End of the day his comments were out of order, but they don't affect the marks of his students. The bell curve theory which he mentions actually stood at one point in time but was eventually dropped cos alot of it seemed to be based on the economics of 2 different cultures.

The paper, well thats been blown outta proportion... going national when the university didn't actually see the article til last week is ****ing ridiculous, especially cos it isn't enough time to sort out something on this scale. The actions of the exec over it all, haven't impressed me but thats a U.C matter.

I'm not a bigoted ****er or anything like that & I don't agree with his comments. However everyone is entitled their right to free speech, no matter how wrong it may seem. We are all capable of saying ****e which offends others and this p-c frenzy calling for his head is just daft. I don't think he should be fired straight away, but I do think that there is a need for disciplinary action concerning how he chose to voice his personal opinions.

It's also highly annoying that all the focus is about the racist comments, if you read the article u'll notice that there's more than just racist comments made.

As for the paper, well they've broke the no platform policy again (think back 2 BNP article last year - if you wernt here, it was Nick Griffin spouting off ****), twice in the space of 2 weeks by providing him a platform and pretty much condoning the comments by printing them. I have got more to say about the papers involvement with everything, but this forum isn't the place for it.

If that pisses any1 off then fine, but all of the above is my views and my personal opinions, not your's and not on behalf of you. The issues I'll b bringin up at union council will be my own personal thoughts as a union councillor/trustee, about how this has all been dealt with.

The issues will be discussed at the next Union Council meeting on 20th March, 6pm, Conference Hall in the ARC. I can provide representation and opinions on behalf of anyone who wants me to (& I'll speak as LGBT rep), or you can come along to the meeting and have your personal say.

Either way contact me and let me know, if you want to do either of these. All details are on here.

Nic x

So based on what yuo are saying, should we fire any Christian lecturers who believe homosexuality is a sin? Should we fire any fioreign lecturers who hold different cultural views on things like sexuality or gender? It's one thing to say you can't act on your views if they will offend people, but its going too far to say people arent entitled to hold views.

One thing is HOLDING views, which all of us do, and another thing is VOICING them. It's fair enough saying that we've got freedom of speech, but the line that divides freedom of speech and a discriminatory offence is quite blurry.

Alberto (in computer cluster again) xx

Anonymous wrote:

---

One thing is HOLDING views, which all of us do, and another thing is VOICING them. It's fair enough saying that we've got freedom of speech, but the line that divides freedom of speech and a discriminatory offence is quite blurry.

Alberto (in computer cluster again) xx

---

Hey Alberto...

Pretty much spot on mate, in my opinion.

Freedom of speech is a precious right that we hold in this country, and it should be constantly maintaiined. Similarly we have the right to criticise and contradict Ellis's views on this matter.

However we also have the freedoms in this country to live without fear of persecution and discrimination. With rights come responsibilites. As Dr. Ellis is in an influential postiton and will come into contact with a vast range of people in his job, I think it is right that his conduct is fully investigated and appropriate action is taken if his views and opinions are seen to impinge on his responsibilities to his students and colleagues.

IMHO, Ellis is entitled to his views. He just has no right promoting them at this University thankyou very much.

Today he's been suspended under the Race Relations Act, the first academic to be sanctioned under the new amendments, and will be suspended until the investigations into his comments are completed.

http://education.guardian.co.uk/higher/news/story/0,,1738150,00.html

What do you think of the people who answered back to demonstrators "you don't know him"? Does he know personally all the students he discriminates against with his preposterous comments?

I don't like it, either, when people who are part of a minority group think that because they're part of that minority and don't mind Dr Ellis's comments, nobody else should feel offended by them. It's quite patronising.

I don't like it, either, when people who are part of a minority group think that because they're part of that minority and don't mind Dr Ellis's comments, nobody else should feel offended by them. It's quite patronising.

---

Here Here! well said!

if people care about the issues they can get involved, thats up to them, and thats cool if they wanna do that.

but just like alberto said about those who don't care shouldn't expect everyone else in the minority not to care either, don't go round telling those that don't care that they should.

