Enjoyed reading your piece. I’m not an academic person se. I’m surprised I actually read your entire article. I find academicians arrogant and tedious. “Get to the point already. Good grief”. Like James Joyce 6 page description of someone opening the door and walking half way into a room, good grief! I despised the closed mindedness of my college professors and the control they had of the students and what they were allowed to learn. When my own children went to college, I saw how they learned truth during their research but would have to write their report in political terms their teacher would approve. I spent an extraordinary amount of time trying to find a school that taught a classical education with some ethics thrown in when my children were young. Impossible. Today, because of the backlash to the dumbing down indoctrination more of these types of schools are popping up. I love learning but I certainly didn’t learn this in a state run institution or university. I had to leave that environment to pursue at my pace what I had hoped I would finally find in college. Ugh! My children who were bright, creative and full of life had to crawl into a square to achieve good grades. What a horrendous waste of potential greatness. These professors can get away with ramming their ideologue down the throats of their student screaming 1st Amendment rights while denying that right to their students are beyond disgusting. I know there are wonderful teachers and professors, many taking early retirement, tired of walking the thin line of political correctness. The more no one can really understand what academicians are saying and consider them brilliant anyway are the very academicians promoted for their brilliant ability to say nothing intelligent. I love how people can sit through a lecture in awe of their “brilliant” professor and walk away not having much more understanding than when they went in. Hooray another successful academician. I liked your analogy. Another attempt, however basic and non threatening as we can get, to break through the thick concrete academic bubble.
I very much understand. My eldest is more of an Arts person - she quit school in her final year - couldn’t see the point and was having extreme anxiety attacks. She would have really interesting discussions with me about stuff (we did a bit of part home-schooling) and then the teacher would just want to hear a formulaic answer. The horror of this is that it’s putting off genuinely curious and bright people from study, because anyone who’s bright doesn’t want to write what I call a colour by number answer, and they want to question. I’m also a huge fan of writing in ways that are hopefully understandable to the average person, even on very complex legal concepts. The fact that you read my post right thought gives me hope that I succeeded in this instance! 😊
"Hegel's philosophy is so odd that one would not have expected him to be able to get sane men to accept it, but he did. He set it out with so much obscurity that people thought it must be profound. It can quite easily be expounded lucidly in words of one syllable, but then its absurdity becomes obvious."
Yes, clearly understanding what the person is trying to communicate is so much more interesting and compelling than an academician trying to sound brilliant while saying nothing of consequence.
You are an astonishingly kind person. I agree with the overall sentiment, I have trouble seeing how anyone could not (but I cede to the evidence to the contrary).
I find it difficult to see how Tim Anderson was a close enough case to have essentially an even split of Federal Court judges, and it is sometimes a shame when these things are decided largely on narrow procedural grounds as to who has the onus of proof. I cannot see how, were I unfortunate enough to have been his student, I could ever have trusted him to even teach me anything not completely tainted by his bigotry, let alone to mark me fairly. On the more narrow legal issues Perram J puts it (of course) nicely:
"
However, thought experiments of this kind needed to be brought down to the realities of this litigation. Having waded into the briar patch which is the situation in Palestine it was Dr Anderson who juxtaposed the Nazi swastika with the flag of the State of Israel. Accepting as I do that it may in an appropriate case be consistent with the standards referred to in cl 317 to use a Nazi swastika in the work of a university academic, it was for Dr Anderson to engage in the forensic gymnastics of explaining how his at least incendiary conduct could be characterised as being consistent with the highest ethical, professional and legal standards referred to in cl 317. This he did not do.
"
Lee J put it more bluntly if less eloquently:
"
For my part, the posting of this image, which is self-evidently offensive (and obviously disturbing to a section of the University community) could not amount to an exercise of intellectual freedom which was both “responsible” (cl 315) and in accordance with the “highest ... standards” (cl 317) – a fortiori where Dr Anderson conceded the offensive image was not even important nor “central to the meaning of the graphic” and was so peripheral to whatever point he was seeking to make that Dr Anderson “forgot” about the image.
"
OTOH this quote from strikes me as eminently regrettable:
"
In terms of what the plurality of the Full Court has stated at [267] and [269], whilst I consider that the Third Comments would be offensive to many people, in the context in which the Israeli flag superimposed with the swastika was used, I do not consider that its use involved “harassment, vilification or intimidation”. In this assessment, it is necessary to consider the matter in the context which existed at the time of publication and not by reference to later events, including the escalation in the dispute between Dr Anderson and the University. The University did not establish any breach of any standard which might have engaged cl 317 of the 2018 Agreement.
