Farrar, you’re a disgrace

Written By: - Date published: 9:28 pm, August 25th, 2007 - 5 comments
Categories: national - Tags: , ,

Well surprise, surprise, National Party blogger David Farrar has joined in the disgraceful right-wing smear campaign currently being conducted against AUT’s curriculum leader for journalism, Dr Martin Hirst.

You’ll have to forgive me if I find this all a little ironic given Farrar’s carefully scripted outrage just this morning over Labour’s supposed smears against John Key.

You see, Dr Hirst is a socialist, and in the stunted minds of Mr Farrar and his permanently aggrieved commenters this kind of unorthodoxy is tantamount to thoughtcrime. The calls for him to be sacked from his post have started already.

This reveals a lot about David Farrar. What are we to make of a man who will fight like a cornered rat to defend the ‘freedom’ of National Party backers like the Exclusive Brethren and the Kyoto Forestry Association to buy an election, while at the same time signing up to a vicious smear campaign aimed at getting a university lecturer sacked from his job for holding unorthodox views?

Oddly enough, AUT doesn’t appear to see Dr Hirst’s political views as grounds to disqualify him from teaching. Last time I checked this country still valued a little thing called academic freedom, even if does take the fun out of Farrar’s witch hunts.

Which is interesting, given the unacknowledged source of Farrar’s smear is Trevor Loudon, a deranged McCarthyist who spends his spare time ‘exposing’ small time left-wing activists and fretting about the imminent ressurection of the Soviet Union.

As much as Farrar tries to distance himself from the more toxic right wing bloggers and present himself as a moderate, it seems he’s not all that different himself. Perhaps he’s just better at hiding it?

5 comments on “Farrar, you’re a disgrace ”

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  1. Robinson 1
    27 August 2007 at 12:12 pm

    Thank christ someone is finally pointing out Farrar’s hackness. I’ve watched this “national party blogger” (nice touch by the way) get away with some appalling acts of sophism in the past and yet still get presented in the mainstream media as a “web commentator”. I’m not sure if it’s his god-awful politics or the fact that he’s not a very good spin doctor but still gets away with it that pisses me off more.

  2. Toby 2
    27 August 2007 at 8:08 pm

    I couldn’t care less about Dr Hirst’s political views. But to call someone else a nazi is going too far.

  3. JamesK 3
    27 August 2007 at 11:38 pm

    Well Toby, let’s put it this way. If you had your name and photo posted not once but twice on the website of a far-right thug like Trevor Loudon in an effort to provoke hatred and, ultimately, your sacking, wouldn’t you be a little concerned?

    Add to this Trevor’s actual links with nutbar fascist-aligned groups – http://indymedia.org.nz/newswire/display/45086/index.php – and Dr Hirst’s comments actually seem pretty reasonable…

  4. Tane 4
    28 August 2007 at 10:32 am

    You know, I can’t help but find Loudon’s outrage over Hirst’s ‘neo-nazi’ comment a little hypocritical given his attempt to associate Hirst with the North Korean regime – http://newzeal.blogspot.com/2007/08/doctor-hirst-come-pyongyang-weal-soon.html (check it out, the racism in this post is shocking even for Loudon).

    It’s also interesting that Farrar chose to attack Hirst’s comments, but thought Loudon’s racist and dishonest attacks were perfectly fine.

  5. James Sleep 5
    2 September 2007 at 1:07 am

    Nice work, I did expose his involvment in the EB in April and got munterfied for it! Anyway nice blog!