Intellectual bravery seems dead on the Left.
Young America’s Foundation agreed to help a conservative group on Marquette University’s campus sponsor an abortion debate between a conservative and liberal professor.
That is until the liberal professor bailed.
The event’s organizer, Maggie Gervase, had booked Marquette’s Dr. Dan Maguire to represent the pro-abortion position and sent a follow-up email confirming the debate format. She got this in reply:
Maggie, I just looked up [the pro-life professor] Dr. Mike Adams and found he is a psychology-criminology professor. I am a theologian presenting theological arguments. I would not try to debate Dr. Adams in psychology/criminology since it is not my field. Similarly he would not want to debate me in theology since he is not a theologians [sic] and could not argue a theological position with professional competence. We would be skew lines. So when you find a theologian who wants to debate me, as was done at Notre Dame, get back in touch. Dan Maguire.
In response, the conservative professor, Dr. Mike Adams (University of North Carolina Wilmington), said this in a Townhall op-ed today:
Professor Maguire’s excuse for backing out of his commitment to debate me is dishonest for at least two reasons:
1. He has previously made, in public, an argument for abortion that is not theological. Specifically, he argued that, even if human, the unborn is not a person, which means the unborn are not citizens deserving of equal protection. This is an argument based on the 14thAmendment. Clearly, he is stepping into the constitutional arena, despite his claims to remain safely on theological ground.
2. In the 1990s - at Marquette University, no less – Professor Maguire debated the issue of capital punishment. Unsurprisingly, he took the anti-death penalty side. Later, he was also featured on a Marquette panel arguing specifically in favor of government run-health care. In neither case did he debate a theological issue from a strictly theological position relying strictly upon his theological training.
Dr. Adams clearly exposed Dr. Maguire’s inconsistency. He’s publically debated topics from a non-theological perspective, so why was this debate different?
Another Marquette professor, Dr. John McAdams—who had previously debated Dr. Maguire—confirmed this inconsistency in a blog here:
His insistence that he will debate only theologians is odd, given that we, over the last couple of decades, have been on two panels with Maguire. One, in the 1990s, was on the death penalty. Two people (us included) debated on the pro-death penalty side, and Maguire (along with another faculty member) were on the anti-death penalty side.
Just a few years ago, we and Maguire were (with several other people) on a panel on health care. It was not explicitly a debate, but panelists were chosen based on opposing perspectives on government run-health care.
Maguire has no special expertise in criminal justice nor in health care, but he was willing to appear.
With his inconsistency and cowardice exposed, the only real question is: Will Dr. Marguire un-bail and agree to the debate?
