Northwestern Professor Backs Iranian President re: Holocaust

[msnicolea]

This guy has been around for a while--he wrote a book, "The Hoax of the 20th Century: The Case Against the Presumed Extermination of European Jewry" in 1976. I hate that he lends "academic" credibility to these outrageous claims/beliefs.


Chicago Tribune

CHICAGO - A Northwestern University professor known for denying the Holocaust happened has publicly sided with Iran's hard-line president, who has been on a campaign against Israel.

Engineering professor Arthur Butz said that he agrees with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's remarks calling the Holocaust a "myth." Butz said his comments supporting the president recently were published by the English-language Tehran Times and Iran's semiofficial Mehr news agency.

Butz, a tenured professor whose views have been known in the United States for years, is being promoted by Iranian news sources as one of the world scholars who support Ahmadinejad's views on the Holocaust.

"I congratulate him on becoming the first head of state to speak out clearly on these issues and regret only that it was not a Western head of state," Butz said in a Mehr news report. He posted the same comments on his Northwestern-provided Web site.

Jewish leaders expressed fear that support from a United States educator could add credibility to Ahmadinejad's comments about Israel and the Holocaust.

Butz did not comment in the Iranian press or on his Web site about Ahmadinejad's views on the destruction of Israel.


http://www.belleville.com/mld/belleville/news/nation/13797190.htm?source=rss&channel=belleville_nation

[kris97]

Does this guy have a legitimate academic career? How the hell does he work for Northwestern -- one of the top, what, 20 universities in the country? :rolleyes:

[msnicolea]

Does this guy have a legitimate academic career? How the hell does he work for Northwestern -- one of the top, what, 20 universities in the country? :rolleyes:

He does--he's a tenured full professor there, I think. And in NU's defense, he has the right to believe what he believes. :( I expect the majority of the faculty there are absolutely mortified that this guys is their colleague. There has been debate re: whether or not he has the right to use Northwestern University webpages to promote these ideas--the University says yes, even though they condemn the ideas posted, but several Jewish organizations are fighting to stop it, saying that because what he is writing is so blatantly false and inflammatory it sholdn't be protected by free speech.

[Myra]

Why is an engineering professor making wild claims about history?

[flygirl]

He's an enigneering professor, for crying out loud. His relationship with Northwestern has nothing to do with the social sciences, and I think it's abuse of his position to publically air his views through the university.

[batgirl]

His last name is Butz? :D

To quickly defend Northwestern.... once a professor obtains tenure there is very little a university can do. Professorships are extremely hard to get, but a few wackos will get through. They go up for tenure after about 5 years (depending on the department), and once they get tenure (which is usually hard to get) they are pretty much not fireable. They can deviate in whatever direction they desire with no worries.

[msnicolea]

His last name is Butz? :D

To quickly defend Northwestern.... once a professor obtains tenure there is very little a university can do. Professorships are extremely hard to get, but a few wackos will get through. They go up for tenure after about 5 years (depending on the department), and once they get tenure (which is usually hard to get) they are pretty much not fireable. They can deviate in whatever direction they desire with no worries.

Yup--plus, I'm not sure that being a scary asshole is reason enough to dismiss someone--my Dad is a professor and I can say for certain that some of his colleagues wouldn't last long under those guidelines!

[flygirl]

Oh, I know they can do it. Doesn't mean I have to agree with it :D.

[chrisinluv]

One of the early revisionists, Fred Leuchter claimed to be an engineer, and used his supposed expertise in order to claim that the machinery at the camps could not have been used for killing such great numbers of people. I have not read anything by this Butz guy, but I wonder if that is what he is trying to assert. I think Leuchter was outed as pretty much a fake. He could assemble machinery, but I am not sure he ever designed any. His declarations were pretty much discredited, in the end.

[msnicolea]

One of the early revisionists, Fred Leuchter claimed to be an engineer, and used his supposed expertise in order to claim that the machinery at the camps could not have been used for killing such great numbers of people. I have not read anything by this Butz guy, but I wonder if that is what he is trying to assert. I think Leuchter was outed as pretty much a fake. He could assemble machinery, but I am not sure he ever designed any. His declarations were pretty much discredited, in the end.

