Vigilante Justice at Northwestern?

In calling attention to student protest against (Northwestern's) Prof. Peter Ludlow, Brian Leiter, a renowned legal scholar, uses "vigilante justice" to describe what appears to have been intended as a fairly modest protest: "students will sit in on Professor Peter Ludlow's 12:30pm philosophy class and will walk out of his class together at 1:00pm."--Facebook. This is certainly annoying, but even if repeated on a weekly basis -- and then it would certainly be disruptive -- it does not amount to vigilante justice (e.g., according to Wikipedia: "Frontier justice (also called vigilante justice or street justice) is extrajudicial punishment that is motivated by the nonexistence of law and order or dissatisfaction with justice.") Even the fact that Northwestern has now chosen to replace Ludlow for the remainder of the quarter does not amount to more than a serious nuisance (primarily to his replacement, that is, "the chair of the philosophy department," as well as the students who may well have benefited from Ludlow's expertise).

The protesters are certainly right to be angry about Northwestern's attempts to keep its own findings against Prof. Ludlow quiet, thus, depriving his future students, future employers, and his peers in the profession crucial information.  More damaging, from all the newsreports, it appears that Northwestern's administration is more concerned about its reputation than the well-being its students.

As I have said before, Ludlow has made vital contributions to drawing attention to and analyzing the evils of the National Security state. While many will disagree with me over this: it is vital that he keeps a home in an academic environment or, better yet, some kind of think tank away from students. It strikes me as unjust to fire somebody for an offense that apparently was not defined as such [ADDED FOR CLARIFICATION: that is, a fireable offense] when the event took place. More generally, I also believe that all people deserve second chances in life. Few deserve to be vilified forever, Even so, it is very troubling that his legal strategy amounts to suggesting the victim asked for it. Obviously (yes?), universities and the philosophy profession have been too welcoming of perpetrators of sexual harassment; to his credit, Brian Leiter has long been very outspoken about this professional embarrassment. Even so, I think he is mistaken to vilify those that protest this sad fact peacefully.  

Comments

[Michael Kremer]

It bears mentioning that Winter quarter classes at Northwestern end in a week (March 15 to be exact). http://www.registrar.northwestern.edu/calendars/2013-14_University_Calendar.html
So this is not a huge inconvenience for anyone, really.

[Dave Maier]

Leiter has posted a link to Ludlow's answer to the student's charges [her name is redacted]. As manifested in that document, at least, Ludlow's legal strategy is not well described as "suggesting the victim asked for it," which implies that he admits that there was sexual contact but that it was her idea. Instead, in that document he denies just about everything flat out.

I agree with most of the rest of this post though; "vigilante justice" is quite a stretch for a protest of this sort.

[Eric Schliesser]

My post was posted before that document was released. But I note that even in his response, Ludlow grants that the student ended up asleep in his bed with him (both fully clothed).