"
WTF? Apparently, having drunk _all_ the kool-aid, his Honour accepted that the graphic was prepared for the academic purpose of discussing statistics about deaths in the conflict. I mean, I could give my post discussing judicial cupidity a background of men in robes and wigs being hung, but that would be so far from meeting any possible standard of the type mentioned in s317 as to be beyond risible.
I was trying to get the general issue away from the Anderson case, which for me, is a case which triggers that amygdala hijack I was talking about - i.e. a strong emotional response of fear and worry.
I was unconvinced by the dissent as well, to be honest, but I know some free speech absolutists who would argue that it’s fine to let rip at any group of people you want, that’s what academic freedom means. I had an argument with some of them on a related topic a few weeks back: their argument was we should ALL be able to say what we want, because it’s better to know if people hate you and respond to that. I said that they might feel differently if they’d had someone say to their face some very unpleasant things which I don’t think I should repeat here, but let’s just say - it was much, much worse than Dr Anderson’s image.
I am not a free speech absolutist. I think a teaching environment and a professional environment is different to being on the street. There is a power imbalance which makes this problematic in my eyes. Dr Anderson can have whatever views he wants in private, but he should not let it affect his relationships with students or his teaching. He should allow for students to have other views, and in fact encourage them. I feel very strongly about this.
I’m also aware that I have views which some people might find wrong or even offensive. Probably all of us do! So I am also thinking from that perspective. FWIW, I’d be very careful in the way I aired those views in a teaching or professional environment, and if I do air them publicly, I disclaim any relationship to the University and make it clear - this is on me. Certainly I would never expect students to share them, and I’m always aware I have a diverse cohort of students.
I am totally open to the idea that Anderson's comments/image were "free speech" writ large, but that has nothing to do with the concept of "intellectual freedom" which is intrinsically linked to the role of a "teacher" at the university, far less of the scope of any constitutional protections in Australia (which were quite sensibly not raised).
No, no! Change the incentives, says the remedies lawyer. Incentives are all. People respond to incentives. I need to write a post on this. Mind you, at moments in the last year, even I have had “this whole academic thing has become poisoned”, then I meet with normal people doing normal things and teaching and being decent people and I think - okay. There is still worth here.
Well I certainly have a soft spot for incentives! I still think that every legislative proposal should have an "incentives impact assessment", even though I expect that they would be complete shite focused on first order effects in a static world populated by care bears.
And after Trump won the election and the left _still_ did not support any material fettering of executive power I concluded that incentives was simply a totally alien concept to many people.
On the day of the 2021 AFL Grand Final, I read a Facebook comment by a young member of the Greens saying "we should ban football". If this young chap becomes an academic the example provided in this post may cease to be fancifully hypothetical.
!!!! Well. I still want you to write your AFL story. I would be very upset at such a suggestion. But you knew that. I just recalled that I was the first girl in my primary school to join AFL little league. Obvs I wasn’t very good, because - well, I have cerebral palsy. But this is evidence that I am ecumenical in my approach to football code.
I did have a friend who said, “sport is the opiate of the masses, it should be banned.” Me: “Oh @#$& off, let the masses have something.” As I told her at the time, she purportedly acted for the proles, but didn’t like it when a prole objected…
Thank you for this thoughtful piece, and I definitely found your analogy apt and useful.
If you are willing and curious, I would welcome any insights you’d share as regards recent developments in nicotine and tobacco research (and I’d be happy to find a time to zoom if that would be easier). This is the area where I spend almost all of my professional time and I have an important disclosure: I consult for JUUL Labs on their nicotine vaping products.
The only global scientific society focused on this topic, the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco, has been wrestling with the role and place of “the Tobacco Industry” since its founding in the 1990s, and the effort to more comprehensively exclude the industry from its house journal (Nicotine & Tobacco Research or NTR) and conferences continues and builds. The most recent contribution is this invited Commentary in NTR: https://doi.org/10.1093/ntr/ntae109. It was published in early May and represents the views of the society’s Health Equity Network. It is deeply referenced (I particularly recommend reading ref 10, Maddox et al (https://academic.oup.com/ntr/article/24/6/933/6470893) and argues for the full exclusion of anyone receiving “commercial tobacco industry” funding.
