WASHINGTON — A civilian professor at the U.S. Naval academy and an outspoken critic of the institution now says school officials are trying to silence him with a formal reprimand that could potentially end his career.
Bruce Fleming has taught English at the Annapolis campus for 27 years. He’s become the academy’s most outspoken critic, deriding its policies and practices in national media outlets, and has long clashed with leadership at the Navy’s elite training ground
Fleming’s latest troubles began last August as the academy was plunged into the national debate over how to stop sexual assault.
In two classes, Fleming criticized the school’s sexual assault prevention training as fostering a presumption of guilt against male students. A female student in each class pushed back, with one arguing that Fleming was perpetuating “the rape myth.”
Fleming later e-mailed the two female midshipmen and all the students who were in both classes about the exchange, according to investigators.
“I can tell that you were not comfortable with me questioning the givens of sexual assault training … and I hope that I gave you time to express your POV (point of view),” he wrote one of the female students, according to The Washington Post). “Please get used to the fact that there is no assertion that is too sacred for me to question it.”
The female midshipmen then complained to sex assault prevention officials.
