Let Flanagan’s remarks die
UCalgary prof wasn't inciting violence, just making a really horrible joke
Already a rather controversial character in Canadian politics, Tom Flanagan got himself in hot water again this week over his remarks about Wikileaks founder Julian Assange.
When asked what he thought of the Wikileaks revelations in a panel interview on CBC’s Power and Politics with Evan Solomon on Monday, the University of Calgary professor and former senior advisor to the prime minister said that Assange should be assassinated, in what seemed to be an attempt at humour. Flanagan has since apologized for his remarks, saying that he never “seriously intended to advocate or propose the assassination of Mr. Assange,” he told the CBC.
Assange and his lawyer don’t seem to be taking Flanagan’s comments in jest, calling for Flanagan to be charged with incitement to commit murder.
Coming from someone with such an extensive political background, I can’t imagine what Flanagan was thinking. Joking about the assassination of a major public figure is terrible coming from anyone, but it is particularly shocking coming from someone who should be an expert in what not to say. However, considering it was obviously a bad joke and not a serious incitation to commit violence, maybe it’s time for everyone to move on.
Flanagan’s comments have since been denounced by the Prime Minister’s spokesperson, and alumni from the U of C are petitioning the university’s president, Elizabeth Cannon to take disciplinary action against Flanagan.
The letter to Cannon, penned by Kris Kotarski, a writer who contributes a bi-weekly column for the Calgary Herald, stated that Flanagan “should understand that academic freedom is not possible without political freedom, and that political freedom cannot survive in a climate where journalists and opponents of a ruling regime hear public intellectuals advocate for their assassination on the nightly news.”
Kotarski and the undersigned alumni are asking Cannon to publicly distance themselves from Flanagan’s comments, condemn him in the harshest possible terms, and censure him for hurting the university’s reputation.
A university spokesperson has stated that they’re not currently planning on reprimanding him, explaining that Flanagan was representing himself on the CBC, not the university, and has a right to his opinion. The Conservative party has also been trying to distance themselves from Flanagan, saying that he hasn’t worked for the Conservative party for years.
In the video footage of the interview, Flanagan’s comments don’t come off as if he’s seriously advocating for the swift assassination of Assange. They come off as something your conservative uncle would say in a drunken argument over an awkward family dinner. The difference is that Tom Flanagan is not your drunk, conservative uncle, he’s a prominent academic and someone who is often associated with the prime minister. He should have known better than to make a joke about assassinating the founder of WikiLeaks on the CBC.
I agree that the university should distance themselves as much as possible from Flanagan’s remarks, and make it clear to the public that they don’t condone what he said. I’m also not defending his remarks in any way. Yet to censure him for what seems like a joke gone horribly wrong seems like a bit of an overreaction.
In a couple weeks, most people will forget Flanagan’s remarks on their own. However, if the university censures him, it will make it much harder for people to let Flanagan’s remarks die, considering it would probably be a huge news story itself. That will only draw stronger connections between his assassination comment and the U of C, something those petitioning for his condemnation probably don’t want.
To Kris and gar and T in Toronto and other apologists for Tom Flanagan who claim Wikileaks has put lives in danger I say this: name three. Name three people whose lives have been put at risk by Wikileaks’ release of documents. I certainly haven’t heard of anyone being killed because of the publication of these documents. Flanagan and his ilk are pissed off by the lack of control they and their interests have over Wikileaks, nothing more than that. Unless they are dimwits who believe their own inflated rhetoric.
No he was not joking …
west has been sending assassinators every where to kill others who work for other’s interests …
they just fail to mention that this is the same as terrorism …
but when we do it, it is sacred.
Ms. Petz, I take it from this article that you would support the defense of “just kidding” for jokes about bombs in airports as well.
Try saying your neighbour should be assassinated and see what happens if said neighbour finds out. I think he retracted his statement because he knew it to be illegal to incite to violence let alone murder.
Corporatism has become America’s new high religion and as a result broad societal disintegration is now everywhere. Truly to the average “broke” right wing leaning american voter, the Republican party has played the role of Judas, but instead of betraying “the one” they have betrayed millions in the name of abject greed for the privileged high priests of wealth.
The motto, “Hear what we say, and not as we do” should be the new Republican party slogan for neo-conservatism. This corporation profit party has become the most dangerous threat to world peace and prosperity since WW-II.
The Canadian people would be WISE to never let down on questioning authority like has happened here in the United States. The U.S. is now the World’s poster child for what will happen to your standard of living if you allow the millionaires, billionaires and religion to align themselves to a prominent political party. They will surely exploit you for every penny of profit they can possibly extract regardless of the social consequences.
