Professor Richard Burt on left
BOSTON - University of Massachusetts professor Richard Burt has a reputation for his fixation on porn, in writings, research, and even private parties. But complaints to the university said he went too far when he posted a racy website on university computers. The university apparently agreed, pressuring the tenured English professor to remove the site from the school's computers.
Visitors to the site could see pictures of Burt fondling breasts, links to "Porn Stars I Have Known," and revealing images of his wife, plus links to other adult sites, according to the Boston Globe. Burt earned his Ph.D. in English literature at the University of California at Berkeley, and became a full professor at University of Massachusetts in 1998.
The university says they weren't striking at Burt's academic freedom - he is also known for scholarship on censorship and sexual expression - rather, they say, the site had to be removed because it utilized university accounts and broke the school's policies on information technology and acceptable use.
Cases similar to Burt's have been reviewed in various courts, including a Virginia case where a federal appeals court sided with a law banning state workers from sexually explicit online communication, the Globe said. The American Civil Liberties Union claimed the law abrogated the First Amendment.
Electronic Frontier Foundation spokesman Tom McGuire sides with Burt in the matter. "Free speech is free speech," he said to the Globe. "It should be allowed to occur either on the Internet or elsewhere.
