Let's talk "Limits of Free Speech" and academic freedom

[Fenris]

So, Ward (The Wart) Churchill (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ward_Churchill) is suing to get his job back at CU/Boulder.

The University claims he was fired for (some or all) of the following
Lying about his ethnicity (and cheating a legit Native American out of a set-aside job)
Plagerism (academic and artistic--in one notorious case, Churchill put a semi-famous picture on an overhead projector and "painted it", coloring-book style.)
Being a violent (and cowardly) criminal-he kept throwing buckets of blood or red paint on the little old ladies who marched in Denver's tiny Colombus Day parade--strangely, after he pulled this shit for several years, a bunch of bikers said "Screw this" and rode along with the parade...so Churchill decided he'd "made his point". :rolleyes:
Urging people to commit acts of terrorism/incitement to riot (he's on audio tape telling a kid to dress up in a suit and tie and take a bomb in a briefcase into a bank)
Being dumber than a box of rocks. And not interesting quartzes and feldspars. I'm talking he's dumber than igneous rocks, people.
And generally being a douchebag.

(cites on request)

Churchill claims that he was fired due to CU/Boulder not liking the fact that Churchill published an essay about how all the people who died in the World Trade Center on 9/11 deserved it 'cause they were "little Eichmans" and it's a violation of his free speech rights.

Me? I'm a near first-amendment absolutist. Short of (literally) yelling "FIRE!" in a crowded theater, libel or certain treason-type issues (publishing secret plans or some such), the phrase "Congress shall make NO law..." isn't really ambiguous. That means, if it was up to me, Janet Jackson's nipple would be just fine on TV, as would the F*bomb, the "n-word" and everything else.

That said, Churchill isn't a government employee and the government isn't stifling him.

Let's assume for a moment that the sun stops in it's tracks and the heavens open up and Wart is correct: he WAS fired for saying that everyone who died in 9/11 were "little Eichmans".

I'd be fine with that: Burger King would be well within it's rights to fire a burger-flipper who told each customer "Hey, our burgers are SHIT! Go to Good Times if you want a burger that's not made out of cow's assholes*"

So whaddaya think?
Does being a Professor allow you to say anything you want?

Should a school have the right to fire a Professor for the Professor saying something that materially damages the reputation of the school?

I dumped a bunch of issues here--there a thread in 'em that someone wants to discuss?




*Speaking of Ward Churchill. ;)

[St. Urho]

I agree. There are many good reasons why he got fired, and none to keep him around. Also, it pissed me off that supporting Churchill became such a liberal cause célèbre, especially since he's a droolingly moronic, self-citing plagiarist.

[Misanthropic Contrarian]

So, Ward (The Wart) Churchill (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ward_Churchill) is suing to get his job back at CU/Boulder.

The University claims he was fired for (some or all) of the following [list]
Lying about his ethnicity (and cheating a legit Native American out of a set-aside job)
Plagerism (academic and artistic--in one notorious case, Churchill put a semi-famous picture on an overhead projector and "painted it", coloring-book style.

How exactly is this plagerism? Has Churchill claimed that he was the original painter of the original painting? How is this any different then someone doing a paint by numbers of the Mona Lisa? There must 1,000's of those and I've never heard anyone throwing around plagerism accusations about any of them them.
Does being a Professor allow you to say anything you want?

Should a school have the right to fire a Professor for the Professor saying something that materially damages the reputation of the school?

I dumped a bunch of issues here--there a thread in 'em that someone wants to discuss?

*Speaking of Ward Churchill. ;)
Being a tenured professor allows you to say anything you want.:p

If you are a professor who's books are published by your college press, then the college probably does have some legal standing when it comes to what you can and can't say in your books, they could argue that if you don't like it, you can simply take your manuscript to another publisher.

As for Churchill himself, sounds like you've been watching way too much of the O'Lielly Factor lately.

Churchill is a complete non-entity within the collegiate academic world, O'Lielly is just giving him free publicity.

[Fenris]

How exactly is this plagerism? Has Churchill claimed that he was the original painter of the original painting? How is this any different then someone doing a paint by numbers of the Mona Lisa? There must 1,000's of those and I've never heard anyone throwing around plagerism accusations about any of them them.
He sold them as original "Native American" art. The painter of the original painting thinks they're plagerized.

As does the writer of a textbook that Churchill took pages out of and passed off as his own work.

Churchill is a complete non-entity within the collegiate academic world, O'Lielly is just giving him free publicity.
"O'Lielly"?

In any case, I live in Colorado and hear bout this douchebag daily, now that his lawsuit is going forward. I've never listened to "O'Lielly".

[Boon]

As a teacher, although just in public school, technically I'm tenured. I do not have all the freedoms given a college prof., but I must be given cause for my termination.

We do have limited 1st Amendment rights, Pickering v. Board of Education being the primary case establishing that. There is also Board of Regents of State Collages v. Roth and Perry v. Sinderman that guarantee post-probationary or tenured teachers due process prior to termination, in accordance with the 14th Amendment.