Wikileaks should be a warning shot about the dangers of political corruption that will visit a town near you if you ever let down your collective guard. Notwithstanding the destructions caused by corrupt financial institutions, another example would be Monsanto Corporation’s deadly GMO seeds that are now infecting your Canadian food supply. Many of you may not be aware, but since 1996, this agricultural threat has quietly become in my opinion the most dangerous health threatening ticking time bomb any society has ever faced and it’s quiet Trojan horse like introduction onto Canadian farms should be setting off alarm bells to anyone who can mentally connect 2 dots.
GMO seeds in my opinion should be classified as a dangerous controlled substance in Canada and out right banned. Here is good information on the subject: http://cosmiccpa.com/votecherylwolfe/?p=151
I am positive that Flanagan was speaking “tongue in cheek”. It is no doubt in poor taste but that does not make him a criminal.
Assange has committed criminal acts in submitting “classified” documents on the “net”. They are and need to be classified for a reason.
Radical governments around the world use such inconsiderate publications to encite war and other stupid acts agains others.
Theft is a crime. Stealing Classified docets is “theft”.
It should however, bring to light the unworthiness and incompetence of our computer age. Nothing is secure nor private anymore.
Hackers are monopolizing on everything that is “none of their business.”
Somehow for the Cons, an apology is all you need to get a clean slate…just as Tom’s remarks for some aren’t criminal, drones dropping missles on people’s homes in far away lands are equally not criminal–they are remote controlled spokesmen for corruption and the absence of law…but wait, 9/11 changed everything
You just don’t get it Capt. Wikileaks is a transparency activist for “whistle blowers.” Thank GOD that some government workers have a conscience and won’t drink the coolaid of corrupt governments. If we are to maintain any vistages of freedom, it will be due to the brave people who have risked life and limb exposing corruption and wrong doing. This is FREEDOM in action at its purest form.
BRAVO Assange and the thousands of hero’s who know right from wrong and acted on their moral compass. Had the THUGS on trail at Nuremburg decided to not participate in government crimes, they may have lived to a ripe old age.
Moral to the story: Wrong doing when exposed, does not make the person who exposed it WRONG or in need of being murdered, on the contrary, they need to be protected by law and it appears from governments as well.
Stop defending him people! He is a well educated University Professor that went on National television to express his viewpoint, which by the way was suggesting that Assange be killed.
Why do we need to discuss this anymore, does his retraction of his original statement make it any less believable that he meant what he said?
Isn’t it part of the damage control game to retract and apologize?, so how do you people that are defending him (a complete stranger) so sure that he doesn’t actually believe what he said? How would you feel if he said what he said about your brother, your father, or your son or daughter!
He needs to be SEVERELY and PUBLICLY reprimanded!!
The great Canadian mad.Those of you who got your knickers in a knot are obviously the same who think Omar Khadr is an innocent child who was influenced by his Daddy.We Canadians can not save the world and pursue someone who really was tongue in cheek. Do none of you realize the harm this dumb Aussie can do to international relations?The guy is a nut case! When your neighbors wall is burning it becomes your business.Flanagan is probably right
Flanagan is a University Professor, a former aide to the Prime Minister and being interviewed on CBC television which is seen around the world. His statements are NOT a joke, they are criminal and it is my belief that he should be charged. A joke has a story and a punch line. Calling for the assassination of another human ‘actually’ on national television has got to be a crime and should have been dealt with swiftly and strongly, or we are about to see either more of these types of unpleasant issues or worse, the actual assassination of innocent people.
Arrest Flanagan and put the arrest on national television.
So the traitor to the world thinks that the professors remarks are damaging, to bad he can’t hear mine he would crawl into a hole with his taliban friends and never come our. As I am sure he and his people were paid by them to do this.
To capt cb, gar and mikey.
Each of you in your own way is an idiot. You waste peoples time by writing unthoughtful comments generated by a barely functioning brain. Why would anyone object to information that proves conclusively that our government and others like it, condone laying and duplicity as a normal coarse of international action.
Denial of service attacks, shutting down web sites, cutting off of operating funds, etc. only insures interest and eventual dispersal of all those not so secrete files.
Get real all.
Incitement to murder.
Fox News junkies would not hear it any other way.
I really think that mr. Flanagan should be persecuted for for incitation to murder mr. Assange. Let the court decide if he was serious about murdering a journalist or not.
The fact that mr. Flanagan is a university professor and former PM advisor doesnèt give him the right to incite a murder even if he was not serious. no excuse what so ever.
Mr. Assange should go ahead and press charges and Canadian judicial system must fight this horrible practices and behaviours.
It may have been intended as a joke but it was hardly harmless. Similar sentiments have been coming from conservatives south of the border. Many a serious threat is uttered in a jocular Sopranoesque way to provide cover.
