The most telling line in this story is "Gorby is neither Jewish nor African-American." As you can see by his picture, he's what's known as a "White guy." And I suppose, since he's not a member of either group, he's not allowed to have theories about why Jewish students at his school pass the bar 90 percent of the time, black students as low as 12 percent. And his remarks actually were innocuous, considering that he was offering an environmental, rather than genetic hypothesis. It's true that a young man who spent his youth studying Talmudic logic will have much less culture shock in law school than someone who didn't, but of course, a group doesn't develop a tradition of study unless it has a large number of high IQ members.

In fact, if Gorby had been simply been saying that Christianity itself was anti-intellectual, he could probably get a grant to prove it.

Did prof's views on Jews, blacks cross line? JOHN MARSHALL | He sues law school, says remark about students' religions cost him his raise BY ABDON M. PALLASCH CHICAGO SUN-TIMES , August 1, 2007

Is it racism? Robust academic debate? Or clumsy words better left unsaid?

John Marshall Law School professor John Gorby has filed a lawsuit against his employer, saying he was improperly punished for what he believes were innocuous comments to a student after class.

The student, who is Jewish, was doing well in class and Gorby pondered whether his religious training — which from a young age encouraged critical analysis of written Scripture — explained why Jews pass the bar at higher rates than African Americans.

Gorby opined that blacks were brought up in religions such as Baptist churches that "emphasize an emotional and spiritual religious experience rather than discussion and debate about the meaning of scriptural language."

Gorby is neither Jewish nor African-American.

The student shared some of Gorby's comments with classmates, resulting in an elevator confrontation in which an African-American student asked Gorby if it was true that he said blacks don't do well in his class.

She filed a complaint with an assistant dean. The Black Law Student Association demanded Gorby be suspended for 30 days without pay. Gorby addressed the student group trying to straighten things out.

The arguments have been going for five years. That first conversation took place in Gorby's office in 2002. The law school has gone through three deans since then.

The first one took no action on the complaints against Gorby and agreed to give him a 5 percent raise, the lawsuit states.

The second dean, Patricia Mell, killed the raise and put a letter of reprimand in Gorby's file which said, "Academic freedom does not excuse poor judgment. It does not excuse 'pondering' about racial or religious stereotypes to students who legitimately may fear that their law professor may see them through that prism and treat them accordingly in class."[VDARE.com note: Patricia Mell is an African-American, which you would think would be relevant here.]

Gorby appealed and the school's appellate board ruled for him, removing the reprimand from his file.

But he never got his raise. And he spent $25,000 on attorney's fees. He thinks the whole episode represents a stifling of the academic freedom that should allow him and other professors to have provocative discussions with students about subjects such as how to boost bar-passage rates that — according to his lawsuit — have ranged as low as 12 percent some years for African Americans at John Marshall compared with about 90 percent for Jews.

Gorby asks for about $1 million.

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