My Life With The Academic Left

FrontPageMagazine.com ^ | January 15, 2004 | Professor Frances B. Cogan

[quadrant]

When i college, I majored in government. Many, though not all, of my professors were left-of-center and opposed to US involvement in Vietnam. As a Vietnam-ear vet sometimes I challenged their opinions. However, most of the time I let their comments pass, even the sillier ones, and for the simple reason that I wanted to graduate, not squabble with the faculty.

Whereas in my day, there were a fair number of professors whose opinions were conservative, now almost all the faculty hold left of center views.

The occasions when I debated faculty members whose views were left wing, I found them willing to listen. Although never willing to change their views, they were willing to admit a mistake, or that I'd had made a valid argument.

Now, it seems the left is not only unwilling to change its views, it is unwilling to listen to opposing points of view. In my opinion, they are authoritarian liberals who are more interested in propaganda than scholarship.

That's why I would major in accounting, if I were a student
today.

Majoring in liberal arts just isn't worth it these days.

[Ciexyz]

This is why I no longer contribute to my alma mater. I'd rather contribute to my church.

[Ciexyz]

Jane Fonda visited my campus, Penn State, at the height of the Vietnam war. I was aghast that student activity funds were expended to pay for her appearance. However, I went to see her just to see what the hoopla was all about. Fonda came in like she was "La Pasionaria", the rabel-rousing rebel. There was only one viewpoint, that the US was wrong. It was disgusting.

[Ciexyz]

Hey -- you're on to something! Let's start a Free Republic University! Why not? Jim can be the Dean!

[Ciexyz]

Message for Jim: a Free Republic university is a workable concept. You could start small, with correspondence courses. I personally would be interested in taking a correspondence course taught by a knowledgeable Freeper conservative. For instance, a course on American constitutional law as viewed by a conservative. A study of the erosion of our right to religious practice and expression. A study of the faith of our founding Fathers and Mothers.

Later, you could move on to degree status. I would support such a concept. It's a thought.

[Billthedrill]

Intense deja vu here - while the author was going through this I was about an hour up the road in Corvallis experiencing the same environment - only I was in uniform at the time. It's hard to fully describe the feeling on campus then - it was literally enemy territory if you were in my situation and you really did have to walk around with eyes in the back of your head.

I was, fortunately for my own intellectual well-being, a Science major, and hence most of the pressure I felt was from my fellow students and not from the faculty, who tended to be largely neutral if not downright sympathetic - those were the days when there actually was a fair percentage of military veterans on the faculty.

Ours was considered the "conservative" campus in the state of Oregon at the time, which was quite a joke to those of us who saw the smoking ruins of the firebombed Air Force ROTC facilities. It may have been worse in Eugene - it probably was - but it was quite bad enough where I was.

I will say this in defense of the liberal arts faculty - some of the most idealistic, liberal members were also the first to come to my defense when I got stomped on for expressing an unpopular opinion, such as that the people I was serving with weren't really mindless automatons who were spitting babies on bayonets. Those faculty members were on the barricades but took pains not to let it become personal, and I'm grateful to them, although they're mostly retired by now - my gracious, this was a third of a century ago!

Things have, if recent experience is any guide, gotten worse - the ideologues that sat next to me are now the ones on the podium, and haven't lost any of the certitude or gained any better knowledge over the years. But I did notice two things - first, that a faculty member who managed to shut up long enough to attain tenure is now considered a maverick when he or she is a defiant conservative, and second, that students still admire and emulate such mavericks. It drives the tenured radicals nuts.

[goodnesswins]

As a former community college board member (elected) I miss my education focus in my life and see the future of most colleges negatively.....but, THIS is SOMETHING I do believe is NEEDED.....there are online classes, I'm wondering if there is a way to tie APPROPRIATE ones into Free Republic and make it work.

[laconic]

A friend of mine left Hungary in the late 1960s rather than serve in the communist army. He studied at Columbia and attended a teach-in by Jane Fonda. When Fonda proclaimed to the cheering students that they'd be "lucky to live under communism some day", he stood up and challenged her on the basis of his own bad "luck". She responded that he didn't know what he was talking about! Fonda and her ex-husband Hayden are VERY bad people who have profiteered off this country and do everything they can to destroy it, in connivance with their Hollywood friends like Barbara (Babwa) Walters who put her on the 100 Most Important American Women list. BTW, she donated $100,000 to the Gore recount effort in Florida which didn't cause a ripple in the mainstream press.

[BartMan1]

No. He has told me to stop sending him any reminders of what campus leftwing nuttiness has done to academia.

The lesbians in his dept are the bane of his existence.

[Jaysun]

BRAVO

[JoeFromSidney]

Hey -- you're on to something! Let's start a Free Republic University!

Look into Yorktown University. It already exists. http://www.yorktownuniversity.com/

Disclaimer: I'm on the faculty.

[IncPen]

You would think that he would view the lesbian's presence as a victory. I'm not surprised, I guess.

[quadrant]

Believe it or not, I believe in a liberal arts education.

It does teach one how to express oneself, verbally and on paper.

It should teach one how to think and reason.

It should foster a sketical mind and encourage debate.

It should teach one an appreciation for the accomplishments of men and women, especially those of one's own culture and history.

From what I've read, few colleges do any of these four.
Perhaps the three colleges you mention have this mission still. If so, I commend their leadership.

[Paul Ross]

Why is it that guys like this (a well-educated professor) are always at a loss to communicate specifically what in the hell they are talking about?

I think the guy is quite sufficiently specific. He has identified in general the subjects that result in censure: I.e., ANYTHING not Left-of-Center...Remember the censorship of Horowitz's views on the Reparations movement, so much so that they even censored PAID-advertising ? Remember the Professor from Columbia? Nicholas De Genova, a Columbia University anthropologist, who infamously told a campus "teach-in" that "I personally would like to see a million Mogadishus" He was not only not atypical, he might be statistically close to the current norm....

In the dreams of the anti-American left, every war is Vietnam. That conflict was their greatest--indeed, their only-- triumph of the 20th century. A divided America lost its will to fight, and the people of South Vietnam lost their chance at freedom. Some folks positively lust for American defeat----while others reflexively reach for the Vietnam analogy every time America goes to war...

[goodnesswins]

Thanks.....I knew there was one like yours out there...wasn't Bill Bennett instrumental in its startup?

[Ciexyz]

http://www.yorktownuniversity.com/
Thanks for the link, I'll check it out!

[Ciexyz]

Disclaimer: I'm on the faculty.

I checked out the web site for Yorktown U. and you're right, the courses are there for students who want a background in government, history, economics and American culture from a conservative point of view.

The fees are reasonable and I'll definitely recommend this web site to others.