En Passant

This was published in today’s Canberra Times. Support for uni strike The forthcoming strike at the University of Canberra highlights a reality not often mentioned in discussions of higher education. (“Canberra Uni staff to strike for first time in decade’, October 11, p3) Our universities are built on the unpaid labour of their workers. A […]

  In Independent Australia today, I discuss the suppression of free speech behind the recent suspension of academic Roz Ward. I say among other things: ‘Ward has clearly adversely affected the university but only if your criteria for judgement is a reactionary newspaper like The Australian. The Vice-Chancellor’s actions are entirely consistent with a profit model […]

The following is a statement by the Victorian branch of the National Tertiary Education Union on La Trobe University’s shocking decision to suspend Roz Ward for a Facebook post that the Australian flag is racist. Roz has been a key person in the Safe Schools anti-bullying campaign for school students. The Murdoch owned Australian newspaper has run a witch hunt against her for her Marxist views, all with the aim of destroying Safe Schools which teaches respect and understanding for LGBTIQ students. McCarthyism is alive and well in Australia and La Trobe University’s decision is yet another example.

But why stop with funding Bjorn Lomborg, Mr Pyne? Surely this government could also be funding a creation science think tank, an anti-vaccination research centre, a gay conversion institute and a 9/11 conspiracy colloquium? The possibilities are endless. Who knows, maybe we could convince Cory Bernardi to leave politics and head up a government funded ten year study into the links between gay marriage and bestiality?

Sarah Garnham writes in Red Flag that ‘our protest-based campaign has already had two significant victories over the government.’

‘But for these victories to be meaningful, we need to match Pyne’s determination. We need to continue the fight against privatisation, funding cuts and fee increases.’

On Friday 13 February, an organization of concerned students calling itself The New University (http://newuni.nl/) occupied the Bungehuis, one of the University of Amsterdam’s buildings and one of the Humanities Faculty’s primary locations. The students are protesting the financialization of academic life, and are calling for the radical democratization of university management. According to press releases issued by the students, their decision to occupy a university building was only taken after they had become convinced that all other options for entering into discussion with the university’s management had been exhausted, and many less impactful forms of protest had already been exercised (see http://humanitiesrally.com/).

Students are keeping the flame of free speech alive with their ‘unauthorised’ protests against Pyne and his attempted destruction of Universities. To defend free speech and Universities join with students in their just campaign against fee deregulation and funding cuts on 25 March across Australia.

About 30 students in Sydney were protesting against Education Minister Christopher Pyne and his attacks on Universities. Here is the ABC video of a policeman pepper spraying the students. This is what their ‘democracy’ looks like.

For the unions and students fighting alongside Labor and the Greens, the job to convince crossbenchers and the public that deregulation is in itself a problem – the real fight – starts now.

Alexis Vassiley in Red Flag argues for free higher education.