It has been a mantra of those calling for Marquette political science professor John McAdams to be sanctioned for his blog criticisms of a philosophy teacher and graduate student, Cheryl Abbate, that as a student, Ms. Abbate was uniquely "vulnerable."  Thus, the letter sent to Marquette by some number of Harvard philosophy graduate students stated:

Universities owe their graduate students—who are among the most vulnerable members of their communities—a guarantee of protection from this kind of treatment. But at Marquette, we were recently disturbed to learn, Cheryl Abbate was put in a position where her best option was to transfer out of her doctoral program.

We call on Marquette to articulate a clear policy for protecting its graduate students from abuses by more powerful members of its community.

As I noted at the time, the idea that universities have an obligation to protect teachers from criticism of their pedagogy by other members of the university is unworkable.  But what I want to remark on here is the assumption that Ms. Abbate was "vulnerable" and Prof. McAdams was the "more powerful member[]" of the community.  As a generalization, it is true that graduate students are more vulnerable to various professional and other setbacks than tenured faculty.  But it wasn't true in this case, as should now be clear:  It is McAdams who now faces the full might of the university as it tries to end his career, while Ms. Abbate has had the good fortune to move on to a much better PhD program, where she will hopefully flourish and move on into her own academic career.  Assumptions about "vulnerability," like other stereotypes, may sometimes belie a more complex situation.  And "protection of the vulnerable" can not, in any case, trump all other values, for when it does we end up with injustices like that at Marquette.

(And for a similar take on related issues.)