Re: [Marxism] Ward Churchill Redux

[Waistline2@xxxxxxx]

In a message dated 5/7/2009 3:32:53 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, 
_farmelantj@xxxxxxxxx (mailto:farmelantj@xxxxxxxx)  writes: 
 
>> However, it should be noted that both Larry Tribe and Charles  Ogletree, 
both members of the faculty of Harvard Law School, have admitted to  
committing plagiarism in their published works. Both men remain on the HLS  
faculty. 
 
Several years ago, Norman Finkelstein and Alex Cockburn charged Alan  
Dershowitz with having plagiarized many of the footnotes and citations in his  
polemical book, *The Case for Israel* from Joan Peters's earlier book, *From  
Time Immemorial*.  Dershowitz has never admitted to committing plagiarism  
or even having done anything amiss. He remains on the HLS faculty. <<  


Comment

Last comment.  


Any and every job in America and the world requires  certain quality 
control standards. Academia is no different, in that it has its  own standards 
and 
tenure benchmarks. Plagiarism is considered cause for  reprimand or 
dismissal, and as ML's comment points out, what is considered  plagiarism 
changes. 
One should not violate the standards of their job, including  academia if 
one is to remain employed there. 

The case of Ward  Churchill has very little to do with violating academic 
standards.  The  reason our country has Indian studies; African American 
history and Women's  history is the same reason we have histories of the 
American working class as  distinct fields of study. Academic standards is 100% 
political. 
 
Actually, my opinion is that we would be better off without "such  
standards" as we have known and lived these standards for the past 200 years or 
 
more.  

Historical narrative is 100% partisan. 
 
The personal passion of the historian rivets their personal ideology and  
quest for truth. There is no such thing as a non class bias science. In is 
not  simply a question of how science is deployed. The pathways through which 
science  is pursued, are opened and become pathways precisely as a function 
of ideology,  class and property. The science behind the atomic bomb "did 
not just happen" as  the result of some individual being interested in the 
atom and its structures  and then "accidentally" discovering how to lay waste 
to humanity. The result  proves the intent and motivation, rather than 
judging one on the basis of self  profession. Science has its history as the 
"discovery of the law systems  governing processes."  

What the individual "see" and their  method of scientific inquiry is 
saddled with class ideology, class interest and  cultural inheritance. One 
always 
have to be told what they are looking at when  peering into a microscope, 
and then taught how to understand what they are  viewing.   

The standards that Mr. Churchillâs employer  holds him to contain an 
inherent political bias or there would have been no  charges leveled against 
him 
or cause for public inquiry. Universities have no  abstract set of 
non-political, non-bias quality control standards and criteria  that seek to 
unravel 
facts of history outside the realm of ideology and  politics. History as 
historical narrative is assembled and reconstituted based  on facts preserved 
by 
the ruling classes and its institutions and how the  actions of individuals 
are shaped during a given era or time frame.   

Facts are partisan and partial truths. Water only runs downstream  under 
specific conditions. General laws of processes are general and always  subject 
to further discovery and knowing. 

Seeking to shift through  facts based on say reports by commissioned 
officers reporting their activity is  useless. All of human history proves that 
what a generation considers facts,  gives way to a deeper understanding of 
truth and a reconstituted understanding  of "facts." 

A discussion over whether or not the American military  deliberately 
infested an Indian community with blankets carrying small pox, - in  any 
historical period, strikes me as so much insanity. The insanity is the  demand 
for 
one to prove intent on the part of the individual as the means to  prove 
result. 

Yes, the spreading of disease as part of genocide  was deliberate and 
conscious and the outbreak of smallpox - a previously unknown  disease amongst 
the Indian, is the overriding evidence to be weighted rather  than testimony 
by the very people responsible for the outbreak.  

Yes, such action was a conspiracy using the modern definition and  criteria 
for the meaning of conspiracy, which does not require the individual to  
grasp the impact of their actions as part of a systematic series of events. 
Nor  should the jury be diverted into examining such nonsensical issues as 
whether or  not "conscious intention was motivating factor." The intent is 
proven by the  result rather than how one interprets the passion of the 
individuals 170 years  ago. 

Mr. Churchill does not stand above criticism or critique or  having his 
methods investigated and challenged. Is not the issue what methods  are 
historically valid?  Mr. Churchill is not required to present a written  
statement 
from 170 years ago saying "I hereby declare it my intent and  motivating to 
be the further killing of Indians." 
 
Is is not obvious the written evidence was destroyed and or omitted?  This 
in itself is proof of genocidal intent and conscious effort to shape method  
of inquiry for hundreds of years to  come.  

WL. 





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