JohnK wrote:

---

Erm, the responsibility for defending the rights and welfare of LGBT people was devolved to the LGBT Assembley. The LGBT Society committee are actually run a social society only. So maybe you are directing your anger at the wrong people, anonymous 2.

---

I spoke to the university about this when the article was first printed. I've been working on this and have fought to get the unions press statements changed to include homophobia etc, continually raise the issue of offence caused to LGBT people to people speaking on behalf of the union and make sure that they raise it in interviews etc. This is in addition to working with Unite Against Facism to address the homophobic comments.

I've also tried to get LGBT representation at the rallies, because I couldn't make it due to work committments. However this was near impossible because...
1) it was held at short notice, 2days isn't enough time to arrange it
&
2) No-1 else wanted to get involved or help with arranging representation.

Factors to take into account here are that I don't control what Jess Salter chooses to write in national papers, the union council (aka the union) are working with the University to resolve this issue - I'm included in this & most of all, racism is been put to top of the agenda due to ethnic minority groups, societies and assemblies having huge support from students of ethnic minorities, this support includes the students working with the representatives to get their voice heard and help with the campaign. End of day, 300 people working with and supporting a rep to get their minorities issues heard, are going to get alot further than 2 ppl doing the best they possibly can, unsupported. This isn't including the restrictions in which union councillors as representatives of the union are having to follow throughout this.

I've been saying all year that it'd be good if people could get involved with the assembly, because it'd be more productive. However not many people turned upto assembly meetings and they were just a waste of time, I've asked for support, views, experiences etc on here all year and no-1's been interested. Like I've said there doesn't have to be a major committment, it could be something as small as writing an article to go in the paper, making a poster, writing a motion for U.C etc. It's not like I'm never around either I make the effort to go to coffee hours when I can and my contact details are all over. Anyone can get involved if they want to, there's no block on that.

If what I've done so far in relation to the Frank Ellis stuff isn't enough, please tell me what I'm supposed to do and how, when there's just 2 of us working unsupported for the welfare & rights of LGBT students. If anyone can come up with a better idea, I'd sure love to know about it.

JohnK wrote:

---

I think you may have taken my comment the wrong way. The assembley, in particular you Nic, has been doing LOADS in this area, especially in terms of keeping people informed about it, so well done.

What I was pointing out to anon was that it isn't in the remit of the LGBT committee anymore to do this sort of thing.

J

---

Well the comment about directing anons anger at the wrong people was open to misinterpretation, so it was easy to take it the wrong way. I apologise for taking it the wrong way, but it was an easy mistake to make.

Even though it isn't the remit of the LGBT committee, it would be nice if the LGBT society were more involved in assembly stuff and gave support to the union rep, rather than the comments 'it doesn't affect me' 'i can't be bothered' 'I have no interest in LGBT politics' 'Its not my place to do anything' etc. Like I've been saying all year, more support and involvement would be fantastic and much more productive. Even though anons comments were directed at the committee, they are right to an extent, because there should be more involvement from the society, as society members often bring problems/issues to me and expect me to deal with them, but are often unwilling to offer support/get inolved with the assembly for the above reasons.

I'm not going to lie, its a ****ing hard job and there have been points this year where I could quite easily have quit because I couldn't be bothered to take the stress of the job. The main stresses have been the lack of support and the fact that people are more willing to sit back and criticise rather than get involved and help. I appreciate it's abit extra to take on, but people doing little bits would be loads more helpful than people taking the easy option of sitting back and criticising.

its the overlap on welfare again... society look after society members welfare, but there's an overlap on2 the assembly working to look after LGBT students

Thats a fair point. However the viewpoint of the union is that he's voiced these opinions in media, which goes to the student body, not just once, but twice. Breaking a multitude of the Unions equal opportunities policies and no platform policies, via the use of a unions incorparated body (leeds student). As the union is there to primarily represent students and look after their welfare, as well as taking a stance against discrimination, it has acted in the interest of its members and in accordance with the breaches of union policy, which happened within LUU.

