We just discussed the free speech and academic freedom issues of schools investigating professors for their postings on social media. Now we have A New Jersey college professor who was fired by Essex County College after appearing on “Tucker Carlson Tonight.” Professor Lisa Durden staunchly defended a black-only Black Lives Matter event and caused an uproar of criticism over her highly insulting comments about “white people.”
Durden taught communications and pop culture classes as an adjunct professor and agreed to appear on the June 6th show. Durden came out swinging in the interview and mocked the very notion that whites could object to be excluded from a Black Lives Matter event. Her response to a basic question about racial discrimination was “Listen. What I say to that is boo-hoo-hoo. You white people are angry because you couldn’t use your ‘white privilege’ card to get invited to the Black Lives Matter’s all-black Memorial Day celebration! Wow!”
Durden proceeds to give a rather rambling diatribe in response to the questions. I found her appearance highly disturbing and offensive. However, she was introduced as a BLM supporter and a political commentator. She was not referencing a matter at the college and did not suggest that she was speaking for the college in any way.
College president Anthony Munroe acknowledged that he got a lot of heat about the interview “expressing frustration, concern and even fear that the views expressed by a college employee with influence over students would negatively impact their experience on the campus.” While Durden did not associate herself or her comments with the college Munroe insisted that it did not matter: “her employment with us and potential impact on students required our immediate review into what seemed to have become a very contentious and divisive issue.”
In response to the action, Durden exhibited the same over-heated rhetoric and claimed that she had been “publicly lynched” by the school. She added “I thought it would be a safe place for me. I thought when I came home from war, I would be safe.”
It is often hard to defend free speech when the speaker is displaying hateful or racist sentiments. However, Durden was engaging in the public debate over racial exclusions and raising provocative ideas about race. There was no evidence that she had allowed these sentiments to impact or affect her teaching at the college. As much as I disagree with her views, I do not see how her statements outside of the college should be grounds for termination. Indeed, there is no clear standard for what statements will deemed termination grounds. Instead, it seems like the college is using a “we know it when we see it” approach. That creates an obvious chilling effect on academics who want to participate in the public dialogue over issues like race.
What do you think?
She shouldn’t be fired. Nevertheless I was struck at how hateful, ridiculous and cruel her remarks were. She should be ashamed of what she said. There is no desire on her part to be a good person displayed in this interview. I guess cruelty and stupidity is a game for her, a way to make money and seek fame. That is an ugly way to live. I wish people would repudiate these kinds of choices for their lives.
It’s so much better to try and bridge gaps, be kind, be decent. What a jerk.
A free society will reject and ostracize these racists. They can marinate in their hate with like thinking people, but systematically removing them from our public forums is a must. If the progressive-leaning systems don’t do it themselves, the citizen consumers will. The reversal of this decades long poison is in a break-neck speed reversal. Amazing what can occur when the ‘citizens’ of this country get fed up and rise up. I am thrilled to be around to see it.
I’m surprised Essex county is a huge Dum stronghold maybe other colleges and universities will get rid of these left wingers?
Why has anyone ever thought that one person (a “teacher”) was of a sound enough mental positioning to impart their “knowledge” to others. Sometimes “teachers” and anyone else, say informative things and other times they speak pure BS. Often they themselves cannot tell the difference. It’s up to students and listeners to decide for themselves which comments they hear are useful and which are BS. Never believe anything someone says just because they are paid to be a “teacher” or news commentator.
Blacks suffered immeasurably for centuries at the hands of White Supremacists. White Supremacy continues and Blacks continue to suffer. However, the very people that should be attending BLM events are Whites. Discrimination is discrimination and should never be tolerated. Look at what happened in Israel. We should be moving in the opposite direction and payback is not the same as freedom and equal rights.
issac – who do you think captured those blacks to sell to the whites? It was other blacks and Arabs. In fact, there were a significant number of black slave holders in northern states. Who do you think captured the Irish and sold them to the Arabs? The Vikings. During WWII we forced German POWs to work on farms and ranches because we were low on actual manpower. It was not against the Geneva Convention, only officers didn’t have to do manual labor. And who can forget the bridge over the River Kwai, built by British forced labor.
