Ward Churchill, Free Speech, and Academic Freedom
There has, as yet, been no interest in discussing Homeland Security. Perhaps that's not edgy enough. Very well, how about a discussion revolving around the question:
Should the University of Colorado fire Ward Churchill?
If you don't know who Ward Churchill is or why there are many folks who think that he should be fired (and many who do not) allow me to give a quick overview. Ward Churchill is presently a tenured Professor in U of C, Boulder's Department of Ethnic Studies. He also wrote an Essay on 9/12/2001 entitled "Some People Push Back" On the Justice of Roosting Chickens in which he enumerates what he views as the United States's crimes against the rest of the world in general and against the Muslim world in particular in order to show that the attacks of 9/11 were both justified and inevitable. In this essay, he says that the Pentagon is obviously a military target and thus the attack against it was absolutely justified. He also said that, while the occupants of the Twin Towers were "civilians of a sort", they were hardly innocent, calling them "little Eichmanns"--modern day Nazis carrying out a deliberate genocidal pogrom against Islam. They were, he wrote, "willingly and knowingly" feeding the military, whose crimes he writes at length to document and were therefore also justified targets. [Post slightly edited on 2/11/05 to remove an offensive sentence].
As for my opinion, which you can read in the comments section here [note: the article and many of the comments at this site definitely do not meet the standards of discussion at Continuum and I express my opinion in this regard in the same comments section], you will find that I was definitely against firing Churchill upon First Amendment freedom of speech grounds. I find many of his comments, particularly the little Eichmanns comment, to be odious in the extreme and for this he deserves to be shunned and despised by all Americans whether within the academy or without. However, he should not, in my opinion, be fired for them. Aside from the free speech issues, the academy has long had a tradition of encouraging the exploration of competing ideas, including odious ones, through academic freedom.
Recently, however, I have become aware, through this article, of allegations that, if true, are definitely grounds, not only for firing Churchill from the U of C but for his being banned from the academy altogether. His alleged offense is academic fraud. If true (and while the charges appear to be true I am not in a position to confirm them in a "peer" sense), Churchill has made up, out of almost whole cloth, an incident of US military genocide against the Mandan Indians in 1837. The source that he cites as supporting his claim appears to do nothing of the kind. The fact that he originally made this claim in court under oath in his own defense makes his offense doubly offensive: not only has he misrepresented a source to make wholly false charges against the US military, he committed perjury in the process. He also seems to have repeated his false claims at a later date, making up new details without attribution. This is precisely the sort of action that is, and deserves to be, a virtual death sentence in the academic world.
If this proves to be true, neither the University of California nor any other University should have anything to do with Ward Churchill ever again.
Update 02/10/05: This article, too (warning, it's a long PDF file), documents Churchill's tenuous relationship with facts. Again I am no scholar and have no expertise in the area of US Government - Native American relations so I am not qualified to judge, in any peer review sense, the truth of the claims made in this article. I, rather, provide it for you're study so that you may make up your own mind whether Ward Churchill is a scholar or a fraud.
Update 02/16/05: Apparently, Ward Churchill is a plagiarist, too.
What do you think?
By the way, I will also be accepting articles concerning Homeland Security, if you'd rather talk about that. Please remember the groundrules for articles and comments, to wit:
1. I'm looking for reasoned debate, not ad hominem attack.
2. Foul language will be edited or even form grounds for rejection.
3. Articles will be expected to remain on the given topic.
4. Articles should be no longer than 1,000 to 1,500 words
5. Please frame views that do not agree with yours in positive terms
that proponents of said view use with respect to their views.
Other than that, any position on the topic is acceptable. Please submit your contributions to me at revcraigh@yahoo.com.
posted by Craig R. Harmon at 1:50 PM
18 Comments:
Craig: I tracked down your blog through your screen name on one of your posts on Misha's Rottweiler. Welcome aboard! Great blog, by the way.
