Ward Churchill Round Up

Ward Churchill is, of course, the University of Colorado professor who wrote an essay contending that the victims of the 9-11 attack were "little Eichmanns" who "got what they deserved."  He has since "clarified" these remarks, stating that only some of the people who died in 9-11 deserved it, and that more terror attacks might be necessary to properly radicalize America.  Here is an interview with the great man, if you want to see for yourself (and check out the picture).

Since coming to light, Professor Churchill has pretty much been exposed as a fraud.  It now appears that his claim to be an Indian (which was likely significant in his hiring by UC) is entirely fabricated (just like his claims of Vietnam service).  More significantly, real scholars have examined his writings, and it turns out that Churchill does his research the easy way, by just making stuff up:

Thomas Brown, a professor of sociology at Lamar University, has written a paper that outlines what looks like a more conventional form of academic fraud on Churchill's part. According to Brown, Churchill fabricated a story about the U.S. Army intentionally creating a smallpox epidemic among the Mandan tribe in 1837, by simply inventing almost all of the story's most crucial facts, and then attributing these "facts" to sources that say nothing of the kind.

Furthermore, as Mark Goldblatt at NRO points out, the people who publish Churchill's "scholarly writings" are themselves a bit off the beaten path.  Here is the one of his publishers' mission statement:

AK Press is a worker run book publisher and distributor organized around anarchist principles. . . . Our goal is to make available radical books and other materials, titles that are published by independent presses, not the corporate giants, titles with which you can make a positive change in the world.

In other words, Churchill is a raving moon bat, a lightweight, and an academic fraud.  So why are we writing about him?  Goldblatt points out the real issue here, which is how this wacky conspiracy theorist, whose level of scholarship is on par with the people who hand out tract leaflets on street corners, managed to get a tenured position (and in fact was a department head) at a major public university:

[T]he fault here does not lie with Churchill; he's a symptom, not a disease. The fault lies, generally, with the sick academic culture in which he has thrived, and, specifically, with the administrative weasels at the University of Colorado who have repeatedly rewarded his dubious critical achievements.

As for Churchill himself, the only real appropriate response is to make fun of him, as only Iowahawk can.

Comments

Churchill's need to "clarify" was due not to a fault in his essay, but to its distortion by dishonest reporters (and bloggers). None of the smears against him that have appeared in the media and blogosphere stand up to scrutiny, but that does not slow down their repetition by participants in the witch hunt. We see Churchill ambushed by a TV crew, in between classes and death threats. The interviewer's insolent tone ("looks like you ripped it off") leads me to doubt his denial that the camera crew initiated the physical confontation. Given the context of what appears to be a well-orchestrated witch-hunt, my guess is that the crew entered the campus with the mission of assaulting Churchill and filming his response, much like police who assault people and then charge them with the crime they themselves have just committed.

As for the plagiarism charge, I believe Churchill's explanation that he had the original artist's explicit permission. It's a little difficult to settle the issue, given that the artist is no longer around; but the raising of such an obscure point when the overriding issue is Churchill's political activity suggests that someone put a lot of effort into digging up dirt and found damned little of any substance.

Roscoe, could you explain how AK Press' mission statement justifies your terming any author it publishes "a raving moon bat, a lightweight, and an academic fraud"?

Churchill is highly regarded by his students, academic colleagues, and by legions of progressives (including me) who value him as both scholar and leader. His tenure was well-deserved and well-earned, and is now serving precisely the purpose for which tenure is designed, namely, as a bulwark against political attack. Almost none of Churchill's attackers can even quote him accurately. This discussion is not really about anything Churchill has done wrong. Rather, it's about what he's done right. He's being targeted for clarifying our understanding of American oppression and the the stuggle against it, and for inspiring those engaged in that struggle and related ones around the world.

Here's an overview of the scandal:
http://www.kersplebedeb.com/mystuff/s11/churchill_rwor.html

[Roscoe]

Well, there is now a link to "The Revolutionary Worker" on my site. Isn't that special.

First off, whoever you are (yes, I know, you must remain anonoymous or the black helicopters will get you) your comment mostly addresses issues that weren't even mentioned in my post. For example, there is nothing in the post about Churchill's physical assault on a reporter (he deserved it too, I guess) and his plagerism of art work (he might claim he got the original author's permission, but I think the buyers had a right to know they were buying "derivative" (i.e. copied) art). As such, it appears that most of your post is boiler plate and that you are wandering the web inserting it word for word in response to posts involving Mr. Churchill. So please excuse me if I don't respond.

The one part of the comment addressed to involves my conclusion that Mr. Churchill is a raving moon bat, a lightweight, and an academic fraud. You ask me to justify how this conclusion stems from the fact that Churchill writes in places like "AK Press".

Well, it doesn't entirely. Certainly most (actually all) academics publish in peer reviewed journals, and so if Churchill's stuff tends to appear in publications organized around anarchist principles, you have to wonder what the tenure committe at UC was thinking. But read my original post again; the conclusion that Churchill is a moon bat and a fraud is drawn from a number of factors, such as the fact that he "invents" the history in his supposed scholarly articles, lied about being part Indian (he lied about his war service too) and for his public comments, including his crude assertion that the victims of the 9-11 terrorist attack deserved it.