BTW, the Irish were enslaved by the British earlier and much longer than blacks have been enslaved by whites.
Of course Paul.
Good points! And lets not forget the Jews that were enslaved by the Romans.
lee43 – the Jews were pretty much enslaved by everybody. Richard the Lion-Hearted had to take them under his personal protection to protect them in England.
In fact, there were a significant number of black slave holders in northern states.
Black slaveholders were in Southern states and numbered about 3,000 in a black population of about 4,000,000.
Yes, but they existed, and in Africa, they were ALL African. If we are going to be pedantic. 😛 The point is that we have to move on if we expect to move on. No one is doing this in America *now*. The past is dead.
James – historical accuracy. BTW, sex slavery is a real problem in the USA and other countries.
No, white slavery is a small problem.
DSS – read carefully what I wrote.
Less than 2% of the population owned slaves the peak of slavery around 1860. 28% of freed or free “blacks” owned slaves. Out of the 10 or so million of “slaves” captured in the African continent only 6% went to North America, the majority went to South America, namely Brazil. No Republicans owned slaves.
Less than 2% of the population owned slaves the peak of slavery around 1860. 28% of freed or free “blacks” owned slaves.
There were about 500,000 free colored in 1860., or about 95,000 households given the mean size of households in that era. You’re asserting that 27,000 black households owned slaves, There were about 5.2 million free households in the United States in 1860. You’re asserting that (a) 104,000 households owned slaves of which 27,000 were free negro households. I don’t thinks so.
Your figure of 28% of all households owning slaves is a garbled citation to some figures John Hope Franklin compiled for New Orleans only.
The implications of your contentions regarding slaveholding in general would be that the mean number of slaves owned by a slaveholding household (3.9 million slaves spread over 104,000 households) is that the mean number per slaveholding household is 37 slaves. The conventional figure cited is a mean of 10 slaves per owner.
(John Hope Franklin’s census of North Carolina suggests that negro slaveholders there generally owned fewer than 4, and lists only 3 of 600 who owned more than 10).
“28% of all free negro households. ”
N.B. the free population of the US in 1860 was north of 27 million, assembled into 5.2 million households.
BTW, the Irish were enslaved by the British earlier and much longer than blacks have been enslaved by whites.
What are you talking about? The English conquest of Ireland was a centuries long process. However, it occurred after the disappearance of chattel slavery in England (and contemporary with the gradual dissipation of hereditary subjection generally).
DSS – the English threw the Irish off their own lands and then made them tenants of the new British landowner. They were forced to work for him or starve, which they usually did. Why do you think the Irish hate the British so much?
Again, chattel slavery did not exist in the British Isles after the 11th c. It was pretty unusual therein at the time of the Domesday Book (1087 ad). You had serfdom (which was in decline from about the 14h century onward), feudal dues, and agricultural wage labor. You had them all over Europe. What you did not have was chattel slavery. Angus Maddison’s estimate of income levels in select European countries in 1820 (just prior to Catholic Emancipation in Ireland) does assess Ireland as much less affluent than Britain (incomes about 58% lower), but on a par with Scandinavia and Bohemia.
DSS – whether they were land slaves or wage slaves, the English enslaved the Irish.
Agricultural laborers are not slaves. Neither are sharecroppers.
DSS – You know nothing about agriculture. What was your major?
I don’t do biography on these sites and don’t appreciate your gamesmanship.
Irish peasants were not ‘enslaved’ any more than any other dependent agrarian population in Europe, and, unlike Czech peasants or Russian peasants, were not serfs in 1840. . The experience of impoverished agrarian life seven generations back it isn’t much of a source of political grievance culture most places in Europe today but it has been in Ireland as recently as 40 years ago. Too bad for Ireland.
DSS – I didn’t ask you to give up your virginity, just your credentials. Need to know if you are cut and pasting or worked the fields.
What war did she come home from? Maybe she suffers from PTSD and has an disability discrimination claim.
I think she was shot at by snipers in Bosnia. No, wait. That was somebody else. Never mind.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Clever. I am dumbfounded that the sniper in Bosnia line never got more play in comedic circles. I thought it was a joke for the ages, sort of like Hillary’s gift of humor to the world. We should still be laughing at that line, right.
