SHARE Marquette University Professor John McAdams

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John McAdams, a Marquette University associate professor, says he is being "treated like a potential terrorist" after being suspended with pay and banned from campus while the university investigates his conduct, presumably because he publicly criticized a teaching assistant for not allowing discussion of gay marriage in an ethics class.

A student had objected to the teaching assistant's handling of the class discussion weeks ago and, after class, recorded his conversation with her. The teaching assistant told the student that "some opinions are not appropriate, such as racist opinions, sexist opinions." She suggested if someone in the class were homosexual, they could be offended if another student challenged gay marriage.

The student who disagreed told her it was his right as an American citizen to make arguments against gay marriage, to which teaching assistant Cheryl Abbate replied: "You don't have a right in this class to make homophobic comments."

McAdams, a member of the political science department, learned of the flap and lashed out at Abbate in his blog for not allowing the gay marriage discussion. An online petition in response to McAdams' public chiding of the teaching assistant drew support for her from professors and other teaching assistants around the world.

Marquette spokesman Brian Dorrington said in a statement Wednesday that the university last month "began reviewing both a concern raised by a student and a concern raised by a graduate student teaching assistant."

While the review continues, Dorrington said, McAdams has been relieved of his teaching and other faculty duties. The tenured professor's salary and benefits will continue during the review.

Marquette University President Michael R. Lovell in a recent campuswide letter addressed university expectations and "Guiding Values" to which all faculty and staff are required to adhere, "and in which the dignity and worth of each member of our community is respected, especially students," Dorrington said.

"This is a matter of official policy, but it is also a matter of our values," Lovell said in the letter. "Respect is at the heart of our commitment to the Jesuit tradition and Catholic social teaching."

Lovell also said in the letter that Marquette listens to any member of the campus community who expresses concerns alleging inappropriate behavior, and that the university would not tolerate personal attacks or harassment.

"To be clear, we will take action to address those concerns." Lovell said. "We deplore hatred and abuse directed at a member of our community in any format."

In a post Wednesday on his conservative-leaning blog, McAdams says he received an email from the dean, Richard Holz, informing him that until further notice he was relieved of all duties and activities that would involve interactions with Marquette students, faculty and staff.

Holz told McAdams to contact him in writing if he needed to come to campus "to explain the purpose of your visit, to obtain my consent and to make appropriate arrangements for that visit."

Holz enclosed Marquette's harassment policy, its guiding values statement, the university mission statement, and sections from the Faculty Handbook, which outline faculty rights and responsibilities, stating, "These documents will inform our review of your conduct."

McAdams said in his blog that Marquette "has again shown itself to be timid, overly bureaucratic and lacking any commitment to either its Catholic mission or free expression."

"The fact that Holz sends the 'harassment policy' suggests that somebody thinks that merely blogging about questionable conduct by a philosophy instructor constitutes 'harassment,'" McAdams wrote.

"Marquette's harassment policy is absurdly vague and includes 'behavior (that) is intimidating, hostile or demeaning or could or does result in mental, emotional or physical discomfort, embarrassment, ridicule or harm.' That's right, even mental discomfort (which should be a normal part of having one's opinions challenged in a university) is considered harassing...

"As for having to remain off campus — in effect, being treated like a potential terrorist — we don't know where that came from. The last time we were accused of harassment (it was sexual harassment, since we told an entire class that feminists grossly exaggerate the incidence of college date rape) we were not treated like a terrorist."