Last night gar claimed Assange was putting people’s lives in danger. Now he’s softened his position to ‘harming international relations.’ When I challenged you earlier to name three people whose lives were put in danger by Wikileaks you stayed silent, gar. Can you explain the harm to international relations that is now your strawman? The corrupt gov’t of Hamid Karzai will be miffed at the US? Garsh, uncle Jed, now how will Halliburton and the Cambridge Group pad their profits? Nas-s-sty Wikileaks. It’s exposing the precioussss.
Things become interesting when having to play the game by the same rules eh Mr. Flanagan? What a simply mean spirited, un Christian thing you’ve said. You put into question the moral character of the academic and political elite.
Assange should be found and returned to Sweden where he can face those rape charges. Hatred for America and doing things to harm that great democracy should not give anyone a get out of jail free card for rape.
The activist who launched a police complaint against Mr. Flanagan should be charged with wasting police time.
Diplomats are there to provide honest opinion on the events and people they encounter. If that honesty is compromised by fear that the likes of Assange with leak your views then such opinions may be less blunt and honest and our leaders will be less well informed. We will all pay a price for that. Once he has served any time for rape, find some deep dark dungeon with no internet and send him there for the remainder of his natural life. Far better than executing him.
Listen up — Julian Assange isn’t nor was he a journalist. Where do you people find this sh**?
If prominant corporate kingpin say Ben Bernanke came to give a speech in Toronto & I made a statement about how someone should shoot him what would happen? I would be investigated, maybe tried & convicted of uttering threats. Oh, but I was only joking! However, in our corporate run nation a prominant politician says something absurd it is “brushed off”. I also find it utterly disgusting that almost all political leaders are clearly against Mr. Assange yet he has the support of most people. It is clear that democracy is long dead in the world, lets face it we live in an economic oligarchy. Politicians like this are why I do not vote & the arguement of “if you do not vote you have no say” has no merit anymore for if you do vote you still have no say.
“Assange has committed criminal acts in submitting “classified” documents on the “net”. They are and need to be classified for a reason.”
So did the NY Times.
Hey Wageslave – America is a GREAT DEMOCRACY? Really? Does mass social injustices at the hands of the Priests of mega wealth make it a GREAT DEMOCRACY or is it the rank corruption and unconstitutional actions of the government itself? Perhaps it is the molecular war going on inside a head as a result of all the GMO foods you consume. Certainly that is a good excuse for a bad opinion.
Look I just want to make sure I understand the facts about the United Fakes of America because I can’t find social justice, equal rights or even one nation under God, but I do find a government not flush with deviants and propagandists who will stop at nothing from stealing from orphans, widows, the old or medically challenged.
Maybe you meant that Great Democracies are built on the mass destruction of the middle class, exportation of 10 million jobs to Asia, and the greatest mass transfer of wealth from TRUE WAGESLAVES to the millionaires and billionaires who rig the financial markets?
Look if all was right in the U.S.A, Mr. Assange would not be our embarrassment and instead we would be reading how everyone thinks America is a Great Democracy and he could hide here from the big bad ugly world!
Take it from this perspective: what if it were you or who had said it, relative unknowns in the world with no known world wide exposure or influence or even a wide audience-,…say-,…like on a blog for instance or YouTube video.
In light of the fact that Mr.Flanagan is in fact a person with known political influence and involved with public policy, he should be prosecuted to the full extent that the law allows, not limited to inciting hatred or a full blown charge of uttering threats.
There are people with even lesser public reknown and influence, in fact: virtual nobodys, who have been brought to bear the full brunt and reach of the law for uttering words with far less lethal connotations.
Mind you; as far as I know, so far only in the context of a civil proceeding , not criminal, but just the same, for the person who feels wronged, the outcome for the perpetrator is ugly and costly.
In a world where in one part of the world air traffic controllers are forced to work upon pain of injury , death or imprisonment for refusing to work, thereby negating the right to strike, this is clearly a world where one cannot say or do anything one wants without fear of repercussion, at least as far as Spain is concerened.
Saying this is a correct punishment for Mr.Assange (proviso that he has broken laws in the first place) is concurrent with the one bullet one sentence attributed to drug traffickers in red China.
Sack Tom Flanagan. He is a stain on the reputation of all Canadians.
Here you will find the truth about the allegations levelled at the journalist Julian Assange:
http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-news/7516830-swedish-justice-system-destined-to-be-laughing-stock-of-world-james-catlin
Democracies do not gun down journalists in the street – the Russians do that.
Julian Assange is the greatest journalist to ever walk the face of the earth.
Sack Tom Flanagan.
Sack him NOW !!!
if alex hundert, et. al. can be charged with conspiracy to commit mischief, imprisoned for months on end with ludicrous bail conditions, and subjected to the full power of the state for, presumably, simply talking (in privacy) about breaking some windows at toronto g20 then perhaps mr. flanagan should be charged in the same vein for couselling actual violence against another human being. this would simply be an equitable distribution of “justice”, no? having actually watched the video of mr. flanagan’s tirade and reading what apologists are claiming as retraction i am rather disgusted, i must admit. our criminal code has a section dealing with counselling crimes, this should apply and mr. flanagan’s remarks should be taken as seriously as possible, given his stature as advisor to the PM. let a jury decide whether or not he was joking and allow the intervening years before trial act as punishment in the same way that our justice system is currently punishing the activists who would have an end to our unwinnable and immoral wars.
