Academia, Free Speech, Uncategorized

Skidmore Students Call For The “Immediate Firing” of Professors Who Attended Pro-Police Rally

download-1There is a controversy brewing at Skidmore College where students have demanded the “immediate firing” of three faculty members who were spotted at a “Back The Blue” pro-police rally.  It is the latest expression of intolerance for opposing views in higher education.

According to WAMC, the student group Pass the Mic has made 19 demands of Skidmore after a “Back the Blue” rally for police from late July. The targeted faculty are music lecturer Mark Vinci and art professors David Peterson and Andrea Peterson.

Pass the Mic’s website includes an email targeting the professors and notes that the Petersons were spotted “were seen protesting with Blue Lives Matter protestors, while Skidmore alumni and students were being teargassed and attacked on the other side of the street”. They added:

This is absolutely unacceptable and reinforces what we art students have always known. That Professor David Peterson is racist, sexist, and has made a studio space that is not inclusive through his consistent mistreatment and disregard for non-cis white male students. But now he is openly advocating and preaching exclusionary, racist, and fascist ideology. 

The students insist that

To remain silent and not take tangible action against the professors after this, affirms to the Skidmore community–students, faculty and staff–that the institution does not have the safety and wellbeing of those most affected by racist pedagogy. They are, simply put, unfit to teach and I demand action. 

What is chilling is that the students want the school to punish the academics for supporting police and dissenting from their view: “Specifically, we want a public email from them addressing their presence at the Blue Lives protest, a conversation with the two professors about the implications this has on their pedagogy.”

The worse implication for pedagogy is the enforced orthodoxy, which the President of the university should denounce.

103 thoughts on “Skidmore Students Call For The “Immediate Firing” of Professors Who Attended Pro-Police Rally”

  1. Dear Skidmore students – If the level of oppression at Skidmore is too much for your sensibilities, then you are always free to transfer to any college or university where you could enjoy a higher level of personal comfort.

    1. Exactly, skidmore isn’t cheap, if it’s too much might I suggest an inclusive and most likely free NYC college ?,

  2. Annnnd the corrupt DC Appeals Court rules that the crucifixion of American hero Gen. Flynn shall continue. Prof. Turley: crickets.

  5. Professor Turley should consider requiring posts to have some relation to the article he has written. “anonymous” seems to be the worst offender in this regard. It is wonderful to contribute something intelligent to the conversation. If all you want to do is dump on others, then do it on twitter. That’s what it’s there for.

    1. Moe, you sound like a common sense conservative appealing to reason. But some of the commenters here are over-spirited youths seeking to engage outside the narrow range of issues covered by this blog.

      Then there are certain ‘Feisty Types’ wanting to stretch subjects beyond what the regulars here consider appropriate. They might rationalize by saying if the subject concerns free speech then conspiracy theories are certainly ripe for discussion.

      Contrarians might argue that if the president is actively promoting discredited conspiracy theories, that should certainly be discussed in relation to free speech and, or, Tyranny Of The Left issues.

      In any event, they’re fooling old Moe; a rock solid conservative! A man who makes no apologies for his dull but earnest nature.

      1. But some of the commenters here are over-spirited youths seeking to engage outside the narrow range of issues covered by this blog.

        Says the man wont to tell us how chummy he is with the millennials in West Hollywood.

        1. Absurd, I honestly think you and the troll fantasize about life in West Hollywood. For me that community is just a corridor to drive through en route to the West Side. And that’s all West Hollywood is for thousands of commuters.

  6. Trump, Gateway Pundit And QAnon Believe Covid Death Toll Lower Than Reported

    But Scientists Believe The Opposite

    White House coronavirus adviser Anthony S. Fauci on Tuesday refuted online misinformation amplified by President Trump that the virus’s death toll has been vastly overstated in the United States.

    The claim was shared by the far-right website Gateway Pundit and a follower of the baseless QAnon theory in Twitter posts that Trump retweeted Sunday, one of which was removed for violating the company’s coronavirus misinformation policy. It falsely claimed that only 6 percent of the nation’s 180,000 reported covid-19 deaths are legitimate, pointing to a statement on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s website saying that 94 percent of deaths involved co-morbidities.

    “If you look at the people who died of covid disease, the point that the CDC was trying to make was that a certain percentage of them had nothing else but just covid,” Fauci said during an interview on ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “That does not mean that someone who has hypertension or diabetes who dies of covid didn’t die of covid-19. They did.”

