UT Austin Professor Under the Microscope for Pushing Sexual Deviancy Under the Guise of “Scholarship”
Jose Nino
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After receiving fierce criticism and being stalked by students and other members of the community, University of Texas at Austin classics professor Thomas Hubbard is defending his scholarly work on sexual consent laws and pederasty. He is specifically defending his views on sexual activities between men and boys.
Hubbard has received pushback in recent news coverage and editorial columns for his efforts to teach and normalize pederasty, which is often portrayed in ancient Greek art and literature. Pederastic relationships between men and boys were a feature of numerous cultures in Ancient Greece.
The UT professor previously wrote that “contemporary American legislation premised on children’s incapacity to ‘consent’ to sexual relations stems from outmoded gender constructions and ideological preoccupations of the late Victorian and Progressive Era.” He also contended that “pederastic intimacy” once served as a “socialism mechanism” for dealing with boys growing up without fathers.
Following sustained criticism and targeted stalking behavior from students and other members of the community, University of Texas at Austin classics professor Thomas Hubbard is defending himself and his scholarship regarding sexual consent laws and pederasty, or sex between men and boys.
Hubbard told The College Fix, Hubbard that there is nothing nefarious about his research.
“I have never said anything more radical than that we should consider moving in the direction of what most European states do, which is to maintain an age of consent of 14 or 15 with special protections against prostitution of those under 18 or involvement with an adult who is in a position of trust (family members, teachers, therapists, clergy),” he stated.
Hubbard has been subject to pressure from activist on the UT campus. The student group known as “Fire The Abusers” has been leading efforts against him. The group called out Hubbard on their Instagram page, and accused of him of being “guilty” of publishing works arguing that “statutory rape and age of consent laws are burdens,” trying to lower the age of consent, and “being celebrated in online communities for pedophilia views.”
A video recently posted on the group’s Instagram page shows masked activists pounding on Hubbard’s door and windows at his home, yelling “Thomas Hubbard you can’t hide / pedophile come outside!” The video also showed the police escorting Hubbard out of his house, with the protesters yelling: “Who protects pedophiles? Pigs do, pigs do!”
The blog Incendiary News asserted that, in a course titled “Mythologies of Rape,” Hubbard had students write about their experiences with sexual assault and “made them argue whether or not it is actually rape under Texas penal code.” One student even claimed that Hubbard had his students “write a paper over [sic] lowering the age of consent and lowering the punishment for sexually assaulting a child under the age of 6.”
In a public Google doc that attempted to set the record straight on his scholarship, Hubbard denied the accusation that he had students write about their personal sexual assault experiences. “Students were given a paper topic that asked them to evaluate the legal status of two hypothetical scenarios, and how they would have advised the parties if they had been actual friends. Students were given the option of discussing a real case about which they had knowledge, with names changed to conceal identities,” he said.
Hubbard told The College Fix that his age-of-consent arguments are based on other parts of academic scholarship.
“I have…proposed that we might consider a different age of consent for males and females, since the most definitive and never refuted meta-analysis of the psychological effects of teen sexuality with older partners…shows that most college-age males do not regard their teen experiences as harmful, whereas most females regret them,” Hubbard wrote.
The North American Man/Boy Love Association (NAMBA), a pro-pedophilia and pro-pederasty organization, has a track record of praising scholarship that is closely associated to Hubbard’s works. In 2000, Wallace Hamilton Press—a publishing company that NAMBLA runs—published “Greek Love Reconsidered,” a collection of essays that examines the history of ancient Greek homosexuality and features the works of other classics scholars. Hubbard was an editor of the publication, which had an essay written by him titled “Pederasty and Democracy: The Marginalization of a Social Practice.”
In his Google doc, Hubbard admitted that NAMBLA “distributed part of the print run [of the essay collection] to its members.” He stated that he does not “endorse NAMBLA’s idiosyncratic approach to legal reform,” nor does he “share the sexual orientation of its members.” He claimed the essays in that collection “offered accurate, non-romanticized historical understanding of Greek attitudes” toward adolescent sex.
Hubbard has received praise in pro-pedophilia circles. A post published on the website BoyChat, a pro-pedophile message board, described him as “a great man — fearless on speaking out against today’s phobic persecution of boylove.”
The classics professor believes that UT continues to have him on board due to his vast knowledge of Greco-Roman sexuality and his extensive scholarship on Ancient Greece.
“In addition to teaching for 40+ years, I am author or editor of seven books and about 100 scholarly articles, and have received numerous external grants to support my research, including most recently from the prestigious John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. I am considered one of the world’s foremost experts on ancient Greco-Roman sexuality, and have been invited to author numerous encyclopedia articles on the subject and to lecture at some of the world’s most distinguished universities, including Oxford, Cambridge, London, Paris, Berlin, Munich, Amsterdam, and numerous others on four continents,” he wrote on his Google doc.
Hubbard still stands strongly behind the conclusions he has made drawn in his work. “To my accusers, pointing such things out means that I am ‘promoting pedophilia’ and I must be a pedophile myself. For the record, I am not one and have never in my life been intimate with anyone under 18,” he told The Fix.
UT-Austin spokesperson Shilpa Bakre chimed in on this controversy. She stated in an email correspondence with The College Fix that “the study of controversial and even offensive ideas is protected by academic freedom and the First Amendment — as is the right of others to strongly disagree with and draw attention to those ideas.”
“If someone is alleged to violate university policy or takes actions that threaten the safety of the campus community, the university will respond swiftly, investigating allegations thoroughly and imposing sanctions as warranted,” Bakre stated.
Bakre also highlighted that “the incidents directed at Professor Hubbard are unacceptable. He received threats of physical harm and had his home vandalized. Students have the right to contest specific ideas, but threatening anyone’s safety violates the law and university standards of conduct. UTPD is concerned by these threats and actions against our faculty members and continues to work to protect them from harm.”
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