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Joel
Tagert
Columnist
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It’s certainly been an interesting semester. Along with the
usual demands of attending college, the members of our student organization
Creative Resistance, have been working hard to foster debate and change
minds here on campus.
This semester, we’ve seen the good, the bad and the ugly.
The good: progressive presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich. The
bad: David Horowitz and his Academic Bill of Rights. The ugly: personal
attacks and baseless accusations by politically motivated students.
On Sept. 26, we were lucky enough to sponsor a speech on campus by
Dennis Kucinich, the remarkable Ohio congressman running for the Democratic
presidential nomination. I was impressed on this occasion not only
by his usual integrity and passion, but also by his remarkably open
and personable demeanor.
Kucinich spoke about a few of the differences between himself and
the other Democratic candidates: his support for truly universal health
care, his initiatives for peace and his opposition to growing corporate
power, especially NAFTA, the WTO and the proposed Free Trade Area
of the Americas (about which two Creative Resistance officers traveled
to Miami to protest).
Even as we were wrapping up Dennis’ visit, we were gearing
up for David Horowitz’s upcoming speech at the Tivoli Turnhalle.
Horowitz was here in part to push for his Academic Bill of Rights,
which State Senate President John Andrews was (and is) seeking to
codify as legislation.
The Academic Bill of Rights is a carefully parsed work of political
doublespeak, which seeks to co-opt the language of civil rights and
free speech to instill fear and control curriculums in our schools.
Working with the Rocky Mountain Progressive Network, we assisted
in organizing a press conference in opposition to Horowitz’s
views and ABOR. One of the speakers at that event was student body
president Felicia Woodson, who spoke in defense of free speech on
campus.
We were dismayed to learn later that certain groups, including internal
factions in the Student Government Assembly, were seeking to use Woodson’s
speech as a justification for her dismissal as president. I continue
to feel that she was perfectly correct in exercising her right to
speak at that event.
I also feel that the SGA was wrong to conduct its hearing to remove
Woodson from office behind closed doors, and I hope in the future
that the SGA will seek greater transparency in their deliberations.
As something of a follow-up, on Nov. 18, I watched a debate at the
Multicultural Lounge in the Tivoli regarding the Academic Bill of
Rights. It was telling that, when cornered, Ryan Call (of David Horowitz’s
Students for Academic Freedom) made clear the right’s real agenda
here: taking control of curriculums away from professors and putting
it in the hands of Metro’s Republican-appointed Board of Trustees.
Also telling was columnist Nick Bahl’s very personal attack
on Dr. Oneida Meranto, published as a letter in this paper on Nov.
13, just prior to the ABOR debate.
Bahl’s letter was very disheartening to me. First, it signified
an editorial failure on the part of the Met staff. They were so uncomfortable
with Nick’s invective that they decided to publish it as a letter
rather than a column. But a newspaper need not publish every letter
it receives; and surely such a smear job should have been a candidate
for the trash. In any case, it should at least have followed the five
hundred-word limit on letters imposed on everyone else.
Much more disheartening, though, was that Nick’s letter seemed
to be exactly the kind of personal attack ABOR encourages. Of what
relevance to political discourse or academic merit is the quality
of Dr. Meranto’s smile, or that Nick finds her class boring,
or offhand gossipy comments about Meranto taken out of context?
None. These things have no relevance. They are mean-spirited name
calling and nothing more.
I wonder, in all this, if Nick has considered whether he is acting
out of compassion rather than pettiness. Does he actually believe
that he is working for people’s benefit? Or has the question
never crossed his mind?
I think there’s a deep cynicism at work here. It’s a
cynicism which says that the ends justify the means. It’s a
cynicism that says personal attacks are acceptable so long as they
go unpunished. It’s a cynicism that says since everyone is petty
and selfish, then why not be petty and selfish, too?
I would never deny that people are selfish. It’s the nature
of the Self to be selfish. But we have a choice. We can choose to
give in to our selfishness, or we can struggle upwards to selflessness.
We can choose to be petty or we can choose to be visionary.
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