How’s this for a variation? Replace “if you believe that, I’ve got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you”, with “if you believe that, you’ll believe I landed under sniper fire in Bosnia”.
But the reason is, that the media is reluctant to make fun of leading Democrats. Covfefe gets a lot of coverage, but dang, Obama went to England, and signed in a guest book under the wrong year! How much did you hear about that? There is plenty of material, but like Sharon Atkinson once said, she was pulled off a story so as to not embarrass Obama. Once, several years ago this story came out about Obama stuttering and stammering:
Which utter nonsense caused me to write a sonnet, in proper meter and rhyme scheme, no less!, to the worshipful Obama minions:
I was really proud of that poem! It even had allusions to Chris Matthews, and Bill Clinton in it!
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
It was a cringe worthy interview.
As she represents the company she works for, when you go in the spotlight you must take care to control your demons.
When you are holding a ‘public’ gathering and not a private-invitation only gathering, you need to include everyone that might want to celebrate that idea with you. To do otherwise is true hate.
She is adjunct faculty, she is at will any way. I think the BLM is racist to begin with and anyone who belongs to it are racists. Same goes for the KKK.
Anyone who thinks she is not taking this into the classroom is just silly.
And my take is this: if there were no children in the room; if the impressionable could neither see nor hear the hate-filled, divisive tone of this so-called “educator” – if the kids weren’t listening – one could make a fair case for leniency. But the reality is that this person is contributing in a huge way toward a chasm that grows uglier by the week. And hundreds of thousands of college-age teens are smack in the middle of trying to figure out what’s “normal” and appropriate. Who could believe Durden is in any way part of the solution?
In a wiser society, Free Speech would cease at the point it damages the young. And this woman’s abject distain for harmony – indeed her contempt for White America – is dangerous.
“There was no evidence that she had allowed these sentiments to impact or affect her teaching at the college.”
And I see no evidence this woman would be even remotely disciplined enough to curb her hate-filled rhetoric in a classroom full of teenagers. And that, my friends, adds mightily to the crapification of America.
If she had the discipline to pretend not to express her hatred of white people at work, it would astound me. Tucker is as civil and logical as any television personality working today, always staying on the specific point he invites people to explain themselves about. She had absolutely no such discipline when confronted by Tucker’s logical, simple, questions. She veered wildly outside the realm he kept trying to reel her back into. If she can’t help herself on national television, who could imagine her doing it when she’s in control of a classroom?
The college did what it did because she was damaging to the brand, though, not because she is a hysterical racist. But certainly, she does not have the temperament to teach college classes; perhaps she just gave them the perfect excuse to not renew her contract, which they were itching to do anyway, but feared being accused of racism for doing so.
Everybody has to write something, even if it is wrong.
“‘Tis better to remain silent and thought a fool than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt.”
An effective long term method to reduce racism is to simply don’t talk about it in everyday life. If it is not made to be an issue where all too many things or events are presented under the rubric of racism then over time it will cease to be an issue. But, there are too many opportunists in leadership or positions of influence who have much to gain, or maintain and will keep the injustice in everybody’s face.
Stacey Dash & Morgan Freeman certainly share agreement on these matters.
No, the solution is to be able to talk about it realizing that it is just a stupid idea that we invented and has no actual power over anyone that chooses to actually be conscious and present to life. Words are just words, we bring the rest.
I’m mainly referring to Jonathan Turley here as opposed to the comments here. The general public discussion on racism seems to start with the premise that “white people” get to define it. I’m not in the camp that believe that black people cannot be racist, they can. Having said that, it’s almost amusing to observe all the ways overtly racist things are no longer racist because they have been defined away.
Now, if a racist action isn’t accompanied by racist language and a clear racist intent, it isn’t. The recent killing of a Muslim teenage girl, leaving a Mosque in Muslim attire is considered “road rage.” How many times do we get official statements after crimes against minorities that it “wasn’t about race.” The “Alt-Right”, White Nationalists, Alt-Light and others are becoming increasingly mainstream, some occupying offices in the White House but this Professor is “highly disturbing and offensive.”
In the same way that history is written by the victors. Racism is defined by those who engage in it most.
