"We're Tired Of Byers"

A student newspaper demonstrates judgement (unlike this online one):

Check And Mate

UBC professor Michael Byers, who gets invited onto damn near every media panel on Afghanistan in this country and often falsely identified as an expert on the issue, and who refused an invitation to participate in the Manley Panel report but never misses a chance to follow up on rape and war crimes allegations against our soldiers, gets absolutely destroyed in an editorial by the UBC student paper, the Ubyssey.

We're Tired Of Byers
Our View

Last week, UBC political science professor, failed NDP Candidate, and media gadfly Michael Byers went on a hunger strike as part of the 2010 Homelessness Hunger Strike Relay. When we heard the news, virtually every member of The Ubyssey editorial staff winced. And not just because it was a self-serving media stunt that reeked of martyrdom and did little to serve the actual cause of homelessness. Since he arrived on campus in 2004, we’ve seen, heard, and written more about Byers than is merited given his accomplishments—how ever impressive they might be. He’s written many a book, comes off as incredibly thoughtful in interviews, and people who take his classes generally have nice things to say. That’s the case with a lot of academics though—and we don’t see many thrusting themselves into the public spotlight with the gusto Byers does.

But Byers isn’t an academic at this point; he’s a politician. He ran for the NDP last election, he plans to run again for them in the next election and he’s ready to criticize the Harper government about anything at the drop of a dime. Except he—and reporters who use him for his good quotes and pretty face—still refer to him as an “in ternational law expert,” even when he’s talking about the Olympics, the economic crisis, or any other subject that has nothing to do with international law. An academic imparts his learned knowledge on an issue, and a politicians promotes himself and his particular views. With Byers, the line is certainly blurred. At this point, whenever he publicly promotes a cause, it’s difficult to tell: is he promoting an important issue, or is he promoting Michael Byers and the NDP?

We know that even though his actual job is a UBC professor, UBC students aren’t exactly his first priority. After all, this past semester plenty of graduate students signed up for his class on global politics, but when they got to their first class, he told them that due to the upcoming election the class would be cancelled. He then proceeded to tell them why he was running, why students should vote for him, and, by the way, if anyone wanted to volunteer for him, that would be super awesome. Not exactly a humble display from the socially conscious professor.

All of which has led us to conclude the following: we’re tired of Byers; tired of talking about him, tired of hearing about him, and tired of his pseudo-self promotion. Michael Byers, we’re taking a cue from Stephen Colbert: you’re on notice.

Marvellous. Incredible. As The Torch would say, Bravo Zulu Ubyssey editors.

A sample of my own Byers hurls here and here.

Via Brian Platt, a good man.