[Vision2020] A Response to NSA's Roy Atwood

[keely emerinemix]

"Truth defends itself, and those who tell it are safe within its walls."  
Brilliant, Nick, and utterly appropriate here.

If your information is correct, then NSA ought to explain why they've 
criticized you -- and apologize for the wrong information as well as the 
criticism.  If your information is wrong, then perhaps they can point out 
where you and others have misstated things.  Calling you a "banshee" and 
mocking you is  rude and hardly strengthens their position, and threatening 
legal action if they can be proved wrong in litigation is silly.

Truth, goodness and beauty are in and of themselves wonderful, but they're 
not the essence of the Christian gospel, nor is their exaltation the 
exclusive purview of Christians.  But no one would ever counsel the 
religious among us to engage in behavior that contradicts them, and so I 
join other interested Visionaires in asking Dr. Atwood to point out exactly 
where Dr. Gier is wrong -- so my mind can be set at ease.  In addition, they 
could also explain why people insist they've seen Confederate flags and 
portraits of Robt. E. Lee in Logos school.  I've never heard of such 
culturally and geographically specific mass hallucinations, but what do I 
know?

Help me out here, please.

keely




From: nickgier at adelphia.net
To: vision2020 at moscow.com
Subject: [Vision2020] A Response to NSA's Roy Atwood
Date: Wed, 22 Feb 2006 17:59:09 -0500

Greetings:

This is a longer version of a letter I intend to send to the two local 
papers.

To the Editor:

In his letter (Feb. 20?) Roy Atwood, President of New Saint Andrews College 
(NSA), claims that he once constructively engaged me on the issues of NSA 
accreditation and Doug Wilson’s slavery booklet. I have saved all my 
e-mail correspondence with Atwood and I beg to differ about the nature of 
his response.  It consists mainly of name-calling and ends with a promise 
never to communicate with me again.

The logical fallacy of “poisoning the well” is one that I’m certain 
that NSA “senior fellow” (but MA only) Doug Jones teaches in his logic 
classes.  Ironically, this is a fallacy that NSA faculty commit on a regular 
basis.
Instead responding directly to the issues, Wilson, Atwood, and Jones try to 
discredit the source of the objections.  They do this by some pretty 
ferocious name-calling.  I’ve been called slanderer, God-hater, and 
banshee (my favorite).  They chose to poison the well rather than answer the 
charges.

Early on I urged Atwood to clarify his statements about NSA accreditation, 
but he refused to do so. In April 2003, NSA attorney Greg Dickison testified 
before the Latah County Commissioners that the college was duly accredited. 
You can hear Dickison's voice at 
http://www.tomandrodna.com/temp/NSA_Accred.mp3.  In a letter to the Daily 
News on May 23, 2003, Atwood made the same claim.  The problem of course is 
that NSA did not receive its accreditation until November 29, 2005.

Tom Garfield, principal of Wilson’s Logos School, also charged me with 
untruths.  A friend helped me find an image of the portrait of Robert E. Lee 
in a Logos classroom, a picture Garfield said they did not own.  A local 
band and former church members confirmed the display of the Confederate flag 
at school functions, something that Garfield also denied.

It seems to me that the fallacy “poisoning the well” is not well 
formulated.  It really is a form of argument ad hominem, “against the 
person” rather than the issues at hand.  The Well of Truth cannot be 
poisoned, and I challenge Atwood and his colleagues to follow their 
savior’s advise that acknowledging the truth will set them free.

Atwood concludes his letter with a threat of legal action.  In 33 years of 
handling faculty grievances I’ve been threatened with libel several times, 
but I always reminded my accusers that truth defends itself and those who 
tell it are safe within its walls.

When Atwood was at the UI, he was known as a good scholar and able 
administrator.  His former colleagues are really puzzled about what happened 
to this professor who used to be such a good academic citizen.

There are well-qualified students at Logos and NSA and some competent 
faculty, just as there are good, decent people who attend Wilson’s Christ 
Church.  One can usually spot these people because they frequently speak of 
Wilson’s goal of achieving “truth, goodness, and beauty.” These fine 
folks need to be reminded that their leaders have not always told the truth, 
that condoning slavery is not good, and that calling for the execution of 
homosexuals is just plain ugly.

Nick Gier


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