You said, “I’m not in the camp that believe that black people cannot be racist, they can.”
Hey, we finally agree on something!
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Not likely to be the beginning of a beautiful friendship but one never knows?
The nasty and unacceptable truth is that racism and all other prejudicial ~isms are normal human behaviour and along with them so are ethnic cleansing, genocide and slavery. Indeed the German Jewish Holocaust was only a somewhat larger instance of normal behaviour.
Of course blacks are racist, I can prove it with this syllogism:-
All members of species homo sapiens sapiens are racist, all blacks are members of species homo sapiens sapiens therefore all blacks are racist.
Of course I can also prove that all whites a racist thus:-
All members of species homo sapiens sapiens are racist, all whites are members of species homo sapiens sapiens therefore all whites are racist.
The difference is that since the levers of power in society are mostly in the hands of whites, whites have numerous opportunities to exercise power to damage the interests of minority people but the instances where a lever of power in the hands of a minority can be used to harm a white person are much fewer.
It is normal for humans to perceive harms done to them by others as much worse than would a disinterested observer and to perceive harms done by them to others as smaller than they are as if viewed through a telescope the wrong way. However the harms done by whites to blacks, slavery, lynching, Jim Crow, the killings of Tamir Rice and Philando Castille are so severe that there is little room to exaggerate. Professor Lisa Durden has more than enough reasons to hate white people and especially to hate white liberals who are so smug and convinced of their own sincere nonracism. I would understand if used a knife to gut and uninvited white liberal who turned up at her BLM protest.
Meanwhile white people are so hurt when hit by the word “racist” but not as much as Philando Castille was damaged by the implicit anti-negro racism that caused a white policeman to kill him.
I think you are overstating things. You said, “However the harms done by whites to blacks, slavery, lynching, Jim Crow, the killings of Tamir Rice and Philando Castille are so severe that there is little room to exaggerate.”
Not, there is a lot of room to exaggerate.
The concentration camps were freed in 1945. About 6 million dead. By 1960, the survivors had built Israel into a modern country, and fought and won a few wars. That took about 15 years, and what the Jews went thru was far worse than slavery in the United States.
Germany and Japan were bombed into dust in 1945. Millions of their citizens dead. Yet, by 1960, both countries were rebuilt, and were modern industrial type nations again. Again, less than 15 years.
Slavery ended in December 1865. Do the math. That was over 150 years ago. Jim Crow, sometime in the 1960s. Almost 60 years ago.
And here??? Heck, Black slaves in America thrived, and had longer life spans than their relatives back in Africa. Was slavery fun??? Of course not, but they were better off than if they had stayed in Africa, where they already slaves of some other African tribe prior to being sold to the Americas or the Middle East. And those African tribes were not Christian, and did not a damn one way or the other how they treated their slaves. Here, slaves learned various trades and skills, and many learned how to read and write.In Africa, uh not so much.
Was Jim Crow fun??? No, I think it was demeaning to have to drink out of a separate water fountain, or go to the rear of a restaurant for service. Or be denied certain jobs, or a meaningful voice in society.
Probably just as demeaning as what the Jews went thru for centuries in Europe, where they were often consigned to ghettoes, denied certain occupations and in general, treated like crap. But the Jews didn’t just sit around and whine about things. They educated themselves, and got the jobs they could, and did them well. Then, when certain countries let up on them, the Jews were ready to thrive. And they did thrive.
What about Blacks. It’s 60 years after Brown v. Brd of Education, and still blacks are having trouble in school. In some schools in California, there are ZERO black boys who are at grade level on reading and math. 60 years after the the Voting Rights Bill, and the end of Jim Crow, and you have a 72% overall black illegitimate birth rate. Blacks commit about half the crimes in the country, even though they are only about 13% of the population.
Sooo, you know what I think? Maybe it is time for white people to stop whining and making excuses about racism and Jim Crow and insist that Blacks start acting like other human beings and get off their sorry, trashy, lazy a$$e$, quit popping out b*st*rds left and right, and get their poop in one sock. Like every other race on Planet Earth has done.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Yet no reporting on the Hispanic man who killed her? Et tu, Brutus?
Way to miss the point.
