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Alrighty.
Unless you've been living in a cave for the past couple weeks, you have probably heard of Ward Churchill, a professor at Colorado University, who recently stated his views on the September 11th attacks...and you probably know the gist of his views...that America deserved the attacks, and his calling the victims "little Eichmanns."
First, I will tell you that I find these views to be utterly insulting and nonsensical, and I for one find comfort in the fact that the majority of the reaction on this subject from responsible human beings has been pretty much right where it should be...outright and utter condemnation.
(Please note the equivocation in that last sentence...it becomes important here in a bit...)
I will also tell you that I agree that Ward Churchill had best be checking through the want ads of his local paper for a job, because the man will not find work at a reputable college or university once he is fired, and I believe that he WILL be fired at some point.
However, this will not happen as a result of his remarks about Sept. 11.
Now, I can see two reactions from this last statement. The first, from those on the Right, and from the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks would be: WHY THE HELL NOT? And trust me folks, I empathize all the way with you on this.
And before the total morons who make up the vast majority of the college/university populace in this country start cheering for victory, please remember that the man WILL be fired. My opinion of these people has sunk too, which is why I hedged a bit earlier when I talked about responsible human beings. The actions of a few students at a recent CU Board meeting called to discuss the case of Ward Churchill convinced me that these people are not normal. As for being responsible, as a former college student myself, I contend that as long as you are getting money either from parents or financial aid, you are not responsible in the true sense of the word.
These idiots were storming around the room where the board meeting was held yammering about an obstruction of Churchill's rights of Free Speech.
However, what the CU Board decided to do should lift the spirits of those offended by Churchill, whether they are victims of the Sept. 11 attacks, or just honest, sensible, reasonable people who think that Churchill's spoutings amount to the equivalent of raw sewage in the arena of ideas.
The CU Board decided rightly that they will look into the writings of Ward Churchill, to see if his writings, which have been controversial as well, are protected by the Free Speech amendment to the US Constitution.
See, STOOPID speech is generally protected, even at a university, because it represents a different point of view from the majority, or perhaps a more "enlightened perspective."
However, if a speech or a book demonstrates teachings that indicate that the professor in question is inept, incompetent, or outright falsifying information, that my friends will get you out of a job at a university, whether you are tenured or not.
And in the case of CU & Ward Churchill, we seem to have a case where our dear friend, the Nutty Professor, has passed off fiction as scientific fact.
In 1993, Churchill published a book entitled "Indians Are Us?: Culture and Genocide in Native North America." In it, he made the following claims:
- The US government had a policy of eventually wiping out the Indians.
- The US Army deliberately spread smallpox among the Indians of the US West.
- The US government passed a lot requiring proof that an Indian was more than one-half Indian before providing a land grant to that person.
All of these claims have been contested by scholars who have some background in Indian history. Ward Churchill claims he is one-sixteenth Creek indian, but this claim is not confirmed. He claims to have served in the military in Vietnam, but those claims have shifted. Churchill himself will not answer questions about his past, or questions about his academic qualifications.
However, Thomas Brown, a sociology professor at Lamar University called Churchill's claim of the use of smallpox to commit genocide "shocking" and "fraudulent." Churchill cited UCLA anthropologist Russell Thornton as his source for the assertion, but in reading the two
claims, Churchill's argument does not match Thornton's. Thornton describes how the Mandan indians may have received smallpox from the deckhands on ships that traded up and down the Missouri River. Churchill claims that smallpox-laiden blankets were distributed by the US Army at Ft. Clark.
Another critic is John LaVelle, a University of New Mexico law professor, who said that Churchill's book "constitutes a regrettable setback in Indian people's struggle for social justice." In further comments, LaVelle said: "...the discerning reader will discover that, notwithstanding all the provocative sound and fury rumbling through his essays, Churchill's analysis overall is sorely lacking in historical and factual veracity and scholarly integrity."
In other words, Ward Churchill wouldn't know truth if it came up and smacked him in the face with a huge sign that said I AM THE TRUTH on it. His claim that the US has had a concerted plan to wipe out the indians has never been proven and is the thin hope of those seeking something...anything...to stick Uncle Sam with. The US government is certainly no angel here, but they are not as guilty as Churchill and his radical buddies make them out to be.
The claim that the US passed a law requiring indians to be one-half indian in order to receive land grants is also proven false, in this case because people have read the law in question, and the language Churchill says is in there...well...isn't.
On those three claims alone, Ward Churchill can be proven to be teaching bad history. The man is entitled to his views, and he is entitled to speak them. However, as I have always said, your right of free speech does not entitle you to an audience. In other words, just because you can say something doesn't mean that people have to listen. However, in a classroom setting, the students are expecting their professor to bring them truthful information on the subject, with a minimal amount of their own biases. If Ward Churchill can not keep his political biases out of his class, he is inept.
If he is teaching falseness and passing it off as the truth, he is incompetant.
In either case, he should forfeit his position at Colorado University.
John B.
(Note: I used a front-page story printed in the Denver Post on February 10, 2005 for some of the info in this article.)
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3 comments:
I find it interesting that you claim to value democracy, yet you join in with the media propaganda and popular hype regarding Churchill.
