On Monday, October 10th, at approximately 2:00pm (Eastern Standard Time), I was contacted by Mark Krawzyck, head of the Networking Department at Greenville Technical College, where I am currently enrolled as a networking student. He informed me that a complaint had been filed by an instructor in his department, one Bob Whaite, about a blog entry I had written (see: The Asshole Database Instructor) two days prior, which featured him somewhat prominently and in a less than flattering light.
Now, I would like to preface this by saying that I have absolutely no problem with Mark. I happen to think he’s the best instructor I’ve had thus far, and I enjoy his class(es) immensely. I realize he was simply the 3rd party attempting to handle a complaint issued by one of his employees and that none of this reflects his personal opinion in the matter, merely his role as director of the department.
The gist of the conversation was that, while entitled to my opinion, my posting of it on the public internet (my personally funded and hosted blog) was unprofessional. While not said in so many words, the implication was that I should either remove the post “or else.” I believe the exact phrase used (multiple times) was “the Administration would not take too kindly [to the post].” I agreed that it was probably unprofessional, but stood by my opinion and defended my right to express it in the public forum of my choosing. Indeed, Bob’s initial comment, which precipitated the entire event, was also quite unprofessional as well.
During our conversation, I also attempted to point out to Mark the existence of multiple public websites dedicated to the review and ranking of professors and teachers. Sites such as Rate My Professors (Professor rating), Rate A Prof (Professor rating), Pick A Prof (Professor rating and scheduling based upon those ratings), and even the K-12 version Rate My Teachers (Teacher rating) are dedicated to allowing prospective students to learn about a teacher before enrolling in a class they may later learn to regret taking.
For reference, I looked up both Bob Whaite and Mark Krawzyck on Rate My Professors. While Mark had no reviews, here are the results for Bob (the maximum score per category is 5.0):
- Bob Whaite
- Easiness: 4.5
- Helpfulness: 3.0
- Clarity: 2.5
- Overall: 2.8
- Comment(s):
- Mr. Whaite is a different guy.
This is where the seemingly double-standard appears. Mark was “not concerned with what’s online” in reference to the above sites, while still opposed to my posting of the same type of information. “The Setonian” - the “Voice of the Seton Hall Community” -, a publication of Seton Hall University, which held a rank of 46th on the Rate My Professors top 50 list of most-ranked schools at the time, even wrote an article about the website - yet somehow those optionally anonymous comments aren’t a problem.
At this point in the conversation, my choice of the phrase “asshole” was brought into question. I’m still unsure what difference it would have made, had I simply called him a “jerk”, as the stated opinion is still unquestionably the same, but my choice of adjectives apparently compounded the problem. I personally have no problem with even excessive use of profanity. However, since the word “slander” was also thrown out in relation to my post, I decided to take it upon myself to do some research into legal definitions, rulings, and precedents surrounding the right to freedom of speech.
According to Dancing with Lawyers, on their Libel, Slander and Defamation of Character information page:
Defamation is written or spoken injury to a person or organization’s reputation. Libel is the written act of defamation, vs. slander, the oral act of defamation.
Obviously, slander is clearly out, since this was a written (typed) statement. What we’re dealing with now is actually ‘libel’, but in any case, it’s all a certain type of ‘defamation’ we’re talking about. According to the EFF on one of their Bloggers’ FAQ pages dealing with Online Defamation Law, the elements of a defamation claim are:
The elements that must be proved to establish defamation are:
1. a publication to one other than the person defamed;
2. a false statement of fact;
3. that is understood asa. being of and concerning the plaintiff; and
b. tending to harm the reputation of plaintiff.4. If the plaintiff is a public figure, he or she must also prove actual malice.
The problem with this claim lies in point number 2. After having re-read my post multiple times, I’ve yet to find any instance that could even potentially be considered to be a statement of fact. All I did was demonstrate my personal opinion. Not once did I encourage others not to take his classes, nor did I infer that he should be fired or disciplined in any way. I simply put forth all the facts of the matter and my personal opinion. Everyone else is left to come to their own conclusions, whatever they may be.
