Monthly Archives: March 2017

Help! We have Fallen and Can’t Escape the Current Age of Anger! – City Watch

Posted: March 17, 2017 at 7:04 am

The Dark Side of Globalization-When I was a gloomy 16-year-old grasping to find some meaning in the world, my father gave me a tattered copy of social philosopher Michael Novaks The Experience of Nothingness. Seriously.

There have been times over the past few decades when Ive considered this gift a few yards short of insensitive and maybe even borderline teenager abuse. But Im quite certain Dads intentions were no more malicious then than when he took me to see Annie Hall when I was 11.

The essence of Novaks argument -- and to some extent Woody Allens classic 1977 rom com -- is that individuals can achieve some semblance of wisdom if they stop believing in culturally sanctioned sentimental pablum about life (and love) and embrace the essentially tragic nature of human existence.

In my dads defense, Novaks 1970 book was in no way a prescription for fatalism. Rather, it was an exhortation to find enlightenment on the other side of disillusionment. Accepting lifes despair and emptiness, Novak argued, was a prerequisite for becoming a liberated and fully conscious human being.

Novak knew that what he was prescribing was no easy task. Because it lies so near to madness, he wrote, the experience of nothingness is a dangerous, possibly destructive experience. Having no recourse to the comfort of broadly embraced cultural symbols and benchmarks requires inordinate doses of honesty, courage, and ethical self-reflection.

Novaks brand of transcendent nihilism was itself a response to a cultural breakdown caused by the rapid social change of the late 1960s. Neither nostalgic for tradition nor putting full stock in the coming of the Age of Aquarius, Novaks push to accept the void was more a do-it-yourself guide to living in the void than it was a viable call to collective action.

Ive been thinking a lot about nihilism lately, both because Novak passed away in February and also because I just finished reading Indian writer Pankaj Mishras brilliant new book, The Age of Anger: The History of the Present. Mishra offers a sweeping, textured, unified theory of our dysfunctional age and explains what angry Trumpites, Brexiters, and radical Islamists all have in common: an utter fear of the void.

Eschewing facile political or religious explanations for the rise of nihilistic social movements around the world, Mishra points to a crisis of meaning wrought by globalization. He sees the destruction of local, intimate, long-rooted systems of meaning as the opening of a spiritual Pandoras box within which lies infinite doubt and disillusion. Mishra sees these negative solidarity movements as the psychically disenfranchised targeting what they see as venal, callous and mendacious elites.

Brexiters railed against liberal cosmopolitan technocrats, as did Trumps white nationalists. Radical Islamists loathe the hedonism and rootlessness of wealthy Muslims whove surrendered to Western consumer society. Rather than advocate for an agenda that would provide them tangible returns, they all cling to nostalgia for simpler times and rally around their hatred for those they see as the winners in a new world order.

In Mishras view, this new world order isnt simply neoliberal capitalism allowing money, goods, and services to flow unimpeded across the globe. Its also the attendant ideal of liberal cosmopolitanism first advocated in the 18th century by Enlightenment thinkers like Montesquieu, Adam Smith, Voltaire, and Kant. Its the belief in a universal commercial society made up of self-interested, rational individuals who seek fulfillment.

Theoretically, modern global capitalism liberates individuals from the constraints of tradition, and encourages them to move about freely, deploy their skills, and fulfill their dreams. But the burdens of individualism and mobility can be as difficult to carry for those whove succeeded in fulfilling that modern vision as for those who cannot. A decade ago, one study foundthat a disproportionate number of Muslim militants have engineering degrees, a prestigious vocation in the developing world. So, while accepting the conventions of traditional society may leave a person feeling as if he or she were less than an individual, rejecting those conventions, in Mishras words, is to assume an intolerable burden of freedom in often fundamentally discouraging conditions.

What concerns Mishra most is that when personal freedom and free enterprise are conflated, the ambitions released by the spread of individualism overwhelm the capacity of existing institutions to satisfy them. There are simply not enough opportunities to absorb the myriad desires of billions of single-minded young people. As Mishra sees it, todays nihilistic politics are themselves a product of the sense of nothingness felt by growing numbers of uprooted outsiders whove failed to find their place in the commercial metropolis. A moral and spiritual vacuum, he writes, is yet again filled up with anarchic expressions of individuality, and mad quests for substitute religions and modes of transcendence.

