This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: Schools

  • “Stopped Clock Principle” Proven Again

    Can’t say I think much of – or often agree with – Bill Maher.  But IMO he certainly hits the nail on the head here:

    Bill Maher: UC Berkeley is ‘the cradle for f—king babies’

    So, what did Berkeley do to get under Maher’s skin?  He was referring to the recent trend of UC-B (and other universities) caving and “uninviting” conservative speakers in response to student complaints.

    The short linked article has another gem or two in the way of quotes from Maher.  It’s definitely worth the two minutes to read for those alone.

    Well done, Mr. M.  You’re proof that at least a few liberals don’t always merit the title “libidiot”.

  • Michael Rectenwald; NYU prof, victim of PC gestapo

    Michael Rectenwald; NYU prof, victim of PC gestapo

    Michael Rectenwald

    In the New York Post today, they tell the story of New York University professor, 57-year-old Michael Rectenwald, who was pushed out of his job by a panel of his peers because of his views on the PC culture;

    Rectenwald launched an undercover Twitter account called Deplorable NYU Prof on Sept. 12 to argue against campus trends like “safe spaces,” “trigger warnings” and other aspects of academia’s growing PC culture.

    He chose to be anonymous, he explained in one of his first tweets, because he was afraid “the PC Gestapo would ruin me” if he put his name ­behind his conservative ideas on the famously liberal campus.

    […]

    “I thought there was nothing objectionable about what I had said,” he told The Post.

    “My contention is that the trigger warning, safe spaces and bias hot-line reporting is not politically correct. It is insane,” he told the student paper in an interview published Monday.

    A 12-person committee which included two deans named in the Orwellian tradition “Liberal Studies Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Working Group”. They wrote;

    “As long as he airs his views with so little appeal to evidence and civility, we must find him guilty of illogic and incivility in a community that predicates its work in great part on rational thought and the civil exchange of ideas,” they wrote.

    “We seek to create a dynamic community that values full participation. Such efforts are not the ‘destruction of academic integrity’ Professor Rectenwald suggests, but rather what make possible our program’s approach to global studies,” they argued.

    What? “Full participation?”

    He had a meeting with his own dean and Human Resources. They claimed to be worried about his mental health and sent him off on paid leave for the rest of the semester.

    I guess NYU prefers the Stalin model of keeping people in line.

  • Rosa Brooks: Veterans Are Not Experts on Foreign Policy

    Rosa Brooks: Veterans Are Not Experts on Foreign Policy

    Chock Block sends us a link to Foreign Policy where some chick, Rosa Brooks, writes “Sorry Folks, Veterans Are Not Necessarily Experts on Foreign Policy“. According to the bio about her, she’s “a Schwartz senior fellow at the New America Foundation. She served as a counselor to the U.S. defense undersecretary for policy from 2009 to 2011 and previously served as a senior advisor at the U.S. State Department.” In other words, she’s way smarter than rest of us because she’s sequestered in a think tank with a bunch of other pointy-headed hippies, and she doesn’t like the idea of veterans being asked our opinions on foreign policy.

    I focused on “US Diplomatic History” when I was in college. Much of that study included our wars, there was really very little about diplomacy – like Clauswitz said “war is politics by other means”. No one hates war more than those who have to fight them – so who knows more about pitfalls of bad foreign policy?

    Ms. Brooks disagrees. She’s concerned about the attention that veterans got during the last presidential debate which was sponsored by that broke-dick IAVA and NBC News;

    Some of those service members and vets are smart, thoughtful, and sophisticated about politics, policy, and global affairs. Others are dumb as rocks.

    This is par for the course in any group of millions of Americans: Some know what they’re talking about; others just like to talk. Wearing a uniform — or having once worn a uniform — doesn’t make someone uniquely qualified to evaluate political candidates.

    No question, service members and veterans have a unique personal stake in politicians’ decisions about whether and when to use military force. But having a unique personal stake in these decisions isn’t the same as having unique wisdom.

