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A man by the name of Michael Bonesteel has reportedly resigned from his position as a professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) after several “militant LGBT students with an authoritarian agenda” pressured school administrators into scaling back his course load until he no longer qualified for health insurance.
According to Campus Reform, Bonesteel is “a renowned expert on comic books and outsider art.” Bonesteel taught a number of popular classes at SAIC.
Bonesteel, speaking with The Chicago Reader, stated that trouble first began in December when a transgender student took offence with his theory that an artist whose work is known for featuring girls with penises could be taken as evidence of said artist’s abuse as a child.
Bonesteel was ultimately forced to issue an apology on an SAIC website for his “insensitivity,” namely, his suggestion that transgenderism may be linked to child abuse.
School administrators also mandated that he receive training on dealing with “identity related material” in his course work.
A mere two days after that conundrum, another student of Bonesteel’s stood up during a class and expressed displeasure with a well-known author behind an assigned reading.
According to Bonesteel, that same student – as Bonesteel got into a debate with him – also lashed out at “SAIC’s policies toward minorities and transgender students specifically, levelling accusations of racism and homophobia toward me in particular.”
The student also reportedly criticized Bonesteel’s failure to provide a “trigger warning” for a discussion concerning implied rape in an assigned reading.
Bonesteel stated that, in response to the student’s complaint, “the dean ultimately ‘determined that it is more likely than not that your conduct in relation to this student constituted harassment based on gender-identity in violation of the School’s Policy Against Discrimination, Harassment and Retaliation.’ ”
Months later, another student filed a complaint claiming they were “troubled” by that very same incident.
Subsequently, The Chicago Reader reports, SAIC administrators told Bonesteel he would not be teaching any courses in comics going forward.
“His outsider art classes were to be revamped and readings by ‘scholars in the field of Outsider art were to be discarded in favor of new readings from academic journals,'” the outlet states.
In addition, Bonesteel’s hours would be reduced to the point that he’d lose his health insurance benefits.
Of the decision, The Chicago Reader quotes Bonesteel as stating, “to be labeled discriminatory and charged with sexual harassment because I got into a heated debate with a hostile student who happened to be transgender, and for that student’s accusations of sexual harassment to be credited—and for my account and those of several other student witnesses to be discredited—seems entirely unfair.”
Further, he added, “to be punished by refusing to let me teach three comics courses in which I had invested twelve years of time and effort and love, and in the process take away my insurance benefits, these were the conditions that I found unacceptable.”
Bonesteel ultimately issued his resignation via a letter dated June 12, stating, “it is my contention that I have been unfairly vilified and demonized by [a] small cadre of militant LGBT students with an authoritarian agenda.”
So, in other words, the tolerance gestapo strikes again and solidifies their place in culture as the most intolerant community under the rainbow.
Sources:
CBR
Our Urban Times
Campus Reform
The Chicago Reader
