http://www.pandasthumb.org/archives/2007/07/threats_against_university_of_colorado_biologists.html
My colleague, Michael Grant of the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Department, was one of the victims of the recent harassment, reported by Steve Reuland here. Professor Grant tells me that he has “been receiving these histrionic emails and books and packages for a year; he even comes into my office when I’m not here. He started with me and Jeff Mitton [chair of EEB] but expanded to the rest of the department and may have crossed a legal line with the rest. I have a huge stack of emails and packages and even a big fat paperback book from him.” I think that, by legal line, he means the threatening tone of the last e-mail below.
“Among other things,” writes Professor Grant, “he identifies me as a ‘child molester’ for teaching evolution and threatens to get me fired plus he threatens legal action on that front. In the most recent communications, he writes words many of my colleagues consider death threats.”
I do not know what preceded the following, but here is an early e-mail sent to Professor Grant. The boldface and italics are in the originals, but I have spared you some very large typefaces.
I do not know why he makes terrible Yiddish puns, but to fress is to eat like a pig. The harasser is, in fact, a Messianic Jew, but we prefer not to state his name until it is made public.
Finally, the following is an excerpt of what was recently sent to Professor Grant and several other faculty members in EEB. Many of the EEB faculty consider it very dangerous and possibly a death threat.
Robert Crowther of the Discovery Institute disbelieves the Denver Post story, suggests it is a hoax, and asks, “But where’s the evidence that the perps are actually creationists, or religious at all?” He likens the story to that of Paul Mirecki of the University of Kansas, who is alleged to have punched himself in the nose, no doubt to embarrass creationists.
Mr. Crowther’s “evidence” includes an interesting overinterpretation of a policeman’s comment, “It basically said anybody who doesn’t believe in our religious belief is wrong and should be taken care of,” which he conflates with something that the perpetrator wrote; need I add that the policeman was only paraphrasing?
If this is a hoax and the e-mails were not sent by a creationist, then the author is a veritable Alan Sokal.
My colleague, Michael Grant of the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Department, was one of the victims of the recent harassment, reported by Steve Reuland here. Professor Grant tells me that he has “been receiving these histrionic emails and books and packages for a year; he even comes into my office when I’m not here. He started with me and Jeff Mitton [chair of EEB] but expanded to the rest of the department and may have crossed a legal line with the rest. I have a huge stack of emails and packages and even a big fat paperback book from him.” I think that, by legal line, he means the threatening tone of the last e-mail below.
“Among other things,” writes Professor Grant, “he identifies me as a ‘child molester’ for teaching evolution and threatens to get me fired plus he threatens legal action on that front. In the most recent communications, he writes words many of my colleagues consider death threats.”
I do not know what preceded the following, but here is an early e-mail sent to Professor Grant. The boldface and italics are in the originals, but I have spared you some very large typefaces.
I do not know why he makes terrible Yiddish puns, but to fress is to eat like a pig. The harasser is, in fact, a Messianic Jew, but we prefer not to state his name until it is made public.
Finally, the following is an excerpt of what was recently sent to Professor Grant and several other faculty members in EEB. Many of the EEB faculty consider it very dangerous and possibly a death threat.
Robert Crowther of the Discovery Institute disbelieves the Denver Post story, suggests it is a hoax, and asks, “But where’s the evidence that the perps are actually creationists, or religious at all?” He likens the story to that of Paul Mirecki of the University of Kansas, who is alleged to have punched himself in the nose, no doubt to embarrass creationists.
Mr. Crowther’s “evidence” includes an interesting overinterpretation of a policeman’s comment, “It basically said anybody who doesn’t believe in our religious belief is wrong and should be taken care of,” which he conflates with something that the perpetrator wrote; need I add that the policeman was only paraphrasing?
If this is a hoax and the e-mails were not sent by a creationist, then the author is a veritable Alan Sokal.