    Funny, but that’s the way I feel about those in academia who have no real practical experience outside of their cloistered existence inside the ivy-covered walls, whose only personal stake is worrying about that peer review on a paper. Brooks really just doesn’t like the military – she called us a welfare state a while back.

    The generous benefits we give our military reflect the increasingly reflexive esteem in which we hold the armed forces. Despite (or because of) the dwindling number of Americans who serve or have a close relative who serves, support for the military has become America’s civil religion.

    In part, this is because we recognize that with our all-volunteer military, the few truly do make sacrifices for the many. The punishing deployment tempo of the last decade — not to mention the thousands of military personnel killed and wounded — has wreaked havoc on military families and communities, even as most Americans live lives wholly untouched by terrorism and war.

    But this can’t fully account for the disproportionate benefits we bestow on the military. Plenty of other Americans serve the nation in vital ways — consider public school teachers and nurses — and plenty of other Americans, from fishers to fire-fighters, have dangerous jobs. We don’t seem inclined to fling free health care and housing in the direction of teachers or fire-fighters, though.

    She claims to be married to an Army officer, Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Mouer, but, I’d advise him to sleep with one eye open. She doesn’t like military folks no matter what we do, or what we know. Or maybe she’s just a tiny bit jealous of the fact that our opinions are more valuable to Americans than those of a petty little teacher in a second-rate school.

  • The University of Chicago and free expression

    The University of Chicago sent a letter out to it’s incoming students explaining to them that the University will be a forum for ideas, not a megaphone for students – that they shouldn’t expect “trigger warnings”.

    “Our commitment to academic freedom means that we do not support so-called ‘trigger warnings,’ we do not cancel invited speakers because their topics might prove controversial and we do not condone the creation of intellectual ‘safe spaces’ where individuals can retreat from ideas and perspectives at odds with their own,” Ellison said in the letter, which was obtained by Inside Higher Ed. “Diversity of opinion and background is a fundamental strength of our community. The members of our community must have the freedom to espouse and explore a wide range of ideas.”

    UofC history professor John Boyer, who wrote a book “Academic Freedom and the Modern University: The Experience of the University of Chicago” which accompanied the letter to students says this discussion isn’t new in human history;

    The point of his book, he says, and the reason the school wanted students to read it, is that “the questions about academic freedom are as old as university education itself. This goes back to the German universities of the 19th century. It originated in Europe, was adopted by Americans and amplified through the lens of our First Amendment. It’s a perennial issue.”

    Of course, New Republic had a conniption fit charging that the letter violates free speech;

    Ellison’s letter is a perverse document. It’s very much like the French Burkini ban: an illiberal policy justified in the name of liberal values. As CUNY historian Angus Johnston notes, “There’s no college in the country where profs are required to give trigger warnings. They’re all voluntary pedagogical choices. Which means a professor’s use of trigger warnings isn’t a threat to academic freedom. It’s a MANIFESTATION of academic freedom.”

    Johnston is exactly on-point. Prior to Ellison’s letter, University of Chicago professors had the right to use trigger warnings or not use them. Now, if a professor decides to use them, he or she will face administrative opposition. Academic freedom means that professors get to design their syllabus, not administrators like Ellison. His letter is a prime example of how the outcry against “political correctness” often leads to policy changes that limit free speech.

    Of course, the letter violates the tenets of the 1962 Port Huron Statement, the plan by Tom Hayden and the hippies to take over the education establishment to guide the country Left. The Chicago letter is a speed bump on that journey.

  • TCU boots vet from Journalism class for his opinion

    GDContractor sends us a link to a story at Hypeline about a disabled veteran and student, Matthew Monahan, who was booted from a Journalism class at Texas Christian University because the teacher of the particular class decided that Matthew’s class assignment was “dark, offensive and inappropriate”. I’m not sure we’re getting the whole story, but then the University isn’t answering any questions.

