The UWA student guild has trashed their own University’s reputation with their pig-headed attacks on Dr. Lomborg’s appointment. The warning is out for the thousands of overseas students, enrol at UWA at your peril:
“Students, staff and graduates are the key stakeholders at this institution, and it is so important that they are being heard. It is reassuring to know that when decisions cause this kind of public response, we will be taken seriously,” president Lizzy O’Shea said in a statement.
Heaven help any student that doesn’t toe the line. Even back in the ’60s, when I was a first year student, the Student Guild was run by the left, but today they have become far more extreme.
Aristotle opens the Metaphysics with one of his most striking phrases: “By their nature, all men desire to know.” Quite so. But not at the University of Western Australia.
Nor is there any mystery as to why. According to a press release issued late Friday by the university’s vice-chancellor, Paul Johnson, the proposal to establish, with $4 million in federal government funding, an Australian Consensus Centre which would undertake “detailed economic cost-benefit analysis into many of Australia’s, and the world’s, biggest challenges”, had met “strong opposition” and hence could not proceed.
Since there was no consensus to seek consensus, it was better to let ignorance flourish than for the merest shard of knowledge to creep in.
Human Rights Commissioner Tim Wilson:
The University of Western Australia’s decision to reject Bjorn Lomborg’s Australian Consensus Centre is disturbing for its validation of a culture of soft censorship…
It’s hard to think of a more anti-intellectual act to promote wilful ignorance about contemporary public policy challenges.
A friend of mine recently joked: what’s the opposite of diversity? UWA just proved the answer: university.
Just as the Professors of most Australian Universities have become a retirement club for failed and former labor MPs and their media enablers.
So don’t be surprised that University of Western Australia academics forced out internationally renowned Bjorn Lomborg, the “sceptical environmentalist”, for questioning the warming faith.
After all, this university made former Labor premier Carmen Lawrence a professor. Also there is former Labor foreign affairs minister Stephen Smith, now professor of law.
I don’t say either professor wanted Lomborg blackballed, but they indicate UWA’s political culture, as do the many former Labor politicians in universities.
UPDATE:
If you really want an example of the Left’s grip on universities, check out the members of the Senate of Sydney University – and we’re not just talking Peter FitzSimons. Two Fairfax writers, a former Labor MP, an ABC presenter….
UPDATE
Meanwhile, here is my updated list of other university appointments and grants that raised no protests by academics:
– former Labor prime minister Julia Gillard appointed honorary professor at Adelaide University.
– former Labor foreign affairs minister Gareth Evans appointed professor and Chancellor of the Australian National University.
– former Labor foreign affairs minister Stephen Smith appointed Winthrop Professor of Law at the University of Western Australia.
– former Labor Premier Carmen Lawrence appointed professor of psychology at the University of Western Australia.
– former Labor Premier John Bannon appointed associate professor at Adelaide University.
– former Labor backbencher Maxine McKew appointed a Vice Chancellor’s Fellow at Melbourne University.
– former Labor NT Chief Minister Clare Martin appointed Professorial Fellow at Charles Darwin University.
– former Labor Deputy Premier John Thwaites appointed Professorial Fellow and head of the Monash Sustainability Institute at Monash Unviersity.
– former Labor science minister Barry Jones appointed honorary professor at Melbourne University.
– former Labor Premier John Brumby appointed Professorial Fellow at Monash University.
– former Labor ACT Chief Minister John Stanhope appointed Professorial Fellow at Canberra University.
– former Labor leader Simon Crean appointed to council of Monash University.
– the Grattan Institute, a Left-leaning think tank at Melbourne University, given $30 million by the Rudd and Brumby Labor governments.
– the Whitlam Institute, a shrine to Labor Prime Minister Gough Whitlam at the University of Western Sydney, created by Labor Governments and given $7 million by the Gillard Government for refurbishment.
– the Bob Hawke Prime Ministerial Centre at the University of South Australia, created to ”honour the values of Bob Hawke”, former Labor Prime Minister.
– the Bob Hawke Institute, created at the University of South Australia to honor Labor Prime Minister Bob Hawke by “working towards social inclusion, equity and social sustainability”.
– Islamist apologist Waleed Aly appointed lecturer at Monash University’s Global Terrorism Research Centre despite not having a doctorate.
– former Age editor Andrew Jaspan appointed head of The Conversation, a Leftist on-line news and views site funded by universities and the then Labor federal government.
– former Age editor-in-chief and Leftist Paul Ramage appointed Vice Chancellor Professorial Fellow at Monash University.
– warming alarmist Tim Flannery appointed professorial fellow at Melbourne University’s Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute to preach global warming.
– controversial Labor-appointed police Chief Commissioner Christine Nixon appointed to council of Monash University.
– former ACTU secretary Bill Kelty appointed to council of La Trobe University.
– Fairfax columnist and Leftist Peter FitzSimons appointed to Senate of Sydney University.
– Fairfax writer Kate McClymont appointed to Senate of Sydney University.
– ABC presenter Andrew West voted onto Senate of Sydney University.
The Left’s capture of our universities is almost complete.
 Winthrop Hall, UWA |