Looking at why Churchill was fired: "professional incompetence, neglect of duty, insubordination, conviction of a felony or any offense involving moral turpitude… or sexual harassment or other conduct which falls below minimum standards of professional integrity" Link. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenure) I'd say they gave more than enough cause.

Professional Incompetence is a broad one, as is neglect of duty, but I believe that simply proving those two issues occured and negativly affected the students is enough.

I don't neccissarly think he should have been fired, I'm as much a Freedom of Speech guy as Fenris. However, if in the course of his actions above, he was neglecting his duties to those students, that's offense.

I don't know enough about University level stuff, but is there an option for censuring a Professor? I know that the AAUP can do that to universities Link, (http://www.aaup.org/AAUP/issues/AF/censure.htm) but is there no recourse for them against a tenured prof.?

[Misanthropic Contrarian]

He sold them as original "Native American" art. The painter of the original painting thinks they're plagerized.

As does the writer of a textbook that Churchill took pages out of and passed off as his own work.


"O'Lielly"?

In any case, I live in Colorado and hear bout this douchebag daily, now that his lawsuit is going forward. I've never listened to "O'Lielly".


O'Lielly= Bill O'Reilly.

I'm still a bit confused, did Churchill claim that he the original painting was done by himself or the overhead thingee? If it;s the former then yeah that's plagerism, if the latter, then not so much.

Look, I have little sympathy for Churchill myself, he comes across as an egomaniacal douche just shrieking for someone to pay attention to him.

Another question is just what % of the university budget goes towards Churchill's salary/upkeep? I have a much bigger problem with the fact that recruits for the U of Colorado football team were taken to strip clubs/prostitutes on the universities dime.

[Fenris]

O'Lielly= Bill O'Reilly.
Ah--

I've listened to him maybe twice in my life. Can't stand the guy.

I'm still a bit confused, did Churchill claim that he the original painting was done by himself or the overhead thingee? If it;s the former then yeah that's plagerism, if the latter, then not so much.
Neither--he sold the color-by-numbers thing he traced on the overhead (and flipped) as an "original Native American work of art" (which is 3 lies in 6 words) See here (http://cbs4denver.com/local/ward.churchill.thomas.2.541927.html)

ETA: and here (Churchill's "original" piece is the one on the right) (http://www.thefurtrapper.com/images/Churchill.jpg)

And that doesn't include his academic plagiarism.

Look, I have little sympathy for Churchill myself, he comes across as an egomaniacal douche just shrieking for someone to pay attention to him.
Completely granted. But A) I had a personal sorta run-in with him, B) We get a lot of news about him and he's a good test of free speech/academic freedom rules because he IS so much on the wacky fringe and C) heh--sometimes it's FUN to feed the trolls. ;)

[Misanthropic Contrarian]

As far as your run in, does he stink of cigarettes? He has that look "aura" around him?

As far as your thinking that his getting fired for his comments about 9/11 and tying that with an employee of Burger King telling all customers that "The Whopper sucks dick!!! Go to McDonald's!!", those are two different things.

Churchill was commenting on those who died in the events of 9/11, but AFAIK he never singled anyone out specifically by name, and he didn't mention the Colorado University. I don't think he was right to be fired for that. It's too much like Ari Fleishers getting on national Tv and scolding everyone to "watch what you say,".

Now, let's say that the shootings at Virginia Tech had taken place at U Colorado/Boulder where Churchill happened to be teaching and Churchill said something about how fabulous it was that everyone died, then I can see that as a fireable offense.

[Fenris]

As a teacher, although just in public school, technically I'm tenured. I do not have all the freedoms given a college prof., but I must be given cause for my termination.

We do have limited 1st Amendment rights, Pickering v. Board of Education being the primary case establishing that. There is also Board of Regents of State Collages v. Roth and Perry v. Sinderman that guarantee post-probationary or tenured teachers due process prior to termination, in accordance with the 14th Amendment.
Here's a question though:

Should there be academic freedom of speech? (I'm playing devil's advocate here to a large degree). Why should university professors have rights that no other employee in the world has? Any employee shelves some of his or her free speech rights at the door--an employee of Microsoft who said "PCs suck, buy Apple" would be fired, for instance.

[Boon]

There needs to be a degree of academic freedom granted to both University and Public Teachers. A good reason for that is what you're doing, playing devil's advocate. So many things are controversial and need to be discussed in the classroom, that not allowing many would be academically dishonest.

For me it boils down to this: I'm not there to preach my personal beliefs. I'm there to give both sides and not use my position to advance my own thoughts. Especially since my classroom is equal to a captive audience.