The general public discussion on racism seems to start with the premise that “white people”
Definitions of a term are an emergent property of their everyday usage. The overwhelming majority of native English speakers are white. Suck it up.
No, I think you need to leave your bubble. Racism is just another form of hate. Call it whatever you want, but most sane and caring people know that mistreating others is wrong, and those even more awake understand that superfluous differences between people are just that – superfluous. It doesn’t really matter how hate is ‘defined’. Do you want to engender understanding, or not? If not, then by all means continue your semantic pontification. Not really very helpful. Being good to one another is much more effective, along with the understanding that some people are and always will be misguided ***holes.
English is my native language. I know the meaning of every word you used but have no idea what you’re talking about or in what context.
I think that all people have biases mostly based on those who are different from themselves ways that include skin tone, speech, religion, culture, disfigurement, etc. Racism to me is the systemic oppression of a group based on the white-defined “race”. Systemic bias, racism, means that those who of the targeted group are systematically rejected from some jobs, mortgages (or they are subjected to higher interest rates) assuming they are allowed the purchase, rejected as tenants, not allowed to join certain clubs or organizations, are subjected to various indignities.
What we are seeing now is a number of Black activists who are tired of being targets of systemic oppression that most egregiously includes police actions that too frequently end with an innocent Black person being killed. When a 12 year old child (Tamir Rice, he shall not be nameless) is shot dead without warning because he happens to be playing with a toy pistol in a park and there is no accountability for the person, a white police officer, who shot him, it’s more than time enough for people to speak out. Tamir wasn’t the first, nor is he the most recent, there have been dozens, if not hundreds. Another officer was just found not guilty in the killing of Philando Castile. If Philando had been white, he would not have been shot, in fact, he probably would not have been pulled over in the first place.
I found Ms. Durdan hard to hear for two reasons, Tucker’s constant interruptions and talking over and lecturing but also due to her tone. Her message may be on target, but a refinement of her presentation would be helpful.
Not speaking of racism might work, but how, when race seems to be the root of so much systemic oppression? This is not a sarcastic question. How else to change the system that has a history in this country that is as old as the country itself?
I agree with you. Her delivery was way over the top…
We can talk for the next hundred years. People must be willing to have honest dialogue with the mindset of progress and change. Because racism is systemic, you must first identify who benefits from this system. If the “powers that be” were interested in trading some of their power for social equality and change, we’d be further along.
So maybe we shouldn’t try to integrate as much as “pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps,” as they like to say, and work toward building our own system. Trying to be included hasn’t worked thus far, maybe a different avenue is required.
There have been communities of Blacks that have done well. Greenwood, a district in Tulsa OK, Ococee, FL, Rosewood, FL used to be thriving, self-sufficient communities of African-Americans.
It ain’t 1923 anymore. And there were a lot of thriving, self-sufficient black communities in the county, even up until the 1950’s and 60’s. And still, in some places. But, a 72% illegitimate birth rate will tend to really screw up thriving, self-sufficient communities. And all without the help of the Klan, or roving lynch mobs. Thomas Sowell retired last year, and this was in his column:
You might enjoy this. Unlike your examples, this one is NOT from about 10 years after the Titanic sank. It’s from last year.
https://emsnews.wordpress.com/2016/05/03/washington-post-cant-figure-out-why-black-neighborhoods-see-lower-and-lower-property-values/
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
What we are seeing now is a number of Black activists who are tired of being targets of systemic oppression that most egregiously includes police actions that too frequently end with an innocent Bl
They’re not ‘systematically oppressed’. ‘Black activists’ have a business to run (with sorosphere money).
The most salient problem blacks face which differentiates them from the rest of the population is security deficits in their neighborhoods and schools. There are two impediments to addressing security deficits: prog-trash (in the legal profession and school administration) and suburban indifference.
You’re not helping the problem, you’re part of it.
enigma – why do you think that white people get to define racism? Or are you referring to white people get to decide whether individual actions are racist?
Racism is defined as “prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one’s own race is superior.” That’s not any one race defining the term. It’s the definition in the English language.
