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.
Flanagan is a vicious, sniveling coward and the history books will remember him as such.
I don’t think the history books will remember him as anything. He’s a controversial but uninfluential academic who has dabbled in politics with little personal success. Let’s not overstate the impact of his comments.
This article is an excellent example of the journalistic double standard propaganda we’re all so sick of. It would have a distinctly different tone if the suggested assassination came from a non white.
Don’t be absurd for there has to be some real negative consequences no matter who he is, for what he said was really out of line anywhere.
It is very reassuring to read a news article on the media (Maclean’s) commenting on the media (Tom Flanagan) about the media (Wikileaks). I think the news is getting too newsy.
What he did was set a precedent. If he faces no consequences, then anybody else can say the same thing about any public figure and not expect to face consequences – in fact they can use the same excuse he did.
Deplorable. He should be reprimanded.
The only surprising thing here is that more politicians haven’t voiced similar opinions. I mean, let’s face it — these guys have been screwing their constituents over with complete privacy for over a hundred years. The fact that a group like WikiLeaks might expose their backroom malevolence is frightening to them.
I hope WikiLeaks continues and reveals more corporate secrets.
Dear Sarah Petz:
University of Calgary Professor Tom Flanagan cannot be let off the hook that easily – for advocating the killing or disapearance of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. Yes he has apologized, but only after he was fingered publicly by Assange.
I watched the video of Solomon’s interview with Flanagan, and there was definately a serious tone to Flanagan’s hateful comments.
Flanagan is part of the ruling establishemnt and the rulers and establishment have been embarrassed by the Wikileaks revelations. So the powerful establishment wants to dearly shut Assange up, because he is revealing the ugly truths about the corrupt rulers, and their stooges – and the established media, and people like Prof Flanagan (who is in bed with people like Harper).
Liars and scoudrels are afraid of the truth. I’m not embarassed by the truth, like Hillary Clinton is. Stop persecuting Julian Assange.
Sincerly Ray Wegner
I think your article is the big joke. It was evident he wasn’t joking at all when he said it, and if anything was caught up in and scoffing at his own hubris. It’s a transparenct tactic to laugh and smile while saying the most evil of things, to enable oneself to later take the cowards way out of “only kidding”. Get serious.
It strikes me as odd that the outrage over wiki leaks is nothing more than rage at being caught at something. The wrongs of the doers are apparently not supposed to be a part of the equation. Somehow it is spun so they are the victims, albeit of their own design.
Flanagan then publicly continues to babble with the same belligerent arrogance.
The whole point is lost on these people. Utterly lost.
Unacceptable excuse. I’m pretty sure we have jails full of people who said “I didn’t really mean to.”
Not to pursue Flanagan’s offense is to tacitly condone it, which would lead to the conclusion that the justice system offers preference to the privileged, and that Canadians accept a culture of redneck Americanism more characteristic an Appalachian coal town.
Prosecute Flanagan to the extent of Canadian law.
What a surprise — Maclean’s is taken over by The National Post, and they publish an article in defence of their old buddy Tom Flanagan. And if someone had called for Benjamin Netanyahu’s assassination, what would their response be? My money says Macleans would not be dismissive, nor be able to see it as a joke. Yes, they are that predictable.
Flanagan is a tool, and it looks like he’s in good company at Macleans.
Hmm, interesting point of view MacLeans. Ya, lets leave this issue just fade away, and then everyone can utter death threats and the law can do nothing about it! I mean, we should all get the same treatment right? Maybe everyone should start uttering death threats (jokingly of course, maybe put a smiley face emoticon after it) — because we are being told that this is not a big deal, and there is no law against it!!!!!
Everyone panics when a school kid utters a threat on some blog somewhere about a schoolmate or his school, and this guy can do it on TV, and its “not a big deal”?
We are letting them get away! WHY? Someone MUST ask Harper why this guy is not being charged. Confront him!
WAKE UP EVERYONE!
PS
Sarah Petz comes off as
a) Poly Anna
b) Apologist / Propagandist / Shill
c) A rosy-cheeked twenty-something conciliator
d) NOT the future of Canadian journalism
Suggesting we simply ignore and forget about Flanagan’s outrageous public remarks is almost a irresponsible as actually making them.
Only at University of Calgary. He should be fired and prosecuted.
What a double standard. When David Ahenakew talked about the Jews he was reprimanded to the fullest extent. His order of Canada was taken away and was threatened by the Conservative Federal Government not to take his place back with the National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations. The Conservatives even threatened to cut off all money to the natives if they reinstated him AFTER he was acquitted. Now we have a Conservative buddy who says the same thing and everyone says it’s a joke and move on. I guess it is because Assange isn’t Jewish. Disgusting.