Despite his call to harness the experience of nothingness, Michael Novak duly warned of its dangers and potential for destructiveness. Unfortunately, his exhortation to lean in and embrace the void strikes me as about as helpful to frustrated millennials as it was to me when I was an angst-ridden teenager. The answer to todays nihilistic political movements clearly isnt more hyper individualism. Nor is a violent return to a traditional past realistic. No one knows how to escape from our current global age of anger. But I suspect that whatever answer there might be will first require us Western liberals to admit that we have finally reached the limits of the Enlightenments cult of secular individualism.

(Gregory Rodriguez is publisher of Zcalo Public Square where this column was first posted and editorial director at the Berggruen Institute. Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

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Congress slams ‘right-wing’ groups for attack on Kannada writer – India.com

Posted: at 7:01 am

New Delhi [India], Mar. 14(ANI): In the wake of the recent attack on Kannada writer Yogesh Master, Congress leader and legal advisor to the Government of Karnataka Brijesh Kalappa condemned the attack, stating that such attacks are common with writers who preach rationalism.

Master, the author of a controversial Kannada novel Dundhi, was attacked on Monday by unidentified persons, who smeared his face with black oil.

To this regard, Kalappa, in an interview with ANI, highlighted similar events in the past and alleged that certain right-wing organisations in Karnataka, Goa and Maharashtra have chosen to oppress rationalist thinkers and writers by such attacks.

The only way these (right-wing) organisations can match a writers intellect is by resorting to violence, be it Govind Pansare, Narendra Dabolkar or M.M. Kalburgi. I urge that the culprits need to be punished immediately and attacks of such nature need to be curbed, said Kalappa, drawing parallels to the recent Ramjas College row in Delhi.

With regards to the recent assembly polls in Goa and Manipur, the Congress leader slammed the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), stating that the Modi Sarkar has not learnt any lesson from the severe rap they received from the Supreme Court.

The Prime Minister has time and again re-iterated the partys objective to achieve a Congress-free India. This is the concern, rather than taking the country forward or developing the economy. In both Goa and Manipur, the BJP is trying to stifle democracy with money, said Kalappa. (ANI)

This is published unedited from the ANI feed.

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Why don’t humans kill each other like we used to? – Learn Liberty (blog)

Posted: at 7:01 am

Humans are getting more and more peaceful. Violent deaths from all causes (murder, war, etc.) have declined massively throughout human history.

But to what do we owe this increasing peace? Enlightenment philosophy? Commerce? Or the rise of governance by states?

Harvard social psychologist Steven Pinkers book The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined provides a magisterial, comprehensive, and generally persuasive explanation of the peacefulness phenomena, yet the book contains a big omission.

Pinker claims but fails to prove that early states significantly increased human welfare by reducing the rate of war death.

In his attempt to make this argument, Pinker compares the rates of war death in stateless societies, prehistoric and contemporary, to state societies, mostly from the 20th century. The rate of war death was three to four times as high in the stateless societies as in the state societies.

There is one big problem with this comparison: can we really believe that the only salient difference between Neolithic peoples or tribal Papuans and 20th-century Europeans is the existence of a state? What about commerce? What about Enlightenment rationalism?

In fact, later in his book, Pinker supplements his state-pacification-process argument with a humanitarian-process argument about the role of commerce and growing empathy (due in part to Enlightenment philosophy) in spreading peace from the 18th century onward.

But Pinker doesnt provide the relevant comparison for evaluating the role of the state: the rate of war death in prehistoric stateless societies versus the rate of war death in prehistoric state societies.

Pinker might fall back on the data showing that the rate of violent death in medieval and early-modern Europe and in 15th-century central Mexico was still below that of prehistoric and contemporary stateless societies. (These figures include homicides, not just war deaths.)

But medieval and early modern Europe still had access to the legacies of Christianity, Roman law, and the long-distance trade made possible by medieval fairs and the navigation technology of the time. Central Mexico under the Aztecs was also a commercial society with trade, navigation, and division of labor.

We know that these factors probably had some pacifying effect, however limited. And while the state may well reduce the rate of private violence, that leaves unsettled the question of whether it increases or reduces the rate of death from civil and external wars.

