Professor Put On Leave In Wake Of Anti-Abortion Display's Dismantling

[The Straight Story]

Professor Put On Leave In Wake Of Anti-Abortion Display's Dismantling

POSTED: 11:49 pm EDT April 17, 2006

HIGHLAND HEIGHTS, Ky. -- A college professor has been put on leave and will retire at the end of the semester after admitting she told students to destroy an anti-abortion display on campus.

Sally Jacobsen, a professor in the literature and language department at Northern Kentucky University, will not return to the school, President James Votruba said.

"I believe what she did was outside the scope of her employment," Votruba said Monday.

Jacobsen acknowledged leading graduate students on Wednesday to a grassy area near the University Center to rip up about 400 crosses. The crosses, temporarily erected a week earlier by a group called Northern Right to Life, were meant to represent a cemetery for aborted fetuses.

It was unclear whether Jacobsen took part in dismantling the display. She could not be located for comment Monday afternoon. University police were investigating the vandalism report.

http://www.local6.com/news/8783900/detail.html

[cali]

1. I have no sympathy

at all for her. What a remarkably stupid thing to do.

[Teaser]

2. Yeah...boneheaded move

nt

[jeff30997]

3. I agree.I respect her opinion but...

It reminds me of the moran who did the same thing at the Cindy protest.

[MadHound]

4. Good,

Sorry, but if you're going to have free speech for one side, you have to have free speech for all, even speech that you disagree with and feel threatened by. What this woman did was wrong, and I'm glad that she is receiving the consequences for it.

Now if she had merely set up a display of her own, or spoke out on the site of the crosses, I would have backed her to the hilt. But destroying something just because you disagree with the idea behind it is wrong, and goes against the very basis on which our country was founded.

[miss_american_pie]

5. That's some professor

Most of mine couldn't even get their students to do their assignments, much less destroy protest displays.

[MrModerate]

6. Yep, really dumb, completely unhelpful . . .

And frighteningly close to the tactics you'd expect from the wingnuts.

I know it's tough, but the high road is what will eventually get us to where we want to go, and the gutter smell hanging around the 'Licans is what will doom them.

[Charlie Brown]

7. Vandalism is a very poor tactic to advance a political cause

It takes you down to the irrational, mob-menality of the opposition.

What she did was wrong, and, truth be told, she should help them return the crosses.

[Cassandra]

8. She would have been much better off...

encouraging her students to set up a pro-choice display.

[The Straight Story]

11. Good idea! (nt)

[jeff30997]

9. She really shot herself in the foot!

Those kinds of tactics can only hurt your cause.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

10. That's the rough part about free speech

you have to honor it across the board. She should be fired.

[TreasonousBastard]

12. Fire her, jail her, and make...

that whole crew pay for the destruction. Just like the abortion clinic bombers must pay for their crimes.

We hated it when that redneck ran over Cindy's display, and I can't imagine how I'd feel if someone destroyed the AFSC's "Eyes Wide Open" display. If we destroy theirs, we are no better than those who would destroy ours and we have lost all moral authority for what we stand for.

No matter where any of us stand on an issue, this sort of violence and destruction only hardens positions and makes it so much more difficult to come any meeting of the minds or productive discussion. Things are bad enough in the abortion debates that we don't need to inflame things further with this sort of nonsense.

Free speech for all- even if I despise what they say, I have to let them say it. It's just the right thing to do. And besides, my speech just might be the next to go.

[EFerrari]

13. You'd think a LANGUAGE teacher would get that. n/t