Jean Moulin

When you are an exchange student in the Université Jean Moulin Lyon 3 people tell you first how the university came to its name.

Jean Moulin was the head of the french resistance movement during WWII. The Nazis eventually caught him and tortured in order to receive more information on the resistance movement.
But Moulin rested unwavering and he refused to give any information. When the Nazis recognized that he would stay silent even after the worst torture, they decided to bring him to one of their concentration camps. Moulin died on his way there in 1943 of heart failure.

This is a tragic story and it is fitting that buildings and places are named in the memory of his great achievements.

Then you get bit by bit more information on the history of the university you`re in.
First there were no Lyon 2 (Université Lumière) and Lyon 3 (Université Jean Moulin). It was only one university. But during the student revolt in 1968 the professorate separated in a left wing and a right wing camp, what became Lyon 2 and Lyon 3.

So, ok. The university Lyon 3 was founded by right wings. But if you think that is just history doesn´t reflect the school today you are wrong. In fact there were 4 professors who made anti-Semitic statements while teaching at the school. This starts with the denial of Auschwitz or the membership in the right extremist party Front National. Just in 2004 a professor of the Lyon 3 doubted in public if the numbers of mortalities during WWII were right.

Today in 2008 they have all been suspended of course all, and are not longer teachers in the Lyon 3.
But when you hear these stories it seems like irony that the university has the name of this great resistance fighter and you ask yourself "what would Jean Moulin say, if he knew"?