Should he be allowed to express his private thoughts publicly? Hell yes he should. I've no problem with that, even though teacher's have a limited right to that already. Tenure should only apply to IN the classroom, leaving the school with the ability to terminate for actions outside of it. I think tenure has been abused in that respect. It's not a bullet proof vest or a get out of jail free card. It's supposed to protect the professor from unjust termination.

[Misanthropic Contrarian]

Here's a question though:

Should there be academic freedom of speech? (I'm playing devil's advocate here to a large degree). Why should university professors have rights that no other employee in the world has? Any employee shelves some of his or her free speech rights at the door--an employee of Microsoft who said "PCs suck, buy Apple" would be fired, for instance.

I think you're missing the context--if an employee of Microsoft says "Microsoft sucks dick! Apple Rules!!" in an email he sends while working in his office at Microsoft, then yeah, there is a case for punishment, as long as Microsoft has a policy in place which prohibits such things and the employee is made aware of said policy. If the employee does the same in the privacy of their home using a non-work email, then Microsoft has no cause for punishment.

There is also the question of exactly what specific "message' a university/college is trying to send out. Honestly there has to be more then one.

[Sgt. Max Fightmaster]

Looking at why Churchill was fired: "professional incompetence, neglect of duty, insubordination, conviction of a felony or any offense involving moral turpitude… or sexual harassment or other conduct which falls below minimum standards of professional integrity" Link. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenure) I'd say they gave more than enough cause.

These all sound like pretty good reasons to fire someone.

People can debate forever back-and-forth about the 'real' reason behind the firing (and certainly we've all been in situations where various sins were trudged up to justify a firing), but it occurs to me that, unless someone can argue cogently against these charges, there's more than enough on the table to fire Churchill, regardless of any underlying agenda.

I personally don't know much about this guy. He sounds like one of the rare breed of professors - and they are rare, no matter how often right-wing commentators try to assert otherwise - who seem to think academic work is just as well served by stringing together bombastic assertions. Call it the Jane Fonda approach to intelligent commentary and debate. This is also a great way to kick up a stink about a firing: Claim that you're being attacked for some past bombastic assertion, and not for the fact you're a self-aggrandising dipshit who's about as intellectual as a hemorrhoid.

[Andrew Jackson's Hair]

Before I even clicked on the thread I knew it would be about Ward Churchill. The fake Indian thing alone is enough to have him fired imho. Native Son, what a nutless jerk this guy is.

But uhm, yeah. I guess the entire thing really goes to what teachers are supposed to do. Teach of course, but teach what? Is the purpose of schooling to impart actual academic knowledge to students, or is it to socialize them? The more one can argue that a teacher's purpose is to socialize (e.g. grades k-12) the less I really support the concept of additional free speech protection.

At the collegiate level, it should theoretically change but then you move into an entirely different system of rules, rules which pre-date the legal concept of free speech and probably go back to the first universities of old Europe. The politics of academia are what they are, and no matter what Churchill said or did not say, we can ultimately conclude that he fell afoul of those politics. That he deserved to go down just makes it savory, as opposed to the socially inept but well-meaning lab rat who has his funding pulled because he can't mingle effectively. I'd feel bad for the latter.

Maybe Churchill will be "Indian" enough to drink himself to death in a gutter while lamenting the evils of the white man. No, we're not that lucky.

[Orbifold]

Should there be academic freedom of speech? (I'm playing devil's advocate here to a large degree).

Yes.

Why should university professors have rights that no other employee in the world has? Any employee shelves some of his or her free speech rights at the door--an employee of Microsoft who said "PCs suck, buy Apple" would be fired, for instance.

Because university professors aren't doing the same job as an employee of Microsoft.

The principle of academic freedom originates in the recognition that universities are not just a business, churning out product in response to consumer demand. Universities are also centres of inquiry, ideally unfettered inquiry. We as a society claim to value knowledge, and claim to belief that the pursuit of knowledge goes hand in hand with the advancement of civilization. But the best pursuit of that knowledge doesn't occur when the state or society tries to pressure research into approved channels only, whether that pressure is implicit or explicit.

If you want universities to be actual centres of learning, not just western madrassas, then academics need to be able to pursue knowledge. All knowledge, not just knowledge that makes you feel comfortable, or knowledge that confirms societies existing beliefs. The tricky knowledge, the unconventional knowledge, the knowledge that goes against prevailing wisdom: that's just as vital, possibly even more so, than the conventional stuff. But people aren't going to pursue that if they think they'll be punished or shamed for doing so. And that's the reason for academic freedom: to guarantee that there will be someone who feels free to ask not just the approved questions, but the difficult questions as well.

Which, in the end, has little to do with whether or not CU had cause for firing Ward Churchill. There's more than a little daylight between asking difficult questions and throwing paint at people. But don't use Churchill to try and drag academic freedom through the mud, either.

[Helen's Eidolon]

Orbifold, you said it much better than I could.

It sure sounds like there is cause for firing this guy, no arguments there. But I feel deeply uncomfortable with the notion that ideas in articles could get a professor fired.

