changing institutions—such as K-12 schools and prisons—still have catching up to do. For those who don’t identify with the gender marker assigned to them at birth and don’t want to be pinned down by binary labels, the moves made by Harvard and UVM are a good first step.

With lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) folks fighting for more social and legal recognition, the restrictive options of “he” and “she” don’t cut it anymore. The singular “they” is one gender-neutral option, but some people just can’t get used to how grammatically unfamiliar it sounds in sentences like “Riley thought they would be late.”

That same article gives some examples of how to use gender neutral pronouns.

	Nominative (subject)	Objective (object)	Possessive determiner	Possessive Pronoun	Reflexive
Invented pronouns
Ne	Ne laughed	I called nem	Nir eyes gleam	That is nirs	Ne likes nemself
Ve	Ve laughed	I called ver	Vis eyes gleam	That is vis	Ve likes verself
Spivak	Ey laughed	I called em	Eir eyes gleam	That is eirs	Ey likes emself
Ze (or zie) and hir	Ze laughed	I called hir	Hir eyes gleam	That is hirs	Ze likes hirself
Ze (or zie) and zir	Ze laughed	I called zir	Zir eyes gleam	That is zirs	Ze likes zirself
Xe	Xe laughed	I called xem	Xyr eyes gleam	That is xyrs	Xe likes xemself

That’s right. Politically correct types actually expect people to talk like that.

Would something this crazy come to Marquette? Of course. We cannot expect Marquette to resist any trendy notion that is being adopted elsewhere in academia, and one of the places that is most politically correct at Marquette is the English Department.

From an Arts & Science College mailing to all faculty dated January 19, 2016:

Department of English job talk series (Spring 2016)
	Name	Job talk	Title
1	Kantor, Roanne Ro-Ann Can-ter Pronoun: She/hers (Anglophone)	Th 1/21 3:30-4:50 LL 296	“‘Even if You Gain the World’: The Twining Routes of Latin American and South Asian Authors.”
2	Edoro, Ainehi /aɪnehi/ Pronoun: She (Anglophone)	M 1/25 3:30-4:50 MH 105	“Achebe’s Signature: African Literary Archive and the Ancestral Principle.”
3	Bronstein, Michaela mih-KAY-luh BRAWN-steen Pronoun: feminine (Anglophone)	W 1/27 3:30-4:50 MH 105	“The Revolutionary Tradition: Authorship and Assassination from Russia to South Africa.”
4	Grohowski, Mariana Mary-anna  Preferred pronouns: She, Her (RhetComp)	Th 1/28 3:30-4:50 LL 296	“Understanding Current, Former, and Future Military Personnel’s Rhetorical Practices.”
5	Campbell, Lilly - l IH - l ee   k AE m - b uh l Pronoun: she (RhetComp)	M 2/1 3:30-4:50 MH 105	“Embodied Genre Learning in Clinical Nursing Simulations.”
6	Sanchez, Fernando fur-NAN-doe Preferred pronouns: him, his, and he (RhetComp)	W 2/3 3:30-4:50 MH 105	“Multimodal Composition in Urban Design.”
7	Angeli, Liz ændʒəli: (it’s like “Angela” except with “lee” at the end) Pronoun: she, her, hers (RhetComp)	Th 2/4 3:30-4:50 LL 296	“Dispatched and Responding: Rhetorical Work in Emergency Medical Services.”
8	Patterson, G G (“gee”) or GPat (“gee-pat”) Pronouns: They/Them or Ze/Zir (RhetComp)	M 2/8 3:30-4:50 MH 105	“Negotiating Difficult Dialogues at the LGBTQ-Religious Junction.”
9	Martinez, Aja “Asia” Pronoun: Her/she (RhetComp)	W 2/10 3:30-4:50 MH 105	“Counterstory: The Writing and Rhetoric of Critical Race Theory”

Of course, almost all the people on the program are happy with the traditional pronouns. But a certain “G Patterson” wants to be “They/Them” even though he or she (or whatever) is just one person. Or even worse “Ze/Zir.”

Why Not?

So why not simply call people what they want to be called? Isn’t that just polite?

In the first place, it puts a huge burden on everybody in society to learn how each and every person wants to be addressed. Referring to a female-looking person as “she” can become a social gaffe. Using “Ze” sounds downright bizarre.

But Worse

Far worse is that demands to use gender neutral language are an attempt to bully society into accepting a particular idea about gender: that people are not either male or female. Pope Benedict has roundly condemned this view. He says of Chief Rabbi of France, Gilles Bernheim:

He quotes the famous saying of Simone de Beauvoir: “one is not born a woman, one becomes so” (on ne naît pas femme, on le devient). These words lay the foundation for what is put forward today under the term “gender” as a new philosophy of sexuality. According to this philosophy, sex is no longer a given element of nature, that man has to accept and personally make sense of: it is a social role that we choose for ourselves, while in the past it was chosen for us by society. The profound falsehood of this theory and of the anthropological revolution contained within it is obvious. People dispute the idea that they have a nature, given by their bodily identity, that serves as a defining element of the human being. They deny their nature and decide that it is not something previously given to them, but that they make it for themselves. According to the biblical creation account, being created by God as male and female pertains to the essence of the human creature. This duality is an essential aspect of what being human is all about, as ordained by God. This very duality as something previously given is what is now disputed. The words of the creation account: “male and female he created them” (Gen 1:27) no longer apply. No, what applies now is this: it was not God who created them male and female – hitherto society did this, now we decide for ourselves. Man and woman as created realities, as the nature of the human being, no longer exist. Man calls his nature into question. From now on he is merely spirit and will. The manipulation of nature, which we deplore today where our environment is concerned, now becomes man’s fundamental choice where he himself is concerned. From now on there is only the abstract human being, who chooses for himself what his nature is to be. Man and woman in their created state as complementary versions of what it means to be human are disputed.

