The Value of Tenure

According to this report, a tenured professor at Marquette University has been suspended because of a post on his blog critical of another professor (who had indicated that she would not tolerate any discussion of gay marriage because it was already a settled issue). Tenure is supposed to protect professors’ rights to publicly hold unpopular opinions, so this should be interesting. It reminds me that someone or other has said that a right is nothing but a probability, a probability that society will let you do whatever it is that the right says you can do. If this professor gets fired, then we can say that tenure doesn’t mean anything anymore since it is simply false that holding an unpopular opinion won't lead to firing. Remember that protecting against being fired in these circumstances was the reason why tenure was instituted in the first place, and if it no longer offers that kind of protection, then there is no point in having it.