New York, NY – A Brooklyn College professor’s wild statements in defense of Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s U.S. Supreme Court nomination may be “disgusting” and “repugnant,” according to the union representing CUNY faculty and staff — but they ought not immediately cost him his job.
The Professional Staff Congress/CUNY came to Brooklyn College Professor Mitchell Langbert’s defense on Thursday, issuing a statement simultaneously denouncing the business department teacher’s outrageous comments, while also urging he be assured due process.
Langbert is under fire this week, after he attempted, in a recent blog post, to dismiss Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s Senate testimony, in which the California psychology professor accused Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her 36-years-ago when the two were high school students.
In a September 27, blog post, Langbert wrote, “If someone did not commit sexual assault in high school, then he is not a member of the male sex. The Democrats have discovered that 15-year-olds play spin-the-bottle, and they have jumped on a series of supposed spin-the-bottle crimes during Kavanaugh’s minority, which they characterize as rape, although no one complained or reported any crime for 40 years.”
Groups of Brooklyn College students rallied on the Midwood campus lawn early Thursday afternoon, calling for Langbert’s ouster.
In response to the fallout, the PSC/CUNY released a statement saying, in part, “Regardless of Professor Langbert’s subsequent claim that his remarks were intended as satire, his advocacy of sexual violence, together with the misogynistic and homophobic views expressed in his blog post on Judge Kavanaugh, are the antithesis of what colleges—and unions—represent.”
Continuing, the union added, “Nevertheless, the PSC vigorously opposes calls for immediate dismissal of Professor Langbert, repugnant as his comments are. Professor Langbert is entitled to the due process protections the PSC has won for every CUNY employee represented by the union. The right to due process offers protection of dissenting and minority positions, no matter how repugnant those positions may be; due process must be upheld in every case if it is to have meaning.”
Brooklyn College students rating Langbert on the popular RateMyProfessors.com website, overwhelmingly give the business department professor “Good” and “Awesome” marks. Despite this, Lambert has attributed his ire to Brooklyn College students somehow being “indoctrinated in socialism” and the “totalitarian bigotry that Brooklyn College represents.” He’s also characterized Democrats as being a so-called “sissy party.”
In urging due process for Langbert, the PSC also said it joins “students, faculty and staff colleagues at Brooklyn College and throughout CUNY in denouncing Professor Mitchell Langbert’s disgusting statement that committing sexual assault in high school is a prerequisite for being ‘a member of the male sex.'”