There is also the fact that half of Dr Ellis's students, like yourself, haven't heard or experienced discrimination from him, whereas the other half/Ellis's students who are from a minority group, now feel unable to approach him to talk about their work etc based on his views, this could potentially have a disastrous effect on their degree and infringe on their right to study without fear of discrimination/harrassment.

This university union in particular is very responsive to protesting against racism, due to the large numbers of international and black & asian students on campus, this is why the comments were picked up on quickly and several groups such as unite against facism, I-soc, respect etc rallied around to start the protest. It's not been helped by the fact that the union were forced into acting quickly as a result of Leeds Student paper taking the story to national papers and reporting nothing had been done before they'd reported it to the relevant university departments. This saw a huge increase in media interest in the situation at Leeds. The protesting groups, the union acting on behalf of a majority of its members and outside pressure groups protesting and lobbying the unversity.

However throughout all this Dr Ellis did himself no favours by writing his views in national papers and lapping up the media attention, which forced the university to ban him from speaking to/putting his views in the national media, as everytime he did the situation got worse. Other underlying factors are that the university's reputation has been marred by this and if they were seen to do nothing, it would ruin the reputation of Leeds Uni, which is 1 of the most popular choices of university and the fact that the universities strategy plan has pledged to listen to its students more, so they couldn't really turn a blind eye and ignore a large amount of its student body & the possible negative effects of this, such as a huge drop in the numbers of people applying (top up fees has already seen this happen) and less money for the university, which is basically ran as a business with the aims of generating income.

While Dr Ellis may be a good lecturer, he chose to voice his opinions via a medium in the union and then did himself no favours by not responding to the V.C and writing in national papers creating more of a media sensation. The fact he was more than willing to do this on a national scale breached the racial relations act and the university had to take action.

Hope that clears things up a little bit and explains whats happened and why. Most of the people protesting knew who and what they were protesting against due to the presence and support for groups such as unite against facism, what they had read in the student and national newspapers and had seen on tv. This isn't counting the support from other universities who had heard about the situation and have the same societies, eg. I-soc, respect etc. and NUS who represent students on a national scale, as well as rallying support for its members from other members. Yeah there may have been a few people turn up seeing the banners and joining in, but don't assume it was just that, there was alot of involvement from groups outside of Leeds University too.

As for the hype, well I've read the transcripts of the interview and can honestly say I think the interview was set up with an ulterior motive to create a scandal and the actions of the paper not reporting it 2 the university or showing them the transcripts etc, but choosing to run straight to the national papers about it with false information and play on the racism card to gain support, were just to try and gain someone a career in journalism. I've read the whole interview and the questions were leading, things said were taken out of context and other people who have seen snipets of the interview took them out of context... I know for a fact that people were told that he'd said 'homosexuals should be weeded out of society', when he didn't say that, as an attempt to create more hype and scandal/gain support. Generally everything just blew up at once and the descent of national media attention on Leeds happened far too quickly before anyone had time to sit down and think rationally about how to best deal with the situation in hand, forcing people into acting quickly to resolve the issue quickly.

If you'd like to talk further about the unions stance or have any comments, dont hesitate to contact me. As a union councillor I've seen the process of dealing with this and know the unions stance. Also as you can see above there are my personal opinions about the whole situation. However, I can see both sides of the argument and will provide representation for any1 from either side of the debate to the Union.

U might well be! I pop kids out like a thai girl playing with ping pong balls, where did u fly out?

it was indeed, i love people who smother my hands in capatilist cambodian orphans blood juice upon the first meeting... coca cola is just the best thing n the surefire way 2 win my heart, especially dousing me in it, mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

nah thats laying in bed wi a ciggy drinking the special juice out of a bucket with straws, 1st date is dousing, 2nd date is lapping it off n well I've jus detailed the third date..

roll on the 2nd date & lets see how things go... this wedding plan sounds like am on2 a winner!