{"id":5589,"date":"2017-04-23T14:35:06","date_gmt":"2017-04-23T14:35:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2017\/04\/23\/the-collapse-of-the-catholic-universities\/"},"modified":"2017-04-23T14:35:06","modified_gmt":"2017-04-23T14:35:06","slug":"the-collapse-of-the-catholic-universities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2017\/04\/23\/the-collapse-of-the-catholic-universities\/","title":{"rendered":"The Collapse of the Catholic Universities"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yet another example, one so egregious<\/a> that I pinch myself to see if I am awake:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

St\u00e9phane Mercier, a lecturer in philosophy at the Catholic University of Leuven<\/a> (UCL) in Belgium initially was suspended <\/a>from teaching, pending the outcome of disciplinary proceedings, because there was opposition in a class from a feminist group to his philosophical <\/em>argument to the effect that abortion is the killing of an innocent unborn human life, which is an \u201cintrinsically evil,\u201d always unacceptable, regardless of the circumstances. The response from both the UCL administration and the Belgium Bishops Conference to his philosophical argument, which was put forth in a document<\/a> entitled \u201cThe Philosophy Supporting Life: Against a so-called Right to Choose an Abortion", has been confusing.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

UPDATE 2\/24:<\/span><\/p>\n

A reader sends this:<\/span><\/p>\n

A student at the institution informs me this is the passage that led to the lecturer's sacking. It was a First Year Philosophy course:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

"[…] reminds me of Newspeak, the official language of Oceania in George Orwell's 1984. Voluntary interruption of pregnancy is a euphemism that hides a message, namely the truth, which is that abortion is the murder of an innocent person. It is a murder particularly abject, because the victim has no defense against it. if murdering an  innocent person capable of self-defense weren't repulsive enough, taking the life of someone who doesn't have the power to defend himself is even more vile. Today, we hear people who believe abortion is immoral, but don't think about making it illegal, a disturbingly absurd way of reasoning. […] Imagine that the same person declares rape immoral, but thinks it shouldn't be made illegal in order to protect the freedoms of an individual (except for the victim…). that's absurd, right? So, if abortion is murder, as it is said to be by some, doesn't that make it worse than rape? Rape is immoral, and fortunately illegal as well. Shouldn't abortion, which is even more immoral, be illegal too?"<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

BV's comment: Imagine getting sacked at any university, let alone a supposedly Catholic university with the word 'Catholic' in its name, for giving this argument!<\/span><\/p>\n

Leftist termites are undermining the great institutions of the West, and the authorities in charge of these institutions have either abdicated, or are termites themselves.  The edifices of higher culture are in dire need of fumigation. Figuratively speaking, of course . . . .<\/span><\/p>\n

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<\/a>Potentiality and the Substance View of Persons<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/fieldset>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yet another example, one so egregious that I pinch myself to see if I am awake: St\u00e9phane Mercier, a lecturer in philosophy at the Catholic University of Leuven (UCL) in Belgium initially was suspended from teaching, pending the outcome of disciplinary proceedings, because there was opposition in a class from a feminist group to his philosophical argument to the … Continue reading “The Collapse of the Catholic Universities”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[313,62],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-abortion","category-catholic-corner"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5589"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5589\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}