McGinn leaving Miami under a cloud.

The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that Colin McGinn is leaving Miami "amid allegations that he sent improper messages to a graduate student." (The story is behind a pay-wall.)

"Mr. McGinn...denies allegations that he behaved improperly. Those allegations were lodged by a female graduate student who has said that the professor sent her a series of sexually explicit e-mail and text messages, starting in the spring-2012 semester."

"one message in which they said Mr. McGinn wrote that he had been thinking about the student while masturbating."

There are two important features of the Chronicle's report that I wish to highlight here: (i) apparently there are still quite a few men within philosophy that simply do not 'get it:' "In addition to Mr. Erwin's support, Mr. McGinn has won backing from some philosophers at other universities who have written to the University of Miami on his behalf, according to faculty members at Miami." (The Chronicle also reports a (named) male philosophy graduate student as follows: "I can't understand why the university forced him to stop working with graduate students who have nothing to do with this case...There's no reason for the university to have taken these drastic steps when this particular situation involves just one student.") Luckily, one important person, Professor Donna E. Shalala, president of the University of Miami, had a "strong" personal reaction to the allegations.

(ii) From the Chronicle's report it appears that the victim's boyfriend (a graduate student in the department) and Amie L. Thomasson, were very supportive of her. As a discipline we need more such 'advocates.'