Stop the presses! The Guardian has just discovered — get this — that academics are hampering anti-terror efforts! This article adds, quite correctly, of course, that not only are they "fundamentally hostile to the UK's security services," but they also generally purvey a whitewashed and misleading view of Islam that gives students no idea why terrorism arises from such a glorious cultural environnment — expect, of course, because of the wickedness of America and Israel. (Thanks to Jeffrey Imm.)
University academics are hampering efforts to defend western democracy against Islamist threats because they are fundamentally hostile to the UK's security services, according to a leading professor.Anthony Glees, Brunel University's professor of politics and author of previous research suggesting dozens of UK academics acted as agents for the east German secret police, Stasi, will risk inflaming the academic establishment by warning in a lecture today that universities are nurturing a political culture deeply sceptical over the role of British intelligence agencies.
Addressing the prestigious political studies association meeting at Lincoln University, Professor Glees will claim that academic attitudes shaped in the 1960s through opposition to the Vietnam war have blighted the work of the agencies both in tackling old-style security threats during the cold war, and in fighting the new "war on terror".
In his paper, published in today's Times Higher Education Supplement, Professor Glees - who is director of the centre for intelligence and security studies at Brunel - says: "There is still a marked suspicion of professional security activities, even in the defence of liberal democracy... Some senior members of Britain's diplomatic community and more than a few members of Britain's academic community believe that security and intelligence services do not provide the answer to the problem but are, in fact, its cause."
Academics are mainly "hostile to the idea of intervention in international affairs and have, since 1980, harboured strong suspicions of American motives".
Professor Glees will also claim that political correctness makes it difficult for academics to attack Islamic fundamentalism or oppose student societies that demand the destruction of western society, if they wish to do so.
The extent to which radical Islamic ideas are brewing in UK universities will "come as shock" to people in years to come, he said.
Professor Paul Rogers, of Bradford University's peace studies department, yesterday argued it was the duty of academics to remain independent of "what appear to be the interests of the state".
He said: "I would have thought that to some extent what you are depending on from academics is not only high levels of integrity but also independence of mind, giving the ability to propose solutions that governments would not necessarily expect."
The government might have done well to consider some of the alternative solutions presented by academics to the issue of Islamic fundamentalism before turning to a problematic war on Iraq, he said.
The Guardian has just now discovered that many academics put forward "a whitewashed and misleading version of Islam." I good end my post with, "Duh!," but this problem is too serious for such monosyllabic, but loaded-with-meaning term as duh.
Education has always been the key to the success of any conquest, whether it is the re-education of a conquered people, or the preparation for conquest which is the stated goal of Islamist that are carefully crafting college and university courses that an any way affect the perception of Islam in the West, as well as in the indoctrination of the very young in K-12 classes. Community outreach education is another way, education friends and neighbors using the everyday contact one would have in neighborhoods and social organizations.
Educating bureaucrats, pofessionals, politicians, the "ruling and operation classes," will ensure a smooth transition once the conquest from within reaching the tipping point.
It is gratifying that The Guardian has come to the conclusion that academics in institutions of higher learning are "interferring with security," but they have a long way to go before understanding the complete problem.
there is a saying that goes "a liberal is just someone who ain't been mugged yet." perhaps the guardian has been mugged recently
An acquaintance of mine, attending classes on a campus here that's well known for its general, purblind pro-Arab stridency (across the board, from the faculty-members down to the freshers), gave me the chance of a wry smile when he said of his university's staff: "Oh, they think they're Cuba...."