Interesting--I wonder if that's part of his "reasoning."

[flygirl]

That's kind of what I was thinking when I first read he's an Engineer (sorry I haven't looked at his arguments in detail). We all know anyone can take facts and spin them to support a belief or opinion. ;)

[msnicolea]

More about him here:

http://www.adl.org/learn/ext_us/butz.asp?LEARN_Cat=Extremism&LEARN_SubCat=Extremism_in_America&xpicked=2&item=butz

And an interesting blurb for Wikipedia:

Beliefs of Holocaust Deniers

Holocaust deniers make the following claims, though not all Holocaust deniers make all of the claims listed:

* Nazis did not use gas chambers to mass murder Jews. Small chambers did exist for delousing and Zyklon-B was used in this process.
* Nazis did not use cremation ovens to dispose of extermination victims. The amount of energy required to fire the ovens far exceeded what the energy-strapped nation could spare in wartime. The cremation ovens that existed would have been too small for this purpose and the reason there were cremation ovens at all was they were put in to provide cremation services for the deaths from natural causes and disease epidemics that could reasonably be expected in a high-density work camp.
* The figure of 5-6 million Jewish deaths is an irresponsible exaggeration, and many Jews who actually emigrated to Russia, Britain, Palestine and the United States are included in the number.
* Many photos and much of the film footage shown after World War II was specially manufactured as propaganda against the Nazis by the Allied forces. For example, one film, shown to Germans after the war, of supposed Holocaust victims were in fact German civilians being treated after Allied bombing of Dresden. Pictures we commonly see show victims of starvation or typhus, not of gassing.
* Claims of what the Nazis supposedly did to the Jews were all intended to facilitate the Allies in their intention to enable the creation of a Jewish homeland in Palestine, and are currently used to garner support for the policies of the state of Israel, especially in its dealings with the Palestinians.
* Historical proof for the Holocaust is falsified or deliberately misinterpreted.
* There is an American, British or Jewish conspiracy to make Jews look like victims and to demonize Germans. Also, it was in the Soviet interest to propagate wild stories about Germany in order to frighten related nations into accepting Soviet rule (Poland, Czechoslovakia, etc.). The amount of money pumped into Israel and reparations from Germany alone give Israel a strong incentive to maintain this conspiracy.
* The overwhelming number of biased academics and historians are too afraid to actually admit that the Holocaust was a fiction; they know they will lose their jobs if they speak up.
* In any event, the Holocaust pales in comparison to the number of dissidents and Christians killed in Soviet gulags, which Holocaust deniers usually attribute to Jews.

Additionally, two other common claims of Holocaust deniers are easily confused with the legitimate debate of functionalism versus intentionalism:

* Although crimes were committed, they were not centrally orchestrated and thus the Nazi leadership bore no responsibility for the implementation of such a policy.

Documents such as the Wannsee Conference protocols, the Einsatzgruppen reports, and many other original materials have overwhelmingly demonstrated the centralized planning and knowledge of the Holocaust by most upper echelons of the Nazi leadership. Historians continue to debate how widespread the knowledge of the Holocaust was in German society and government, and how the decisions to implement the Final Solution evolved, but the centrally-planned nature of the Holocaust, and the role of the Nazi leadership in its planning and execution, has not been subject to any doubt by scholars or historians.

* There was no specific order by Adolf Hitler or other top Nazi officials to exterminate the Jews.

While to date no such specific "Führerbefehl" has been found, there is no necessity for it to exist in order to establish that Hitler was aware of the Holocaust. In addition, particularly in the context of the Wannsee Conference, it has been proven that the upper echelons of the Nazi regime did indeed give orders that resulted in the Holocaust.

