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Jewish World Review April 27, 2001/ 5 Iyar, 5761
Marianne M. Jennings
http://www.jewishworldreview.com --
DAVID HOROWITZ, former leftie and Black Panther, created a ruckus with
his "10 reasons reparations for slavery are wrong" ad in college newspapers.
Horowitz is a brave man to confront this aggressive generation raised in day
care centers where graham cracker lines turned every toddler into a marauding
warrior.
But the fearless Mr. Horowitz visits campuses to explain his ad and
position. He came to my campus, Arizona State University, last week. His
sponsors, College Republicans and the Federalist Society, had their fliers
torn down. There was no outrage when this censorship was reported in the
campus newspaper. Moreover, because my daughter was quoted in that story
about working to replace destroyed fliers, a physics professor called for her
punishment for "vandalism" in posting the fliers. Apparently the laws of
physics don't apply sanctions uniformly.
The student government withdrew funding for the event. The
African-American studies department, along with the critical thinkers of the
law school, and other la-la land patrons scheduled a debate on Mr. Horowitz's
ideas during his speech. I must try this critical thinking thing for debate
without your opponent sounds inviting.
Horowitz still drew a crowd that required expansion into the full
ballroom to accommodate 250 more who topped the planned 250 capacity. The
turnout was a record for a university event with no funding. There is a
hunger for differing views on campus.
As students filed in, you could see and smell political leanings. Women
with no mascara - trouble. Men with bandanas on their heads - trouble with a
capital "T." Women with Toni Morrison novels and the new Cliff notes for
them -- grand Poohbahs of trouble. Greenies are easily detected by odor --
clean is limited to forests and rivers. Conservative students are easy to
spot -- they have books.
The spoiled liberal brats were in full tantrum mode. When the College
Republicans' president, a son of Syrian immigrants, began the meeting with
the pledge of allegiance, mockery reigned. Many remained seated smirking at
the flag and country that gave them their Pell grants and free condoms at the
health center.
The petulants interrupted Mr. Horowitz countless times with inane shouts
of rote demagoguery. These are programmed automatons trained on a campus
that knows only one ideology and indoctrinates its mentally frail charges
accordingly.
Had conservative students behaved the same at the conflicting, albeit
unilateral, Horowitz event, they would be disciplined for hate speech. Civil
discourse is now but a soliloquy of one-sided views slathered with emotings.
Mr. Horowitz opted for written questions- a process that works because
there is something about literacy that hones the thought processes. The
Birkenstock crowd would have none of that. Fed a steady diet of Jerry
Springer, they opted to stand on chairs and point fingers rap style as they
shouted eloquently, "You shut up," and "Liar."
Their thoughts and conduct speak volumes about their training. They lack
the ability to listen and analyze. As I lawyer I witnessed the first time
questions were non-responsive. Mr. Horowitz wanted them to examine the
sources of oppression. They wanted money.
And the more Mr. Horowitz cited facts, the more agitated they became.
Facts drive liberals to irrational behavior. Mr. Horowitz suggested that
minorities' lack of education and resulting loss in earning power might be
attributed to the domination of inner city school boards and councils by
blacks and minorities. He pointed to the D.C. schools, the $11,000 per
student spending there and the still dismal performance of minority students.
He cited social promotion in LA schools with the resulting release of
illiterate minority students into the work force for a doomed future. The
shouters asked for his source. He gave it to them - LA Times, Jan. 20, 2000
(the article notes that if social promotions were halted there over 350,000
mostly minority students would be held back). They called him a racist. The
shouting increased. Mr. Horowitz left abruptly.
I have long known that college campuses do not promote the exchange of
ideas. My colleagues fuel the fires of oppression with fiction and suppress
fact. The pent-up frustration of students' resulting inability to reason was
palpable in that room. Horowitz stood as the intellectual superior to
arrogant brats who don't see the magnitude of their ignorance let alone the
role that the free exchange of ideas plays in resolution of issues.
The irony is that the lefties declared victory. As they should. They
squelched free speech. They ignored facts. From torn fliers to shouting,
they won. Long live tolerant liberals. Long live vacuous reasoning. Long
live the memory of the Horowitz event for the injustices those who seek
compensation have heaped upon
04/20/01: First, let's kill all the tests
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