I had Flanagan as my prof for a class a couple years back, and this sounds exactly like the sort of jokes he would make in class. In general, he’s the type of guy that makes liberal use of hyerboles in order to communicate his point. Like most proffessors, his jokes are usually not very good. But having been in the position to have actually had conversations with him, I can say his comments on CBC were complete in line with his odd sense of humor.
Killing someone is never a joke.
Prof. Flanagan’s views seem to echo the U.S. gut reaction party line. I suppose that’s not surprising since he is well known as a supporter/apologist for the right-wing point of view.
What is surprising is the “blue wall” phenomenon at the U of C which washes its hands of this whole affair and chooses not to notice Flanagan’s incitement to criminal action which was not, incidentally, withdrawn for a full day. The CBC’s Evan Solomon was sensitive to the offense and offered Flanagan a chance to soften his remarks right on the spot. Flanagan, would you believe, is a professor of political science who one would expect to be endowed with insight into the power of off-handed remarks.
Flanagan is a tenured facuty member and thus an integral part of the University of Calgary’s cultural fabric. By not censuring him or, perhaps more properly, reviewing his entitlement to tenure, the University in effect supports him, displays its insensitive character and tarnishes the reputation of all those who are or have been associated with it.
Perhaps censure should be extended right to where the buck supposedly stops — the U of C’s President and its Chancellor.
Anthony E
10:05 AM on December 4, 2010
This comment is hidden because you have chosen to ignore Anthony E. Show Details
I don’t see anything wrong what Mr. Flanagan said and I fully support the idea. Time for the university folk to deal with the real world. Assange has put many lives in danger.
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With persons like you we are going right to hells in a Canada who do not want VIOLENCE!
Maybe you should move to USA then you will see what real world is.
Assage is doing his job.Some real big journalists are reviewing all the cables before they are realist.
Disappointed in Maclean’s. Construing Flanagan’s remarks as a joke is a pretty big stretch (consider that his original comment was followed up with “I wouldn’t be unhappy if Assange disappeared”). You folks should be ashamed of yourselves for publishing this kind of hypocritical, hyper-partisan material. What happened to telling the truth, and fulfilling the role of the fourth estate (ensuring power is accountable to the people – the citizens – they work for)?
“Joking about the assassination of a major public figure is terrible,,,” Terrible? That sounds terribly inept, Sarah Petz. How about despicable, vile or cowardly? The hypocrites at U Calgary say his private thoughts are his own but if Flanagan was attacking gays or women or Indians we all know what the response would have been. The government understands this sort of verbal thuggery opens the door to all kinds of ugly conduct that our country can do without. Don’t like someone? Call for his murder! Then beg off,- Just kidding! Flanagan should go. Out! For that matter the institution of tenure that coddles this parlor assassin should go too. I hope readers will join me in registering our protest to this “terrible” man’s employer.
The open letter from U of C alumni asking the U of C to censure Flanagan is online here:
http://censureflanagan.wordpress.com/
your title is just irresponsable .Hope one citizen will bring a charge on him.
Wasn’t inciting violence???? NO just to murder a person!!!!
People advocating that Flanagan be criminally charged are insane. The second political adversaries start using speech laws to prosecute their opponents for sharing views (whether tongue in cheek or not) that do not conform to their own worldviews is the day we lose something as a society that makes us exceptional.
Seriously people. You want to throw someone in jail because he said that someone who was spilling state-secrets should be assassinated. It’s not even that radical of a proposition. What about overhearing people having a conversation in a coffee shop where this same statement is made? Would you call the police?
I’m surprised that most people here wouldn’t rather live in a Canada where they aren’t not afraid of being thrown in jail for offering an opinion (of even a joke for that matter). There is a reason why we will never be called anything close to “the greatest generation”.
Riiiight, so if people start saying they should “off” some member of Flanagan’s family in retribution for this threat, he won’t get too worried about it. Everyone knows that death threats are just a good laugh, as innocuous as bomb jokes at an airport. Just goes to prove that not all educated people are clever.
if this is the type of person surrounding our govt leaders and offering advice its no wonder were all screwed up
damn jerk
“Seriously,” Jamie: Flanagan, who is someone being kept at taxpayer/government expense, is calling out in a public forum for someone’s murder, ie, he is literally inciting a capital offense. Your pathetic coffee shop analogy is as corrupt as the U of C’s own double standard. If you overheard someone calling for your own death what would you do, recite the Charter?
Why is Sarah Petz/MacLean’s palliating this creep’s behaviour, taking his walk back at face value? Maybe they should should review their whole cozy relationship to the country’s universities if getting them onboard for the rating game means cutting them slack on issues like this.
