Author: Ophelia Benson

It’s scary when they start shooting up judges. Very scary, in the same way it’s scary (terrifying, actually) when there are Congressional representatives willing to try to pass legislation as grotesquely unconstitutional as the mockingly-named Constitution Restoration Act, and when an angry (and thoroughly corrupt) senator threatens judges from the floor of the Senate. It’s scary when theocrats start to target the judiciary, because in a secular state, the judiciary is the only institution that can block majoritarian moves to establish theocracy.

And they know that in Turkey. They are scared, and they’re pissed.

Tens of thousands of people have marched through the Turkish capital, Ankara, in protest at the killing of a judge by a suspected Islamist gunman. Protesters waved Turkish flags and chanted slogans that the country must remain a secular state. A man calling himself “a soldier of Allah” shot dead Judge Mustafa Yucel Ozbilgin and wounded four others at a top administrative court on Wednesday…Correspondents say the attack may have been linked to the court’s record in upholding the ban on Muslim headscarves in universities and government offices – a decision condemned as illegal by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose ruling party has Islamist roots…The gunman reportedly burst into a committee meeting of the Council of State, shouting “Allahu akbar!” (God is great) as he fired his weapon…”This massacre attempt is directed against the secular republic. We strongly denounce it,” said the statement read by Sumru Cortoglu, chairwoman of the Council of State.

Bad, bad, very bad.

The Turkish newspapers are interesting. Bekir Coskun in Hurriyet for instance:

Whether they have a gun or a bomb in their hand, their target is the same: To wipe out the secular republic, to prevent modernity and civilization and push Turkish society into a way of life from the Middle Ages, to make Sharia law dominant.

Bad.

So I suppose right now somewhere in the middle of London (where is the ICA, anyway? I forget. Piccadilly? Bedford Square? next to Hatchard’s? I have no idea) some people (how many, I wonder? fifty? a hundred? two?) are listening to three or four guys talking about truth. I wonder what they’re saying about it. That it can be hard to get at, perhaps. That it’s in a well. That Bacon named an essay after it. That it’s not a bad thing to aim at, on the whole. That people who play certain public roles have a particular obligation to aim at it, and to avoid aiming at the other thing. That it’s just a matter of common sense, when you get right down to it. No, not that last one, that one’s a joke.

Well, I hope they’re all enjoying themselves, at any rate.

Interesting. The University of Colorado has released a report on its investigation of Ward Churchill. And?

Among the violations that the committee found Churchill had committed were falsification, fabrication, plagiarism, failure to comply with established standard regarding author names on publications, and a “serious deviation from accepted practices in reporting results from research.”

Uh – that’s bad. That’s what you don’t do. You know like when you go to the dentist? The dentist isn’t supposed to take the sharp things and jam them into the roof of your mouth on purpose. That’s contraindicated. Same thing with this. Academics aren’t supposed to falsify, fabricate, or plagiarize. It doesn’t matter whether they’re controversial or offensive or rowdy or longhaired; they don’t get to falsify and fabricate. They just don’t. Being controversial and offensive doesn’t mean they do get to, as some kind of compensation for the fatigue or risk of being controversial and offensive. It doesn’t work that way. Made-up social science just isn’t wanted, no matter how thrillingly controversial the maker-up is.

It’s like David Irving, again. Ward Churchill doesn’t have a free speech or First Amendment right to falsify and fabricate. It’s not a criminal offense and not an imprisonable one, but it’s not a protected free speech right, either. He doesn’t get to say ‘it’s my First Amendment right to fabricate and falsify my research’ and carry on doing it.

He doesn’t get to say his hand slipped, either. They thought of that, and said No.

The Committee found that Professor Churchill’s misconduct was deliberate and not a
matter of an occasional careless error. The Committee found that similar patterns recurred
throughout the essays it examined. The Committee therefore concluded that the degree of his
misconduct was serious, but differed on the sanction warranted.

The committee also pointed out that the controversy is one thing and the misconduct is another. Important point, that.

The Committee notes that the Laws of the Regents of the University of Colorado
define “academic freedom” as “the freedom to inquire, discover, publish and
teach truth as the faculty member sees it, subject to no control or authority save
the control and authority of the rational methods by which truth is established.”
We understand and were careful to distinguish “misconduct in research”…from the issue of “truth” addressed by
the Regents’ Laws’ definition of academic freedom. The Committee observes
also that the allegations we were asked to investigate were initiated in the wake of
the public outcry concerning some highly controversial essays by Professor
Churchill dealing with, among other things, the 9/11 tragedy. While not
endorsing either the tone or the contents of those essays, the Committee reaffirms,
as the University has already acknowledged, that Professor Churchill’s right to
publish his views was protected by both the First and Fourteenth Amendment
guarantees of free speech. Although those essays played no part in our
deliberations, the Committee expresses its concern regarding the timing and
perhaps the motives for the University’s decision to forward charges made in that
context.

The timing and context are highly unfortunate. Too bad Churchill provided so much ammunition for his critics.