My disclosed interests restrict my capacity to approach these questions in anything approaching an unbiased way, let alone that I have many friends in the society that I won’t have good excuses to see regularly. In addition, as a white cis male of substantial privilege (I believe I am likely the most fortunate/lucky person out there—I might be the Domino of the non-comic book world), I know that my instincts and feelings are not well calibrated to consider all of this, as much as I wish to.
Any and all recommendations will be gratefully received. Thank you.
The question of funding is an interesting one. Funding can, of course, distort research, but I don’t quite understand why tobacco company funding is somehow more distorting than government funding, or other sources of funding. As long as you disclose it fully, surely that should be enough? This is me thinking like an equity lawyer: disclosures of conflict of interest can neutralise the conflict.
I suspect the problem is that the tobacco industry blotted its copybook decades ago, as I understand it. Would it be true to say that society doesn’t trust tobacco companies now as a matter of course, even if the problems have been dealt with? I’m not a smoker, and I never will be, because I’m hospitalised every few years for my lung problems. Hence I have no idea about the politics you describe above, other than a vague recollection of scandals in the 80s, and some unpleasant legal cases in Australia in the 90s and 2000s.
I should admit that my research is so “non-exciting” that no one gives me grants, other than little fund the uni gives me each year. Actually, that’s not true, I once got a scholarship to go to the UK for three months, so that was nice, but I could do research on any topic I wanted. I chose remedies over bribes, because they’re fun. So sad there hasn’t been a case on that lately, but never mind.
As for how to break through the issues in your area - it sounds hard. The main criteria for assessing the worth of your work (or anyone else’s scientific work, for that matter) is whether the research methodology is sound and notes conflicting research, you disclose your funding fully, and provide your full datasets (I have a “thing” about providing data sets upon which conclusions are based where possible). If so, you’re okay, and it’s up to others to disprove it or disagree with it. But no doubt this is an idealistic and unrealistic view of how research in very contentious areas operates. Maybe I should be happy to be “non-exciting”. I just get to pootle around doing my things.
Another insightful and thought-provoking essay, thank you, Katy. I think the scholarly approach needs to be taken in all levels of education. Schools seem to be rife with teachers using their position for influence over young minds, also encouraged by media, both "informational" and "social".
Yes. I had a long chat with a colleague about it this afternoon - we really don’t think we should be shoving our views down students’ throats. And it doesn’t matter whether they’re left or right or whether we agree with the views or not…
Here's to more educators who think like you do! And, if more young people were open to scepticism and analysis in forming views, then continuing to challenge their thinking, being prepared to change their minds, the future would look bright.
This was a fun read. Going off at a tangent slightly, my main thought on reading it was just how few people - staff and students - really need to be (or should be) in a university (I'm thinking here of non-STEM). When I was at university in the early 70s, the numbers were maybe 25% of what they are now (maybe even less)....which was probably about right. How foolish and delusional was the subsequent "all must have prizes" massive expansion (and dilution) of 'higher education' in the Western world.
So back to your football studies instance...sack him and close the course. Then cull from the university all the other 'Mickey Mouse' courses that should never have become academic studies in the first place. Sorry.
There is a very serious argument that we do not need to have university enrolments or courses at their current level. And yes, I was being both a little silly and a little snarky with my example. I share your concern about Mickey Mouse subjects.
Mind you when I was an undergraduate, I did a subject called Histories of God, which was a very serious and scholarly inspection of depictions of God in the three Abrahamic religions and involved reading various religious texts. I really enjoyed that subject. It’s what caused me to be interested in religious law. I also did a subject called King Arthur: Myth or Legend? which was fabulous - reading old Welsh poems, medieval French sources, early Anglo-Saxon chroniclers, etc. My conclusion was: there may be a kernel of historical reality for King Arthur, but we will never know, and the figure we have now is layers and layers and layers of myth around any kernel, so much we can’t even see. So I’d be upset if those kinds of subjects were abolished, because they were fantastic, scholarly and deeply learned. I’m thinking of those two because I ALWAYS got questions in job interviews: “What the heck is with that subject?” And then I’d explain and the interviewer would say, “Actually, sounds interesting.”