Let’s be real here. He wasn’t advocating it as policy. He didn’t build an argument stating why this man should be killed. It was just an off-the-cuff comment that he made in a public venue. I’m not saying that it wasn’t in poor taste, or that he shouldn’t have retracted (which he did), but I am saying that he shouldn’t be criminally prosecuted. Anyone denying that these calls for criminal prosecution are politically motivated needs to give me some of what they are taking. I bet you that if someone did a poll asking views of Flanagan before his comments and compared it those seeking criminal charges, there would be a large correlation between the two those with decidedly negative views and those wanting to throw him in jail.
You have to remember the United States is a business where the influential make billions in schemes that the ordinary people get to pay for without their consent and over their objections and more importantly against all forms of LAW. In fact the Congress should be called Congress, Inc. and the President, President, Inc. and so on because it is nothing more than a business to make them and their financial scamsters filthy rich. Basically, we have rank corruption in Washington from both parties, a fully defacto government, a war machine (which has robbed the standard of living the American people and foreign nations) and global corporations like Goldman Sachs who direct the powers of government to make themselves rich beyond all belief, and a propaganda machine to keep it all hush hush. To me, Julian Assange is a very brave man for stepping into the breach to pull back the vale on the greedy maggots who are destroying this earth while they sack its wealth in your name and mine. I absolutely LOVE the way the political elites and political hopefuls like Sarah Palin are hitting the airwaves in opposition to Free Speech and in defence of censorship as if the main duty of government and politicians are to maintain the status quo for those doing wrong or ‘on the take.’ Yes, they are coming out of the wood work like this Canadian professor who is now a back peddling embarrassment to his university and I think a majority of the Canadian people. It has become rather clear that the “truth” is nothing more than what the elites decide it is and and anything else is to be censored, ostracized or the source of said news assassinated. By the government not showing its outrage over the activities of its agents as exposed by Wikileaks, it admits that Wikileaks releases are really WHO they are and what they do when the light of day is not exposing them. However, those leaks expose just who and what these arrogant people are and that’s the cat they don’t want out of the bag, but it is too late. In fact Wikileaks needs to be renamed to “Whistle Blower Leaks” because those published releases are actually the result of scores of brave people going out of their way to expose what they see as flat wrong. I can’t wait for the CORPOATE leaks to hit the airwaves. People need to pay attention because these corporate leaks will go a long way to explain HOW they, the anointed privileged few have been screwing the people out of their possessions, homes, jobs, savings, farms, retirements, security and standard of living in the United States.
I guess next time somebody denies the “holocaust” it should be considered that they are just making “a really horrible joke”….come on, Ms. Petz….you must be a true idiot!
Off with Flanagan’s head! …oh just joking. While I am at it Off with Steven Harper’s head too…No repecussions for asking for people’s head on a pike anymore it seems. That makes it Open Season on heads even though it went out of fashion with Henry VIII. I know my grandchildren will definitely NOT be going to U of A if the taxpayer keeps this kind of rubbish brain on our payroll there.
As a UK resident, I was quite appalled by Mr Flanagan’s remark. Was he simply mirroring what “people were thinking in private” ie..US Government? Maybe that will form the content of a future leak! Appalling comment made by a now questionably intelligent man. To call for the assassination of someone, in a public arena, is crass, and at best irresponsible. Lets hope Assange secures an “incitement to commit murder” charge on the Calgary School “learned” Professor.
Mr Burton you state its just a laugh, like a bomb scare at the airport. Try it next time you fly, see the laugh you get!
G Tryon,
Flanagan doesn’t work for the government. He used to work for the PM, but not for some time now. He is privately employed at a university. He as on TV speaking for himself, not the university or any specific group.
Saying that someone “should” be assassinated and actively encouraging it are two entirely different things. How many comment sections in articles have you read where there are scores of comments where people say rapists or whatever should be executed. Should the government track down these people too?
The difference is that Flanagan stated his preference for a desired outcome, by saying that Assange “should” be assassinated. He didn’t actually advocate or incite violence. If he said that people should actively seek out this man and kill him, then an argument could be made.
I am an academic in Canada. No, urging someone’s assasination is not part of our cherished academic freedom or freedom of speech. And it is certainly not a joke. Plain and simple, it is against the law. The last time I checked, Canadian law applies to everybody, even Flanagan, regardless of what some corrupted journalist thinks.
The wikileaks case demonstrates the authoritarian and corrupted face of several states, such as the USA or the UK, and their puppet regimes in Iraq and Afhanistan, as well as the corrupted face of big corporations and companies like Amazon and Paypal.
Jamie. What tosh Semantics! What Flanagan said, implied, or ment..are all the same thing. Have you heard the word Fatwa? Now im not implying this is a Fatwa”(promoting violence against an individual kind) but in the context of someone stating an intention its the same thing, just originating from a different religious wing. A remark made by an idiot on a Monday afternoon dish the dirt TV show I can forgive, but made by a Professor of a “reputable” establishment while the gathered panel all snigger knowingly, I cannot!
no way should his remarks be allowed to die. this man should be arrested for inciting violence, and he should lose his job. PERIOD!!!
