Posted on 01/20/2006 11:31:22 AM PST by flixxx
Censoring Liberal Professors Susan Estrich Friday, Jan. 20, 2006 It is one of the worst ideas to hit academia: paying students to tape their professors, in the hopes of discouraging their expression of views that one side considers to be "radical."
Most alumni associations aim to improve their alma maters. But the Bruin Alumni Association – an unofficial group, not to be confused with the official UCLA Alumni Association – seems determined to do just the opposite. If it has its way, the classroom will no longer be a place where students and faculty can discuss ideas freely. Shame on them.
The Bruin Alumni Association's new project offers students $100 to tape-record the classes of certain professors who have been designated by the organization. While the organization claims to be concerned about radicals of any stripe, its "Dirty 30" consists entirely of liberals who have signed petitions that are "anti-Bush, anti-Israel, antiwar" or against Bush's judicial appointees.
The program, according to UCLA, violates the official university rules, which bar taping classroom lectures without a professor's permission. But that is the least of it. It violates not only the professor's academic freedom but also that of every student in the classroom. Imagine asking a question, or expressing a point of view, knowing that a fellow student is taking detailed notes and taping the class for purposes of monitoring the slant of everything that is said – in the name of political correctness.
Are there more liberals than conservatives teaching in America's top universities? Probably.
Are there more conservatives than liberals running America's top companies? Probably.
Is there room at UCLA for an organization to provide mentoring and support for Republican students? Certainly. Could such an organization help conservative students organize campus activities, bring speakers to campus, even provide backup for students so they feel more comfortable speaking up in class? Why not?
But the Bruin Alumni Association doesn't stop there. Its Web site comes complete with the very sort of diatribes it would be the first to condemn if posted by others. It aims to engage in the very sort of content-based review of lecture notes that would violate not only the rules of academic freedom but also the mandates of the First Amendment if posted by any official university group. It would have students restricting the private political activity of faculty members, also in violation of the First Amendment, again in the name of the free exchange of ideas.
Jim Rogan, the former congressman, Clinton prosecutor and UCLA alum, in resigning from the organization in protest, pointed out that he didn't need a Web site to tell him there were plenty of liberals on the UCLA faculty. But he didn't sign up to silence them, either. Hear, hear.
I've been teaching for 25 years, the last 15 at the University of Southern California. In my classrooms, I have only three hard and fast rules. No political correctness. Every point of view is not only welcome but also essential to a full discussion. Nothing said in the classroom leaves the classroom. If you don't agree with something, you argue the other side. I've never had a complaint in 25 years.
I suppose I should be pleased at the self-destructiveness of our competitors down the road. But it pleases me not at all to see freedom threatened from any direction, conservative or liberal.
Balance is not the issue here. Freedom and open discussion are. Professors who can't keep their politics out of the classroom need to be addressed by the administration, not by student and alumni censors. As for alums, those who love their school and care about its students should find a better way of showing it.
COPYRIGHT 2006 CREATORS SYNDICATE INC.
Orwell called this newspeak. Exactly the opposite effect will transpire when students are allowed to voice views that contradict the radical left spewings of these "professors" without fear of recrimination.
If Estrich is screaming about it it's easy to figure out who's ox is being gored.
BS. Those colleges are paid by students and tax payers.
Maybe for the same reason the NY Public School system didn't want parents to see the new history books they were buying?
"Are there more liberals than conservatives teaching in America's top universities? Probably.
Are there more conservatives than liberals running America's top companies? Probably."
So - - companies are providing the money for these Communist propagandist professors to tear apart the United States?
UCLA - - - ACLU - - - -hmmm.
I express a lot of points of view in my classroom, and I let students tape everything I say. (As a matter of courtesy, I think a student should ask first.) Why say something to a roomful of people if you wish to hide it?
And the administrators will be sure to look into the allegations as soon as they are done revising the latest campus speech rules that deem conservative ideas to be hate speech.
Are there more conservatives than liberals running America's top companies? Probably.
Those that can, do. Those that can't, teach.
I disagree. Maybe the profs will stay on the subject.
The liberal tool of word redefinition is a perennial favorite.
Here's a clue: Exposure is not censorship! Look up the words.
I think Estrich needs to write another book, go on The Factor, and be completely destroyed again by O'Reilly.
She's a lying bitch. She's infamous around USC Law School for being a shrieking, shrewish harpy who never forgets a slight and uses grades as a weapon for payback.
Every point of view welcome? How many law students are going to risk the wrath of the wicked witch of the west when the mega-bucks legal careers are in her hands? Nobody. That's who.
I don't really understand. I taped my lectures during most of college, because I had a severe tendonitis problem, and couldn't take notes. I never had to get "permission".
last year it seemed like susan estrich was on fox news a dozen times a day......i found every fox news email address i could find (some just so her fellow employees at the station could have a good laugh) and sent a short, simple email stating every time i saw susan estrich i changed the channel.
(Professors who can't keep their politics out of the classroom need to be addressed by the administration, not by student and alumni censors. )
Herein lies the problem. The administration has failed miserably in its duty to police the professors. It's time for external pressure. The light of day is the best disinfectant.
Sir, iot is so obvious that you are a conservative, and NOT a liberal prof who wants to censor other opinions while protecting your own desire to indoctrinate students. Bravo for you. I hope that you soon get tenured and continue to practice true academic freedom. The Lib profs definitely do NOT think like you.
Sorry, Susan. The College Left's Tenured Radical days of immunity are OVER.
I have always taped my professors lectures after portable tape recorders were available.
I then replay the lecture to be sure I did not forget a great point.
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