Yes they do sound interesting... and very much in line with what a university is really for. I tacked a "Sorry" to the end of my comment conscious that I was somewhat cheekily hijacking the thread over to one of my own 'hobbyhorse' themes. And yes, what is and isn't valid for university scholarship is something too complex to define on a comment thread. I came across you via my customised Substack Reads bulletin by the way... and will continue to check your posts now....as you might, I hope, check out my own STB 'Stack.
But swastikas and nazis aren’t comparable to football. Godwin’s Law… people who invoke Nazi to make a point are usually not providing evidence for their views, or support and safety for their dissenting students.
It gets more ugly when the Jewish state is equated with Nazism. Then we’re in blame the victim territory. And the Jewish students in the room might have generational flashbacks of their great grandparents, former European academics, being subjected to similar treatment…
Full disclosure - I’m identifiably Jewish and your Soccer example was great but also doesn’t adequately convey the feeling of being the only student in the lecture hall who is overtly unwelcome.
No. You’re right. I couldn’t think of an analogy which was equivalent - I played with making it more pointed, but it didn’t work. I decided the main idea was to get people to think about this with a non-threatening scenario about which readers didn’t have preconceptions one way or the other. Maybe I’d even make them laugh a little.
I didn’t want people who have already closed their minds on Middle Eastern conflict to just turn off the post and not read further. I’m trying to make people open their minds and think. Also the point I’m trying to make applies to many contentious issues, not just to Middle Eastern conflict, although that’s the hot button issue on campus right now, as it has been off and on again since I was a undergrad student.
I’m aware that many Jewish students feel unwelcome on campuses right now. Current times are weird and scary. A year ago I would have said the image used by Dr Anderson was on the fringe. I still can’t quite believe some of the stuff I see around uni on posters and stickers these days. I hope for all our sakes—not just for Jewish and Israeli students but for everyone—that things calm down. This is not an atmosphere which is conducive to learning or discussion.
The best example I could think of is if he had shown instead an cartoon of a horde of brown people assaulting white females in the streets of an Australian town, for example. I don't think he'd have been physically able to return to a university in Australia after that, and I'm pretty sure the NTEU would have told him to f*** right off too.
Yes. That is the thing. The NTEU wouldn’t have touched him with a barge pole. It’s why I had to quit the NTEU - I no longer felt confident that they would help me if I got into trouble. In fact, I worried they might attack me. This is a derogation of the fundamental principles of what a union is about - they should be protecting workers. Why are they are so obsessed with a conflict in the Middle East which has nothing to do directly with Australia, and certainly nothing to do with university staff working conditions or anything core to their mission…? Well. I can only see one answer to that question, which is why I had to quit.
Well written, and while I agree with you, the question you posed on what happened to the Enlightenment value of tolerance is critical here.
Unfortunately the post modernists view the world in terms of relative power, and the end conclusion to this is a Hobbesian nightmare - the war of all against all. Add to this the idea that group identity is paramount, and toleration falls away entirely.
This is how University Professors can allow themselves to propagandise students and force certain points of view onto them as orthodoxy. The idea that there are cogent reasons to exercise restraint and toleration is for them just phallogocentrism or something similar - reason being used to oppress their group or diminish the amount of power their group has and therefore is something that should be resisted. Remember - they are the voices of unreason.
And unfortunately this brings us back to the question of whether to tolerate the intolerant. Im with Dworkin on that one.
I hate the framing of everything in terms of relative power. It’s so blunt, and leaves any nuance to the side, which is how we get ourselves into this mess. Anyway. I am trying to be a voice of reason and tolerance. For totally random reasons, I was looking at the European Wars of Religion a few months back. That’s what tolerance is trying to stop. We have to live beside each other without fighting in a tribal manner. Have further thoughts on tribalism, and self-help remedies… watch this space.
"Dr Anderson presented a seminar to academics which included a PowerPoint slide with an Israeli flag being torn, with a swastika revealed behind it."
It's one thing to be opposed to Israel, and to express that thoughtfully. But a slide with an Israeli flag with a swastika behind it is hardly "thoughtful". The ultimate objection to Dr. Anderson is not his ideas but his simplistic and childish approach. Surely "professionalism" in academia must have something to do with the quality of argument, and this is where he is ultimately lacking.
