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University of Delaware Fires Part-Time Professor over Facebook Post

posted by martyb on Friday July 28 2017, @02:40PM   Printer-friendly
from the karma-gonna-get-ya dept.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

The University of Delaware is cutting ties with a part-time professor who provoked a controversial firestorm for saying North Korea detainee Otto Warmbier "deserved" to die.

The Newark school said it will not re-hire Katherine Dettwyler, the adjunct faculty member who blasted the 22-year-old student as "young, white, rich, clueless" in a since-deleted Facebook post Tuesday.

source

The school's statement (pdf):

The comments of Katherine Dettwyler do not reflect the values or position of the University of Delaware. We condemn any and all messages that endorse hatred and convey insensitivity toward a tragic event such as the one that Otto Warmbier and his family suffered.

The University of Delaware values respect and civility and we are committed to global education and study abroad; therefore, we find these comments particularly distressing and inconsistent with our values. Our sympathies are with the Warmbier family.

Also at; CBS News.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @04:30PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @04:30PM (#545838)

    I'd agree with this, but you need to make sure you're not stating this because of your own personal political views. In other words saying a person 'deserved' to die for being young/white/rich/clueless is no different than if was labeled young/black/poor/idiotic. The question is is such speech something people ought be allowed to say, not whether it's something people ought be allowed to say against a certain group or another.

    Either way it's not exactly a productive comment, but in the end free speech is of course unnecessary for things that none would find controversial. In any case it's true value is not in comments like this, but in the freedom to express ideas that may run contrary to the interest of the powers that be. I live in a nation where we have these sort of laws. And so even with a VPN I would not feel comfortable giving an example of how free speech would be valuable. I suppose even lacking the specific example, this fear of expressions is perhaps itself an example of the value of free speech.