To me, I believe Churchill absolutely should be fired from the University of Colorado-Boulder, and in this case the freedom of speech issue is irrelevant. There is absolutely no right of subsidy inherent in the Bill of Rights, no matter how many "emanations and penumbras" that one may try to read into it. Ward Churchill is basically being paid by the taxpayers of Colorado to spread hatred, and that is intolerable. This is precisely the same sort of argument that (accurately) was made against some of the NEA's more controversial federal grants, such as those to "avant-garde "artists" such as Andres Serrano, Karen Findlay and Robert Mapplethorpe. Those people were given obscene amounts of taxpayer monies to produce obscene works of art, and frankly, "obscene" is a pretty good description of Churchill's rantings, as well. Were Churchill a member of the Nazi Party or the KKK, we would not even be having this discussion; he'd already be gone from CU...
As for the fraud allegations: Churchill's entire academic career appears to have been a fraud. He falsely claimed to be an American Indian to win a position in CU's Ethnic Studies department - and ended up running that department - and of course you've already pointed out the flaws in Churchill's one major scholarly work. This guy is the new Michael Belleiles, who perpetrated the fradulent historical gun-control study Arming America,, and who was also discredited for his fraud and ultimately fired from his tenured position at Emory University. Churchill deserves at least the same fate.
Oops. Hit the wrong button before I was finished. Oh well...
Anyway, the above post pretty much sums up what I think about the Churchill affair. I'm also inclined to think that charges of treason might not be out of order, but there are definitely some First Amendment issues there..
Thanks for your time.
Wes Seaton, aka "LC Wes"
Wes, welcome to Continuum. My opinion concerning the first amendment and his job I've already stated. Concerning Churchill's Native American ancestry, lack of evidence is not the same as fraud and proving a negative is extremely difficult to do in cases like this. In any case, in my opinion, whether Mr. Churchill is or is not a Native American is not relevant to his continued employment at U of C.
As you say, Churchill's Native American ancestry is not as important to his legitimacy as a teaching scholar, as is his blatant disregard to historical truth. This may or may not 'come out in the wash' yet, I do not discount the subject lightly. Self inflated blowhards are an inexpensive commodity. Those that teach their liberal lies to our youth, who swear under oath to their factual authenticity, are a pox on us all.
My congrats on your recent offer to the Imperial blogroll at AIRE. I would think you would fit nicely in the Dept. of Education section or possibly the Dept. of Politics.
Mikenchi
Mikenchi, thanks for your comments. I hope you will return often and contribute your thoughts here at Continuum.
As respects the issue of Free Speech - it speaks to the old saying, "I may not like what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it." We are having our rights slowly but surely whittled away in that respect - free speech zones, oaths of loyalty, blah blah - but academic fraud is another matter, and if true, that is not a national debate but a disciplinary matter for the university involved. If it is a rumor started to stir the pot over his bizarre statements - then that must be investigated and the person behind it needs to pick a different windmill. Just my opinion.
Frstlymil, I agree.
Mike, I can't imagine that Churchill's comments have pleased anyone but Islamic fascists, whose opinion, I have no doubt, mirrors Churchill's excactly, and the most extreme left wingers, who champion Churchill. My comment was catty, however. I'm sure there are many Liberals who are disgusted with Churchill's comments and who have no desire to see terrorists' opinions given legitimacy, therefore, I withdraw the offending portion of my post with apologies to all.
Now, if you notice, I did not call for Churchill's dismissal for his 'Little Eichmanns' comment or for the offending article that he wrote on the day after the 9/11 attacks. They were outside of the classroom. However, even if he included similar comments in his teaching, I would defend his job on the grounds of accademic freedom.
Publishing made up claims and citing sources that are then said to back up one's made up claims when they clearly do not, whether those are being taught in class or not, denigrate the intellectual integrety not only of the Professor but of the institution that employs him. I cannot believe that you would defend the continued employment of an academic fraud.
Hmm... I've touched on this topic over at The Rott. While it is a free speech issue it is a defamation (unsure of spelling). The people in that plane and the people in the building are individuals and if you are to believe the prof. they are all likened unto Hilter's stooges who helped to contribute directly to genocide... and I'm quite posistive that was the direct comparison he was going for.
