From the statement by Denis Rancourt, a physics professor, on his firing by the University of Ottawa at the end of March:
I was fired by the University of Ottawa on March 31, 2009. I was fired
under the false pretext of having arbitrarily assigned high grades in
one course in the winter 2008 semester...
I have communicated my views on a variety of broad societal issues, including:
environmental concerns
professional ethics
the Palestine-Israel conflict
the influences of lobby groups and the media in our representative democracy
I have communicated my views on a variety of broad societal issues, including:
environmental concerns
professional ethics
the Palestine-Israel conflict
the influences of lobby groups and the media in our representative democracy
The university's response to the concerns that I have raised has been to attempt to silence me through a series of disciplinary actions based on various false pretexts. All of these actions have either been dismissed, abandoned by the university, rejected by an arbitrator, or are heading to arbitration for likely rejection. The latest pretext used by the university, the grading issue, will not be upheld, for obvious reasons already determined by a previous arbitration award. ..
It appears that among the real reasons for the university’s attempts to discipline me since September 2005 and for its recent most harsh actions against me under President Allan Rock’s mandate might be the administration’s opposition to my political views about the Palestine-Israel conflict, which, starting in 2005, I have expressed in articles, on radio, in my blog postings, at public venues, and in my classes. In September 2005 the dean cancelled my Physics and the Environment course following a complaint (regarding an email comment about Zionism), channelled through the university’s Canadian Studies Institute director Pierre Anctil to the VP-Academic. A complaint against an invited speaker in the course, Professor Michel Chossudovsky – who spoke about Middle East geopolitics-- from the Jewish Student Association then gave rise to a sustained but failed attempt to discipline me. In 2006 I invited two Canadian-Palestinian speakers to address the class in my Science in Society course. This was followed by a damning January-2007 editorial in The Ottawa Citizen and I was subsequently removed from teaching all the first-year courses that I had developed. The Ottawa Citizen is a CanWest newspaper and its director is a member of the university’s Board of Governors. CanWest Global Communications Corporation is a staunch advocate and supporter of Israeli policy. In 2007 I criticized the university’s official position on the academic boycott of Israel on my UofOWatch.blogspot.com blog. The repression against me intensified when new university president Allan Rock, a staunch supporter of Israeli policy, arrived on the scene in July 2008....
The facts indicate that my dismissal has little to do with grading in one course and is blatantly political. Such repression violates the most fundamental principles underlying academia -- academic freedom, professional independence and responsibility, and due process -- and is a threat to the integrity of all universities.
It also appears that the university's true objective, and a direct consequence of its actions, in first suspending me and then firing me for motives based in bad faith, is to end not only my employment, but also my career, thereby causing me considerable personal losses in addition to dissolution of my research group.
This is what happens when your government sells its foreign policy to Washington in exchange for the HOPE of continued corporate access to the American market. It's not just our neocon prime minister who thinks that Israel's responses to resistance to occupation (called "terrorism" in Canada) are "measured." Our "loyal opposition," headed by Michael Ignatieff (yes, that Ignatieff, called by Tony Judt one of "Bush's useful idiots") declares that Canada has a responsibility to "support democracy"–not Palestinian democracy, of course, despite the fact that Hamas won free and fair election, but rather, Israeli "democracy"–the democracy that legislated Arab parties out of Israeli elections.
Canada has the democracy it deserves: we had the opportunity to nix NAFTA in a general election but preferred to enhance our reputation as hewers of wood and carriers of water for the American empire.
This is what happens to every highly centralized, Big Brother government that inevitably gets infiltrated by special interest group X. Totalitarians love big government, because they only have to seize a few strings at the top to jerk everyone below around. Duh. (If the secular public schools hadn't dumbed the Western masses down to the extent they have, this would be self-evident.)
della is right, and I am so happy to see the comment about the political carpetbagger, Michael Ignatieff. [If you want to see how the Lobby works, check into his political ascension. An absolute disgrace.]
CanWest Global Communications Corporation is a neocon fortress. They bought up every single major paper in Canada in the last 15 years, and now the news from there is completely controlled. Michel Chossudovsky writes a news blog. I've fact-checked his stories many times, and each time his facts are what they say they are.
Rancourt's problem is that he's in Ottawa, which is now a rabid Likud hotbed. Really prominent older Jews with buckets of money and who stay under the radar run the political show. Aided and abetted by the T.O. Jews. The Montreal crew used to do it but they're mostly aligned with NYC as a result of Bronfman heading south in the 80s.
Harper can align himself with Israel all he wants. As the Netanyahu/Lieberman alliance begins to turn off the world, the regular Canadian politicians will see the light faster than their American counterparts because of Canada's hate laws.
CORRECTION: If you want to see how the Lobby works, check into his political ascension in Canada.
[Talk about a bamboozle.]
Wikipedia has an article on Rancourt but having read it I'm no wiser about the merits of his case than I was before. I don't know if this is a result of Wikipedia's well-known pro-Israel bias or the possibility that this matter is a tempest in a teapot.
Wikipedia is self edited. Not to be trusted.
Interesting! Now I understand what I read a couple of months ago by Stanley Fish, another Jew, and why he was opining on his blog at the NY Times on the limits that should be imposed on academic freedom. He used Professor Rancourt as an example of the abuse of academic freedom who gave all of his students an "A" in one of his physics courses and supposedly would talk abou whatever he wanted in his classes. The controversy surrounding this professor's politics on Israel-Palestine is never, ever mentioned because, of course, that would in no way color the Jew's opinions.
Colonial Zionists changing hearts and minds of the next governing generation. Keep undermining rule of law, guys. Whose ass is that going to bite hardest in the long run?
I don't know what to make of this. Clearly, the guy's political views would not endear him to the administration, but he also sounds like a nighmare for any department head.
In classes like Physics, especially, a professor does need to actually follow the curriculum and give grades that actually mean something. I'm guessing the school has a legitimate teaching complaint against the guy, but it is magnified by political issues.
I think you're probably right, David F. I looked at his Web site. The Chemistry head had an amusing letter to this guy. ("I refuse to enter a battle of wits with an unarmed man.")
If you're curious to know the truth about Denis Rancourt, see http://rockourtwatch.blogspot.com
Next time I get a traffic ticket, I'm going to say it's because of my views on Israel, not because I was speeding.