    Despite online claims, the CDC statement was not a departure from what has been known about the coronavirus. The CDC has said for months that people with underlying health issues are at greater risk of developing serious symptoms from coronavirus.

    Co-morbidities reported on the CDC’s website include heart disease, obesity, diabetes and hypertension — conditions that can make a person more vulnerable to the virus. Each would appear on a person’s death certificate, along with covid-19. Death certificates may also list sepsis, respiratory arrest, kidney failure or other conditions as the immediate cause of death, but those are caused by the infection.

    Many scientists, Fauci among them, think the virus’s true death toll has been undercounted, not overcounted, because of lack of access to testing at the start of the pandemic and deaths that happen at home.

    “The numbers that you’ve been hearing, the 180,000-plus deaths, are real deaths from covid-19,” he said Tuesday. “Let there not be any confusion about that. It’s not 9,000 deaths from covid-19. It’s 180,000-plus deaths.”

    Edited From: “Faucci Debunks Coronavirus Death Misinformation Promoted By Trump”

    Today’s Washington Post
    …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

    Is Dr. Anthony Faucci part of a Deep-State effort to inflate Covid death numbers? Should the public put more faith in Trump, Gatway Pundit and QAnon?

    Obviously our president feels a conspiracy has impacted health statistics. Yet the Science community and mainstream media would have us believe the president is less than credible.

    1. But Scientists Believe The Opposite

      You’re 60 some years old. You can quit fussing over what the cool kids think

    2. I would guess the COVID cases have been under-counted. I feel that’s probably so based on certain obvious features of how this unfolded, and it seems a lot of experts appear to agree.

      However, reporting death causes is complicated and the deaths attributed to it very well may have been overcounted. Or, they might have been undercounted too. This is a matter to be analyzed in a rigorous manner and not oversimplified and then politicized immediately. but that is ever what the mass media does.

      1. Kurtz, you’re right! Political appointees should be prohibited by law from interfering in published statistics.

      2. They’ve overcounted, without a doubt. The question is in how many cases was the Wuhan Flu identified as the cause of death rather than a co-morbidity.

        It’s been a serious problem, but public health officialdom have exposed themselves as being an occupational guild one step above social workers and school administrators in the shall-I-trust-you strata.

  8. What irks this Cracker after watching the video of the most recent shooting by police of a black man and the media narrative is they NEVER point out the resistance to the police command(s), why not go peacefully and fight the battle of false arrest or whatever or however they feel harmed. The escalation seems to end in a shooting. So I’ll ask what is a Cop to do, just let the situation fester until later, forget about why they where there in the first place, beg for them to follow their command, beg forgiveness because the person is a minority?

    1. Oh, you mean you have to stop when a policeman says stop. I thought that was optional.

    2. police cant shoot you just for disobedience. the question is have they given you a lawful order for their own safety or the safety of others, which disobedience makes an imminent danger of grave bodily harm all that more likely.

      Such as when a guy has refused orders, taken a few Tasers and kept on ticking, and goes for a deadly weapon under his seat, like in Kenosha.

      so context matters. disobedience of orders to drop weapons or not reach for them are the most basic example.

      disobedience of something trivial does not matter and is certainly not a basis for a use of lethal force.

      there are subtleties to this which the BLM and their collaborators in mass media always ignore

  9. HAS CORRECTNESS STYMIED REPORTS OF THUGS SHUTTLING BY JETLINERS?

    In a wide-ranging interview with the Fox News host Laura Ingraham on Monday night, President Trump spread multiple conspiracy theories about the protests that have erupted across the nation. Many of his unfounded claims can be traced back to narratives that have been swirling online for months.

    Here are three of the baseless conspiracy theories that Mr. Trump spread and where they came from.

    1) A plane ‘loaded with thugs’ headed to the Republican convention.

    During the interview with Ms. Ingraham, Mr. Trump claimed that “we had somebody get on a plane from a certain city this weekend, and in the plane it was almost completely loaded with thugs, wearing these dark uniforms, black uniforms, with gear and this and that.”

    Mr. Trump then alleged that the people were headed to Washington, D.C., to disrupt the Republican National Convention.

    There is no evidence of a flight matching Mr. Trump’s description. But the claim is similar to a baseless allegation that appeared online as early as June, when a wave of cities and towns became alarmed by unsubstantiated rumors that the loose collective of anti-fascist activists known as antifa was being sent into their communities to disrupt the peace.

    Edited from: “Trump Spread Multiple Conspiracy Theories On Monday. Here Are Their Roots”

    Today’s New York Times
    ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

    Is there a conspiracy in the media to withhold information about this army of thugs jetting about the country? Or is Trump completely out of his mind (while accusing Joe Biden of senility)?

