<p>And now we have the facebook angle…</p>
<p><a href=“http://media.www.columbiaspectator.com/media/storage/paper865/news/2006/10/06/News/Investigation.To.Look.At.Facebook-2336662.shtml?sourcedomain=www.columbiaspectator.com&MIIHost=media.collegepublisher.com[/url]”>http://media.www.columbiaspectator.com/media/storage/paper865/news/2006/10/06/News/Investigation.To.Look.At.Facebook-2336662.shtml?sourcedomain=www.columbiaspectator.com&MIIHost=media.collegepublisher.com</a></p>
<p>I had originally thought perhaps most of the bad behavior came from nonstudents. But now it is clear that leaders of certain Columbia and Barnard student organizations are talking out of both sides of their mouths regarding the incident:</p>
<p>"Adhemir Romero, CC '07 and president of the Chicano Caucus, issued a statement on behalf of the executive board Wednesday night expressing regret that the protesters had silenced Gilchrist. But Karina Garcia, CC '07 and the group’s political chair, was seen on the stage and quoted in a statement by the ANSWER Coalition, an anti-war group that supports immigrant rights.</p>
<p>‘Let tonight be a model for others around the country. And let it be a lesson to the Minutemen: wherever they go, they will be confronted," Garcia told ANSWER. "We have an obligation to the millions of immigrants in this country who are being demonized and targeted by the Minutemen, KKK, and other racists.’"</p>
<p><a href=“http://media.www.columbiaspectator.com/media/storage/paper865/news/2006/10/06/News/Students.Strategize.In.Wake.Of.Brawl-2336664.shtml?sourcedomain=www.columbiaspectator.com&MIIHost=media.collegepublisher.com[/url]”>http://media.www.columbiaspectator.com/media/storage/paper865/news/2006/10/06/News/Students.Strategize.In.Wake.Of.Brawl-2336664.shtml?sourcedomain=www.columbiaspectator.com&MIIHost=media.collegepublisher.com</a></p>
<p>L-W,</p>
<p>-Who here described Columbia as a “far left-wing campus”?</p>
<p>-Who called for bringing “out the nicksticks and crack any heads within arms reach”?</p>
<p>-Who said they “condemn President Bollinger and the entire university community”?</p>
<p>Perhaps you are simply engaged in your own somewhat eccentric debate over the matter?
I know at Dartmouth the University advised canceling classes during the immigration rally on campus so liberal students could protest without pain or loss of grade. That was quite accomadating, don’t you think? </p>
<p>The point is that there is a persistent atmosphere at most universities conducive to the stifling of free speech and it does not come from conservatives. The “book-burners” here are uniformly liberal. </p>
<p>Really, it’s just taken for granted at this point that protesting and disrupting conservative speakers on campus is not only accepted but de rigueur.
…but of course you do!</p>
<p>O.K. Foutain Siren, I’ll bite, because that’s really your motivation, right? I like to believe that I am a person who speaks from a critical analysis or personal observation. That being said, you should order cable TV so like myself, you could have watched Bill O’Reilly make the statements I posted [with the exception of “cracking heads”, that is my own poetry that interpreted HIS motivation].</p>
<p>Idmom, I read the Spectator and I agree with you that the student leader quoted is a bit ‘weak in the knees’ ethically. I am altogether not surprised to learn of the participation of the International Socialist Organization, don’t know 'em but no doubt they are akin to the Spartacus Youth League of yore.</p>
<p>That display of stupidity – and intelligent people can do stupid things – does much to set back the liberal cause. I thought liberals were in general opposed to war, and violence too. Well, here, when an opportuniy presents itself, they fail to follow their own preachings. </p>
<p>“What we have here is a failure to communicate” – and good communication requires intelligence – not fists.</p>
<p>Well said Leanid. He’s another line from the same film that should bring sobriety to the intolerant; “I got my mind right, boss.” LOL.</p>
<p>Ooops!!! Should have typed …“Here’s another line…”</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>L-W,</p>
<p>My motivation comes from being a student-editor/writer for a conservative campus newspaper that is routinely attacked by slap-happy liberals: From thievery, to protests, to physical intimidation. </p>
<p>Members of the Dartmouth Review staff have been permanently suspended (overturned by real New Hampshire courts) for nowhere near the type of “protest” mounted by campus liberals at Columbia–on two occasions for “Vexatious exchange” (means, ‘speaking out of turn’). I’m not that concerned about Mr Gilchrist or the “Minutemen” (I don’t like them, or approve of their cause). I’m far more interested in what these “events” represent to the discourse of conservative students on campus. </p>
<p>These professional speakers will move on, they have already had, I suspect, their college years and now live in a world of moderation as radical as they want it to be (that is, off campus). I don’t know, but I’m willing to bet that by normal standards your college-age student is liberal by disposition, age and up-bringing. In any case, I doubt they are a conservative on campus. If they were, you would have heard stories about the subtle and not so subtle intimidation that exists. For me, it is as often as not a good challenge…but this is not the case for everyone.</p>
<p>This subtle intimidation is fueled by the antics of hooligans and their applauding galleries. These “events” fuel and embolden the spirit of intimidation on campus. I myself have had real instances of such intimidation, from being threatened by a group of guys while doing my part to distribute our little paper, to receiving hateful emails replete with caricatures and intimidation to being chastised by liberal professors. </p>
<p>It’s real. These knuckleheads and their galleries at Columbia just did it with the cameras rolling: </p>
<p>Now, what do you think they do when they are not on camera? </p>
<p>…sleep?</p>
<p>The elite Universities like Columbia have a long tradition of suppression of conservative ideas and thought. It is nothing new. That’s why liberals on campus feel empowered to enforce their views by any means necessary, and to take away the right of free speech from those that disagree with them.
