A rchive Date
[ 17-06-2000 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ Canada ]
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[Stow your sympathy for 'maligned' prof
By LYN COCKBURN -- Winnipeg Sun
June 17, 2000
You read Michael Coren's column Thursday so you're all sympathied up over the plight of poor Henry Makow who (sob) says he lost his job as an English prof at the U of W because: he's not a radical feminist, is heterosexual, defends marriage, believes men are not women's enemies and was the victim of an anonymous letter written by four radicals in one of his classes.
I don't know how old Michael's children are but I suspect he would not want an 18-year-old daughter of his present in a first year English class taught by a 50-year-old man who announced one day he had beaten his ex-girlfriend ("she started it" ) and afterwards they "had great makeup sex."
It seems Michael was so busy quoting poor Henry Makow he forgot to talk to any of the 18-year-old daughters who listened to the prof day after day.
I sat down with one of those daughters Thursday morning, and the first thing she said to me was, "This has nothing to do with feminism. He's blown this up into something about feminism. It's about unprofessional conduct."
But when I contacted Makow he said, "That's ridiculous. This is the way feminists censure people they don't agree with."
And just how unprofessional was Mr. Makow's conduct?
Depends on what you think your daughter (or son) should have to listen to in a first-year English course.
Do you want your daughter asked in class and out of class (Makow questioned young women outside the classroom) when and how she lost her innocence?
Would you like her to be told that women should devote their lives to serving their men because the high divorce rate in North America is caused by women who have careers and are not therefore good mothers. (During a telephone conversation, Makow said to me: "The university has an agenda to encourage women to pursue careers and not follow the more traditional path.")
Would you like your daughter to be asked in class, and again outside class, if a certain passage in a D.H. Lawrence novel aroused her?
Want her subjected to the statement that religious Jews and Muslims look ridiculous because of the way they dress?
Want her in a class where the professor shouts at his students? Do you want her asked in class and out for details about her relationship with her boyfriend, if she happens to have one? Or in a class where the professor talks about his sex life?
And for those readers whose sympathies still lie with Makow, may I point out that much of what Makow said in class is on tape. And everything he said was witnessed by enough students to resink the Titanic.
Makow himself says, "Everything I said in class had a definite academic purpose."
The young woman I interviewed is on tape saying to Makow: "You're in a position of authority. It's not like you're my friend asking me these kinds of questions. You're the professor."
Makow says everything he said got twisted. "It's all a distortion." The young woman I interviewed Thursday morning said it is Makow who twisted the situation.
"Personal information is not appropriate for a classroom," she said.
And why have I not named her? Because she's afraid. So are the other women (a total of 11 young women instituted the initial complaint against Makow and they did so with the approval and knowledge of the majority of their classmates) who also do not want their names used.
"We have reason to be scared of him," said the young woman, adding that she and her friends were indeed worried when Makow talked about beating his ex-girlfriend (even if it was her fault!).
Nonetheless, the official letter of complaint was not anonymous. Seven young women signed it. The signature of the young woman I interviewed is on that letter.
It is a letter which complains about Makow's inappropriate comments and questions, about his conduct, his yelling at students in class.
I brought up Makow's accusation that "gender feminists are waging a campaign against heterosexuality" and the young woman sitting across from me shook her head and threw up her hands. She repeated the statement that the complaint didn't have anything to do with feminism in the first place and said that heterosexuality had absolutely nothing to do with the incident.
I have a daughter, Michael Coren, and after the family doctor made inappropriate remarks and gestures to her, I wanted him disbarred or whatever the hell it is that is done with doctors.
I would feel the same way about a professor who made inappropriate unprofessional remarks to my daughter, in or out of class.
I think most parents would feel exactly the same.
Poor, poor Henry. Silly, silly Michael.
Lyn Cockburn can be reached by e-mail at lcockburn@wpgsun.com
 World Fact Book (CIA)]
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