Jay is totally correct. I support and defend an academics right to have a point of view and his freedom to express that point of view regardless. In the words of Samuel Johnson, "Everyman has the right to say what he believes to be the truth and it is every man's right to knock him down for it." I do not wish academics to hide behind a cloak of secrecy as to their political viewpoint. You do not have to be blind Freddy to work out the political persuasion of others. It's obvious and can't be hidden! Let's have the debate. Who is afraid of free speech?

What we learn at school and university is insignificant to the learning we do later. Institutions are there to instill in us the processes of learning, not to comprehensively indoctrinate us with all the skill and knowledge we need to acquire for life and certainly not to indoctrinate us with the particular views which any particular educator might hold.

"Education" should equip us to be able to distinguish the truth from the lie, between right and wrong and to give us the confidence to challenge the less than truthful, be it a David Irvine or a Global Warming Zealot or on a more difficult level, ones own view on say abortion.

Rainier “Right wingers who want to indoctrinate without any reflexivity at all about their teaching practice or their ideological straight jacketing are the most destructive. Hitler showed us this.”

I have little concern for the right wing, the extremes like Hitler do not rate in any broad sense.

Personally, I hold more concern for the left-wingers, bearing in mind the massively greater genocide committed by the socialist (who’s goal is communism, according to Lenin) and who are far more insidious and likely to pollute the minds of impressionable children with lies about how capitalism is unfair to the some and how socialism treats all equally, meaning equal poverty and equal repression.

Regarding “However, i reserve to right to not to put up with ludites here on OLO.
Their intellectual retardation is their choice alone.”

Actually the ludites were of the left (smashing the machines owned by the naughty capitalists).

I guess your own "intellectual prowess" might be suffering a little but last time I looked, “retardation” is non-discretionary attribute.

I am reminded of the old saying by Georges Clemenceau

"Not to be a socialist at twenty is proof of want of heart; to be one at thirty is proof of want of head."

KOLLONTAI “Who is afraid of free speech”
I agree, always remember

“Freedom of Speech distinguishes between the Sage and the Fool based on the merit of their words.
Censorship treats their words the same.”

When I tutored WWII history at university - quite some years ago - the head of the department carpetted me for my approach to my tutorial groups.

The first statement I made to the tute groups was that they, the students, had to question everything they were told - in lectures, by me, the media, even their parents - they must research for facts.

They were also told that if they presented a paper at variance with what they were taught, and it was well researched, well argued and referenced, they would be marked accordingly.

The tutorials were extremely noisy and productive; quite unlike some others where students, often too intimidated to speak, sat like silent shaggs on a rock. Importantly, they were given permission to think for themselves.

I marked the first two term's papers. None failed.

At the end of the year, when the papers were marked by others, none of my students received less than a credit; they also had more distinctions than any other groups.

Given permission to think for themselves, the tools to use, and room for healthy debate, university students are competent to arrive at informed answers.

No academic should impose their beliefs upon their students; certainly not try to indoctrinate them.

Let me move from a personal discussion to eventually make a point about universities and capitalism.

When I taught at University my approach was "Doubt all, doubt all" and that included whatever I said or did. This was seemingly difficult in the context of tax law for example, but the discussion of policy and law helped students debate a range of issues from left to right.

Couple that with a soft Socratic approach, and I consistently rated very very well from students. But ten per cent just couldn't abide the classes. I think they may have been the group in society who want dogmatic answers and have dogmatic views.

But I decided in the end this group would never enjoy what I taught and the way I taught but only did the course on sufferance - to be future tax lawyers, tax accountants and so on or because they understood at least that tax imposed itself on every business and work activity.

But it was the rest of the class whom I really engaged and inspired - not just about the particular tax law in question and its relationship to other tax areas but also to think and question why the law was the way it was, where taxes came from and developed, the results the tax system produces.

The point for me was to inspire students to question and think for themselves, to develop if they could original solutions (whether within the box or outside it was not that important) and to doubt, doubt and doubt.

Although a very large number of students loved me, the same could not be said of some of my peers who treated those who had different ideas (or even, shock, horror tried to organise the staff) with complete disdain.

I would go further than the author. Capitalism needs its thinking technocrats and so produces a mixed bunch - from some who are thought automatons, to some who do indeed doubt all, including capitalism itself. That is the nature of a University under capitalism. I'd be, like France in May 1968, for democratising universities.