    The University sent a detective from the University’s police unit to investigate the incident. They told the police that Monahan had been confrontational and indignant during a class discussion of his blog post, but there are no details of that discussion – only the emotional reaction of the teacher, Ms. Melita Garza. The police note in their report (at the Hypeline link) that Monahan had no prior offenses and that he was completely cooperative with the officer and the school’s administration. The teacher, however disagreed;

    The professor gave the student an “F” on the blog post. Then the professor reported the disabled student veteran to the department chair stating, “the student’s degrading references to women and disturbing video elicited concerns for my safety,” the professor said. “I was concerned about the safety of other students in the course, most of whom were women.”

    Now, if it’s true that the teacher’s assessment was about the blog post that I linked above, I don’t see what she’s talking about. The “disturbing video” is just an interview with the two female soldiers who graduated from Ranger School last year – I don’t know what could be disturbing about it. But then, I never did understand Leftists’ tendency towards hyperbole when it comes to their feelings.

    Like I said, we’re probably not hearing the whole story, but then the University isn’t being cooperative in giving us their side, so what are we to do? They should say something because, at this point they look like a-holes who don’t like disabled veterans.

  • Special snowflakes incapable of viewing reality

    Special snowflakes incapable of viewing reality

    Back in the day, adults went to college in order to assimilate themselves into the real world, but in this day and age, children go to college to dictate to the real world their feelings and biases. Take for example, the movie “American Sniper”, an accurate portrayal of a portion of the life of one American, Chris Kyle. I haven’t seen it yet, so I won’t comment on the content. But, you know who else hasn’t seen it, but feels a need to comment on the content? The Muslim Students’ Association and the Students Allied for Freedom and Equality. They protested to the University of Michigan’s Center for Campus Involvement which was screening the movie for the student body. The special little snowflakes/sparkle ponies complained that a screening of the movie would make them fell unsafe on campus, after everyone sees the movie;

    The online memo, titled a “collective letter from Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) and Muslim students on campus,” accused the public university of “tolerating dangerous anti-Muslim and anti-MENA propaganda” by showing the movie, the highest grossing film of 2014

    […]

    “Chris Kyle was a racist who took a disturbing stance on murdering Iraqi civilians,” the collective letter stated. “Middle Eastern characters in the film are not lent an ounce of humanity and watching this movie is provocative and unsafe to MENA and Muslim CollectiveLetter students who are too often reminded of how little the media and world values their lives. … The University of Michigan should not participate in further perpetuating these negative and misleading stereotypes.”

    As near as I can tell, these students are further perpetuating the notion that all Muslims are terrorists who only harbor hatred towards the American military, because those were the only people from whom Chris Kyle sought to protect the American troops. like I said, I haven’t seen the movie, I read the book and that’s what I got from the book.

    And, by the way, since the movie is a blockbuster hit, the screening on campus probably isn’t the only place folks can see the movie – so, if they’re going to feel threatened by folks who see the movie, they had better move to country where the movie hasn’t been shown.

    It seems to me that there should be a place where a rational discussion could take place among intelligent adults about the movie and the supposed stereotypes portrayed therein. But apparently, a college campus is not that place. A college campus is place where spoiled little brats threaten to hold their collective breath until their collective face turns blue until they get their way and they can censor discussions with their little tantrums.

    The reply to the little letter from the intolerant Muslim Students from the Center for Campus Involvement was pretty sad, too;

    “We deeply regret causing harm to members of our community, and appreciate the thoughtful feedback provided to us by students and staff alike.”

    I deeply regret that colleges are being run by the inmates and that they consider rational discussion to be harmful.

    It’s been my experience that many Muslims aren’t very tolerant of dissent. I’ve seen them attack people who counter-protest their little tantrums. Of course, the police will break up the fights but they don’t arrest the criminals who attack others who peacefully express their opinions. They use our tolerance of minority opinions against us to effectively silence opposition opinions.

    UPDATED: I wrote the above last night and there seems to have been a change in the decision; the University has decided that they’ll screen the movie;

    University Vice President for Student Life E. Royster Harper called the decision to cancel the Friday night showing a “mistake” in a statement.