I saw Flanagan’s interview. I recognized that chuckle. It wasn’t humour. His was the same chuckle unconsciously elicited from me when I watch Tarantino’s Deathproof, when Kurt Russell announces to Rose McGowan that she’ll be scared sooner rather than later.
It’s not a funny scene; he’s abducting her & she’s about to die, yet I laugh uncomfortably in an I-can’t-believe-he-said-that way.
Exactly the way Flanagan laughed as he said Assange should be assassinated. He knew he was being extreme, but he was serious. He even ended his soliloquey ON POINT by saying, with a straight face, that he “wouldn’t feel unhappy if Assange disappeared.”
At first it looks like a joke; but it was glaringly obvious that
Evan Solomon is desperately trying to give Flanagan the chance to recant.
I don’t care who he was representing on the interview; bad joke or not, this is not someone who should be teaching our young people.
Capt. CB wrote:
“Assange has committed criminal acts in submitting “classified” documents on the “net”. They are and need to be classified for a reason.”
It’s not clear to me that Assange committed a criminal act–he didn’t steal the documents himself, only reported on them. I’m not sure that he could be charged criminally any more than the New York times or any of the news agencies who also reported on this story could.
From what I’ve read about most of these documents, probably 99% of them shouldn’t have been classified in the first place. Democratic governments shouldn’t be keeping secrets from the general population.
Make Flanagan ambassador!
With his skills to express himself he will defenitely help Canada (not).
It is dangerous if people even think that way (Flanagan even speaks out).
If, as some of the commentators to this post are claiming, Tom Flanagan was just making a joke, then let him be charged with incitement to murder, and defend himself in an open court. If there is merit to the claim that he acted without mens rea, the truth will prevail in court. Otherwise, anyone can threaten and encourage threats against anyone else with impunity, and this is surely not a joke.
Assassination is not a joking matter because sadly the U.S. as the preeminent superpower has increasingly turned into a totalitarian corporatist regime that has caused a lot of misery throughout the world.
Saying you’re in agreement with the murder of someone who does not share your narrow view or because they won’t bow down and subject themselves to an all consuming corporate tyranny is not an act of an intellectual but rather that of a rouge.
I mean if the destiny of man is simply to become slaves of the filthy rich secret society types, then why even bother? I am glad that Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, has shown more courage than 300 million so-called FREE Americans, who we all know are not.
The world is facing a divide between greedy capitalist brutes that have been hatched from corruption and the vast majority of good people who want to employ their hearts, minds and souls to build a better more socially kinder civilization and it looks like we still have many years to go.
Shameful – even criminal – conduct on the part of Tom Flanagan and disgraceful, too, is the stance of the University of Calgary.
Looks very like Rupert Murdoch supports Julian Assange.
Australian PM Julia Gillard is about to be stripped of her office.
The Australian Attorney General is finished.
And in the following link you can read for yourselves Julian Assange’s letter to the Australian people published a hour ago by Murdoch’s “The Australian Newspaper.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/in-depth/wikileaks/dont-shoot-messenger-for-revealing-uncomfortable-truths/story-fn775xjq-1225967241332
Face it, Flanagan had deep-driven need to use this prominent stage for asserting a macho image to compensate for his small penis.
InukX an interesting article..
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/greenslade/2010/dec/02/the-us-embassy-cables-julian-assange
For un-sensational reporting.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
As for the US Government, wouldnt it just love to get its grubby hands on Assange. A little bit of “waterboarding” for starters!!
Ps. Mikey. With us or against us eh? Crawl back into your ignorant pastel coloured padded cell, that has FOX news playing 24/7.
http://www.suite101.com/content/calgary-police-investigate-flanigans-call-for-death-of-assange-a317702
revealed today: America is NOT a democracy.
Wikileaks cables show the subsequent governments are lying and bodyscans dot the rest to show the naked truth.
Playing dirty…?
http://www.osnews.com/story/24109/4chan_Hits_PayPal_MasterCard_Others_for_WikiLeaks_Snubs
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-jarvis/then-what-can-i-buy-with_b_793078.html
Sorry Sarah, call me stupid, but what part of:
“I think Assange should be assassinated, actually”. Flanagan said…that he “wouldn’t be unhappy” if Assange “disappeared.”
is in the slightest bit funny? And how? Substitute “Sarah Petz” for “Assange” in the above quote. Is it now less or more funny? How would you feel had it been your name that little man had used instead, Sarah?