    3. Yes, and what were the talking heads saying when Trump announced that obama was tapping his phone?? He has been right far more than wrong.

  11. This feels like Germany upon the rise of the Socialist German Workers Party (Nazi) or Ukraine before the Holodomor.

    If supporting police against the nationwide prejudicial campaign to usher in anarchy is a fireable offense at that university, then I hope parents don’t waste another dime to send their kids there.

    Democrats, your party calls for police to be defunded, and in an act of bigotry, accuse innocent law enforcement of all being racist abusers. Your city leaders tell cops to stand down, and allow rioters to loot, burn, and assault. Then they refuse federal assistance. If the feds legally arrive to defend federal buildings, that you refuse to protect, they claim the feds are kidnapping people and inciting violence that you refuse to curb. Then those same politicians blame Trump for the carnage, and stick their hand out for payment. They plow their states into the ground, and drive businesses away with the stick of high taxes and regulation. Then they stick their hand out to the Republican president they despise and demand payment.

    The flames of the burning cities are fanned by the Democrat media, who deliberately misrepresent police encounters to make them appear racist, before a second of investigation has taken place.

    How far will they go to seize power? Look at what they are willing to put the country through to try to win an election. That’s what this is about. They misrepresent law enforcement in order to convince naive people that their nation is racist, in order to reorganize society from capitalism to socialism, and win an election. BLM doesn’t make black lives better. It’s actions have led to the loss of many black lives as crimes skyrocket. It’s goal is to destroy capitalist America and remake it as a socialist country. If they accomplish this goal, they will impoverish more black Americans.

    My God. Don’t give these maniacs more power than they already abuse. Vote responsibly in November, and do not bring the far Left to power.

    3. More like Weimar than the USSR. And, not really like Weimar either, for a lot of reasons. The BLM is fake Marxist compared to the Communists of Germany in the 1920s.
      They are really just mercenaries.

      The parallels to the Red Guard episode in PRC history seem more apt to me, especially because of the insanity happening in academia. The “Woke” phenomenon bears a lot of resemblance to Red Guard insanity of the Cultural revolution in that it is a rejected of all old fashioned social and cultural habits as bad. This made no sense in China at the time except one key stragetic aim: to create chaos which would protect Mao from his upcoming rivals. And it succeeded well at that. Until the PLA (Army) finally got sick of it and Mao told the crazies to stand down.

      Here it seems to me that the BLM-ANTIFA-woke SJW phenomenon is a sort of chaos unleashed by well funded NGOs and NFPs financed by the likes of Geo Soros who wants to destabilize the country enough so that his hired hands in the Democrat national leadership will more likely win out over Donald, whom Soros hates for blocking his globalist agenda. This is similar to Mao ginning up a lot of trouble which was biting his own Communist party leadership and petty state officials in the butt. One says wow why would Mao create so much havoc to disrupt the state which he was the Supreme leader of in the first place? Well it was simply because he saw his rivals gaining strength and he used the far left craziness to disrupt everything. Yes to save his own hide and yes at the expense of millions of lives. He was a wickedly cynical overlord with as much regard for the loss of human life as Chinggis Khan himself.

      In this way Soros is a little different. It’s easier to see him like Jacob Schiff, & the Kuhn and Loeb financiers who floated loans to the Japanese enemies of Czarist Russia, and the Kerensky government which was the Czar’s rival. But he came to see the Soviets as a danger to his own parochial interests — and certainly we can imagine how the intersection of the BLM and crazy left with the anti-Israel BDS movement might trouble Soros too. Or, maybe not! Now lest I be accused of invoking an “antisemitic trope” please read this wiki entry on Jacob Schiff and the historical facts which I refer to, and perhaps the analogy to Soros, may become clear.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_Schiff

  12. Come to think of it these are the same ones that were supporting Sanders but don’t have the guts to keep supporting him with votes and still want free education. I’ll admit to being wrong if I see his votes go up significantly. I dont however hold any hope for feckless snow flakes doing anything for anybody but them selves. No guts, is a prime cause of this situation. Just that familiar yellow color dripping down their backsides.

    1. I refuse to be shaken down so that angry, aggressive art students get a college education, with likely few job prospects, at my expense.

