As such, Bill Donohue of the Catholic League has fired off a letter to the President of the University of Minnesota Morris in protest. I say excellent.
Here is why. As Mr. Donohue states, P.Z. Myers blog was accessible from his departmental webpage. I say was, because as of yesterday it was ... it's not today.
To which Mr. Donohue stated:
The Myers blog can be accessed from the university’s website. The university has a policy statement on this issue which says that the ‘Contents of all electronic pages must be consistent with University of Minnesota policies, local, state and federal laws.’ One of the school’s policies, ‘Code of Conduct,’ says that ‘When dealing with others,’ faculty et al. must be ‘respectful, fair and civil.’ Accordingly, we are contacting the President and the Board of Regents to see what they are going to do about this matter. Because the university is a state institution, we are also contacting the Minnesota legislature.Imagine being a Catholic in P.Z. Myers class. Think you might feel entirely comfortable sitting there, knowing what he thinks about your beliefs and knowing that they're a simple click away on the university-run and sanctioned webpage? Simply put, the link must go.
If anything, it was a supremely stupid move on Myers part. It's not the first, I doubt it'll be the last.
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Thought you might appreciate this; I know I did. This is one of the e-mails Myers received:
"You have asked your readers to provide you with communion wafers for the purpose of "show[ing] you sacrilege, gladly, and with much fanfare." I readily concede that it is extremely strange, even a little creepy, to believe that a wafer is in a real sense God, and yet that is what I do believe. I have no objection to your jokes and satirical remarks -- they're not much different from what Protestants have been saying for five hundred years, and indeed what Berengar of Tours said in the eleventh century. However, I do ask you this: that you not actually carry out your plan. I wouldn't ordinarily make such a request of a stranger, but the thing can hardly matter to you one way or the other -- as you put it, it's a cracker -- and it does matter to me. I have tried to find an analogy to explain my request and this is the best I can do: you might be entirely right that an old rag is worthless and should be thrown out, yet, if that rag were a small child's security blanket, I doubt you would do so, to spare the child's feelings. I put myself in the place of that child, and ask: Please don't. I'm not asking for respect, only for a small kindness of omission: not trampling feelings for the sake of the trampling."
Perfect.
Yep, a very well reasoned and stated response. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.
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