Further, there is an important conceptual problem for the claim that the rise of the state improved human welfare by reducing violent deaths. If the state were such an obviously desirable technology, why wasnt it adopted everywhere voluntarily?

If the state were such an obviously desirable technology, why wasnt it adopted everywhere voluntarily?

After all, early states arose almost exclusively out of conquest, as Pinker concedes. They started as roving bands of armed robbers, who eventually found that converting robbery into regularized taxation would destroy less wealth and generate more revenue over the long run. Autonomous peoples do not go into subject status willingly. As Pinker himself puts it,

People in nonstate societies also invade for safety. The security dilemma or Hobbesian trap is very much on their minds, and they may form an alliance with nearby villages if they fear they are too small, or launch a preemptive strike if they fear that an enemy alliance is getting too big. One Yanomam man in Amazonia told an anthropologist, We are tired of fighting. We dont want to kill anymore. But the others are treacherous and cannot be trusted. (46)

Pinker interprets these comments as establishing the reality of a security dilemma, in which each side is better off fighting given what each other side is doing, even though all would be better off if all sides disarmed.

If the security dilemma is such a horrible fate, why didnt the Yanomami simply submit to one of the other tribes? Why keep fighting? If you dont fight anymore, your war deaths will be zero. Presumably, the reason is that the Yanomami would rather run the risk of dying in battle than accept the certainty of being enslaved. General John Stark of New Hampshire might have been expressing a universal human impulse when he said, Live free or die; death is not the worst of all evils.

If death is not the worst of all evils, or if states actually increase war deaths relative to stateless societies with similar economies and philosophies, advocating a state maybe even a world government to end anarchy between states may be a bad way to advance human welfare.

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Kamal Haasan’s Recent Interview And What It Says About Tamil Nadu – Swarajya

Posted: at 7:01 am

Actor Kamal Haasan, in his latest interview to a Tamil channel, reiterated what he has been betraying all his public life: an intentionally shallow understanding of Indic cultural issues. It seemed as though he was trying too hard to project himself as a progressive individual.

He stated contemptuously that India is a nation which honours a book, the central theme of which revolves around gambling away a woman as if she were an object. In the same interview, he also claimed that his film Viswaroopam was never subjected to extra-constitutional censorship by Islamist forces. He declared that Dravidianism was here to stay. He took to task the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) and showed a fondness for both Mahatma Gandhi and EVR who were poles apart ideologically.

And then he also flaunted his love for Marxism in the interview. The actor, who is known for artful rendering of Hollywood scenes unto Tamil masses as innovations, has thus positioned himself as the voice of the progressives in Tamil Nadu.

So, what explains Haasans over-explaining things?

Haasan is a representative sample of an interesting species in Tamil Nadu. Members of this species are born in upper caste families, claim adherence to rationalism, make shrill leftist remarks and revel in Dravidian rhetoric. Such individuals are happy to support Islamist forces. And curiously enough, they endorse Gandhi, Communism and E V Ramaswamy (EVR or famously known as Periyar) a weird ideological hodgepodge if there was one.

For decades, Tamil drama artist and writer Gnani Sankaran had adhered to this template and has been more Dravidian than Dravidian radicals. And yet despite the intellectual servitude he keeps getting reminded about his Brahmin origins. All this leads us to wonder as to whether such intellectual regression an almost unthinking submissiveness towards Dravidian ideas of racial superiority evolved as an upper caste response towards the threats emanating from Dravidian parties.

If you thought this was bad please rest assured that it can get even worse.

The elder brother of Kamal Haasan, actor Charu Haasan, who identifies himself as an atheist has acted in an evangelical docu-drama, which claims that the coming of Jesus has been foretold in Vedic literature and that Tamil classics including Thirukural are actually Christian literature. One can see where the worldviews of Haasan brothers converge whether they do it intentionally or ignorantly.

In the case of Kamal Haasan and Tamil milieu, the situation is a disturbing caricature of Germany of the 1930s. There is a new neo-Luddite trend in Tamil secessionist forces, which uses tools of anarchy to portray every development project and every incident happening as conspiracy against Tamils. This is derived from the rich Dravidian rhetoric that claimed North enjoys as South erodes.

Interestingly, while the early Dravidian secessionists claimed that the South was neglected in the industrial development their present evolutes the Tamil secessionists claim that every development project was an effort to steal the natural resources of Tamils by Delhi imperialists.