Yet another proud day for all U of C alum.
“Semantics” is what separates casual speech from calculated advocacy / incitement. I sleep well at night knowing that people won’t be criminally prosecuted for the former. Again, I’m not saying that his comments were appropriate, they were. They just are not criminal.
I meant to say that his comments “weren’t” appropriate.
Professor Flanagan may have only intended a silly joke; yet his remarks are reverberating around the world. There are times when leaked information is the only way to get at the truth, and it takes courage to do it. Here is an example from the Professor’s own city – Calgary
A recent disclosure by Wiki-leaks, recounts a meeting between the former CSIS head and a US official. In it it is admitted that CSIS has been “Vigorously Harassing” Canadian residents. This is no more than I and other completely innocent victims of CSIS have been saying for years; yet CSIS has constantly denied it to Canadian Parliamentarians. Though comfortable in ostracizing me, neither have Calgary’s conservative political or business establishments had any interest in getting at the truth at least in my case. Thanks now to Wiki-leaks the truth is beginning to come out. I just wish that the professor’s colleagues had the same courage as Mr. Assange. I recently published a short article:
“Former CSIS Chief Admits to Torture”
http://mostlywater.org/former_csis_chief_admits_torture_0
Roderick Russell
Jamie. I put it to you. What would happen to me if I stated on a news channel, that a member of the cabinet/Senate should be “assassinated”..and that “I wouldn’t be too unhappy if they disappeared? Indulge me, because the idea of you sleeping at night knowing you won’t get prosecuted for such comments is naieve at best. Id inherit a file as long as my arm courtesy of the CIA, M15, Mossad and just about every other shadowy institution you care to mention..or is that just my paranoid delusions of Grandeur?
Ken,
I’d still sleep well at night. Ignoring any possible nuance in context, I don’t think your hypothetical scenario is criminal. Of course there would be professional consequences (and perhaps a flagging in some intelligence circles), but you aren’t actually telling anyone to go assassinate anyone else. If you had gone on tv and said that people should find and kill someone, then yes, I’d argue that criminal prosecution would be an accurate reading of the law.
I’m in agreement with a body of opinion that feels that it doesn’t matter what Flanagan meant or thought he meant. What matters is this not ONE of us could, in the course of working for University, representatively or not, get away with this kind of behaviour. Until he is disciplined, it’s the University that will suffer, even as I and many others around the world forget his name as surely as we had never heard it before.
Act reponsibly, Calgary and show this fruitcake to the Riot Act.
“…but it is particularly shocking coming from someone who should be an expert in what not to say.”
Not what to say? I think you miss the point Sarah. Flanagan has his position as a professor at a university because he’s responsible for upholding the principles of reasoned discourse and dialogue over brute violence. He dropped the mask of civility (even sanity) when he made those comments and exposed the Mr. Hyde beneath. Even the directors of the University of Calgary don’t get it (distressingly!). Murder is not dialogue or reasoned discourse, and the very people who profess to being champions and guardians of the western tradition and “foundational values” are the very people undermining and subverting those same values, not Mr. Assange.
You’ve got it about right. The public censuring that Flanagan has received has already established that calling for people’s assassination — even jokingly — is not appropriate in Canada.
To belabour this will not really benefit anyone. Sounds to me like some other U of C profs might have an ax to grind with the former Conservative advisor.
Now, if only people in the U.S. would stop calling for the murder of Julian Assange…
….has anyone else noticed there’s more focus Assanges personal life in the north American media than the contents of the cables and the exposure of brutal American foreign policy ?? Thank god for the internet.
Just imagine if Prof. Flanagan were of another ethnicity – charges of terrorism would ensue. As a neoCon who slipped and said what he meant, he enjoys impunity. If he is remembered, it will be for his career as an opponent of Aboriginal rights.
Sarah Petz you must be young and/or naive. I would love to see what would happen to you if you went on TV and stated that Harper needs to be assassinated.
This whole flanagan/Assange thing clearly demonstrates that we are not all equal, and that those in “higher places” (cough) can recite “It was a joke” and walk away.
I’m glad this is all happening. It’s time to open up governments and expose the filth that lies within. We need our eyes opened to it all. Assange isn’t putting anyone in danger the US and other agencies already do on a daily basis.
I just hope he’s left the good stuff to the end. If he’s clever he can use it to set himself free.
As for flanagan (I refuse to cap his name) if the UofC wishes to support him then I guess our corporate donations can go somewhere else. And we wonder why Canada is so screwed up.
The bottom line: if you don’t want anyone to discover your dirty little secrets, don’t do them in the first place. Learned that around Grade 3.