Read “God and Man at Yale” by William Buckley. It was written a long time ago, but talks about this very issue. Things have not changed much.</p>
<p>Good point - and because it has been tolerated if not encouraged by the faculty/administration it may well be that students feel it is Not-Columbia to do otherwise. Ah, tradition DOES exist there - lol.</p>
<p>Lake W - I never go after mispsellings. ; ) – signed The Grammar NotSee.</p>
<p>FountainSiren, it does my heart good every time I read your posts. My S is a '10 at Dartmouth and I hope he will someday make your acquaintance. During all his high school years he was harassed by teachers and students alike for his conservative views, and took into account the existence of the Dartmouth Review in his choice to attend because he hoped it meant that conservative opinions were tolerated at Dartmouth a least a little. However, on a different (but I think related) topic, S was more than a bit disturbed by the flying of the Gay Pride flag on the stage during convocation (the Dartmouth flag was on the other side of the stage). It is one thing for a campus community to be tolerant of different views, but IMO it is quite another for a college administration to endorse one view in so public a fashion.</p>
<p>Thanks, GFG.</p>
<p>But please don’t get me wrong…my selfish-side wouldn’t change things as they are at Dartmouth for the world: What an education!</p>
<p>Tell your son the Review offices are open to everyone.</p>
<p>FS:
</p>
<p>Perhaps they do typical college student stuff. Study, go to concerts, flirt, party together, play in an orchestra, participate in a sport, go to a football game, hang in each other’s rooms…How 'bout you FS? What do you do when you aren’t on camera?</p>
<p>In another article, it states that the same group is hosting a representative from the PLO next Wednesday. Who wants to start taking bets that there will be no rush onto the stage, the speaker will not be molested, and he will get his points out?</p>
<p>Off camera, I would do the same things I would do if I were on camera, more or less.</p>
<p>Do you think the same logic applies to your kith & kin, weenie?</p>
<p>I’m not hateful, violent and aggressive on or off camera. I dont seek to stifle debate or try to put my hands over other people’s eyes, or fingers in their ears to keep them ideologically pure.</p>
<p>How about you?</p>
<p>Would you be a hypocrite on camera, or more or less as you are off camera?</p>
<p>Ive been on the other end of their off-camera hi-jinx on occasion, but believe and rationalize as you will. Youre clearly quite good at it.</p>
<p>The video was disgusting. I don’t understand, why were arrests not made? I imagine if a sporting event was interrupted by a group charging the field, arrests would be made.</p>
<p>Why no arrests? Ooh, ooh I know – because it was an intellectual exchange?</p>
<p>This “shouting down my opponent” nonsense has become common behavior by folks of varioius political stripes at Columbia, so I sadly anticipate the same intolerant conduct at the upcoming event about Palestine. The potential for confrontation attracts non-student ideologues as well as bullies among the student body, as was the case in the notorious classroom confrontation a few months ago.</p>
<h1>38 LakeWashington</h1>
<p>I very much doubt there will be the same type of intolerant conduct at THAT upcoming event, unless it’s anti-Palestine. Then you will have CAIR on the doorstep, seething and whining about the mischaracterization of Arabs and Muslims, and in general doing their best to hush up free speech, as they are wont to do.</p>
<p>Exactly.</p>
<p>2 years ago they had the “Palestine solidarity conference” at Duke. This is supposedly run by a student organization, but in reality it’s a front that allows extreme radicals onto campus to broadcast their views, including the concept that the return of occupied territories should include all of present day Israel. As a Duke parent I was very concerned about this, and felt that this “organization” should have been exposed for what it is, and not allowed on campus. However the conference went forward, and it was peaceful, with some mild protests, but nothing of the sort described at Columbia.
Imagine what would have occurred if a group with such radical ideas on the right would have had such a “conference”. </p>
<p>The emotional violent and combative confrontation comes almost exclusively from the left. They don’t want others to hear words that disagree with their views. Kind of reminiscent of the USSR, isn’t it?</p>