2. The David
Barnett Affair
A good deal has happened since I first posted the initial documents concerning the Site Visit Report, including the departure of three of my colleagues, two of whom, namely Professor David Barnett and Professor Brad Monton, when faced with the alternatives of either being fired and engaging in very expensive lawsuits against the University, or accepting a payout and resigning, on the condition that they not sue the University, chose the latter course of action.
The first point
that should be made about the departures of Professor
Barnett and Professor Monton is that there is a very
widespread and
completely mistaken belief that they were charged with
and found guilty of sexual harassment,
a belief that has been generated by irresponsible media
coverage. The
starting point was an article in the Boulder Daily Camera entitled
“CU-Boulder
reports pervasive sexual harassment within philosophy
department,” which generated a widespread belief that
there was
pervasive sexual harassment within the Department, when
in fact only
one member of the Department has ever been found guilty
of sexual
harassment. The myth then continues into the present,
with a Chronicle
of Higher Education article by Robin Wilson
with an opening sentence
that contains the following extraordinarily misleading
expression: “the philosophy department at
the U. of Colorado at Boulder, which has lost three
professors amid
allegations of sexual harassment.”
As regards
Professor Barnett and Professor Monton, the fact is that
neither was
charged with sexual harassment, let alone being found
guilty of sexual
harassment. In the case of Professor Barnett, he
was charged with
retaliation, a charge that was investigated at great
length by a
Privilege and Tenure Committee hearing, and where
members of that
committee unanimously concluded that he was not guilty
of retaliation.
In the case of Professor Monton, I have been told, by a
source that I believe to be reliable, that the charge
was that
he had failed to report an amorous relation with a
student.
As regards the in effect forced departure of Professor Monton, my view is that failure to report an amorous relation is nothing anywhere in the vicinity of adequate grounds for threatening to fire a person. My knowledge of the case is, however, very limited, so I shall not comment further on that case.
The documents that I am posting deal,
therefore, only with the case of Professor David
Barnett, where I believe that it is clear that an
enormous injustice
was done. Moreover, while I have not done a survey of my
colleagues,
and while I am confident that some members of the
Department were
pleased by the outcome, my guess is that most members of
the
Department, though they would not say so publicly, for
fear of
retaliation against the Department, share my view that
the forced
departure of David Barnett was completely
unjustified.
.