The other potential problem is in point number 4 of these requirements. According to the general guidelines found on the above mentioned EFF Bloggers’ FAQ page, it could potentially be argued that Mr. Whaite is indeed a “public figure” of sorts. If this point were successfully argued, he would then face the problem of proving actual malice. As defined in Wikipedia:
Malice is a legal term referring to a party’s intention to do injury to another party.
Since this is most certainly and obviously not true, no defamation suit could be filed, and any cease and desist order related there unto could easily be met with a counter-suit over the attempt to unlawfully restrict my Constitutional right to freedom of speech.
Since we’ve unequivocally established that there is, in fact, no legal issue here, we’ll move on to a more personal level.
Earlier today, I was finally able to contact Bob, as he’d presumably been out of his office all day Tuesday. During the course of this conversation, he informed me how he’d located the original blog entry and notified me that the matter had been reported to the Dean of Student Services (who I presume is Mark’s supervisor).
I must admit that while it would certainly be somewhat exciting to become involved in a court case which would no doubt fall flat on its face, while still affording myself and my blog a great deal of publicity (and probably buy me that Porsche I’ve always wanted), I’m anxious to get this matter resolved. Quite frankly, if I didn’t have time to do the original homework assignment which kicked off this whole chain of events, I also don’t have time to waste in meetings with instructors, deans and lawyers, nor do I have further time to waste reading pages upon pages of legal dribble that more than provides my rights under the law.
With that said, I’m afraid I must decline to remove the controversial post on multiple grounds.
Not only do I still partially agree with my original opinion (we’ll get to that in more detail momentarily), but I’ve also become quite bitter about this attempt to silence my right to free speech. I strongly oppose censorship in any form, and support freedom of speech by both individuals and the press 100%. I feel that if someone is unable accept criticism; they should not be in a position where they will draw or generate it. Regardless of profane content, if Mr. Whaite cannot accept my opinion (and potentially learn from the things I pointed out), then perhaps he should consider an alternative career choice. Teachers of all types draw criticism on a regular basis. Be it from students like me or parents of an elementary schooler who was forced to miss recess, it’s the world we live in, and one of the risks of the job.
As I mentioned, I only partially agree with my original stance that Bob is an asshole. I will admit that I may have been hasty in judging him to that extent, as I’ve had very few interactions with him thus far. While I found him to be quite unprofessional in his internet correspondence with me, he was nothing but pleasant during our earlier telephone conversation. In fact, if I didn’t have this pre-formed opinion of him already, I’d probably have considered him a downright cheerful and all-around nice guy. I’m more than willing to admit that in this isolated incident, I may simply have caught him on a bad day. We’ve all had days where we’re overly stressed, possibly tired, and have a fuse that is considerably shorter than normal. It’s only to be expected that I could have been the unfortunate recipient of his final straw.
To you, Mr. Whaite, I apologize. While I fully support my right to express myself in any manner I deem necessary, I admit I was quite brash and unnecessarily harsh. You may have been unprofessional in my opinion, but it did not justify my branding of you as an asshole (much less a douchebag). While this has certainly been an interesting experience (and a first for both of us I believe), I hope we’ll be able to put this entire mess behind us and try to recover something resembling a normal teacher-student relationship.
If you would like to reach me sometime later this week, I’m not at home during the days, so calling the number in my file really won’t do much good. However, please feel free to email me (either at chris@doesnthaveone.com or through CampusCruiser or WebCT), and I’ll be happy to give you a call. Otherwise, I’ll stop by your office Monday morning after class, as planned.
The Asshole Database Instructor V: The Pow-Wow
NOTE: I initially posted this last night. Unfortunately, I decided to listen to the meeting recording. After it was over, I decided “I’m more pissed off than this,” and so the post got longer and angrier. Then I listened to the meeting again, and once again decided “I’m more pissed off than this,” and so the post got longer and angrier still. Repeat. Growl angrily. Repeat. Growl angrily. Post. An hour later, realize that you probably went a little over the top and mark post as draft until morning.