Enjoyed reading your piece. I’m not an academic person se. I’m surprised I actually read your entire article. I find academicians arrogant and tedious. “Get to the point already. Good grief”. Like James Joyce 6 page description of someone opening the door and walking half way into a room, good grief! I despised the closed mindedness of my college professors and the control they had of the students and what they were allowed to learn. When my own children went to college, I saw how they learned truth during their research but would have to write their report in political terms their teacher would approve. I spent an extraordinary amount of time trying to find a school that taught a classical education with some ethics thrown in when my children were young. Impossible. Today, because of the backlash to the dumbing down indoctrination more of these types of schools are popping up. I love learning but I certainly didn’t learn this in a state run institution or university. I had to leave that environment to pursue at my pace what I had hoped I would finally find in college. Ugh! My children who were bright, creative and full of life had to crawl into a square to achieve good grades. What a horrendous waste of potential greatness. These professors can get away with ramming their ideologue down the throats of their student screaming 1st Amendment rights while denying that right to their students are beyond disgusting. I know there are wonderful teachers and professors, many taking early retirement, tired of walking the thin line of political correctness. The more no one can really understand what academicians are saying and consider them brilliant anyway are the very academicians promoted for their brilliant ability to say nothing intelligent. I love how people can sit through a lecture in awe of their “brilliant” professor and walk away not having much more understanding than when they went in. Hooray another successful academician. I liked your analogy. Another attempt, however basic and non threatening as we can get, to break through the thick concrete academic bubble.
I very much understand. My eldest is more of an Arts person - she quit school in her final year - couldn’t see the point and was having extreme anxiety attacks. She would have really interesting discussions with me about stuff (we did a bit of part home-schooling) and then the teacher would just want to hear a formulaic answer. The horror of this is that it’s putting off genuinely curious and bright people from study, because anyone who’s bright doesn’t want to write what I call a colour by number answer, and they want to question. I’m also a huge fan of writing in ways that are hopefully understandable to the average person, even on very complex legal concepts. The fact that you read my post right thought gives me hope that I succeeded in this instance! 😊
"Hegel's philosophy is so odd that one would not have expected him to be able to get sane men to accept it, but he did. He set it out with so much obscurity that people thought it must be profound. It can quite easily be expounded lucidly in words of one syllable, but then its absurdity becomes obvious."
—Bertrand Russell, Philosophy and Politics
Bazinga.
Yes, clearly understanding what the person is trying to communicate is so much more interesting and compelling than an academician trying to sound brilliant while saying nothing of consequence.
You are an astonishingly kind person. I agree with the overall sentiment, I have trouble seeing how anyone could not (but I cede to the evidence to the contrary).
I find it difficult to see how Tim Anderson was a close enough case to have essentially an even split of Federal Court judges, and it is sometimes a shame when these things are decided largely on narrow procedural grounds as to who has the onus of proof. I cannot see how, were I unfortunate enough to have been his student, I could ever have trusted him to even teach me anything not completely tainted by his bigotry, let alone to mark me fairly. On the more narrow legal issues Perram J puts it (of course) nicely:
"
However, thought experiments of this kind needed to be brought down to the realities of this litigation. Having waded into the briar patch which is the situation in Palestine it was Dr Anderson who juxtaposed the Nazi swastika with the flag of the State of Israel. Accepting as I do that it may in an appropriate case be consistent with the standards referred to in cl 317 to use a Nazi swastika in the work of a university academic, it was for Dr Anderson to engage in the forensic gymnastics of explaining how his at least incendiary conduct could be characterised as being consistent with the highest ethical, professional and legal standards referred to in cl 317. This he did not do.
"
Lee J put it more bluntly if less eloquently:
"
For my part, the posting of this image, which is self-evidently offensive (and obviously disturbing to a section of the University community) could not amount to an exercise of intellectual freedom which was both “responsible” (cl 315) and in accordance with the “highest ... standards” (cl 317) – a fortiori where Dr Anderson conceded the offensive image was not even important nor “central to the meaning of the graphic” and was so peripheral to whatever point he was seeking to make that Dr Anderson “forgot” about the image.
"
OTOH this quote from strikes me as eminently regrettable:
"
In terms of what the plurality of the Full Court has stated at [267] and [269], whilst I consider that the Third Comments would be offensive to many people, in the context in which the Israeli flag superimposed with the swastika was used, I do not consider that its use involved “harassment, vilification or intimidation”. In this assessment, it is necessary to consider the matter in the context which existed at the time of publication and not by reference to later events, including the escalation in the dispute between Dr Anderson and the University. The University did not establish any breach of any standard which might have engaged cl 317 of the 2018 Agreement.