As for deciding whether an individual act is racist, there are often agendas behind such distinctions. There are plenty of instances where African Americans made racist taunts against a Caucasian victim, and yet either politicians or authorities did not class it as a racist crime. But whether or not anyone else agrees to the label, if it meets the above criteria, it is racism. I care not if someone is Latino, African American, or Caucasian. If I disagree with their assessment of whether an act was racist, then I have the right to my opinion. And so do you. Whites do not “get to define” it. You will note that there are often African American pundits who proclaim that an act that met the above definition was not racist. Did that mean that they got to define it? In the criminal justice system, it’s quite common for overtly racist acts against whites to not be prosecuted as a hate crime, or described as racist. So I do not agree that “whites” are responsible.
What I most object to is the hyper focus on basal melanin concentration. This identity politics puts everyone in neat little categories of race, and defines every crime, every political action, and every conversation through the lens of race. It’s divisive. And it’s sad if it’s common for African Americans to believe that the most important identifying characteristic of themselves and their interactions with the world is their race.
I personally believe in the content of one’s character being most important. I am more interested in how someone expresses themselves, their ideas, their opinions, character, personality, and work ethic than I am their base tan. Are they a good person? A good friend? A good neighbor? The more we focus on race, the more such identity politics pits us against each other. The more we focus on characteristics that bring us together, the more we will come together. Availability of jobs, unemployment, the price of gas, road conditions, traffic, working mothers trying to spend quality time with kids, air pollution, community safety – these are more fruitful discussions than having race be the main driver, unless you are talking about some genetic risk factor, such as sickle cell anemia.
How many African American kids grow up not wanting to be a Caucasian kid’s friend because they’ve been raised to believe that Caucasians are born racist (a Liberal meme going the rounds), that they have an agenda to keep the African American people down, blame everything on Old White Men, etc. If you want racism to die then make sure that all kids are raised not to care what skin color someone else has when they are making friends. Because they will grow up to be adults who don’t care what skin color someone else has when they are making friends or doing business.
I have two contrary opinions on things like this. While I think people, even professors, ought to be free to speak their minds on things, they are also proxies for the school, and there is a case to be made that they should be held to a higher standard. Schools have to raise money for various programs, and their association with idiots could damage them fiscally.
Miss Durden believes in segregation by race, when it suits her, and if a white professor said something like that, something like “Well, I guess you black folks just ain’t getting into the white folk’s pool party, sooo live with it!”, then he or she would be canned in a trice.
I think the case is easier when the speech at issue is sooo blatantly racist. It is much hard if say for example, a white professor quoted Ann Coulter in class. Or, had a confederate flag on his pickup truck, Then it is sort of a second hand thing. Some people believe Coulter is a racist, and some people believe the confederate flag is overtly racist, and others vehemently disagree on both of those.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Why would Professor Durden go on national television and make blatantly racist comments? Because in academia her racism has been encouraged and enabled as brave, speaking truth to power, and fighting the good fight. She expected to be hated by the Evil White Man but loved by Liberals, because I sincerely doubt this is the first time she’s expressed these views. She’s obviously been encouraged, and employed, along the way.
And give me a break. She’s not at “war.” She should go embed herself in the desert with our troops so she can grasp the true meaning of the word. Or maybe go join that all-female Kurdish force kicking ISIS butt right now.
How can a university employ a blatant racist without exposing its students to bigotry and hatred and unfair treatment from this professor? That’s a rhetorical question. They employ blatant racists, cop killers, and bigots who despise conservatives all across America. I recall when I was in college we all tailored our essays so as not to offend the politics of the professor. And that was years ago and orders of magnitude less severity than we see now.
So, to be fair to the professors suddenly experiencing a similar standard applied to conservatives, I can see how this can come across as capricious. They have been encouraged to behave this way, to teach class this way, and then suddenly they get fired for it because the rest of the world is now finding out about the dark, seedy underbelly of Liberal politics infiltrating academia?
For a long while, much of academia has become a publicly funded arm of the Democratic Party. It’s not just education; it’s education with a Liberal slant. And that’s not fair. I have the same complain about NPR and PBS. They are excellent opportunities to bring the arts and culture to the American public for free. However, again, they are publicly funded arms of the DNC that have allowed politics to underpin most of their programming. That’s not fair. That’s not equal. That’s skewed. Academia, NPR, and PBS should clean up their act. They need to either be politically neutral, or they need to abandon taxpayer money and become privately funded Democratic universities, and just be open and honest about it so that parents and students can choose. Just post a sign “conservatives not welcome” so no one naive enough to think that education is for everyone need apply to the universities in question.
