Temple University Faculty Wants To Revoke Bill Cosby’s Honorary Degree – The Vote May Not Be Common Consensus

Temple University faculty voted to condemn Bill Cosby over the multiple sexual assault allegations he is facing. Apart from demanding that the university revokes Cosby’s honorary degree, the faculty also condemned the board of trustees chairman Patrick O’Connor for vouching for the veteran comedian.

According to Philly, faculty are also urging the university’s president, Neil Theobald, and the university trustees to rescind Cosby’s honorary degree. The comedian has been a longtime supporter of Temple University.

Additionally, the members also condemned Patrick O’Connor for having defended Bill Cosby. The Philadelphia attorney stood by Cosby in a sex assault lawsuit levied against the veteran comedian by a former Temple employee a decade ago, reported KHOU.

O’Connor had strongly defended Bill Cosby in a lawsuit 10 years ago. The lawsuit was filed by Andrea Constand, the former director of operations for the Temple women’s basketball, who had accused Cosby of drugging and then sexually assaulting her in his Cheltenham mansion. While many sexual allegations levied against Bill Cosby date back a few decades, Constand claimed Cosby assaulted her in 2004. At the time, Bill Cosby was 67-years-old. Arthur Hochner, an associate professor in Temple’s business school and the president of the Temple Association of University Professionals, a union representing the faculty, stated that it was a conflict of interest for O’Connor to represent Cosby. O’Connor was representing Cosby, but both were serving as a Temple trustees, he said.

“As an attorney, he had to make a decision about whether he was going to represent Cosby with the vigorous defense he was entitled to or whether he was going to represent the university. He chose to do both. One of the things we talk about and think about in the business school is ethics and I have talked to a number of professors who teach that course and they are appalled at Temple’s lack of ethics in this matter.”

Despite the vote to act against Cosby and O’Connor, the university, as well as O’Connor, has the right to veto the voice vote, reported ABC News. This is because very few members of the faculty attended the meeting that was held to vote on the issue. Temple University has more than 2,000 full-time faculty members, and each person gets a right to vote on the many issues that are discussed. However, the meeting held to vote on condemning Cosby and O’Connor was attended by less than 40 of the members.

University spokesman Raymond Betzner downplayed the importance of the faculty vote, saying, “With fewer than 40 faculty attending, many of whom were not elected representative senators; it raises questions about whether the resolutions passed can be considered representative of the opinions of a significant portion of the more than 2,000 full-time Temple faculties.”

Hochner added that the faculty’s motion to condemn Cosby and O’Connor and to withdraw Cosby’s honorary degree came on a voice vote of fewer than 100 Temple faculty members Friday afternoon.

Bill Cosby’s reputation as a lovable American father figure has nosedived since the sexual assault allegations. Over three dozen women have stepped forward to narrate dreadful accounts allegedly perpetrated by the comedian. They all start differently but end with Cosby reportedly drugging them and sexually assaulting them. So far, Cosby hasn’t been formally charged, but his name has been severely tarnished.

Bill Cosby had been on the board of trustees of Temple University since 1982. He resigned from his post last year. But some of the members now want to revoke his honorary degree as well.

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