"
WTF? Apparently, having drunk _all_ the kool-aid, his Honour accepted that the graphic was prepared for the academic purpose of discussing statistics about deaths in the conflict. I mean, I could give my post discussing judicial cupidity a background of men in robes and wigs being hung, but that would be so far from meeting any possible standard of the type mentioned in s317 as to be beyond risible.
I was trying to get the general issue away from the Anderson case, which for me, is a case which triggers that amygdala hijack I was talking about - i.e. a strong emotional response of fear and worry.
I was unconvinced by the dissent as well, to be honest, but I know some free speech absolutists who would argue that it’s fine to let rip at any group of people you want, that’s what academic freedom means. I had an argument with some of them on a related topic a few weeks back: their argument was we should ALL be able to say what we want, because it’s better to know if people hate you and respond to that. I said that they might feel differently if they’d had someone say to their face some very unpleasant things which I don’t think I should repeat here, but let’s just say - it was much, much worse than Dr Anderson’s image.
I am not a free speech absolutist. I think a teaching environment and a professional environment is different to being on the street. There is a power imbalance which makes this problematic in my eyes. Dr Anderson can have whatever views he wants in private, but he should not let it affect his relationships with students or his teaching. He should allow for students to have other views, and in fact encourage them. I feel very strongly about this.
I’m also aware that I have views which some people might find wrong or even offensive. Probably all of us do! So I am also thinking from that perspective. FWIW, I’d be very careful in the way I aired those views in a teaching or professional environment, and if I do air them publicly, I disclaim any relationship to the University and make it clear - this is on me. Certainly I would never expect students to share them, and I’m always aware I have a diverse cohort of students.
I am totally open to the idea that Anderson's comments/image were "free speech" writ large, but that has nothing to do with the concept of "intellectual freedom" which is intrinsically linked to the role of a "teacher" at the university, far less of the scope of any constitutional protections in Australia (which were quite sensibly not raised).
The problem is - many university professors do not think their role is linked to being a teacher. I do, but I discovered others do not.
This is really not helping me to convince myself that burning it all down would be an overreaction 😅
No, no! Change the incentives, says the remedies lawyer. Incentives are all. People respond to incentives. I need to write a post on this. Mind you, at moments in the last year, even I have had “this whole academic thing has become poisoned”, then I meet with normal people doing normal things and teaching and being decent people and I think - okay. There is still worth here.
Well I certainly have a soft spot for incentives! I still think that every legislative proposal should have an "incentives impact assessment", even though I expect that they would be complete shite focused on first order effects in a static world populated by care bears.
And after Trump won the election and the left _still_ did not support any material fettering of executive power I concluded that incentives was simply a totally alien concept to many people.
On the day of the 2021 AFL Grand Final, I read a Facebook comment by a young member of the Greens saying "we should ban football". If this young chap becomes an academic the example provided in this post may cease to be fancifully hypothetical.
!!!! Well. I still want you to write your AFL story. I would be very upset at such a suggestion. But you knew that. I just recalled that I was the first girl in my primary school to join AFL little league. Obvs I wasn’t very good, because - well, I have cerebral palsy. But this is evidence that I am ecumenical in my approach to football code.
I did have a friend who said, “sport is the opiate of the masses, it should be banned.” Me: “Oh @#$& off, let the masses have something.” As I told her at the time, she purportedly acted for the proles, but didn’t like it when a prole objected…
Thank you for this thoughtful piece, and I definitely found your analogy apt and useful.
If you are willing and curious, I would welcome any insights you’d share as regards recent developments in nicotine and tobacco research (and I’d be happy to find a time to zoom if that would be easier). This is the area where I spend almost all of my professional time and I have an important disclosure: I consult for JUUL Labs on their nicotine vaping products.
The only global scientific society focused on this topic, the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco, has been wrestling with the role and place of “the Tobacco Industry” since its founding in the 1990s, and the effort to more comprehensively exclude the industry from its house journal (Nicotine & Tobacco Research or NTR) and conferences continues and builds. The most recent contribution is this invited Commentary in NTR: https://doi.org/10.1093/ntr/ntae109. It was published in early May and represents the views of the society’s Health Equity Network. It is deeply referenced (I particularly recommend reading ref 10, Maddox et al (https://academic.oup.com/ntr/article/24/6/933/6470893) and argues for the full exclusion of anyone receiving “commercial tobacco industry” funding.