Dravidian parties have fallen in line with the Tamil secessionists, who in turn are also supported by well-knit Islamist organisations.

It is in this context that one has to see the recent interview of Kamal Haasan, who made all the right noises for the above combination: Hatred for Indic traditions, an abject surrender before the Islamists and reassertion of Dravidian Tamil identity.

That the actor has chosen to speak only after the demise of J Jayalalithaa is also significant. Though it is a telling commentary on the bravery of the aging matinee hero, it also shows how radical forces in Tamil Nadu are attempting to take over the vacuum created by the death of Jayalalithaa.

Kamal Haasans interview has to be seen not just as a specimen of intellectual ossification but also as an indicator of the coming danger Luddite Tamil fascism hands in gloves with Islamist fundamentalism.

In fact, a section of Kollywood has been very vocal in inciting the students against development projects in the state, and is trying to make jallikattu movement dangerously secessionist.

However, the silver lining is the flak that the interview has received from the vast silent majority of Tamils. His half-baked understanding of the Mahabharata has been mostly laughed off. It is this silent majority which shall save Tamil Nadu from secessionists and pseudo-rationalists like Kamal Haasan. Alas, the only problem in Tamil Nadu is that the leadership vacuum continues!

Also Read: The False Symmetries Of Hey Ram

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Respecting the Right of Free Speech – Diverse: Issues in Higher Education

Posted: at 7:00 am

March 16, 2017 | :

Debates over free speech and intolerance have become, once again, news. Over the past few weeks, a number of television pundits, columnists and fellow academics have commented on the fracas that took place at Middlebury College. In fact, some professors who teach at the institution such as Environmental Studies professor Bill McKibben wrote an article for The Guardian and Allison Stanger professor of International Politics and Economics at the college penned an op-ed for the New York Times.

For those of you who are unaware of what transpired, on March 2 the usually tranquil and scenic institution found itself engulfed in an ferocious uproar when a couple of conservative student groups invited Charles Murray, a prominent conservative political scientist, sociologist and author to the prestigious liberal arts college known for its stellar academic reputation to deliver a talk.

Murray began to become well known in certain conservative libertarian circles in the early1980s with his often statistically detailed scholarship that examined topics such as marriage, economics and suburbia. He was catapulted into the mainstream in the mid-90s with his best-selling yet controversial book The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life in which he argues that certain racial groups harbored superior intelligence over others. The book hit the public arena like wildfire and many prominent individuals and some fellow academics accused Murray of scientific racism. The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) labeled him a nationalist who ascribed to eugenics (raced-based scientific testing commonplace in the late 19th and early 20th century).

Students and some faculty who were upset that he was his being allowed to speak on their campus and made their displeasure known by signing petitions, shouting him down and refusing to allow him to speak. The situation became so volatile that Murray and several other people suffered physical injuries. Things became volatile. It was chaos and dysfunction of the most disturbing kind.

That a large percentage of students at Middlebury College were offended, upset and outraged at the fact that a person with the reputation of Charles Murray was granted permission to speak in and of itself is not surprising. This is particularly the case in regards to Black, Hispanics, Arab, gay and lesbian, disabled Asian and other marginalized populations on campus. Over the past several years, college campuses have not been the most hospitable and welcoming places for students of color or in some cases, women. On the contrary, they have been environments rife with hostility, intimidation and occasional violence.

Outside the ivory towers of the academia things are just as volatile. The state of political discourse in our nation is as hostile as it has ever been. We recently witnessed one of the ugliest, mean-spirited and divisive presidential campaigns in recent memory. Our current president has engaged in numerous acts of racial invective, employed numerous dog whistles in his rhetoric to appease the racially intolerant and hostile segment of his base of supporters. He has attacked the Fourth Estate and attempted to demonize his enemies through round the clock and wanton tweeting. He has arrogantly defied the separation of powers that have been the foundation of this nation.

Yes, indeed. The humidity has made the climate uncomfortable and many people who fall outside of the White, male, able bodied, Christian, heterosexual, category (at least 70% of the population) are justified in being unsettled by the current state of affairs.

