Wednesday, February 09, 2005
Ward Churchill
Okay, this guy's totally pissing me off, this Ward Churchill character. And it seems he's pretty much pissing off the whole country, and not along party lines. If you don't know who he is, there's a long explanation and a short one. I'll stick with the short one for now ;) He wrote a book and an essay wherein he said that the victims of 9-11 were "little Eichmanns" who deserved to die. He said this because he believes America was responsible for the deaths of nearly a million Iraqi children (though no-one has ever claimed Iraq was directly responsible for 9-11 other than Ward Churchill). The guy's a tenured professor at the University of Colorado's Boulder campus (yeah, Colorado again, Boulder again, the place JonBenet Ramsey was murdered by her mother and other such things) and therefore pretty much cannot be fired.
Now, for why I'm pissed. Yes, of course, this jerk has his First Ammendment right to free speech--I won't argue against that. BUT his entire corpus of work, the whole reason he was hired by C.U. in the first place, was all based on a fraudulent lie. He claims he's partially Cherokee, although nearly every single Native American organization in the country has rejected his claims. He refuses to prove his genealogy even though it's the reason he was head of the Ethnic Studies department at C.U. I have Apache blood, legitimate Apache blood, and it drives me nuts when people are self-proclaimed members of the Wannabe Tribe. Nuts.
Free speech? Okay, fine, yes, he deserves the right to free speech. But he's advocating violence, he's teaching his students that America must be destroyed, that the attacks on 9-11 weren't nearly enough damage. That's treason, no matter which way you look at it. And I'm DEFINITELY not the only liberal who's angry as hell at this guy. This isn't a party issue, though several C.U. students are trying to make it look like it is. One of Denver's most respected liberal radio talk show hosts, attorney Craig Silverman, is as foaming-at-the-mouth angry at Churchill as I am. Treason should not be supported by tenure. Period.
And with the incitement to violence, you've got to wonder--and remember, I live in Colorado, 20 minutes from Littleton, and I took flowers and teddy bears in the pouring April rain to Clement Park six years ago--if all of this will only end in another Columbine. Whether this guy's rantings are going to result in some of those poor kids who believe his crap picking up a gun and acting on it.
I'm going to post some links in my next post for anyone who'd like to read more about Ward Churchill.
Now, for why I'm pissed. Yes, of course, this jerk has his First Ammendment right to free speech--I won't argue against that. BUT his entire corpus of work, the whole reason he was hired by C.U. in the first place, was all based on a fraudulent lie. He claims he's partially Cherokee, although nearly every single Native American organization in the country has rejected his claims. He refuses to prove his genealogy even though it's the reason he was head of the Ethnic Studies department at C.U. I have Apache blood, legitimate Apache blood, and it drives me nuts when people are self-proclaimed members of the Wannabe Tribe. Nuts.
Free speech? Okay, fine, yes, he deserves the right to free speech. But he's advocating violence, he's teaching his students that America must be destroyed, that the attacks on 9-11 weren't nearly enough damage. That's treason, no matter which way you look at it. And I'm DEFINITELY not the only liberal who's angry as hell at this guy. This isn't a party issue, though several C.U. students are trying to make it look like it is. One of Denver's most respected liberal radio talk show hosts, attorney Craig Silverman, is as foaming-at-the-mouth angry at Churchill as I am. Treason should not be supported by tenure. Period.
And with the incitement to violence, you've got to wonder--and remember, I live in Colorado, 20 minutes from Littleton, and I took flowers and teddy bears in the pouring April rain to Clement Park six years ago--if all of this will only end in another Columbine. Whether this guy's rantings are going to result in some of those poor kids who believe his crap picking up a gun and acting on it.
I'm going to post some links in my next post for anyone who'd like to read more about Ward Churchill.
