Posted on 05/17/2005 5:35:06 AM PDT by Constitution Day
Professor defends Web site
By GEORGE A. CHIDI, Rocky Mount Telegram
Saturday, May 14, 2005
Not all of the e-mail Professor Jane Christensen has received in the last few weeks has been death threats, she said.
"A lot of it is positive," said the N.C. Wesleyan College political science professor at the heart of controversy about a course criticizing the official accounts of the 9/11 attacks. "A lot of people have been very supportive."
The herky-jerky revelations about Christensen's views emerged in online Web logs, also called blogs, linking back to commentary from Web sites such as Frontpagemag.org and Townhall.com, excoriating the professor for challenging the government's account of the terrorist attacks.
The articles refer back to the syllabus for "9/11: The Road To Tyranny" posted on her faculty Web site, which notes that the course is "‘unscientific' in that it relies much on eyewitness accounts and speculation," and that it relies "somewhat extensively on alternative news media accounts and a variety of films and videos in lieu of literature."
Bloggers began linking to Mike Adams' "Jihad Jane and the Jews" article almost immediately after its publication in April. Hate mail, a trickle before the story, became a flood.
"That article basically invited people to wage a campaign against me," Christensen said. "What people should really be looking at is not my syllabus and my Web site, but the government's story on 9/11. Basically, the government lied."
Christensen said she believes some of the reported hijackers from 9/11 are actually alive — a matter of mistaken or stolen identity documented by mainstream media in Europe — and that the government is engaged in a massive cover-up.
"This is what (angers me) so much about this; they want to kill the messenger," she said. "You've got to understand that academic freedom is under attack all over this country."
Dr. Ian Newbould, Wesleyan's president, defended open debate in the classroom in his May 8 graduation address at the Dunn Center.
"Open minds, open to debate, unafraid of curiosity, have thus been recognized as the goal of an education for more than two millennia," he said. "In that sense, right or wrong opinions, or popular or unpopular views, are not relevant and should not be the issue."
But the question of academic freedom is a straw man deflecting criticism from the question of the academic rigor of the course itself, argued a policy analyst from the Pope Center for Higher Education Policy, a conservative education policy think tank in Raleigh.
"This course gives a very narrow, one-sided view of the subject matter," said Jon Sanders of the Pope Center. The use of blogs, apocryphal material and sources which have not undergone peer review in an academic course lends university credibility to material that may not deserve it, he said.
"I don't like this way of responding to criticism by saying you're jeopardizing academic freedom," Sanders said. "It's a response to something else, and not the criticism. ... Certainly the university has every right to ensure that its courses are rigorous and teach the discipline."
Web site stirs up criticism [Jihad Jane of NC Wesleyan]
(April 23, 2005)
No. You have a barking moonbat of a professor teaching hints, rumors, and innuendos. The university has a responsibility to at least vet the facts before they let this yo-yo start filling young minds with this claptrap.
Well, in that case, Doctor Newbould, let's see you institute "The Earth is Flat," and "Holocaust is Hoax" and other subjects in which wrong opinions are held. Afterall, untruth should not be the issue, as you say yourself, Doctor.
Incredible!
It's a pity so much education was wasted on someone so idiotically foolish they, for an attempt to discredit the Bush Administration, could possibly believe anyone could survive either of those plane impacts. Academic freedom isn't under attack, gross ignorance and stupidity is, and always has been. She epitomizes it.
Chirstiansen, put that in your pipe and smoke it.
Of course, nearly 4 years later he has yet to produce his son in person.
And further, I can't believe you and others actually believe that the Pentagon was hit by a plane. Nonsense! We all know President Bush, in his quest for absolute power had explosive charges placed at the Pentagon and also had missles fired at it.
PL, I'm saddened you've revealed I'm part of this massive coverup.
"There are certain things one has to be an intellectual to believe, since no ordinary man could be so stupid."
She is now being recruited by Newsweek
Hah! I'm still waiting to see these so-called academics do something about the Great Moon Hoax!
And don't forget, it wasn't a 747 that hit the North tower. It was just a Cessna loaded with explosives.
I never really understood what that was supposed to prove, though. I guess I'm not too good at this conspiracy theory stuff.
Here is the link to her cover-up links page:
http://faculty.ncwc.edu/Jchristensen/911coverup.htm
A must see...
Thanks.
That is an EXCELLENT point.
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