This is obviously an extreme example, but this (http://feminist.org/news/newsbyte/uswirestory.asp?id=11522) (another view here (http://www.ajc.com/services/content/printedition/2009/02/11/legsex0211.html)) is the kind of thing that happens when universities get treated as companies.

[hendo]

I'm going to agree with pretty much everything Orbifold has said, i think.

The OP asks whether universities should be able to fire professors for saying something that "materially damages the reputation of the school." But it seems to me that this is looking at the situation all wrong.

First of all, the principle of academic freedom means that people should not use the utterances of a single professor when assessing the quality or the reputation of a college. Sure, some professors might say stupid things, or things that we disagree with politically or morally or whatever. But just because a professor is employed by a particular institution does not mean that every utterance he or she makes should be considered representative of, or approved by, that institution.

Second, even if the professor says something you think is ridiculous or offensive, the very fact that he or she is allowed to say it should actually enhance the reputation of the school, because it demonstrates that the school believes in the very principles of freedom of speech and freedom of inquiry that are central to a university's mission.

If Ward Churchill's only crime was to say that the victims of 9/11 were "little Eichmans," he should absolutely still have his job.

Now, while i do think that universities constitute a special case in terms of freedom of speech, and that university professors should have almost limitless latitude in this area, there are other areas where i'm out of step with many academics, and that is the question of tenure.

While my wife is a college professor, and i hope to be one very soon, i actually think the tenure system as it currently stands is very problematic. The institution of tenure was a good and necessary thing, because it was introduced precisely to protect academic from the political whims of powerful university administrators. To the extent that it still does that, it serves an excellent purpose.

The problem, i believe, is that it has become so all-encompassing that it also protects professors from the consequences of professional stagnation and/or incompetence. The fact is that, once you have tenure, you virtually have to commit a felony on campus to get fired. You can be an awful teacher, completely indifferent to the needs of your students, of your colleagues, and of your institution, but with tenure that really doesn't matter.

I think we need a revision of the tenure system so that it continues to function as a guarantor of free speech, but that it also is flexible enough to allow incompetents and malingerers to be shown the door. Doing this would require committees, probably similar to the types of academic committees that universities currently use to make tenure and promotion decisions, and a system of evaluations and appeals. But i believe it can be done.

Even in good economic times, the supply of outstanding candidates for university jobs far exceeds the supply of job, and that goes even more during hard times like the present. My own field (history) had dozens and dozens of cancelled job searches last year, and many universities (even wealthy private ones like my grad school) have instituted hiring freezes for all but endowed chairs. In this sort of climate, a tenure system that lets bad teachers hang round while leaving keen, enthusiastic, well-qualified PhDs without jobs is a system in need of reform.

[steps off one soapbox, and onto another]

As for the more general issue of Churchill at CU, i'll make a few points that i've made elsewhere.

One of the reasons that i, and others on the left, have had misgivings about the firing of Churchill is that the scholarly and academic deceptions for which he was investigated (and ultimately fired) by UC Boulder had been brought to public attention as early as 1996, and yet no-one apparently thought they were egregious enough to warrant any official sanction. The university ONLY began to make any moves against him after his 9/11 speech.

Another thing is, while i think that there was probably sufficient evidence of misconduct to fire Churchill, it's not as clear-cut and certainly nowhere near as large a part of his work as you would assume from reading media reports about the case. In at least a couple of the cases, where the charge was "misrepresentation" rather than plagiarism, the disputes were, it seems to me, as much about differences of interpretation as anything else.

I agree with the investigating committee that Churchill drew unjustifiable inferences and conclusions from his sources, and that the evidentiary burden that he placed on them was far to heavy for them to bear. But if every scholar who overstated his or her case, and who pushed the evidence too hard, was fired for academic misconduct, the universities of America would be empty. It was, i think, the great American historian Richard Hofstadter who said that if a new and heterodox interpretation is worth anything, it's worth a forceful overstatement, because that is the sort of thing that gets scholarly debates going.

The plagiarism issues are more worrisome. I've had to examine my own feelings about plagiarism very closely in assessing my response to this particular issue, because as someone who has taught college kids, i have an obligation to prevent plagiarism whenever possible, and to deal with it when it raises its head. There is no doubt that segments of other works appear in Churchill's work. The problem here, though, is that even the investigating committee conceded that there were doubts about questions of joint authorship in at least one of the cases.

In at least two of the cases, also, the amount of plagiarised material was small enough that it could constitute an honest mistake. Anyone who has written long pieces of research knows that it note-taking is subject to human error, not just in the transcription but in the attribution. In the process of putting my research into written form, i've often had to stop and read my notes very closely to try and determine whether a particular paragraph is my own interpretation, of if i copied it from another source to use as a reference later. If i were perfect, and labelled every single note i took completely accurately, this wouldn't be a problem, but i'm not perfect. I just have to hope that i haven't, somewhere in my dissertation, inadvertently inserted a paragraph that wasn't mine, only to have it thrown back in my face years later.