My disclosed interests restrict my capacity to approach these questions in anything approaching an unbiased way, let alone that I have many friends in the society that I won’t have good excuses to see regularly. In addition, as a white cis male of substantial privilege (I believe I am likely the most fortunate/lucky person out there—I might be the Domino of the non-comic book world), I know that my instincts and feelings are not well calibrated to consider all of this, as much as I wish to.
Any and all recommendations will be gratefully received. Thank you.
The question of funding is an interesting one. Funding can, of course, distort research, but I don’t quite understand why tobacco company funding is somehow more distorting than government funding, or other sources of funding. As long as you disclose it fully, surely that should be enough? This is me thinking like an equity lawyer: disclosures of conflict of interest can neutralise the conflict.
I suspect the problem is that the tobacco industry blotted its copybook decades ago, as I understand it. Would it be true to say that society doesn’t trust tobacco companies now as a matter of course, even if the problems have been dealt with? I’m not a smoker, and I never will be, because I’m hospitalised every few years for my lung problems. Hence I have no idea about the politics you describe above, other than a vague recollection of scandals in the 80s, and some unpleasant legal cases in Australia in the 90s and 2000s.
I should admit that my research is so “non-exciting” that no one gives me grants, other than little fund the uni gives me each year. Actually, that’s not true, I once got a scholarship to go to the UK for three months, so that was nice, but I could do research on any topic I wanted. I chose remedies over bribes, because they’re fun. So sad there hasn’t been a case on that lately, but never mind.
As for how to break through the issues in your area - it sounds hard. The main criteria for assessing the worth of your work (or anyone else’s scientific work, for that matter) is whether the research methodology is sound and notes conflicting research, you disclose your funding fully, and provide your full datasets (I have a “thing” about providing data sets upon which conclusions are based where possible). If so, you’re okay, and it’s up to others to disprove it or disagree with it. But no doubt this is an idealistic and unrealistic view of how research in very contentious areas operates. Maybe I should be happy to be “non-exciting”. I just get to pootle around doing my things.
Another insightful and thought-provoking essay, thank you, Katy. I think the scholarly approach needs to be taken in all levels of education. Schools seem to be rife with teachers using their position for influence over young minds, also encouraged by media, both "informational" and "social".
Yes. I had a long chat with a colleague about it this afternoon - we really don’t think we should be shoving our views down students’ throats. And it doesn’t matter whether they’re left or right or whether we agree with the views or not…
Here's to more educators who think like you do! And, if more young people were open to scepticism and analysis in forming views, then continuing to challenge their thinking, being prepared to change their minds, the future would look bright.
This was a fun read. Going off at a tangent slightly, my main thought on reading it was just how few people - staff and students - really need to be (or should be) in a university (I'm thinking here of non-STEM). When I was at university in the early 70s, the numbers were maybe 25% of what they are now (maybe even less)....which was probably about right. How foolish and delusional was the subsequent "all must have prizes" massive expansion (and dilution) of 'higher education' in the Western world.
So back to your football studies instance...sack him and close the course. Then cull from the university all the other 'Mickey Mouse' courses that should never have become academic studies in the first place. Sorry.
There is a very serious argument that we do not need to have university enrolments or courses at their current level. And yes, I was being both a little silly and a little snarky with my example. I share your concern about Mickey Mouse subjects.
Mind you when I was an undergraduate, I did a subject called Histories of God, which was a very serious and scholarly inspection of depictions of God in the three Abrahamic religions and involved reading various religious texts. I really enjoyed that subject. It’s what caused me to be interested in religious law. I also did a subject called King Arthur: Myth or Legend? which was fabulous - reading old Welsh poems, medieval French sources, early Anglo-Saxon chroniclers, etc. My conclusion was: there may be a kernel of historical reality for King Arthur, but we will never know, and the figure we have now is layers and layers and layers of myth around any kernel, so much we can’t even see. So I’d be upset if those kinds of subjects were abolished, because they were fantastic, scholarly and deeply learned. I’m thinking of those two because I ALWAYS got questions in job interviews: “What the heck is with that subject?” And then I’d explain and the interviewer would say, “Actually, sounds interesting.”
