Christina van Dyke owes Richard Swinburne her resignation

Christina van Dyke is the Executive Director of the Society of Christian Philosophers (SCP), whose President, Michael Rea, recently issued a statement on Facebook disavowing a talk defending traditional Christian sexual morality given by Richard Swinburne at an SCP conference.  Rea’s critics argue that his action has politicized the SCP insofar as it has, in effect, officially distanced the Society from the traditionalist side of the dispute over sexual morality and given an SCP endorsement to the liberal side.  I have argued that Rea owes Swinburne an apology, and a group of philosophers is now petitioning the SCP for an apology.

In a September 26 Facebook comment on Rea’s statement, Van Dyke tried to reassure the critics of the SCP’s neutrality:

Swinburne [gave] a talk titled, “Christian Moral Teaching on Sex, Family, and Life”, which -- as Michael Rea and I have both tried to make clear -- he was and remains entirely free to do.  The content of that talk was entirely of his choosing.  The reason for any sort of announcement following the talk was that Mike and I were being asked whether Swinburne's views were “the” views of the SCP.  They are not, because the SCP does not have an official view on this or any other matter…

To the best of my knowledge, no one in the SCP has the slightest intention of changing the current conference set-up.  Keynotes will be invited and submitted papers reviewed in exactly the same way they always have…  [O]rganizers will, I assume, continue to accept or reject submitted papers based entirely on their philosophical merits or flaws.

End quote.  There is, however, more to the story.  But first, some context.  The conservative philosophy blog Rightly Considered and Rod Dreher at The American Conservative (here and here) have been tracking the Facebook responses of some prominent philosophers to the Swinburne controversy.  What follows is a sample.  Readers highly sensitive to obscenity are warned that they might want to stop reading at this point.

My friends, I give you North America’s finest philosophical minds:

The considered response to Swinburne and his defenders put forward by Jason Stanley, the Jacob Urowsky Professor of Philosophy at Yale University, went like this:

Fuck those assholes.  Seriously.

After this comment was publicized, Stanley posted a follow-up remark on Facebook:

I really wish now I hadn’t said that!! I PROFOUNDLY regret not using much harsher language and saying what I really think of anyone who uses their religion to promote homophobia, you know that sickness that has led people for thousands of years to kill my fellow human beings for their sexual preferences.  Like you know, pink triangles and the Holocaust.  I am really, truly, embarrassed by the fact that my mild comment “F*ck those assholes” is being spread. This wildly understates my actual sentiments towards homophobic religious proponents of evil like Richard Swinburne, who use their status as professional philosophers to oppress others with less power. I am SO SORRY for using such mild language.

Other philosophers soon joined in this Socratic discussion.  For example, Jonathan Jenkins Ichikawa, Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of British Columbia, averred:

Right on.  Also: Fuck those assholes.

Rebecca Kukla, Senior Research Scholar at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics at Georgetown University, sagely added:

Those douche tankards can suck my giant queer cock. 

John Collins, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Columbia University, offered the novel opinion:

Fuck those assholes.

And so on.  For further samples of the discussion going on in this elite salon, head on over to Rightly Considered or Dreher (or Facebook for that matter). 

The relevance to Van Dyke is this.  Rightly Considered now reports that, in a Facebook response to Stanley’s second comment:

Van Dyke reacted to Stanley’s post with a “Haha.” She laughed at the fact that he “profoundly regretted not using harsher language” toward conservative Christians. She said “haha” to the fact that he “apologized” for “wildly understating” his true contempt for conservative Christians.

Rightly Considered offers a screenshot in evidence.  The blog also notes, however, that Van Dyke has since removed this initial approving response, apparently realizing its politically damaging character in the context of the current controversy.

So, Van Dyke apparently agrees that “Fuck those assholes” is an appropriate response to Swinburne and his defenders, and agrees with Stanley that they are “proponents of evil” and abettors of mass murder.  Yet we are supposed to believe that she nevertheless wants the SCP to be neutral between the traditionalist and liberal sides in the debate over sexual morality.

If there were any remaining doubt that some are attempting to politicize the SCP, Van Dyke’s slip of the mask should eliminate it.  Van Dyke ought to resign.  And Rea now needs to apologize both for the disavowal of Swinburne, and for this appalling behavior on the part of the SCP’s Executive Director.  If he is willing to do neither, then he ought to resign himself.