by the collective as a whole

Several letters from Sorbonagre censors have been sent in recent days. One of them particularly made us react as it shows the emptiness of the exchanges. You can read here in this article our response to the provisional administrator of the Sorbonne.

The Article 1269 Case

In a letter recently received by the Observatory, the provisional administrator of the prestigious Paris Sorbonne University attacks the Observatory to have an article published eight months ago withdrawn. The accumulation of charges against us is starting to weigh heavily: a look back at an investigation in troubled waters.

Back to the facts

To begin, let's go back to the facts. 

The letter dated November 3 explains to us that the President of the University has granted functional protection to a colleague, which is entirely respectable. This protection is granted following threats published in online "news magazines". It is quite obvious that the Observatory of Decolonialism and Identity Ideologies has nothing to do with this, but we can quite imagine that in this kind of situation it may be necessary to erase damning texts.

What is it? 

The letter orders us to unpublish an article entitled "Sorbonne and inclusive writing: news from the front" published on January 19, 2021. In this article, "the agent (sic) considers that she was attacked on her person, in particular by the publication of a photograph taken of her in the large lecture hall of the Sorbonne." 

Let's say it right away: we have never published photos of our colleague taken in the "grand amphitheater" (obviously it is too long to write for the President of the Institution) but we have extracted an image from a video freely accessible on the YouTube site of a conference given in her capacity by the agent, no doubt as part of her duties. As the article clearly explained, the video is freely available at this address: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVonX927VLA . Finally: freely viewable… The video is still subject to an age limit in accordance with YouTube's community guidelines. This bothers YouTube, but not the Sorbonne.

The conference, given in Milan and not in Paris…, entitled “Norme eterosessuali, norme sacrificali” allows us to observe the work of the colleague who therefore ends her conference completely naked. Out of respect for the agent, we reproduce an extract from the conference while respecting her anonymity: 

In this context, it is difficult to understand how the Sorbonne could have confused the large amphitheater with this masquerade; and above all: how could the President of the honorable Institution have imagined that his agents could teach in this attire in the large amphitheater? 

And even: how can he not be shocked to learn that an "agent" is teaching in this outfit in what he believes to be the Grand Amphitheater but be shocked on the other hand that the Observatory, which sources and links the original video, is talking about it?

We think we dream.

Just looking at this photo makes you ask yourself a few questions: 

1. It looks nothing like the grand lecture hall at the Sorbonne; 
2. What was she doing in that outfit, if the presidential services imagine that it is the main lecture hall? If a Sorbonne teacher is doing nudism in the main lecture hall (which the presidential services seem to postulate without finding anything wrong with it), who is harming whom?

Our article only repeats exactly the remarks made by the "agent" that we put in quotation marks, there is no insult or defamation or anything. As for the screenshot, it was taken in a public place during a public conference, there is not the shadow of an invasion of privacy.

But the provisional administrator should perhaps read his agent's text more carefully:

"This performance indeed presents many of the constitutive characteristics of post-porn: abolition of the distinction between public and private, use of irony, break with the subject/object dichotomy, erasure of the boundary between legitimate culture (art) and illegitimate cultural productions (pornography), involvement of spectators, public exhibition of practices traditionally inscribed in the private sphere"

Dance Descartes Street2013/3 (n° 79), page 29

Who then mixes the private and the public?

On the legal background

The letter from the Sorbonne legal department was not written by lawyers. Indeed, we do not "harm a person" but "his image, or his reputation or his integrity". Then we do not harm a person "in his capacity as"; all this makes no sense. And the text is full of approximations. We have withdrawn Article 1269, i.e.. Who would argue with people who think it's normal to teach bare-assed at the Sorbonne, when that's not even what we were talking about? We prefer not to respond to statements whose incongruity 
exposes itself as such ex officio.

But one question remains: where did this story of a "large amphitheater" come from? 

We have a lead.

Second letter: the removal of the photo from the press article

The track of the large amphitheater

A letter dated June 4, 2021, reached the Rector of the Academy of Paris. The text of this letter leaves one speechless in the face of such a surge of "cancel culture". Elsewhere, this would have caused a scandal; but in the Parisian university, it has become commonplace. The thirty signatories of this text, some of whom are researchers, addressed to twenty-five recipients, return to the point that stuck in their craw and which motivates their anger: 

 Since its creation, dozens of articles using the work of academics specializing in these fields of study have been published on the “Observatory” website, then relayed in numerous press outlets, in particular Le Point which published the appeal from the “Observatory” accompanied by the photograph attached to our letter. 

quote from the third paragraph of the letter sent by the wokes

You know the photo: it was the one that served as the cover of the article in Le Point that we were lucky enough to be able to do together in the large amphitheater of the Sorbonne. The conclusion of the letter is also threatening and seems to consider the idea of ​​putting pressure on the Press to have it removed – cancel – the photo:

 Surprised on the one hand […] that by acting in this way the Chancellery maintains a certain vagueness on a possible recognition of this “Observatory” which in fact has no institutional affiliation, we would be grateful if you could clarify for us under what conditions this event was able to take place in this prestigious place and its media coverage take place. What do you envisage, if necessary, to put an end to this abusive use? 

quote from the fourth paragraph of the letter addressed by the wokes

“Stop this abusive use.”

 So let's come back to it for a second: our photo is an "abusive use" of the large amphitheater. An "abusive use" that must be stopped. Understand: the photo must be removed from the press. But on the other hand, teaching naked while talking about your anus as a territory? Oh no, that's cool.

In what country do people call on the authorities to rewrite history, muzzle the press, change photos? Oh yes, it's in the Sorbonne.

Bare ass in the big amphitheater

We can therefore better understand the letter that was sent to the Observatory by the legal department and that the incompetence of each party made difficult to read. Taking advantage of the functional protection that the agent benefited from for reasons that have nothing to do with our article, she abused this contact with the legal services to broaden the scope of the protection of her person to that of the interests of the large amphitheater. She will no doubt have confusedly tried to explain that the article is harmful to her, but that in addition it would be necessary to return to this story of the large amphitheater and the press photo taken by Le Point. Which the poor legal department will no doubt have understood nothing of, transforming the narrative into: "the photo of her naked in the large amphitheater must be removed".

Poor University…

This shift in meaning is at the origin of a shift in science.