Yes they do sound interesting... and very much in line with what a university is really for. I tacked a "Sorry" to the end of my comment conscious that I was somewhat cheekily hijacking the thread over to one of my own 'hobbyhorse' themes. And yes, what is and isn't valid for university scholarship is something too complex to define on a comment thread. I came across you via my customised Substack Reads bulletin by the way... and will continue to check your posts now....as you might, I hope, check out my own STB 'Stack.
Don’t be sorry! It’s a really interesting discussion. Glad you came across my post, and I’m intending to check out yours now.
Enjoyed the article. Agree with your premise.
But swastikas and nazis aren’t comparable to football. Godwin’s Law… people who invoke Nazi to make a point are usually not providing evidence for their views, or support and safety for their dissenting students.
It gets more ugly when the Jewish state is equated with Nazism. Then we’re in blame the victim territory. And the Jewish students in the room might have generational flashbacks of their great grandparents, former European academics, being subjected to similar treatment…
Full disclosure - I’m identifiably Jewish and your Soccer example was great but also doesn’t adequately convey the feeling of being the only student in the lecture hall who is overtly unwelcome.
No. You’re right. I couldn’t think of an analogy which was equivalent - I played with making it more pointed, but it didn’t work. I decided the main idea was to get people to think about this with a non-threatening scenario about which readers didn’t have preconceptions one way or the other. Maybe I’d even make them laugh a little.
I didn’t want people who have already closed their minds on Middle Eastern conflict to just turn off the post and not read further. I’m trying to make people open their minds and think. Also the point I’m trying to make applies to many contentious issues, not just to Middle Eastern conflict, although that’s the hot button issue on campus right now, as it has been off and on again since I was a undergrad student.
I’m aware that many Jewish students feel unwelcome on campuses right now. Current times are weird and scary. A year ago I would have said the image used by Dr Anderson was on the fringe. I still can’t quite believe some of the stuff I see around uni on posters and stickers these days. I hope for all our sakes—not just for Jewish and Israeli students but for everyone—that things calm down. This is not an atmosphere which is conducive to learning or discussion.
The best example I could think of is if he had shown instead an cartoon of a horde of brown people assaulting white females in the streets of an Australian town, for example. I don't think he'd have been physically able to return to a university in Australia after that, and I'm pretty sure the NTEU would have told him to f*** right off too.
Yes. That is the thing. The NTEU wouldn’t have touched him with a barge pole. It’s why I had to quit the NTEU - I no longer felt confident that they would help me if I got into trouble. In fact, I worried they might attack me. This is a derogation of the fundamental principles of what a union is about - they should be protecting workers. Why are they are so obsessed with a conflict in the Middle East which has nothing to do directly with Australia, and certainly nothing to do with university staff working conditions or anything core to their mission…? Well. I can only see one answer to that question, which is why I had to quit.
They and many others, a bit depressing really.
Well written, and while I agree with you, the question you posed on what happened to the Enlightenment value of tolerance is critical here.
Unfortunately the post modernists view the world in terms of relative power, and the end conclusion to this is a Hobbesian nightmare - the war of all against all. Add to this the idea that group identity is paramount, and toleration falls away entirely.
This is how University Professors can allow themselves to propagandise students and force certain points of view onto them as orthodoxy. The idea that there are cogent reasons to exercise restraint and toleration is for them just phallogocentrism or something similar - reason being used to oppress their group or diminish the amount of power their group has and therefore is something that should be resisted. Remember - they are the voices of unreason.
And unfortunately this brings us back to the question of whether to tolerate the intolerant. Im with Dworkin on that one.
I hate the framing of everything in terms of relative power. It’s so blunt, and leaves any nuance to the side, which is how we get ourselves into this mess. Anyway. I am trying to be a voice of reason and tolerance. For totally random reasons, I was looking at the European Wars of Religion a few months back. That’s what tolerance is trying to stop. We have to live beside each other without fighting in a tribal manner. Have further thoughts on tribalism, and self-help remedies… watch this space.
So well said! Sadly this view seems to be less common than it used to be
"Dr Anderson presented a seminar to academics which included a PowerPoint slide with an Israeli flag being torn, with a swastika revealed behind it."
It's one thing to be opposed to Israel, and to express that thoughtfully. But a slide with an Israeli flag with a swastika behind it is hardly "thoughtful". The ultimate objection to Dr. Anderson is not his ideas but his simplistic and childish approach. Surely "professionalism" in academia must have something to do with the quality of argument, and this is where he is ultimately lacking.