Comments

You have commented 339 times on Rantburg.

Your Name

Your e-mail (optional)

Website (optional)

	My Original Nic Pic-a-Nic Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Foto

Submit your comments on this article

Home Front: Culture Wars

Students Rebel against Biased Liberal Professors

2004-12-28

Traditionally, clashes over academic freedom have pitted politicians or administrators against instructors who wanted to express their opinions and teach as they saw fit. But increasingly, it is students who are invoking academic freedom, claiming biased professors are violating their right to a classroom free from indoctrination. For example, at the University of North Carolina, three incoming freshmen sued over a reading assignment they said offended their Christian beliefs. In Colorado and Indiana, a national conservative group publicized student allegations of left-wing bias by professors. Faculty received hate mail and were pictured in mock "wanted" posters; at least one college said teacher received a death threat. And at Columbia University in New York, a documentary film alleging that teachers intimidate students who support Israel drew the attention of administrators.

That's the core of the problem. The teachers can (and do) punish the kids who don't toe the party line...

The three episodes differ in important ways, but all touch on an issue of growing prominence on college campuses. In many ways, the trend echoes past campus conflicts — but turns them around. Once, it was liberal campus activists who cited the importance of "diversity" in pressing their agendas for curriculum change. Now, conservatives have adopted much of the same language in calling for a greater openness to their viewpoints. Similarly, academic freedom guidelines have traditionally been cited to protect left-leaning students from punishment for disagreeing with teachers about such issues as American neutrality before World War II and U.S. involvement in Vietnam. Now, conservative students who support the liberation of Iraq are invoking those same guidelines.

It all depends on whose ox is being gored, doesn't it?

To many professors, there's a new and deeply troubling aspect to this latest chapter in the debate over academic freedom: students trying to dictate what they don't want to be taught. "Even the most contentious or disaffected of students in the '60s or early '70s never really pressed this kind of issue," said Robert O'Neil, former president of the University of Virginia and now director of the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression.

I seem to remember great blocs of curriculum being ripped out and thrown away in the name of "relevance." I believe that occurred at the vocal insistence of students dictating what they wanted to be taught. Through the fog of accumulated time I can remember research programs being tossed, speakers being hooted off the podium, teach-ins, sit-ins, "love-ins" and "heppenings," all at the instance of students setting the agenda that drove the curriculum.

Posted by:trailing wife

#4 Many teachers insist personal politics donât affect teaching.

Haaahahahaha, how many is "many"? 5%? 1%? 0.25%?

Posted by: Bomb-a-rama 2004-12-28 1:27:25 PM

#3 We are mad as hell, and we ain't gonna take this liberal bs any more.

Posted by: Capt America 2004-12-28 12:10:06 PM

#2 Now a junior, he objected when all incoming students were assigned to read a book about the Quran before they got to campus.

I wrote about this case here and here. For several years, UNC has required all incoming freshman to read a book, write a short paper on it, and take part in a discussion. This is supposed to introduce you to "critical thinking". In 2002, you could get out of reading Approaching the Quran, if you thought it was offensive to your faith, by writing a one-page paper explaining your decision.

These are the Summer Reading Program books so far:
1999: There Are No Children Here
2000: Confederates in the Attic
2001: The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down
2002: Approaching the Quran
2003: Nickel and Dimed
2004: Absolutely American

(Here's the SRP page, with links to previous years.) I would characterize most of these books as "Let us all now flagellate ourselves for being Americans".

What that last book means, I'm not sure. Judging by its Amazon reviews, I suggest it means "Wait! Wait! We're not anti-American after all!"

Posted by: Angie Schultz 2004-12-28 11:34:12 AM

#1 Switch out the political definition of left and right with race identities of white and black, and then use the standards employed by the liberals in the 1960's to 90's to tag racism to an institution.

One definition of an elite - one standard for members of the inner party and a different standard for members of the outer party.

Posted by: Whaing Wherong1888 2004-12-28 9:34:35 AM

00:00