Drexel University

Regarding the Fanaticism, Anti-Semitism, Historical Ignorance and Fascist Inclinations of Today’s Pro-Hamas Campus Protesters: Now What?

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

Yes, the giant monster chickens have come home to roost. The academics who have used the past decades to indoctrinate malleable students into their victim-obsessed, intersectional ideology while undermining core American values have spawned mutated anti-Semites who regard terrorism as social justice. If this social pathogen didn’t threaten damage far beyond the campuses of woke educational institutions, I would be tempted to respond, “Good! You broke it, you pay for it.” Unfortunately, what’s going on here is far more ominous and potentially destructive.

Just take the time to read the bonkers manifesto of The Drexel Palestine Coalition (DPC), which set up an encampment on the Drexel campus four days ago. You have to read the whole thing to truly appreciate the dishonesty and delusions of this mob, but here are a few highlights to whet your taste for what George Floyd, cynical wokism, the Squad and a feckless President have wrought inflicted on our society;

  • “Label what is happening in Palestine for what it is: a 76 year long genocide and settler-colonial occupation by the State of Israel”
  • “Criticisms of Israel and Zionism will not be mischaracterized as antisemitic or hateful. Furthermore, speech and imagery that express support for Palestine, Palestinians, and Palestinian liberation must be explicitly characterized as acceptable and supported under the University Code of Conduct.”

In other words, “It isn’t what it is.”

  • “Immediately terminate Henry Israeli, professor of Literature of Genocide and the Director of Jewish Studies…”
  • “Immediately terminate Drexel’s chapter of Hillel, a global zionist campus organization, whose primary purpose, funding, and operations are to facilitate birthright trips to Occupied Palestine”
  • “Abolition of DUPD – Drexel Public Safety should not utilize a police force, private or otherwise, given a demonstrated bias against people of color, specifically Black and brown students and (Black Bottom) community members who are primarily low income Black residents.”
  • “Closure of the Starbucks Cafe located in the Lebow Business School”

Close STARBUCKS???? OK, now they’ve really gone too far.

Demands

Continue reading →

The FIRE’s Ten Worst Colleges For Free Speech, 2018

/ Jack Marshall / 15 Comments

The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (The FIRE) is the heroic non-partisan, non-profit that does a lot of the work the ACLU should be doing, but doesn’t. The list (those with links are the colleges covered in 2017 Ethics Alarms posts):

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (Troy, N.Y.)

Drexel University (Philadelphia, Pa.)

Harvard University (Cambridge, Mass.)

Los Angeles Community College District (Los Angeles, Calif.)

Fordham University (New York, N.Y.)

Evergreen State College (Olympia, Wash.)

Albion College (Albion, Mich.)

Northwestern University (Evanston, Ill.)

University of California, Berkeley (Berkeley, Calif.)

Texas State University (San Marcos, Texas)

The whole, awful story of each is worth reading, especially in light of yesterday’s “Ethics Quote Of The Week.” FIRE does not rank the unethical colleges, but I’ll say this: Evergreen may be the worst of the worst, but Harvard is the most shameful.

The FIRE is one of the great ethics organizations in the nation, and deserves every citizen’s respect, support, and gratitude.

Being Fair To College Student Ideological Idiocy

/ Jack Marshall / 55 Comments

Luckily for him, the bank president who wrote this foolishness in 1969 didn't sign his name to it...

Luckily for him, the bank president who wrote this foolishness in 1969 didn’t sign his name to it…Ah, my old college days!

My attention has been drawn recently to two essays by college students, both presumably sent to me on the theory (or hope) that reading them would kill me. The first, published in the Drexel Triangle (the student paper), argues that stage directors should be prevented from casting actors who look the way the playwright envisioned them. The second, published in the Harvard Crimson, makes an even more disturbing assertion: its author asserts that Harvard should stop guaranteeing professors and students the right to advocate controversial views or pursue research that challenges liberal views and assumptions.

I don’t want to devote the bulk of this post to rebutting these two essays, which are, I think self-rebutting. In the theatrical essay, student actress Alyssa Stover argues that a stage director shouldn’t have the right to decide that, say, casting an Asian dwarf as black boxer Jack Johnson in “The Great White Hope” would lead to a less effective production (that is my example, not hers—she objects to a director of “Cabaret” refusing to cast African-Americans as a matter of historical accuracy):

“These arguments are fundamentally flawed. What the audience wants is almost impossible to measure because the “audience” is composed of anyone who can get a ticket. A director or producer’s right to deny someone a role due to their appearance is debatable because this is a judgment based on one person’s preferences and may not actually create something that is stage worthy. The current status quo allows people to be barred from the stage due to physical “flaws,” as determined by the direction. These judgments are not harmless, and when the issue of race is involved, the problem only gets bigger.” Continue reading →