CUPE Committee Advocates Censorship and Ban

So apparently the Ontario University Workers Coordinating Committee of CUPE has proposed that Israeli academics be banned from teaching or speaking at Ontario universities.

I guess there's nothing like starting the year off with some good old fashioned racism!

I tend to avoid writing on topics related to the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. As far as I am concerned, it is a dispute with no fair and equitable resolution in sight or even possible. That said, I find this proposal to be ridiculous and an assault on academia.

Maybe this is just the student inside me speaking but one of the major attractions that I have had to academia is that it tends to serve as a forum for free-thinking and, more importantly, free speech. The proposal to remove all Israeli academics from campuses unless they condemn the assault on Gaza and the bombing of the Islamic University in Gaza.

According to article I read this is, this proposal is meant to be a calculated political response to the recent escalation in Gaza. Well... academia is not the place to do this! This proposal will only hamper any discourse. Censorship has no place in the university classroom, it will serve to provide an incomplete perspective on issues and perpetuate the kind of ignorance that helps to create and further these conflicts.

Now don't take this as my statement in support of either party in the conflict. I condemn senseless killing of any group of people, not to mention the intrusion of politics into the classroom.

I know, I know, that's a funny thing to hear from a political science student.

If CUPE feels it necessary to make a political statement on this subject, make a public announcement or lobby the government. Don't use the academic community as your political medium. You do not represent the students in this community so don't attack the quality of their education. Students pay good money to study from these academics and gain the best educations they can. They should not suffer from your politics.

- blenCOWe