I couldn’t agree with you more Karen
You made some really good points. I am not so sure about NPR, though. IMHO, that is probably the most Whitey-McWhite Culture network that ever was. Sure, you get an hour of rap every so often, but most of the time the show is sooo upper-white middle-classy and up, that I bet hardly any blacks ever listen to it. I mean the language is sooo cultured and precise, that I feel right at home listening to it. Even, the Blues Before Sunrise show which has every black blues player you can think of, is white oriented, with all sorts of history and trivia about the artists.
True, there is a multi-cultural emphasis sometimes, but it never really strays from White Middle Class values. I mean you never get any South American “it is ok to be macho and slap the little woman around”, or “today’s recipe for dog from Shanghai”, or “Cock Fighting-A Proud Hispanic Sport!” type stuff. It is always little goody-two shoes White stuff, that works really well if you live in a largely white area, like Berkeley, or Cape Cod.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Exactly right Karen.
Karen, this list has always provided an insight for me to what’s going on at colleges in this country:
http://mentalfloss.com/article/67933/15-books-incoming-college-freshmen-had-read-summer
This is from 2015 but is till pretty telling what sort of latent mindset some colleges are trying to establish.
Thanks, guys.
What if a college professor does not believe in God? What if that same professor believes that dog was put here on Earth to give mankind guidance on the 8th day? What if that professor preached in class that God spelled backwards is Dog? What if the college professor awarded grades based on the student’s ability to give guidance to other humans? What if the professor had dogs in class as students? What if……
What if a senator who was running for President, doesn’t believe a Christian should be allowed to hold a job?
https://youtu.be/Em9q1SD5sfc
Ter ber – they would have a tough time being elected. 😉
In violation of AAUP standards. Administration deserves censure.
Have you seen her personnel file? Are you wagering she was terminated without consulting with the GC?
DSS – adjunct faculty are not covered by any professional organization. I speak from experience. All they have to do is cancel her classes.
She’s likely on a year-to-year contract which they declined to renew. She teaches a shizzy subject of a sort students take to get distribution credits. The faculty at community colleges who have serious business to attend to are teaching practical nursing, bookkeeping, dental technology, horticulture, veterinary technics, and the like.
DSS – she is likely on a verbal contract, at will hire. Having taught as an adjunct faculty at a couple of community colleges, I know exactly how the game works. It is not a full-time job. You are limited to the number of hours your are teaching each semester, so you don’t accidentally become full-time. You are hired by the course and you are paid only if the course meets the minimum attendance limit.
Having taught as an adjunct faculty at a couple of community colleges, I know exactly how the game works.
No, you know how the game works in Arizona.
DSS – since we tried to unionize, I know the state of the job pretty much everywhere.
Not buying.
DDS – since you hide in the shadows I care little what you buy. Use your real name, prove you have some intestinal fortitude. Then maybe, just maybe, I will care whether you buy it or not.
Free Speech was really important back in the 60s. The Nazi Party marched. The Communist Party demonstrated. The Young Americans for Freedom orated. And each and every member of any of these would defend the right of all the others to free speech.
Was it offensive? If so, so what? Offensive words can never harm me. Listening to racist tripe back then from Neo-Nazis, but allowing the tripe to be said. Even from non-tenured professors fer gossake.
Freedom of Speech.
Freedom of Enterprise.
> There was no evidence that she had allowed these sentiments to impact or affect her teaching at the college. As much as I disagree with her views, I do not see how her statements outside of the college should be grounds for termination.
That seems like a reasonable position, but I am also interested in hearing what a college can or should do when professors make statements like the ones we’ve heard about recently that raise reasonable questions that a professor’s statements or views DO impact and affect her teaching.
What can or should colleges do when students, parents or other faculty hear statements that suggest a professor may have prejudices against certain classes of students and let those prejudices affect their teaching and grading?
Reblogged this on pundit from another planet.