[lawyerlee]

What a total loser. :mad: :( I can handle a lot of ridiculous lies, but Holocaust denial makes my blood boil. There are still bone shards visible in the ground in the locations of death camps. Where do these people suppose those bones came from? Or are they, too a figment of our imagination?! :(

[chrisinluv]

It is chilling that seemingly so many people have gone to great lengths to revise history. I like how they claim

...Many photos and much of the film footage shown after World War II was specially manufactured as propaganda against the Nazis by the Allied forces. For example, one film, shown to Germans after the war, of supposed Holocaust victims were in fact German civilians being treated after Allied bombing of Dresden. Pictures we commonly see show victims of starvation or typhus, not of gassing.

very convenient. Oh no, those weren't German propoganda films of mountains of gold from teeth and family jewelry. Allied forces somehow got a whole bunch of German men, women and children, extracted their teeth, took their jewelry (and everything else there is evidence of heaps and piles of) and then filmed it. Oh, and they did a very good job of impersonating German soldiers, as well. :rolleyes:

[lawyerlee]

Oh no, those weren't German propoganda films of mountains of gold from teeth and family jewelry. Allied forces somehow got a whole bunch of German men, women and children, extracted their teeth, took their jewelry (and everything else there is evidence of heaps and piles of) and then filmed it. Oh, and they did a very good job of impersonating German soldiers, as well. :rolleyes:
And all those Jews willingly left their homes so they could be taken over by other people and kept to this day. Riiight.

[kedzieb]

the scariest part of these people's beliefs to me is that they are denying the holocaust while there are still survivors around to refute them. what will it be like in 20 years, 30 years, when most of the survivors have died off?

[msnicolea]

the scariest part of these people's beliefs to me is that they are denying the holocaust while there are still survivors around to refute them. what will it be like in 20 years, 30 years, when most of the survivors have died off?

I was thinking the same thing. :(

[chrisinluv]

kedzieb
the scariest part of these people's beliefs to me is that they are denying the holocaust while there are still survivors around to refute them. what will it be like in 20 years, 30 years, when most of the survivors have died off?

No doubt!

Boy, I guess I'm going to have to look into what really happened Anne Frank. She's probably out there wondering whatever happened to that old diary of hers. :rolleyes:

[JamBray]

Oh no, those weren't German propoganda films of mountains of gold from teeth and family jewelry. Allied forces somehow got a whole bunch of German men, women and children, extracted their teeth, took their jewelry (and everything else there is evidence of heaps and piles of) and then filmed it. Oh, and they did a very good job of impersonating German soldiers, as well. :rolleyes:
And the films of all of those bodies being piled on top of one another in a huge hole must be comprised of dummies, you know like the Alien Autopsy. And let's not forget those people out there with their tatoos...I guess they just wanted a bunch of numbers on their wrists. :mad: :rolleyes:

[swampy]

Butz is actually not tenured. He's an associate professor, although he has been with the department for almost 40 years.

Word around EECS is that people higher in the department have kept him from getting tenure because of his political views, and he's been able to stay around this long because he has not made them public before. It is speculated that the university will not likely continue to employ him anymore....

[lawyerlee]

Butz is actually not tenured. He's an associate professor, although he has been with the department for almost 40 years.

Word around EECS is that people higher in the department have kept him from getting tenure because of his political views, and he's been able to stay around this long because he has not made them public before. It is speculated that the university will not likely continue to employ him anymore....
Let's hope so! Fingers crossed. :(

[msnicolea]

Butz is actually not tenured. He's an associate professor, although he has been with the department for almost 40 years.

Word around EECS is that people higher in the department have kept him from getting tenure because of his political views, and he's been able to stay around this long because he has not made them public before. It is speculated that the university will not likely continue to employ him anymore....

Associate profesor= tenured in most universities and I've read at least three sources refer to him as "tenured." Assistant Prof generally means un-tenured. Are you reading something that says differently? Not that it matters--I don't think you can be fired from your job for expressing offensive beliefs.

[swampy]

Associate profesor= tenured in most universities and I've read at least three sources refer to him as "tenured." Assistant Prof generally means un-tenured. Are you reading something that says differently? Not that it matters--I don't think you can be fired from your job for expressing offensive beliefs.

DH is an EE grad student here. We've been discussing it over lunch, and my information is from him (and by extension, grad students, postdocs, and faculty in the dept).