I think the historian Lawrence Stone put it quite well, writing about a controversy over academic ethics in the 1980s. Defending a historian, David Abraham, whose work had been criticized for errors and omissions and misrepresentation, Stone said:When you work in the archives you're far from home, you're bored, you're in a hurry, you're scribbling like crazy. You're bound to make mistakes. I don't believe any scholar in the Western world has impeccable footnotes. Archival research is a special case of the general messiness of life.This doesn't mean that we ignore errors, or fail to correct them. It does mean, i think, that some scholarly failings are truly the result of human error, rather than malice or dishonesty.

Anyway, if Churchill had been investigated for his breaches of academic ethics when they first surfaced, and had been found guilty and fired, i probably wouldn't have had a complaint. While i think that some of the charges were not sustained at the level found by the committee, they were sustained sufficiently (and were probably bad enough) to warrant a discharge. It just seemed so problematic to me that this issue came up only after Churchill said some controversial stuff about 9/11.

His plagiarism, also, was far, far less egregious than the plagiarism committed by prominent historians like Stephen Ambrose and Doris Kearns-Goodwin. Admittedly these historians were not university academics, so they couldn't be fired for their dishonesty, but the general willingness of the press and the public to overlook their indiscretions is an interesting contrast with the way Churchill was treated.

If you want to read the Investigating Committee report on Churchill, which discusses all the complaints against him, and goes into considerable detail about each charge and the evidence used to investigate the allegations, you can download it from here (http://www.colorado.edu/news/reports/churchill/download/WardChurchillReport.pdf) (pdf).

And if you want to debate about his firing, then you really need to do that, and you really need to read all of it. Reading the much shorter Standing Committee report is no use at all, as it has virtually no details about the incidents themselves, or about the substantive scholarly issues. And the media reports of the issue also give none of the details that are so important in making an adjudication in a case like this.

[The Second Stone]

Assuming that the accusations against him are more or less accurate, yeah, then fire him. But not for the Little Eichmanns thing. As much as I disagree with that statement, it was a choice conversation starter.

[Fenris]

First of all, the principle of academic freedom means that people should not use the utterances of a single professor when assessing the quality or the reputation of a college. Sure, some professors might say stupid things, or things that we disagree with politically or morally or whatever. But just because a professor is employed by a particular institution does not mean that every utterance he or she makes should be considered representative of, or approved by, that institution.

Second, even if the professor says something you think is ridiculous or offensive, the very fact that he or she is allowed to say it should actually enhance the reputation of the school, because it demonstrates that the school believes in the very principles of freedom of speech and freedom of inquiry that are central to a university's mission.
So where are all the Nazis? Who's representing the point of view of the Klansmen? (and no, it's not Godwinizing to bring up Hitler in a discussion about Ward "Little Eichmanns" Churchill. ;) ). If intellectual freedom is so important, why are so many equally stupid and offensive points of view as Churchill's being ignored? Where are the creationists at CU's Geology/Biology/Astronomy departments? Hell, where are all the "pro-life" sociology teachers? None of these points of view are any less....extreme than the stuff Churchill spews. If academic freedom is so important, why isn't there more emphasis on diversity of opinion?

I think we need a revision of the tenure system so that it continues to function as a guarantor of free speech, but that it also is flexible enough to allow incompetents and malingerers to be shown the door. Doing this would require committees, probably similar to the types of academic committees that universities currently use to make tenure and promotion decisions, and a system of evaluations and appeals. But i believe it can be done.
I think we're in agreement here, with some quibbling over where "free speech" and "speaking as a representative of the university" overlap.

I can't prove this and have no cites, so if this was the SDMB I'd be out of luck, but I hope we can create a different climate here. A friend of a friend of mine (I've met the guy--he's not a phantom "FOAF" or something) actually was in a class Ward Churchill taught. He left after a week. He claims that one of the many things that prompted him to quit the class was Churchill saying that all white males in the class would automatically be deducted one letter grade--so the best they could achieve was a "B" (or 3.0). This was because A) to teach white males what it feels like and B) since white males had advantages from society, this was just 'leveling the playing field'. Ignoring the obvious gross academic misconduct, the level of racism there should get any teacher fired. Imagine a basketball coach who said the same thing to black students.

Not all academic speech should be protected.


One of the reasons that i, and others on the left, have had misgivings about the firing of Churchill is that the scholarly and academic deceptions for which he was investigated (and ultimately fired) by UC Boulder had been brought to public attention as early as 1996, and yet no-one apparently thought they were egregious enough to warrant any official sanction. The university ONLY began to make any moves against him after his 9/11 speech.
< snip >
Anyway, if Churchill had been investigated for his breaches of academic ethics when they first surfaced, and had been found guilty and fired, i probably wouldn't have had a complaint. While i think that some of the charges were not sustained at the level found by the committee, they were sustained sufficiently (and were probably bad enough) to warrant a discharge. It just seemed so problematic to me that this issue came up only after Churchill said some controversial stuff about 9/11.