So here’s what I hope to be the last installment in this unhappy series. With any luck, I won’t get pissed off as I read this and I’ll actually be able to tone it down a tad…
Alright, lots of you have been asking what happened with my meeting today. For those of you with short attention spans, I can pretty much sum it up in one sentence. The gist of the entire meeting was “We realize we can’t do anything to you, but it’d be really nice if you took down your post…” Only with more attitude and overtones of superiority. Anyone else notice a disturbing trend in personality types here?
I find it interesting that, having had so many incredibly cool instructors thus far, that I should hit a patch of such rude and egotistical people in a row.
Upon advice from my loyal readers, as well as common sense and legal advice, the first thing I did was inform the meeting attendees that I was going to record our meeting, and slapped my digital recorder down on the table. If nothing else, this lets me go back and pick apart our conversation for maximum blogging goodness!
Without going through the entire meeting line by line, there were a few things I thought deserved commenting on, and which may be interesting to others as well as myself.
First, Bob was totally silent throughout the entire meeting, which I found more than a little odd… It’s really for the best at this point, because I have no desire to further insult him or hurt his feelings. This entire issue is now about my legal right to say anything I like here on my blog and the fact that certain people have tried to rob me of that right through various means. I do plan on trying to grab Bob for a private conversation sometime on Wednesday and try to explain this to him and appologize. Honestly, if this were still simply about him, I’d have removed the original post last Wednesday when I wrote Part II of the series.
Secondly, Rene Sawyer was very polite, and I think she would be more than happy to sit down and talk with anyone facing this kind of situation in the future. Had I actually met her previously (or known that someone in her capacity actually existed at all), I probably would have been willing to at least entertain the idea of having a talk with her instead of, or at least before, posting. She seemed to be genuinely interested in the problem, and like she was actually looking for resolution, rather than simply “making it go away”. I can’t recommend her highly enough. Thank you, Rene!
Next, I really think this entire issue has been blown way out of proportion. I’m sure people like Robert Scoble and Mark Jen can more than attest that you’re going to get called things you don’t appreciate at one time or another. Whether you think they’re warranted or not, you have to learn to roll with the punches and take everything with a grain of salt. When you’re in a position that groups of people (whether bloggers or students) look up to you for advice / leadership / cookies / gold stars / etc., you’re bound to make a few people unhappy. That’s the way of the world. Taking criticism, of any kind, is one of the things you have to live with. If you’re going to fall apart and go into a hissy fit every time you get called a name, you’re going to be wasting a lot of time in life. No matter how hard you try, everyone isn’t going to love you, and you just have to accept that and move on. God knows I have…
When it all comes down to it, the real issue Kim had with my post was the profanity I used. Apparently, had I mentioned Bob’s name without profanity, or used profanity without mentioning him by name, all would have been well. I tried to explain that, to me, profanity is nothing more than another form of emphasis and expression. There’s nothing inherently wrong with these words… It’s simply the negative connotations society has, for one reason or another, chosen to associate with these words which make them “evil”.
Personally, I swear like a sailor. Calling someone an asshole is no different to me than calling them a “jerk” or a “meany pants”. If “asshole” is this horrible, I can only imagine how people would have reacted, had I called someone a cock sucker… I mean, come on. If you know me at all, you know I can do far worse than “asshole”. Hell, you can even say asshole on broadcast television, can’t you? We’re not even talking PG-13 here people… In any case, profanity was the killer. I even used the phrase “when the shit hits the fan” during the meeting, which was struck down immediately as unacceptable. At the time, since Kim was the one conducting the meeting, I placated and appologized. If it were to happen now that I’ve thought more about it, I’d tell him that I’ll talk any way I like. This wasn’t a “classroom”. I wasn’t there as a “student”, I was there as another adult - at their request. I was doing them a favor by bothering to show up and listen to what they had to say.