I had no reason to distrust him -- but I'm going to see if I can back it up.

[msnicolea]

Oh, I'm sure your DH would know--maybe NU has a different classification scheme--it's just that at most Universities "associate"= tenured--that's how you become an associate professor--getting tenure.

[lawyerlee]

I don't think you can be fired from your job for expressing offensive beliefs.
No, but I'm sure they would do it for a different reason, KWIM? ;)

[msnicolea]

No, but I'm sure they would do it for a different reason, KWIM? ;)

Absolutely--that's why I'm fairly certain he is tenured--much more difficult to fire someone then!

[swampy]

Oh, I'm sure your DH would know--maybe NU has a different classification scheme--it's just that at most Universities "associate"= tenured--that's how you become an associate professor--getting tenure.


Oh, I agree in general. (Although, as a side note -- in my dept., there have also been people hired as non-tenure assoc's, on a tenure-track, so there's another exception.)

[lawyerlee]

Absolutely--that's why I'm fairly certain he is tenured--much more difficult to fire someone then!
Definitely.

And I must say, I hate to be supporting the firing of a professor because I don't like his ideas. But I think it is extremely irresponsible for a university to keep someone like this employed. His job is to teach and contribute to the marketplace of ideas. Instead of doing so responsibly, he ignores all facts and evidence and writes a book based entirely on lies. This disturbes me greatly. :(

[Jazz]

Holocaust deniers make me really really angry!

Re: Swampy's info, the promotion to Associate does generally go with tenure (and in engineering, that's typically at the 7 year mark), however it's not unheard of to be a separate promotion (i.e. associate promotion at the 5 year mark, then tenure decision at the 7 year mark), in engineering, anyway.

I was curious what he does, so I looked up his info on the ECE dept. (http://www.ece.northwestern.edu/) homepage at NU (click people -> faculty -> Butz), and he's only graduated 3 PhD students and 15 master's in 40 years, which is another indication that he's unlikely to have gotten tenure, regardless of his political views.

For not being let go earlier, pre-tenure, you typically have a contract (from the university). So, if he's recently become more public with his views, NU may be trying to figure out how to end the contract, but might not be able to just immediately fire him.

In any case, ICK!!!

(Edited to change NW to NU -- oops!)

[msnicolea]

The sad thing is, this isn't "new" behavior--he has been vocal and public for YEARS, beginning with the publication of his beyond-offensive book.

Also, I suspect that many students don't work with him because of his well-known views--would you want this nut job to be your dissertation advisor? Yikes!

[jnettie]

At the University where DH teaches it goes Adjuct Prof -> Assistant Prof -> Associate Prof. -> Full Prof. where only Full Prof. = tenure. Trust me, we've done the math on # of years to reach that point, what the requirements are, etc. So, some schools are different.

Anyhow, I hope this jerk isn't tenured. Isn't is interesting how most Holocaust revisionists are themselves anti-Semetic? Hmm... wonder what his agenda is?

[janders6]

Here's the latest article on him from the Chicago Tribune (as an aside, as an NU grad when I was there people were continually disgusted by Butz, but he never brought his opinions into the classroom. And, FWIW, I don't remember him teaching very many classes - most of my friends were engineers and they never had a class with him. He is tenured, though.)


NU rips Holocaust denial
President calls prof an embarrassment but plans no penalty

By Jodi S. Cohen
Tribune higher education reporter
Published February 7, 2006


Northwestern University President Henry Bienen said Monday that a professor's recent comments denying that the Holocaust happened are "a contemptible insult to all decent and feeling people" and an embarrassment to the university.

Bienen commented days after tenured engineering professor Arthur Butz commented in the Tribune and in the Iranian press that he agreed with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's assertions that the Holocaust is a myth.

Iran's semi-official Mehr News Agency and the English-language Tehran Times have published Butz's comments, promoting the Northwestern professor as one of the world scholars who support the Iranian president. Ahmadinejad, who also has called for Israel to be "wiped off the map," recently ordered the restart of uranium enrichment, raising fears that Tehran could try to build a nuclear weapon.