That's because the idiot who was president of CU was unwilling to take any action. Remember, she was the same dim-bulb who tried to defend one of the football coaches from one of the many, MANY football-related scandals by saying (close, CLOSE paraphrase) "Well, "cunt" can be a term of endearment." :rolleyes:

It wasn't until they got a new president that there was anyone willing to stand up to Churchill and actually examine his dubious record.

My concern with your argument is that just because a 'crime' has been overlooked doesn't mean that it can be gotten away with forever. If you've been bribing your IRS auditor to look the other way on the taxes you've been cheating on, you don't get off the hook when you get assigned to a non-corrupt auditor.

Our disagreements aside, GREAT post hendo! :)

[Orbifold]

So where are all the Nazis? Who's representing the point of view of the Klansmen? (and no, it's not Godwinizing to bring up Hitler in a discussion about Ward "Little Eichmanns" Churchill. ;) ). If intellectual freedom is so important, why are so many equally stupid and offensive points of view as Churchill's being ignored? Where are the creationists at CU's Geology/Biology/Astronomy departments? Hell, where are all the "pro-life" sociology teachers? None of these points of view are any less....extreme than the stuff Churchill spews. If academic freedom is so important, why isn't there more emphasis on diversity of opinion?

This is quite frankly bordering on nonsense. You're conflating the university's choice of who to hire with the ability of an academic to pursue research without censure once they have tenure. And, you're conflating "academic freedom" with "diversity of opinion", which aren't the same thing. Yes, academic freedom includes the freedom to pursue a differing opinion, but academic freedom doesn't mean an absence of academic standards.

The reason academic freedom doesn't imply creationists in the biology department is because tenure is supposed to be earned, and given to academics with a record of achievement in their field. It does not mean "give tenure to Nazis", because before you get tenure you have to demonstrate that you meet the standards for it, typically through your record of research.

CU, at one point, thought Ward Churchill met those standards, and chose to give him tenure. You disagree and think Ward Churchill's scum, we get it. But if you think that "academic freedom" means that universities are somehow hypocrites if they don't give platforms to Nazis then your view of academic freedom is painfully shallow. Academic freedom is about keeping an open mind in the pursuit of knowledge. Creationism and fascism are about closing your mind and pretending ignorance is knowledge. There's a difference. It pains me that this isn't obvious.

Do you think no one's thought of this before? Do you think universities just invented the tenure system without thinking "You know, maybe we should be a little discriminating here and not give this remarkable job security to any whackaloon that comes in the door?" Do you think getting tenure is easy for most people?

[EJsGirl]

Just popping in to say that I KNEW EXACTLY who this was going to be about when I saw the thread title.

Why won't that idiot stay under a rock? :rolleyes: Having said that, I do miss Boulder... :D

[WednesdayAddams]

I thought it was about this (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/greg-lukianoff/oklahoma-legislature-inve_b_177473.html). :o Sorry. Carry on.

[Brunhilda]

The thing is that Free Speech in academia was meant to protect research agendas, not attacks, plagiarism, and poor treatment of students. If I were the university, I would have tipped the police off to him as making terroristic threats when he suggested bringing a bomb into a bank.

[GIGObuster]

This is quite frankly bordering on nonsense. You're conflating the university's choice of who to hire with the ability of an academic to pursue research without censure once they have tenure. And, you're conflating "academic freedom" with "diversity of opinion", which aren't the same thing. Yes, academic freedom includes the freedom to pursue a differing opinion, but academic freedom doesn't mean an absence of academic standards.

The reason academic freedom doesn't imply creationists in the biology department is because tenure is supposed to be earned, and given to academics with a record of achievement in their field. It does not mean "give tenure to Nazis", because before you get tenure you have to demonstrate that you meet the standards for it, typically through your record of research.

CU, at one point, thought Ward Churchill met those standards, and chose to give him tenure. You disagree and think Ward Churchill's scum, we get it. But if you think that "academic freedom" means that universities are somehow hypocrites if they don't give platforms to Nazis then your view of academic freedom is painfully shallow. Academic freedom is about keeping an open mind in the pursuit of knowledge. Creationism and fascism are about closing your mind and pretending ignorance is knowledge. There's a difference. It pains me that this isn't obvious.

Do you think no one's thought of this before? Do you think universities just invented the tenure system without thinking "You know, maybe we should be a little discriminating here and not give this remarkable job security to any whackaloon that comes in the door?" Do you think getting tenure is easy for most people?
I really could not had said it better.

Incidentally, I do think that Ward Churchill was deservedly kicked out, but I do think also that some right wing sources have decided to still use him in an effort to tar all academics, it does not matter if those same intellectuals are not defending Ward Churchill, it does not matter that he was criticized by many on the left too. It matters only that some did defend him so many sources on the right just want to continue to pass on the idea that all academics (that hold leftist ideas) are like him.

