The higher education union is calling for Sydney University to reinstate controversial lecturer Tim Anderson after a court found he was unlawfully sacked over comments about Israel and other matters – including superimposing the Nazi swastika on the Israeli flag in a lecture slide.
Federal Court Justice Thomas Thawley ruled Anderson was exercising his intellectual freedom and accepted the lecturer’s argument that he created the swastika graphic for academic purposes, to encourage critical analysis and point out comparisons between “fascist systems”.
While he acknowledged the imagery would be offensive to many people, Thawley said the context meant it should not be considered vilification intended to incite hatred of Jewish people.
Thawley found the university had not established that Anderson breached a clause in his workplace agreement obliging him to exercise intellectual freedom “with the highest ethical, professional and legal standards”.
Lawyers have been directed to confer within the next week to discuss penalties and remedies. National Tertiary Education Union secretary Damien Cahill said the union had always called on Sydney University to reinstate Anderson.
“This case was never about what Dr Anderson said,” the union said in a statement. “We don’t always agree with our members, but we will defend their right to academic freedom – a cornerstone of universities.”
Read the article by Michael Koziol in The Sydney Morning Herald.