First, from what I've seen in the media, and in your blog, apparently nobody has actually read the offending article, except for the bit about the "little Eichmann's." Now I'm not one to go around calling people irresponsible, but it seems to me that before we start criticizing someone and calling for them to be fired, we ought to actually read what it is they wrote. Relying on corporate media to tell us what someone said seems risky and naive at best.
Second, just because a lot of other people who swallow all the propaganda the government can dish out (regarding war and terrorism) are enraged by Churchill's comments, that does not indicate that this is the reasonable position to take. "Appeal to the masses" is one of the faulty forms of reasoning that some academics try to warn us against. This fallacy becomes even more dangerous within the context of a democracy. There's a good reason why the phrase "the tyranny of the majority" was coined. As citizens of a democracy we all have reason to want to encourage diverse opinions and voices. As soon as we drown out the dissenting voices and go on witch hunts to eliminate them from the public arena, we forfeit the right to call ourselves responsible citizens of a democracy. Last I knew, merely saying something that pisses a lot of people off is not probable cause for the revocation of your rights to free speech.
Finally, "unless you've been living in a cave" for the past few years, you must know that it is sickeningly hypocritical to deny that America has been involved in many actions overseas which completely explain the hostility and hatred that some feel toward us. If you are not aware of these things, feel free to read the recently declassified CIA documents that verify some of the atrocities we have been involved in on foreign soil. They are widely available online. It takes a thick skin of denial to retain the holier-than-thou attitude that many Americans (including our president) take in relation to other nations. When we meddle with their internal politics, aid rebels who fight against legitimate democracies, and follow policies which cause profound and continuing suffering in other nations, we cannot point fingers when they retaliate. After all, we retaliate when we're attacked. How is our retaliation any different from theirs? The only way to maintain that there is a difference here is to resort to jingoism and selective memory. I hope you have a better answer than that.
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First, thank you for your comments.
However, you are in error about the point of the blog article on several points. Let me put them here, in short form, so that we are clear...
- I support Ward Churchill's rights of free speech, as I said in the blog article. However, this does not mean that he has the right to an audience. Free-minded people are certainly entitled to go see the man's speeches. but others are just as free to stay away if they are offended by his remarks.
- Having said that, to refer to the victims of 9/11 as "little Eichmanns" only a few days afer the incident seems to me to be stupidity bordering on the insane. Not just in speaking such incindiary words, but in thinking that there would be no backlash against them. While Ward Churchill may not be fired because of his speech, that should not stop opposing opinions from becoming known.
- Also, I was not calling for Churchill's firing based on the speech. I was saying that if the CU Board found that he was teaching fallacy, that he was teaching erroneous information to students and passing it off as factual and scholarly, then not only should he be fired, but the university would have an obligation to do so.
As for the "jingoism" of the war effort, why is it that supporters of the Bush administration, or our war against terror are said to be following jingoistic propaganda, BUT there is no such jingoism being spewed by the peaceniks and their associates on the Left.
In either case, I would encourage people to think with their own mind. In my case, I support the war effort because after you clear away all of the arguments, I believe it is the right thing for us to do.
Thanks much,
John B.
Of course Churchill has an obligation not to deliberately spread untruths. However, most of the claims he's made, which you are now questioning, are highly controversial. If some historians are telling one side of the story, and some are telling another side, there is bound to be some dispute about "the facts." After all, history is told by the victor, and Churchill is trying to tell the other side of the story. It seems very hard to dispute the fact that our gov't had many aggressive, hostile policies toward native americans, and that it now has an interest in telling a different story. However, we all have an interest in knowing the truth, and that means we need to hear all sides of the story in order to sort out the truth as best we can. How else can we learn from history?
But I don't think the gist of this investigation is truly about that. In fact, if so many people hadn't gotten angry, nothing would have come of his comments. This looks to me like a serious attempt at retaliation and silencing of dissent. I agree that Churchill could have used a much more tactful way of making his point. But as long as we continue to miss his point (that we all contribute to the current state of foreign affairs, by participating in the American way of life which thoughtlessly tramples on the rights and well-being of others and consumes more than our fair share of the world's resources), we cannot hope for any improvement.
Finally, to still believe that this is a war against terror and an attempt to bring liberty and freedom to the rest of the unenlightened world ... Well, OK: first this war was about bin Laden, and when do we even hear about him anymore? He's become our second-to-last priority. Then it was about WMDs, but then that fell through because they weren't there. Then it was about Saddam Hussein, even though the leaders of many other non-oil holding nations have been just as naughty as he has, and we don't go after them. Then he was pulled out of his hole and taken into custody, and we don't hear about him anymore, because now the war is about freedom and liberty. There are at least two problems with this last claim: is freedom the sort of thing you can force upon people? Are tanks and bombs really the best way to make the world more free? Can you force someone to be autonomous? Does anyone else see the irony here? Second, If spreading liberty and freedom is what we're really after, I can give a list of other nations that are in worse shape than Iraq was. Don't the people in Darfur need freedom and liberty? How about those in East Timor? So why aren't we taking our tanks and bombs there? Because these nations hold no interest for "W". So as long as we allow it to continue, we can expect to be fed ad hoc justifications for a war that is beyond justification.
One last thing: you don't have to be a peacenik to think that this war is misguided and tragic. All you need is a sound reasoning and clear vision.
Sorry for the rant =)
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