    “The initial decision to cancel the movie was not consistent with the high value the University of Michigan places on freedom of expression and our respect for the right of students to make their own choices in such matters,” Harper said. “The movie will be shown at the originally scheduled time and location.”

    Nice to see that there are some smarter people in charge of stuff.

  • Free community college proposed by President

    While our national defense is being slashed to the bone, the President announced yesterday on Facebook that he’s going to propose that the government will pay for a community college education for everyone who “works for it”.

    Post by The White House.

    The White Hose blog details the plan;

    The requirements:

    What students have to do: Students must attend community college at least half-time, maintain a 2.5 GPA, and make steady progress toward completing their program.

    What community colleges have to do: Community colleges will be expected to offer programs that are either 1) academic programs that fully transfer credits to local public four-year colleges and universities, or 2) occupational training programs with high graduation rates and lead to in-demand degrees and certificates. Community colleges must also adopt promising and evidence-based institutional reforms to improve student outcomes.

    What the federal government has to do: Federal funding will cover three-quarters of the average cost of community college. Participating states will be expected to contribute the remaining funds necessary to eliminate the tuition for eligible students.

    Well, you know what? We already pay for a substandard education in our public schools – an education that would negate the need for Community Colleges if our government teachers did their jobs. This will be an excuse for them to do even less teaching. What does a GPA even mean anymore?

    As I’ve written here before, I went to college twenty years after I graduated from high school and I didn’t learn or do anything differently than I had learned in high school. That’s called education inflation. I knocked out my first year of college with CLEP tests because I took college prep classes in high school.

    So the troops are taking pay cuts to fund this completely useless social program. The Defense Department wants to scrap weapons programs like the A-10 so that the government can hand everyone a 2-year college degree that won’t be worth the paper it’s printed on. But the teachers’ unions will stand and applaud, and that’s what really counts.

    I’m pretty sure that the “everyone who is willing to work for it” will turn into “it’s my “right” to get a free college education” within a few months.

  • A foolproof degree plan

    Once again a liberal academic has gone off the rails and made it clear to the world that she hates Republicans with this published pronouncement:

    I hate Republicans, I can’t stand the thought of having to spend the next two years watching Mitch McConnell, John Boehner, Ted Cruz, Darrell Issa or any of the legions of other blowhards denying climate change, thwarting immigration reform or championing fetal ‘personhood.’

    Mind you now that this is a department head at a taxpayer-funded institution of higher learning, meaning that her salary and benefits are siphoned equally from citizens, be they Democrats or Republicans.

    Unfortunately for us conservatives, we have no choice where our taxes go when it comes to funding academia, a huge boil on the greater conservative bottom. To realize that the taxes we work so hard to pay are funneled to academic institutions where the entire left spectrum, from mere liberalism to hardcore communism, is the only acceptable political philosophy is a huge pain in the nationwide conservative populace that dominates this country from border to border and ocean to ocean, with but a few coastal liberal enclaves, heavily black and Hispanic areas, and Indian reservations – and, of course, the major academic centers.

    One look at that map tells you that the huge, productive mass of America is opposed to the licentious, lubricious, and liberal views of those coastal elites who wield huge power through the wealth they have extracted from the labors of those of us who populate that huge eminence between their affluent seaside castles in the air erected out there on the friendly-to-few fringe they have priced out of reach for the rest of us.

    This University of Michigan department head who feels so comfortable and confident in her union-backed, tenured position to the extent she can make such an inflammatory public pronouncement may just have stepped on her tender academic appendage. Quite simply, any Republican or conservative student enrolled in any of her department’s degree programs should immediately submit a letter to the dean of students, the chancellor, the Michigan governor, or whomever – perhaps all the above – with a clearly stated warning that if said student does not receive favorable grades until graduation, then litigation based on systemic bias will follow. With such clearly stated bias by the head of the department, it looks to me like UM campus conservatives and Republicans seeking degrees in communications have a foolproof degree plan.

    Crossposted at American Thinker