Student raises hand to answer the professor. Professor says “Yes, Taylor?” instead of “Yes, Sir” or “Yes, Ma’am”- but nowadays that is just not good enough!
Nick Meriwether, a philosophy professor at Shawnee State University in Ohio, declined to use she/her pronouns to refer to a transgender student in his class. Meriwether would reply to the student with “Yes, Sir” when calling on the student.
After class, the student asked that Meriwether use she/her pronouns when addressing the student directly, but Meriwether refused to do so. The student filed a complaint with the university who launched an investigation into the matter.
Although Meriwether offered to use the student’s name but not pronouns or titles when interacting with the student, the university ruled he should use the pronouns that the student is requesting. Meriwether argued that by doing that would be to “speak contrary to his religious convictions and philosophical beliefs.”
This led the university to determine that Meriwether “effectively created a hostile environment” for the student. The university placed a written warning in his personnel file while threatening to take additional corrective actions in the future.
Meriwether felt he had been treated unfairly and filed a lawsuit against the university.
Despite the university’s attempts to get the case dismissed, the US Court of Appeals ruled in favor of Meriwether and reversed the dismissal of the lawsuit. They ruled Shawnee State University had violated his free speech rights when they disciplined him.
Last week, Alliance Defending Freedom, an organization dedicated to free speech and religious freedom cases, reached a settlement with the university on behalf of Meriwether. The university agreed to pay $400,000 in damages and pay Meriwether’s attorney fees in addition to rescinding the written warning placed in his personnel file in 2018.
The university, of course, has stated that regardless of the decision to settle, they firmly believe they did not deprive Meriwether of his free speech or rights to freely exercise his religion. They believe the actions they took followed school policy as well as federal law in regard to protecting students from bigotry and discrimination.
They maintained students have the right to a discrimination free learning environment and the faculty/visitors/students have the right to freely express their ideas and beliefs. The university also said that this case was “being used to advance divisive social and political agendas at a cost to the university and its students.”