That being said, I still take issue with how Murrays critics handled the situation. Whatever feelings of anxiety and frustration and harbored, refusing to allowing him to speak, his detractors allowed him to gain the upper hand of the situation. The fact is that Murray, like Milo Yiannopolous and a number of provocateurs on the political, social and cultural right live to skewer and discredit their opponents as being intolerant of diverse voices. This is their standard argument.

Rush Limbaugh, Mark Levin, Shawn Hannity, Bill OReilly, and others on the right live for this sort of reaction from the left. They desire and hope for such incidents to occur and reoccur. Such events supply them with ongoing ammunition to denounce and vilify academia, diversity, multiculturalism and other entities that they fear, despise and associate with the other. Such reactions by students are like a dream come true to them.

To be sure, it is tough to have to listen to rhetoric from others who see you as less than equal that denies, and in some cases, dehumanizes your very right to exist as a human being. Moreover, when you are in your late teens and early 20s, your emotions are often tender, reactionary and fertile. You are often inclined to react in an irrational manner if you feel that you are being disrespected and disregarded. Nonetheless, the answer is not to prohibit others with whom you disagree the right to express their viewpoints. Rather, the appropriate and more effective response to challenge such abhorrent rhetoric with facts and logic that will effectively dispel such morally irreprehensible and indefensible speech. To coin the old saying sunlight is the best disinfectant.

Free speech is crucial to our democracy. Either you have it or you dont. When you attempt to deny others the right to speak, it may be only a matter of time before you, yourself will be silenced. Attempting to deny others the right to speak is a misguided and dangerous activity that can result in disastrous efforts for all. Such Stalinistic behavior cannot be tolerated or allowed in our society. Period.

Dr. Elwood Watson is a professor of history, African American Studies, and Gender Studies at East Tennessee State University.

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Experts discuss free speech on college campuses at CRC meeting – Cleveland Jewish News

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Three panelists with expertise in higher education agreed that the right to free speech encompasses most controversial things said on college campuses, however, teaching the students how to engage in civil, persuasive discussions is the best bet for ensuring productive dialogue among those with opposing viewpoints.

The panelists made their points at the Jewish Federation of Clevelands community relations committee Sidney Z. Vincent Memorial Lecture and annual meeting at The Temple-Tifereth Israel on March 15. More than 230 people attended the event, where the speakers considered topics like boycott, divestment and sanctions, free speech and controversial speakers on college campuses.

The speakers were Mark G. Yudof, former president of the University of California; Susan Kruth, program officer at the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education; and Blake D. Morant, dean and the Robert Kramer research professor of law at The George Washington University Law School in Washington, D.C. Each speaker had 10 minutes to talk and then moved into a panel discussion, moderated by Kevin S. Adelstein, CEO and publisher of the Cleveland Jewish News and president of the Cleveland Jewish Publication Company.

"In recent months, speakers from all backgrounds have been blocked from speaking on various college campuses, Adelstein said. Some of those have been met with very strong student-led protests. How has this phenomenon impacted students and the overall college environment?"

Yudof said not inviting controversial speakers has a very bad impact on the schools environment.He referred to the incident at the University of California, Berkeley in February, when a speech by Milo Yiannopoulos, who was then senior editor at Breitbart News, was canceled after demonstrators set fires and threw objects in protest. Although many of the protesters who caused damage were thought not to be students, Yudof said that incidents like that cause universities to not invite controversial speakers because of the eventual backlash from people on both sides, not to mention damage expenses.

Kruth added that canceling controversial speakers "sends the wrong message to the students that this is how you win."

"But they haven't won anything, because they haven't persuaded anyone to any other ideas. And it's not like (the speaker) is gone, they are just going to go talk to different people."

Kruth said that students opposed to a campus speaker should attend the talk, listen carefully and then ask good questions to embarrass the speakers position.

That is how you win, she said.

Morant said he encourages students to engage in civil discourse, where the school creates an atmosphere where students express opinions with the goal of persuasion, rather than name calling or yelling. Adelstein asked if enforcing civil discourse restricts free speech, and Morant said it should not.

"That to me is not censorship, that is creating an atmosphere for exchange of ideas," Morant said. "Your are not telling people that they can't say something, it's getting people invested in being effective communicators."

When an audience question asked the panelists why college students may lack tolerance toward beliefs contrary to their own, Yudof speculated that it goes beyond common stereotypes that students belong to a pampered generation and that students today are hurting.