[Fenris]

Yes, academic freedom includes the freedom to pursue a differing opinion, but academic freedom doesn't mean an absence of academic standards.

The reason academic freedom doesn't imply creationists in the biology department is because tenure is supposed to be earned, and given to academics with a record of achievement in their field. It does not mean "give tenure to Nazis", because before you get tenure you have to demonstrate that you meet the standards for it, typically through your record of research.
But Churchill (again, I completely agree that he's at the whack-job end of the spectrum and doesn't represent the vast majority of professors) got tenure despite similarly racist and ahistorical views. He was still teaching the smallpox legend as fact and proof of 'the white race's inherent evil' (close paraphrase). TThe fact that he got tenure shouldn't protect him when he spreads those lies.

Pat Buchanan, to use another example, in the last 15 years or so has become something of a Holocaust denier and a Hitler apologist--he wasn't always. Had he been a tenured professor (actually, he may be. I'll check*), those views are stupid and radical enough that I'd suggest that 'academic freedom' shouldn't protect him.

ETA: I checked--he's not. Maybe I'm remembering him getting an honorary degree.

[Brunhilda]

The fact he was granted tenure is what is disgusting; the racism and ahistorical views should have gotten him canned. There is a general reluctance to fire tenure track employees, but they should have done it before the period ended.

[hendo]

So where are all the Nazis? Who's representing the point of view of the Klansmen? (and no, it's not Godwinizing to bring up Hitler in a discussion about Ward "Little Eichmanns" Churchill. ;) ). If intellectual freedom is so important, why are so many equally stupid and offensive points of view as Churchill's being ignored? Where are the creationists at CU's Geology/Biology/Astronomy departments? Hell, where are all the "pro-life" sociology teachers? None of these points of view are any less....extreme than the stuff Churchill spews. If academic freedom is so important, why isn't there more emphasis on diversity of opinion?Firstly, i'm going to have to go with Orbifold's rebuttal here. For the most part, i'm in complete agreement with his[?] argument, and i think your position puts the cart before the horse.

Also, as a more general point: Let's say there were some hypothetical tenured biology professor at CU, a person who had all the publications and other research and teaching qualifications necessary to be granted tenure at a research university. If, after having been granted tenure, that professor came out and expressed a belief that the Holocaust never happened, i would argue against firing him or her, on the grounds of the same academic freedom that i've been defending in this thread. That professor has been hired to study and teach biology, and if the people on the biology faculty, and on the university's tenure and promotion committees, believe that the professor is sufficiently competent in the field, then his or her beliefs about a completely unrelated field should be irrelevant.

Granted, i tend to think that Holocaust denial indicates a tendency to make a priori assumptions, and to reject valid evidence, so i guess it's possible that Holocaust denial might reflect on a biologist's abilities qua scientist. But if it seemed that the Holocaust denial were "merely" a political position, or a position based in ignorance, i don't think it would warrant firing.

Now, we run into a problem when we start talking about history or philosophy or sociology professors, because with the humanities and social sciences it can be harder to draw a clear line between a person's work and a person's general beliefs about the world. Humanists and social scientists deal specifically with the human condition and human relations in the research and the teaching that we do. This makes the whole thing much harder to deal with. For example, i'm really not sure how i would feel to learn that an otherwise-respected history professor came out as a Holocaust denier. Even if that person worked in a completely different area of history, and never dealt with WWII Nazism in his or her research or teaching, i would be very skeptical of his/her professional competence, based simply on the fact that there is so much convincing evidence about the Holocaust.I think we're in agreement here, with some quibbling over where "free speech" and "speaking as a representative of the university" overlap.

I can't prove this and have no cites, so if this was the SDMB I'd be out of luck, but I hope we can create a different climate here. A friend of a friend of mine (I've met the guy--he's not a phantom "FOAF" or something) actually was in a class Ward Churchill taught. He left after a week. He claims that one of the many things that prompted him to quit the class was Churchill saying that all white males in the class would automatically be deducted one letter grade--so the best they could achieve was a "B" (or 3.0). This was because A) to teach white males what it feels like and B) since white males had advantages from society, this was just 'leveling the playing field'. Ignoring the obvious gross academic misconduct, the level of racism there should get any teacher fired. Imagine a basketball coach who said the same thing to black students.

Not all academic speech should be protected.First, while i don't doubt your retelling, i have considerable doubts about your FOAF's claim.

But let's assume for a moment that the claim is completely true, and that Churchill did, in fact, tell all white males that they could not achieve a better grade than a B, no matter how good their work.