Which really brings me to my big problem throughout all of this: ego. I’m sick of being treated like a little snot-nosed punk that doesn’t know what the hell he’s talking about. I’ve been working at the same company for 4 years as of December 6th, and in that time I have seen a lot. One hell of a lot. I’ve gone from simple desktop hardware maintenance and installation to fully-fledged Systems Administration, Microsoft Exchange management and Cisco router configuration. All self-taught. If that’s not a fucking accomplishment, I don’t know what the hell is. Just because you’re 20+ years older than I am doesn’t mean you’re instantly qualified to look and talk down to me as if I’m fresh out of high school and trying to cause trouble.
You think I need to mature a little before I realize that I was wrong? That’s fine. You are most certainly entitled to your opinion. And if I think you need to mature a little before you can learn to have a civilized conversation with a student without trying to make them feel inferior, that is my opinion.
As I’ve said, this is a community technical college that has a massive continuing-education program. Half a dozen members of my current Cisco class (with 14 students total) are 30+. If one of them had walked in and sat down during that meeting, would you have been a jerk and tried to get them to cower away in fear? I seriously doubt it.
The attitudes I’ve experienced recently from those “in authority” have reminded me greatly of the attitudes of most of my less professional and less liked teachers in High School… I’ve graduated… When will you?
To move along, I did point out during the meeting that the series of posts that arose after this issue was originally brought up moved me from the 6th page of search results for Bob’s name (55th result to be precise), to the 2nd result. If there’s a better way to shoot yourself in the foot, I can’t think of it. We don’t like having this blogger bashing us, so we make it an issue, which gets him to blog more, which gets his bashing to be more visible to the public. Brilliant idea… Maybe it would have worked before, but we’re in Web 2.0 world now, and the old-school strong-arm approach isn’t going to work out like it used to.
Not only was I able to look up legal resources from around the world and determine my legal rights, but the strength and self-confidence they provided me allowed me to continue to blog about the issue and bring it to an even larger audience. Can you imagine what would have happened, had we actually gotten a lawyer involved? Let’s multiply this by a factor of 10… Can you imagine the bad publicity you’d have generated if I’d gotten a Cease and Desist order and made it on the front page of Slashdot? Cover-ups don’t work like they used to. It’s time to actually start focusing on fixing the problem, not trying to hide it instead.
Kim tried, unsucessfully, to convince me that I was proud that my additional blogging had moved me to the 2nd result. On the contrary. This has all been a very unnecessary headache to me, and it’s impeded into an already overflowing schedule. No, it doesn’t bother me at all. Hell, I wrote the original article, why would it bother me? It was more embarassing for your organization than it was for me personally. You are right on one point though. I am very opinionated about this. You’ve tried everything you can to convince me to remove the post. If we’re playing our stereotypical egotistical personalities here, when your superior point of authority in this equation insists that I do something against my will, what do you think my inferior rebellious academic personality is going to do? I’ll take “Resist like Hell” for 1000, Alex…
The bottom line here is this: The post stays. Not because I still hold any particular opinion of Bob. In fact, I’m considering removing his name entirely from the posts and apologizing in person. No, in fact, the reason it stays is becuase you’ve all been “jerks” about the entire situation. Either slap me with a cease and desist order or leave me alone. Further pressing the issue will only strengthen my resolve and provide me with more blogging material, not to mention risk legal action on my part. Thin ice? Oh, you have no idea…
In closing, I’d like to recommend that no one ever approach Kim Cannon (Head of the Computer Technology Department) at Greenville Tech with any kind of problem. He was utterly insulting and if I’d had someone in a place of business treat me in such a rude manner, I’d not only notify their supervisor, but I’d also never frequent the establishment again. Take it as you will…
Questions? Comments? Concerns? Bueller? Bueller? Bueller?