      1. Karen, just think of the happiness and joy you’ll be providing to some young liberal progressive.

  14. I think these students need to broaden their perspectives. Before they tear down the system and rebuild it into a socialist regime, they need to experience what may be the results. I propose they are shipped to a Sharia abiding country under authoritarian rule. These non-cis white male students may wish to reevaluate their unsafe feelings in America after being dropped off the top of a building or being stoned or jailed for their sexual preferences in their new country.

  15. I believe the only way to give FOOLS such as these Skidmore students their comeuppance … reelect President Trump and elect R majority US House and US Senate — and Rs everywhere in state and local government.

      1. some “heavy set man” thug on a bicycle clobbered a judge on Staten Island a couple days ago. She’s Chinese-American The newspaper did not identify the perp’s race.

        We know what that means. If a perp was seen and he is a white or hispanic, they usually say so. HOWEVER, if he is black, they don’t say so, because they are afraid to anger blacks. So if they do not identify race of an observed suspect, we all suspect, this probably means black. Newspapers started doing this about a decade ago, as part of their efforts to obscure truth.

        https://nypost.com/2020/08/31/cold-cocked-judge-becomes-latest-victim-of-senseless-nyc-violence/

        I predict that one day the population of NYC will be less than 10% white. And yet, the blacks will still complain that they are oppressed. If there are no whites around to blame, they will blame someone else. Just as BLM hates and spits on black cops today just like white ones.

        The same dynamic existed even in the RSA years ago, when the ANC regularly accused Asian residents of being “apartheid supporters” too.

    2. That is tragic, unfortunately no one cares about those lives. Does anyone know their names. It doesn’t fi the Progressive’s narrative so no one talks about them. The Obama/Biden administration did nothing about the black lives in Chicago, Baltimore etc for 8 years. Also, most of those tragic incidents black on black crimes…..again no one cares about them. The anarchists have been trying to stop dissenting voices for years. Conservatives couldn’t give college Commencement speeches, Conservative speakers were shouted down, physically assaulted or had presentations cancelled because the snowflakes are intolerant of opposing viewpoints. Who will protect them when they need the police “Comfort” pets or their local Barista?? BLM is a Marxist organization – these peopl have no idea what they are advocating for. I’ve lived in Marxist countries. It is terrifying!

  17. Skidmore College was founded by Lucy Skidmore.
    (Music)
    Hang on Lucy!
    Hang on. Hang on!

  18. No article on the Judge Sullivan repreive and the illicitly biased DC appeals court allowing an obviously biased Judge to prosecute Flynn by proxy? Surely Mr. Turley, you jest. I am sorely disappointed in you today!

    2. There’s nothing “illicitly biased” about the appellate court’s ruling, nor is Sullivan “prosecut[ing] Flynn by proxy.”

      If Flynn’s lawyer hadn’t applied for the writ, Sullivan probably would have ruled on the DOJ’s motion to dismiss already (oral arguments were originally scheduled for mid-July), and if Flynn didn’t like the outcome, he could have appealed already.

      It’s wholly appropriate for Sullivan to have a hearing, so that he can ask the DOJ some questions about statements in the motion to dismiss (e.g., why did the DOJ originally claim that Flynn’s statements were materially false, but later claim that they were not materially false? what was the “new” material that the DOJ referred to in its motion — how was it new to the DOJ?).

    1. https://morningconsult.com/2020/09/01/battleground-presidential-polling-post-conventions/

      The latest survey, conducted Aug. 28-30 among 12,966 likely voters, found Biden 8 points ahead of Trump, 51 percent to 43 percent. That includes a 12-point lead among women (53 percent to 41 percent), an 11-point lead among independent voters (48 percent to 37 percent) and an 11-point lead among voters in the suburbs (52 percent to 41 percent).

      The figures, which are nearly identical to polling conducted Aug. 14-16, come after daily tracking of the head-to-head contest showed a narrow improvement in Trump’s standing against Biden on Friday. That post-convention bump proved to be fleeting, with daily tracking on Saturday showing Trump trailing Biden 43 percent to 51 percent and Sunday’s responses putting Biden back to a 9-point lead and 52 percent of the vote. The Saturday and Sunday polling came with respective 2- and 1-point margins of error.

      1. Is this pollster one of the major ones doing polls or assessing results for more than one presidential election? They seem to have been in business for less than 6 years.

  20. Po-leece are a capitalist pig construct of the white male patriarchy. All comrades of the people’s collective should be free to do as they wish.
    Private property and the rule of law are for fascists and deplorable kulak untermenschen.
    Forward! Yes we can…burn it all down.

    2. Please let us know where you live since you’ve no appreciation of private property. Under an overpass maybe?

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