university said that it “recognised” the concerns of students and scrapped the module, titled “Islam, China and the Far East”. Greer resigned.
Greer said: “Not only did they fail to protect me, and failed to deal with the complaint appropriately, they then compounded the risk by equivocating about my innocence.
“By saying they recognised concerns, and taking off the module because of student sensitivities, it looks like a whitewash, like they still had lingering suspicions about me.”
He was stitched up, and the university went along with it. Sheer cowardice.
Twelve groups, including the Free Speech Union, Academics for Academic Freedom, Alumni for Free Speech and Christian Concern, have written to the regulator asking it to investigate Bristol.
They pointed out that the university had a legal duty to take reasonably practicable steps to ensure freedom of speech within the law for its students and staff, but took no visible steps to do so in Greer’s case. They allege that Bristol’s failures resulted in the censorship of lawful expression and that, as in the Stock case, there was a failure to take reasonable steps to protect academics from physical harm.
Key failures, according to the groups, include allowing the complaint despite numerous procedural flaws, failing to take action on the aggressive social media campaign by disciplining any students who were involved, and cancelling Greer’s module even though he had been exonerated.
Given the scandal, the complaint notes, it would be a “brave scholar” who would make legitimate observations about Islam in a similar context.
Well quite. Discussion of Islam, let alone criticism of Islam, is becoming increasingly discouraged. As if, perhaps, it might be blasphemous.
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