The campus reaction

Now the far right is demanding withdrawal of support to those universities and their Aleftist@ professors that do not Atoe the line@ with the Aproper@ perspective on the world (AThink tank=s list includes quote from LV woman,@ Las Vegas Review-Journal, November 30).  A group calling themselves AThe Academic Council of Trustees and Alumni@ (Lynne Cheney, wife of VP Dick Cheney, and Joe Lieberman, D-Conn. founded the organization in 1996 - strange bedfellows indeed, demonstrating once again how close the two parties are on most issues), apparently put together a list of quotes from various colleges and universities across the country in the wake of the September 11 attacks.  In a report called AHow Our Universities Are Failing America and What Can Be Done About It,@ they concluded from a very non-scientific survey of quotes (all, of course, taken out of context) that the university system in the U.S. fails to support the official party line about our reaction to the terrorist attacks.  According to the RJ article the fact that some faculty Ainvoked tolerance and diversity as antidotes to evil@ supports terrorism!

The group wants us to return to the teaching of the Abasics@ of American history and heap praise on all the good things we have done over the years.  Are they claiming that this is not already done in the majority of university courses?  If what they claim is true, then America should be flooded with masses of left-wing college graduates, marching in huge numbers, demanding the end to America=s version of terrorism around the globe and here at home!  There should be literally millions of protestors standing in front of CNN headquarters, the Pentagon, the White House, Capitol Hill and every state capitol, not to mention the headquarters of every Fortune 500 corporation!   What do we find instead?  What we find are very quiet college campuses, no protests to speak of (save for a few minor ones in traditional places like Berkeley) and an 80%+ support of the current Awar on terrorism.@  So what are they worried about?  Why should they draw such a distorted conclusion, after a mere unrepresentative sampling of quotes from a few, scattered college professors, students and members of the general public (the quote from a Las Vegas woman is interesting, since she is not even a member of the academic community)?

What concerns me - and should concern all open-minded citizens who cherish our Constitution and the Bill of Rights - is that this sort of paranoia (and that is what it is) is reminiscent of the McCarthy Era when any sort of protest, any statement that could be narrowly interpreted as meaning one was a Acommunist@ resulted in gross violations of our rights.  What these zealots seem to want is, ironically, what they claim to be fighting against, namely, a repression of freedom of thought and action.  They don=t want a truly free society, where people can say and think what they want.  They don=t want anyone to be able to act as true citizens, in the honorable tradition of what the founding fathers wanted, namely, to be responsible enough to dare challenge the government and all of our elected officials, lest they trample on the very rights they claim to support.  No, what these groups want is total capitulation to the Aparty line.@

The group apparently wants universities to Areturn to the basics@ which, according to the RJ article, Aincludes rigorous, broad-based courses on the great works of Western Civilization as well as courses on American history, and America=s continuing struggle to extend and defend the principles on which it was founded.@  The first part of this idea I can agree with, the last part is nothing more than religious-style proselytizing.  But what is truly appalling to me is that if courses were in fact Arigorous@ and Abroad-based@ and really did include the great works of Western Civilization, they would have to include the good with the bad, and of course include the standard works of Karl Marx (or do they just want us all to use the Bible?), Eric Fromm, Bertrand Russell and all the other great philosophers and historians.  Such Abroad-based@ courses might include such topics as how America virtually stole Native American lands (and then commenced to commit what amounted to genocide), plus all the land we took from Mexico, and of course the kidnapping of African slaves, the murder and assault and in some cases deportation of American workers who just wanted decent pay and benefits from the greedy owners (the union movement), the assault on women who just wanted to vote, the denial of basic rights for African-Americans for almost 100 years after the end of slavery, and on and on it goes.  A Abroad-based@ perspective would have to include some of the critically-acclaimed (yet largely ignored) scholarly books by Noam Chomsky, Michael Parenti and Howard Zinn, all of whom have documented the horrible crimes committed by the American state as we trampled our way all over the globe in search of corporate profits (documented, by the way, by sources inside the government, such as formerly Aclassified@ documents) - Central and South America, Indonesia, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, etc.  

Of course many of those reading this - especially the group that issued this report - will conclude that I am in support of the terrorists, which is an absurd conclusion, since it confuses an attempt to understand and explain something with an excuse.  But groups such as this don=t want to understand, don=t want to try and prevent such atrocities, in order to save lives in the future.  They just want to stay in their little cocoon, remain safe and secure in their delusions.   Well, as a college professor for more than 25 years, I refuse to give in to such bullying tactics and will continue to present a Abroad-based@ perspective in my classes (when I discuss Acrimes@ I will include both ordinary Astreet@ crimes along with the Acrimes@ of American corporations and our government) and I would invite all the skeptics out there to attend any of my classes at any time.