[Air-l] british boycott over/no politics?

[Jeremy Hunsinger]

I find discussion fine, especially if it relates to the internet,  
internet research and related topics in some manner.  My position was  
only that, to the best of my understanding, as an association, we do  
not do make statements that may have political import beyond those  
that are implied by our mission.

To me political discussion, etc. is fine.  However, do not get this  
confused with complete freedom of speech, because this list does not  
have that, it is topical and targetted toward the mission of AoIR,  
and the executive committee can and has moderated individuals and  
groups that proved to be problematic.    I think Barry's call is to  
stay topical to internet research, which is what the list tends to  
do, though we do diverge sometimes for brief moments.

On May 26, 2005, at 1:00 PM, Greg Elmer wrote:

> Barry (et als),
>
> I took Jeremy's note to mean that it is not the role of the  
> association to take political stands. And while I find such blanket  
> policies (along with assumptions about what constitutes the  
> "political) troublesome, you've now seemingly extended this logic  
> to the AOiR listserv. What's more since you don't seem to want to  
> take your own advice why should the rest of us avoid 'politics' on  
> the list serv?
>
> I for one would like to see a broad discussion about the social  
> implications of new media, the Internet, scholarship, and the  
> acadmemy (which as some of you know can get messy and political).  
> If you're not interested in posts about political issues that  
> impact upon academic life and society in general then I'd encourage  
> you to actively 'delete'.
>
>
> Greg Elmer
>
>
>
>> Although there are counter-arguments to the anti-Israeli posting
>> yesterday, I agree with Jeremy Hunsinger that they are out of  
>> place on
>> this list.
>>
>> But since the issue has been brought up, my position is that
>> professionalsocieties should be extraordinarily cautious about
>> encouraging boycotts of
>> universities. I don't believe in collective punishment, even if
>> there was
>> a crime -- and there are different sets of "facts"  floating  
>> around on
>> this matter. Hence, I have worked a bit to encourage the ending of  
>> the
>> boycott. And am glad that it happened.
>>
>> For reasons of the first para, I won't respond to any postings
>> about the
>> boycott -- or Israel -- on this list and urge us all to refocus on
>> AOIRstuff.
>>
>> Barry
>> _____________________________________________________________________
>>
>>  Barry Wellman         Professor of Sociology        NetLab Director
>>  wellman at chass.utoronto.ca  http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman
>>
>>  Centre for Urban & Community Studies          University of Toronto
>>  455 Spadina Avenue    Toronto Canada M5S 2G8    fax:+1-416-978-7162
>>             To network is to live; to live is to network
>>
>>
>
> Greg Elmer, PhD
> Bell Globemedia Research Chair
> Rogers Communications Centre/School of Radio-TV Arts
> Ryerson University
> 350 Victoria Street, Toronto, Ontario
> Canada      M5B 2K3
>
> 416-979-5282
> _______________________________________________
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Jeremy Hunsinger
Center for Digital Discourse and Culture
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