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UW prof argues that Kevin Barrett should not be fired
University of Wisconsin professor and campus rights advocate Donald Downs explains why he thinks Kevin Barrett should be allowed to teach Intro to Islam this fall despite his extremist beliefs about who really planned 9/11. "The main argument against retaining Barrett is that anyone who believes in this conspiracy lacks the competence to teach a class at a major university. But when the dust settles, some fundamental principles of academic freedom support the provost's decision," he writes;
First, Farrell's investigation of Barrett's course and previous lecturing experience indicated that Barrett, regardless of his beliefs concerning 9/11, would teach the course responsibly, and that students had rated him a decent teacher. If the relevant department (in this case, languages and cultures of Asia) had decided against offering Barrett the one-course contract in the first place because of its assessment of his scholarship and teaching, that would have been the department's choice to make, based on its own academic judgment. But that is not the situation that we confront.Second, firing Barrett from his one-course contract for this fall in the face of political pressure would set a bad precedent. Indeed, it would constitute the first time in anyone's memory that the university fired an instructor--hired by a department through the normal channels--before the termination of his contract because of political pressures exerted on account of the instructor's views. Even those who agree with Barrett's strongest critics on substantive grounds--as we do--should pause before opening this Pandora's Box.
Not allowing Barrett to teach according to the limited terms of his contract would mean that members of the media and legislature could dictate who teaches and who gets fired based upon their agreement or disagreement with the conclusions certain teachers reach. Though universities are hardly infallible in making their hiring decisions, such a precedent would seriously compromise the wide-open pursuit of truth for which the university properly stands.
Conservatives in the legislature need to remember that the principle of academic freedom protects the right as well as the left. And for most of the last 15 years, it is the right that has needed protection.
Downs goes on to summarize UW's historical relationship to academic freedom, beginning with the university's installation of an unconstitutional speech code during the 1990s, moving through the successful campus movement to abolish that speech code, and culminating in examples of how unpopular political speech--such as the campus paper's publication of one of the infamous Mohammed cartoons last spring--has been defended at UW since then.
Downs overlooks UW's occasional failures to defend free expression on campus--last winter's debacle over the rights of RAs to hold Bible study in their rooms comes to mind--but his essay is nonetheless a strong and necessary statement of why, in cases such as Barrett's, it's so important to adhere to principle. Commenters responding to Downs' argument disagree heartily with him--their arguments are well worth considering, as well.
Posted by acta online at July 18, 2006 12:47 AM
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Comments
All he's really saying is that as long as the instructor sufficiently innoculates himself against all questions by throwing irresponsible and irrational political tantrums in public, that person is safe from any criticism or consequences. Easy enough, given the overwhelming academic penchant towards irrational public tantrum throwing.
Someone please tell me again how Ward Churchill is an isolated case? Or how the people now running our colleges have **any idea** what academic freedom means, and how it stands apart from unbounded psychiatric license?
Posted by: Federal Dog at July 18, 2006 07:45 AM
I find it interesting that every single comment to this op-ed disagreed with prof Downs. And these are voters and residents of Wisconsin whose taxes pay for this university!! Who is responsible for the policies of a state university in the end and who should make the final decisions? It seems to me that when the university is owned and run by the state, then the officials who make the decisions at the university should be beholden to the citizens who fund the university. There is a place for freedom of speech, but there is also a place for the citizenry to have a say in what happens to the university they are supporting to educate their own kids. I think that with the case here and in Colorado and in California with the woman who committed suicide that the tail is wagging the dog and it is far past time for the citizenry to be listened to in the halls of academy. Right now the leadership of far too many universities think that they have the absolute right to do whatever they want without regard to the citizens and the citizens should just shut up and take it. Wrong!!
Posted by: dick at July 21, 2006 10:42 PM
NO ACCOUTABILITY
Prior to WWII and the G.I. Bill, college was for elites. Now -- per J.P. Greene (U-Ark.) -- everyone with a pulse and $$ is in college.
The UW-Madison crowd deludes itself by thinking "we know better than the masses." That is, focus on the esoteric and ignore the basics.
Yo, geniuses -- the now-educated masses know what you are doing -- that is why they are trying to STOP you. If more budget cuts is what it will take to get y'all to listen -- so be it.
BTW: here's what the American Society of Civil Engineers said about 9/11 --
Not that the scientific facts mean anything in Madison ..
Posted by: A.D. at July 27, 2006 07:15 PM