Butz's comments did not address the Iranian president's statements about present-day Israel or nuclear issues.

"While I hope everyone understands that Butz's opinions are his own and in no way represent the views of the university or me personally, his reprehensible opinions on this issue are an embarrassment to Northwestern," Bienen said in a statement to be e-mailed Monday night to all Northwestern students, faculty and staff.

Northwestern's chapter of Hillel, the Jewish student organization, purchased a full-page advertisement, to be published Tuesday in the Daily Northwestern student newspaper. Hillel also called for a community meeting Tuesday night to address the topic: "Why does the Holocaust matter? How do we ensure that `never again' means never again?"

"We're frustrated because we feel forced to take action, but we don't want to dignify his lunacy with a response," the ad says.

Butz, a tenured Northwestern professor since 1974, is known for denying that the Nazis killed 6 million Jews during World War II. He promotes his views through his Northwestern-affiliated Web site, including a link to his 1976 book, "The Hoax of the 20th Century: The Case Against the Presumed Extermination of European Jewry."

Butz told the Tribune last week that he e-mailed comments to the Mehr News Agency after he was approached by an Iranian journalist.

Butz wrote that the Holocaust didn't happen, that it is a "deliberately contrived falsehood" and that its promulgation was motivated by the desire to create a Jewish state in the Middle East. About Ahmadinejad, he wrote: "I congratulate him on becoming the first head of state to speak out clearly on these issues and regret only that it was not a Western head of state."

He posted the same comments on his Web site.

Northwestern sophomore Stuart Loren, a history major from Highland Park, commended Bienen's response but said it wasn't enough. He wants the university to revoke Butz's university-provided Web site.

"This is so historically inaccurate and so biased that I think the university might need to do something more than a passive approach," Loren said. "The fact that he uses Northwestern as a forum to convey his views, that is where I get upset."

Bienen said in his statement that Butz is entitled to express his personal views, and the university will not take action against him as long as he represents them as his own and does not discuss them in class. He also noted that the university has a professorship in Holocaust studies and offers several courses on the Holocaust.

Butz did not return a call for comment Monday afternoon.

Adam Simon, Hillel's executive director at Northwestern, said he has fielded many calls from students, faculty and alumni upset by Butz's comments.

"There are two ways to respond: ignore it or convert it into something positive," Simon said. "Engaging in a conversation about whether the Holocaust happened is a waste of time. ... We are setting a different tone. We are going to talk about why it is important to remember the Holocaust."

[chrisinluv]

NU rips Holocaust denial
President calls prof an embarrassment but plans no penalty

By Jodi S. Cohen
Tribune higher education reporter
Published February 7, 2006



Bienen said in his statement that Butz is entitled to express his personal views, and the university will not take action against him as long as he represents them as his own and does not discuss them in class. He also noted that the university has a professorship in Holocaust studies and offers several courses on the Holocaust.


Having an opinion is one thing. Ignoring facts, and making statements based on BS, as a professor of that university is what he ought to be fired for.

[janders6]

Although I completely agree that his statements and beliefs are despicable and horrifying, I think that if NU fired him for them (provided that he never discussed them in the classroom and conformed to the other job requirements of a professor) they would be violating his First Amendment rights.

[msnicolea]

Although I completely agree that his statements and beliefs are despicable and horrifying, I think that if NU fired him for them (provided that he never discussed them in the classroom and conformed to the other job requirements of a professor) they would be violating his First Amendment rights.

I agree.There are professors throughout the country who take what I consder to be "objectionable" positions (a Muslim prof at FSU made some horrible comments a few years back--I'll have to find a link)--but as long as they are acting lawfully, they have the right to believe what they believe, and say what they say.

[emmjay]

I agree.There are professors throughout the country who take what I consder to be "objectionable" positions (a Muslim prof at FSU made some horrible comments a few years back--I'll have to find a link)--but as long as they are acting lawfully, they have the right to believe what they believe, and say what they say.
One example happened last year with a professor at University of Colorado. He wrote an essay about Sept 11 saying the people working in the WTC were (I'm paraphrasing here) self-important technicrats, and he called them "little Eichmanns" who weren't entirely innocent victims. There was a huge controversy over his remarks and the governor wanted him fired. He ended up resigning as the chairman of a department but he is still teaching (he's a tenured professor).

