academia fails again (was Re: Scientology Strikes Martin Poulter!)

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In article <tomklemDBH96n.2y7@netcom.com>,
Tom Klemesrud <tomklem@netcom.com> wrote:


[martin poulter got yanked by the loon-cult]


>I would have hoped that Netcom's, and my stand on this sort of thing

>would have inspired such a british institution of education, to teach

>leadership and ethics by example, rather than to teach how to cower.


frankly, i admit i'm pretty sick of the so-called liberal academic
community, which seems mainly inhabited these days by namby-pamby
pantywaists who love to preach about tolerance and diversity, even
though most college campuses in the united states are about as 
racially diverse as 'leave it to beaver.'  it seems that academics
have become apathetic, cloistered little enclaves of fuzzy-headed
dimwits who wouldn't know how to act on their convictions even if 
they had the guts to try.


when faced with censorship, they're happy to cave in to it, and
even to enact censorship on their own, as long as the person
censored is unpopular or the person asking for it has deep pockets
and a nasty reputation.


while pontificating from ivory towers about the moral corruption
of the white upper class, they fail to note in the mirror each
morning that they are predominantly white and male, and almost
exclusively upper class.  


nevertheless, it is the very representative of the white upper 
class, newt gingrich himself, who has been painted as a vicious,
scurrilous scoundrel by the press, admittedly often fairly.
nevertheless, it was big business' own representative who 
stood up to the raving hysteria of senator exon and probably
will give us the impetus to defeat the exon bill.  


it was the so-called liberal media, on the other hand, which 
brought us a vicious hatchet job in _time_ magazine complete 
with bizarre propaganda art demonizing the internet.  


and in the erlich case, once again, we find business interests,
private citizens, rich lawyers, one of the largest internet 
service providers, a lobbying group for internet interests,
and a wide variety of interests mostly elite, all taking a 
principled stand against censorship that the academic community
would do well to emulate.


we find that free speech is more valued by the evil plutocrats
of big business than by the so-called liberal academic 
community and the so-called liberal media.  


why?


because it's good business.


>						Tom Klemesrud

>						KoX


i admit that these days i more trust someone willing to take
a stand for their own interests than woolgathering champagne
hippies and _bourgeois_ intellectuals who sound great talking
about abstract principles but aren't worth shit in reality-land.


h
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