Do the people, the civilians, who died that day deserve that remark? not at all, A) very few of them worked for any government enity, so even if you used the arguement that they "deserved to die" for supporting Bush you'd be incorrect because many of them did not vote for Bush.
B) The comparison itself is a mix of about five fallacies, the biggest one being the strawman. He sets it up so that these people become Nazi supporters, he then "knocks it down" by proclaiming that they deserve it.
C) I've gone over a similar Proffesor who I've become almost obsessed with (I know, quite unhealthy being obessesed with someone who you can't argee with) by the name of Howard Zinn. Now, Zinn says some similar things in his speech at Reed, class struggle, but the difference is that Zinn has the consideration to not defame the people who he "accuses" of perpetuating the class struggle.
none of these points mean that he can be prosecuted by law... but the commitee that can get him fired is not a true government body, it is a business board. CU can at any time fire an employee except in cases where their contracts say otherwise. If he casts a poor light on the school and the school loses revenue or prestige over, most contracts won't cover him and he can be 'released" and in my opinion should be for horrid teaching and unprofessionalism while outside of his workplace (which he has to carry back to the classroom).
A Professor's job is not to indoctrinate a student, it is not to tell the students what to think and only give them that information. So often published papers that historians release are full of either outright lies or poor inuendos. I will admit that I have not seen Churchill's class material, but if he is anythign liek the prof. I had at my previous college, well, I'm affraid that this is old news and that he's not the first or the last of these who should be stopped from "teaching"...
absolute nutty right wing cuckoo landTo be fair to me, I linked that only because it was there that I defended Churchill's job on First Amendment grounds. It was not linked to as a resource, per se.
Mike, you said:
you would be hard pressed to legally show that his intentions were to ruin 3000 people's business or reputation.
I think that you would be hard pressed to show that anyone who publishes a paper calling people "Little Eichmanns" was not doing so in order to injure their reputations, at least if a person's reputation legally survives the person. I can't think of any context in which such a statement would not have such a design. In any case, libel is a crime and shouldn't be too difficult to prove in court, particularly if the plainiffs are several thousand 9/11 family members bringing suit on behalf of their dead. Again, I'm not sure that reputation survives a person's death. If not, then I guess the dead can not be defamed or libelled.
Oh, and Mike, some of the people here, including myself, are regulars at nicepuppy.com. These people are passionately and unapologetically right-wing. The rhetoric found there is, I admit, over the top and I do not agree with every opinion expressed there (and I tell them so) but absolute nutty right wing cuckoo land really is the sort of invective, to borrow your word, that is verboten here at Continuum. They are notoriously thick-skinned. Nevertheless, think whatever you will but, as you occasionally remind me, remember our groundrules.
er, that's nicedoggie.net.
Jin,
Thanks for stopping by. I notice that you are a 3rd year law student. I look forward to your comments.
A couple of comments:
1. If he identified himself as a U of C prof and is talking about a subject in his supposed area of academic expertise, it's not "outside the workplace", it's part of his job, and so exactly the same as has he given that as a lecture in class.
2. I'm a strong supporter of academic freedom, but that does not include the freedom to hold opinions that you know to be false. Churchill is pushing the boundaries of this with his Eichmann comment. I will note here that describing the Pentagon as a legitimate target is entirely correct. It's not so legitimate to use a planeload of civilians as a missile, though.
3. If even 10% of the academic fraud allegations are true, he should never work in academia again.
Anonymous (the most recent one), concerning your #2, I would distinguish between holding opinions one knows to be false and publishing said opinions. One can hold whatever opinions one wants...there are no thought police...yet. Publishing what one knows to be untrue is altogether different. I assume that you were talking about published, not held, opinions.
Otherwise, I agree.
Craig:
Pretty much. I do think that holding opinions that you know to be false is intellectual dishonesty of the highest degree, and so a rather bad sign on an academic, who is supposedly paid to think straight. If you don't publicize them, nobody will know, though.
Churchill has the right to express his opinion. So do u. most of what he said is tru but some i do not agree on. BTW im reffering to "Some People Push Back" He doesnt need to be fired. You folks are nuts, hes the man. Go Ward!
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