Pope Francis takes the same view. According to the National Catholic Reporter:

Pope Francis has strongly criticized modern theories that consider people’s gender identities to exist along a spectrum, saying such theories do not “recognize the order of creation.”

Speaking of gender theory in an interview in a new book released in Italy, the pope even compares such theories to genetic manipulation and nuclear weapons.

Gender theory is a broad term for an academic school of thought that considers how people learn to identify themselves sexually and how they may become typed into certain roles based on societal expectations.

“God has placed man and woman at the summit of creation and has entrusted them with the earth,” Francis says. “The design of the Creator is written in nature.”

More

Another hotbed of political correctness is the Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies. Yes, they specify the pronouns to be used of each staffer. And all of the staff are happy to be called “she.”

But how long will it be at Marquette until somebody is accused of a microaggression, or even harassment for calling somebody “she” or “he” when the person wants to be called “Ze.”

At a university that quickly embraces every politically correct fad — notwithstanding that it is flatly at odds with Catholic teaching — not very long.

Update

A search of the Marquette website shows that this is (so far) an isolated case. Looking for “zirself” and “Xyr” and “zir” and “eirs” turns up no relevant hits. But given Marquette’s pattern of adopting every politically correct initiative trending anywhere else in academia, you can expect this to change.

New Director of Gender and Sexualities Center Was Assata Shakur Supporter

Marquette’s misguided sop to the campus gay lobby, the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, caused the Administration a ton of trouble. First, it sponsored the bawdy Femsex seminar, which had women students creating pornography, coloring pictures of female genitalia in the Cunt Coloring Book, and engaging in “non-judgmental” discussions of abortion and prostitution. Marquette had to distance itself from the program, and cancelled the official university sponsorship.

Then there was the mural of black militant murderer and terrorist Assata Shakur, painted on a wall at the Center. When we outed that, Marquette quickly had it painted over, and fired the Director of the Center, Susannah Bartlow. Bartlow, it seems, was simply too politically extreme.

In the wake of this fiasco, Marquette split the Center in two, with one of the pieces being a center with a scholarly focus. According to a Marquette news release:

Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies will support research, teaching

A new Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies will be housed in the Klingler College of Arts and Sciences and will support research and teaching on the topics of gender and sexualities. Directed by Dr. Angelique Harris, associate professor of social and cultural sciences, the CGSS will also hold the Women and Gender Studies major and minor. The CGSS will be located in Sensenbrenner Hall.

“I am pleased that the CGSS will enjoy the leadership of Dr. Harris, who brings deep professional experience and dedication to the center and its mission,” Myers says. “She and I have already had many productive discussions about how we can enhance and grow the major, as well as provide additional academic programming and course development and research support.”

But it seems that Angelique Harris has political views similar to those of Bartlow, at least were Shakur is concerned.

The following is an e-mail that circulated around the campus this past summer:

Dear Colleagues,

As members of MU faculty who teach in Africana Studies or related fields, I’m hoping you might be interested in being a part of a new study collective forming inside and outside of MU. Your insights, histories, research and commitments would enrich it enormously! In addition, it would be wonderful if you’d take a moment to forward the call below (and readings attached) to anyone you think might be interested in your communities and networks. Please email with questions, and I hope you are all having productive, inspiring, refreshing summers.

Yours, Jodi Melamed

Dear One and All,

* In the wake of the firing of Marquette’s Director of the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center and the destruction of a student-created mural of Assata Shakur, a major figure in contemporary Black political activism

*Following 20 years of neglect, zero budget, and no institutional support for Africana Studies at Marquette and in affirmation that Black intellectual history matters

* To support the rise of student and community activism around policing, racism, economic inequality, mass incarceration, detention and deportation, sexual violence and other issues

* Feeling the need to gather to experience the learning that happens when we create knowledge and resist unequal power dynamics in the learning process itself

We send this call for all who are interested to come together in a study collective - name to be determined - inspired by freedom schools and the undisciplined learning collectives of social movements that gave rise to Black, Ethnic, American Indian, and Women’s and Gender Studies.

The name and purpose of the study collective will emerge from our conversations together. Given recent events, we think it makes sense to begin with Assata: An Autobiography by Assata Shakur, a book that has come to represent (once again) the dangers associated with oppositional thinking.

Our first event will take place on July 26th (Sunday) from 3:00-5:00pm at Cudahy Hall (1313 W. Wisconsin Ave) Room 114. Come join us to discuss Assata: An Autobiography, whether you’ve read the whole book, part or none. RSVP not necessary, but appreciated! (To RSVP, email [redacted])

You can also find details on facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/events/841626975905901/

We’ve attached Angela Davis’s Introduction and the first and last chapters of Assata to this email to get you started. The whole book is available on Amazon and in many libraries, including UWM’s and Marquette’s (print and online version available). Please come whether you’ve read the whole book, part or none.

We’re also attaching a short essay entitled “The Whiteness of Police,” which examines policing as a form of racial management which “determines who requires discipline so that others can be secure enough to pursue their self interest.”

Looking forward,
Susannah Bartlow
Angelique Harris
Brianna Hawkins
Jodi Melamed
Sameena Mulla
(Study Collective Co-Facilitators)

This whole project seems as radical as the things that got the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center in trouble. Of course, leftist academics can get together and discuss anything they want, even “The Whiteness of Police” or the deep thoughts of Communist Angela Davis.

And the center that Harris heads is focused on scholarly things, and may be involved only in arcane stuff published in obscure gay and feminist journals (if at all). But, on the other hand, it may be that Marquette has failed to learn a lesson it should have.