I don't understand why you think this supports your argument, because every single person i know who believes in academic freedom would also believe that Churchill should be fired for making such statements. I thought i made very clear in my last post that academic freedom is, for me and for most academics, designed precisely to protect speech that does NOT violate a professor's professional duty to his or her work and students. If a professor says something that expressly violates the principles and standards of academic professional conduct, then academic freedom is not a defense. I do not know a single person in academia who would argue that this sort of prejudice in allocating grades constitutes reasonable behavior, or that it should be protected under the banner of academic freedom.

Then, of course, we need to ask the question: what sort of things DO constitute a violation of academic professional standards? Here there are, i believe, some grey areas, and some perfectly black and white areas.

For me, the "little Eichmanns" comment is a black and white area. It was a personal political opinion, and one that, while perhaps offensive to many people, in no way violated Churchill's duty as a professor, a researcher, and a teacher. If that essay were the only source of controversy about him, then his firing would have been totally unjustified, in my opinion.

The other stuff, mentioned in the report i linked in my previous post, is much more troubling. As i suggested earlier, i think that some of Churchill's sins here were quite grave, and warranted censure or discipline at least, and probably warranted firing. Even if we accept all of his explanations at face value, he was, at the very least, guilty of very poor academic practices, the sort that would get an undergraduate a stern talking to, and possibly a grade of F. At worst—and most likely—he was guilty of precisely the level of academic misconduct that he was accused of, and that warranted dismissal.

But we have to be careful in these grey areas. Firstly, as i suggested earlier, we need to try and evaluate whether they were, in fact, isolated instances of poor methodology and disorganized note-taking, or whether they constituted a pattern of malicious misconduct. Those who teach undergraduates make similar evaluations; i've been known to fail students who simply copy and paste their entire essay from the internet, but let off with a warning students who clearly did most of the work themselves, but who inadvertently included two or three uncited passages in their essay.

Further, we have to make sure that we don't penalize academics for "merely" being wrong. Research and the advancement of knowledge requires that we are sometimes willing to go out on a limb in order to test a new idea or interpretation. The famous historian Richard Hofstadter once said that if a new or heterodox idea is worth anything, it's worth a forceful overstatement. His point was that, if you come straight out with your new idea and don't dance around it with caveats and qualifications, then it's more likely to be tested in the furnace of scholarly critique. And sometimes a "forceful overstatement" will be found to be misguided, or poorly argued, or unsupported by available evidence, or just plain wrong. But that doesn't mean that the person who makes such an overstatement is a bad scholar, or even a substandard one. Getting things wrong is part of what the pursuit of knowledge is all about; the famous physicist Richard Feynman recognized this for his own field, but it is just as true of the humanities and social sciences.

I'm not saying that this was the issue with Churchill. I think the evidence, and the university committee's report, support a conclusion that he was wilfully dishonest in his academic practices. But these are questions that we have to deal with whenever we address the issue of what, exactly, the limits of academic freedom are.That's because the idiot who was president of CU was unwilling to take any action. Remember, she was the same dim-bulb who tried to defend one of the football coaches from one of the many, MANY football-related scandals by saying (close, CLOSE paraphrase) "Well, "cunt" can be a term of endearment." :rolleyes:

It wasn't until they got a new president that there was anyone willing to stand up to Churchill and actually examine his dubious record.

My concern with your argument is that just because a 'crime' has been overlooked doesn't mean that it can be gotten away with forever. If you've been bribing your IRS auditor to look the other way on the taxes you've been cheating on, you don't get off the hook when you get assigned to a non-corrupt auditor.Of course not. The gravity of Churchill's academic and professional problems remained exactly as bad after his "little Eichmanns" comment as they were before it. But, at the same time, it's not the fault of anyone outside the university that the allegations were ignored earlier, and it's easy to understand why some people might be skeptical about the way that the allegations of academic misconduct were only taken seriously by the university after Churchill's political comments got so much negative publicity.

In fact, even if the reason was, as you suggest, simply the incompetence of the previous President, the fact is that the way universities deal with allegations of academic misconduct are directly relevant to the issue of academic freedom. If universities develop a practice of only properly investigating allegations of academic misconduct when a professor makes a controversial public statement, then i think the universities themselves are undermining the principle of academic freedom. Academic misconduct allegations should be properly investigated whether or not the professor is a controversial figure. And controversial public statements should not be the trigger for university administrations to start going through a professor's history with a fine-tooth comb.

[hendo]

Just thought this (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/03/us/03churchill.html?hp) might interest some participants in this thread:DENVER — A jury found on Thursday that the University of Colorado had wrongfully dismissed a professor who drew national attention for an essay in which he called some victims of the Sept. 11 attacks “little Eichmanns.”

But the jury, which deliberated for a day and a half, awarded only $1 in damages to the former professor, Ward L. Churchill, a tenured faculty member at the university’s campus in Boulder since 1991 who was chairman of the ethnic studies department.

The jurors found that Mr. Churchill’s political views had been a “substantial or motivating” factor in his dismissal, and that the university had not shown that he would have been dismissed anyway.