[msnicolea]

One example happened last year with a professor at University of Colorado. He wrote an essay about Sept 11 saying the people working in the WTC were (I'm paraphrasing here) self-important technicrats, and he called them "little Eichmanns" who weren't entirely innocent victims. There was a huge controversy over his remarks and the governor wanted him fired. He ended up resigning as the chairman of a department but he is still teaching (he's a tenured professor).

That's right! I saw him on several talk shows, including one appearenace with the brother of someone who died in the WTC. It was very heavy.

[Jazz]

Also, I suspect that many students don't work with him because of his well-known views--would you want this nut job to be your dissertation advisor? Yikes!
No kidding!

Are there first amendement rulings corresponding to using an employers website? I generally fall into the no-restrictions-on-free-speech camp, even when it's really deplorable speech, but it's not clear to me that using an employers website is a protected right. He could certainly obtain a website of his own, so would it be infringing on his rights to prohibit him from posting anything not related to his research or teaching? Or, would doing so require the same restrictions for the rest of NU's faculty?

[Witty Username]

One example happened last year with a professor at University of Colorado. He wrote an essay about Sept 11 saying the people working in the WTC were (I'm paraphrasing here) self-important technicrats, and he called them "little Eichmanns" who weren't entirely innocent victims. There was a huge controversy over his remarks and the governor wanted him fired. He ended up resigning as the chairman of a department but he is still teaching (he's a tenured professor).

Northwestern also had a dept. chair resign after authoring a controversial book about transgenders- The Man Who Would Be Queen, he's also still a professor there.
http://www.psych.northwestern.edu/psych/people/faculty/bailey/controversy.htm

Incidentally, Butz's website has been up since at least 1997 and it was established then that he hadn't broken any rules. Unfortunately, he's been very careful not to break the rules that would lead to his firing.

I think it's been rumored that the university has attempted to buy-out his contract to no avail.

[swampy]

So, more info. Butz is tenured after all. :(

President Bienen released a statement about it this morning:

Like all faculty members, he is entitled to express his personal views, including on his personal web pages, as long as he does not represent such opinions as the views of the University. Butz has made clear that his opinions are his own and at no time has he discussed those views in class or made them part of his class curriculum. Therefore, we cannot take action based on the content of what Butz says regarding the Holocaust – however odious it may be – without undermining the vital principle of intellectual freedom that all academic institutions serve to protect.



The last sentence is the critical one here, for me. He's right, difficult as it is to swallow.

[chrisinluv]

Although I completely agree that his statements and beliefs are despicable and horrifying, I think that if NU fired him for them (provided that he never discussed them in the classroom and conformed to the other job requirements of a professor) they would be violating his First Amendment rights.


Good point. I can now see why he would be able to keep his job. :)

I work for the state and the county, and we are not allowed to publically voice our political opinions. We can't even have political bumper stickers on our cars. It really sucks. I doubt it's ever been challenged in court, but it probably should be.

[Jazz]

Thanks for the update, Swampy. Makes sense.

[jnettie]

chrisinluv, my Dad worked for the county and he couldn't wear political buttons at work either. They didn't police what he did on his own time or bumper stickers on his personal car...but he did get a company car since he had to drive all over the place for his job so they didn't have to worry about that.

In a way, it's a good thing they can't fire him for his opinions. Policies like this protect everybody.

When I was in college, our dept. chair was a nutjob. The school administration didn't like her since she wasn't doing a good job with the dept. and they were always getting complaints from parents. (It was a dance dept. and she was always warning us not to eat too much or get fat...to the point of practically advocating anorexia, so it was bad.) Well, she went away on sebatical, and her replacement did so much better in her place that they demoted her on her return and transfered her to a different dept. They couldn't fire her, but they could make her life miserable. The woman wouldn't quit, though, so she's still there terrorizing students. :(