"They went through the Great Recession, which was difficult, they have uncertain prospects over the job market, Yudof said, adding that Muslims and students of color face further challenges as well.

"I don't know what to do about it, but I think it's more subtle than just saying, 'there you go again, we indulge this new generation of students."

Although the crowd at the event was mostly well past the typical college age, the Cleveland Jewish News spoke with Alan and Joel Jaffe, college students from Solon on spring break.

Alan Jaffe, 20, said that as a junior at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, he hasnt experienced many incidents at his school related to free speech restrictions, however there is a fence on campus where students are only supposed to write one message a day. One day a student wrote Trump and other students crossed it out, violating the courtesy one message a day rule. Regardless, he said the speakers had interesting and diverse takes on the issues and would like to hear more solutions.

"It would have been interesting to hear some more ideas about how to really solve this problem, Alan Jaffe said. They gave a lot of opinions on what the law is, but not really any approaches on how to make sure people really are able to exercise their right to free speech."

His brother, Joel Jaffe, 18, a freshman at The Ohio State University in Columbus, saw some relevance between the event and the recent divestment campaign at his school, which was struck down by undergraduate government March 8.

"It was really unfair, like the wording (of the petition),Joel Jaffe said. He added that Yudof was the only panelist who eagerly and directly addressed Israel and BDS.

Maybe they didn't want to say anything too political," he said.

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Sullivan defends free speech in keynote address – The Cavalier Daily – University of Virginia The Cavalier Daily

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NEWS U.Va. president emphasizes role of higher education leaders in protecting First Amendment rights by Bridget Starrs | Mar 16 2017 | 03/16/17 2:09am

University President Teresa Sullivan addressed free speech on college campuses and the role leaders in higher education play in protecting First Amendment rights in a keynote speech at the 99th annual American Council on Education conference in Washington, D.C. on March 12.

Almost 2,000 university presidents, deans and other academic leaders attended the annual meeting, which aims to discuss pressing issues facing higher education today. Sullivan gave the keynote address at the Robert H. Atwell Plenary Session.

President Sullivan was honored to have delivered the Atwell Lecture at the annual conference of the American Council on Education, University spokesperson Anthony de Bruyn said in an email to The Cavalier Daily.

The plenary session asked attendees to deeply reflect on their leadership styles, and attendees will likely relate to at least one of Sullivans challenges on their own campus, according to the events website.

In her address entitled, When the Middle Ground is the High Ground: Free Speech and the University, Sullivan examined recent free speech controversies on college campuses across the country and defended the need for free speech in order to promote cultural awareness and tolerance.

If we protect college students today from opposing views and diverse perspectives through speech codes or other restrictions on free expression, we do them a great disservice, because were leaving them unprepared for the intellectual and social fray that they will enter the moment they step off our campuses, Sullivan said.

Sullivan directly addressed the heightening intensity of the free speech debate, citing examples from Texas Tech, Williams College and Kean University.

She also mentioned recent controversies from this year, specifically University of California, Berkeley officials cancellation of a talk by Breitbart News editor Milo Yiannopoulos after violent demonstrations leading up to the event. She also noted that at Middlebury College earlier this month, students shouted down Charles Murray, a writer accused of holding racist views, as he gave a public lecture. The lecture was cut short in response to the disruptive protests, and a Berkeley faculty moderator was injured by protesters as she and Murray were exiting the room.

Sullivan decried the recent attacks, and expressed alarm at individual colleges policy attempts to limit potentially offensive speech.

We need to remember, and we need to remind our students, that the First Amendment protects all speech unless it includes threats of physical violence and this includes speech that some may consider intolerant and offensive, Sullivan said.

Throughout her speech, Sullivan referenced the principles upon which Thomas Jefferson founded the University, including the illimitable freedom of the human mind and the need to combat errors with reason.

Sullivan also discussed Jefferson in the context of the faculty letter against the use of Jefferson quotes in emails meant to console the University community, namely her post-election email.

"In response, about 500 U.Va. faculty and students sent me a letter asking me to stop quoting Thomas Jefferson in my messages to the University community, Sullivan said in her address. They criticized me for using Jefferson as a moral compass, noting his involvement in slavery during his lifetime."

Following the criticism, Sullivan defended her choice to use a Jefferson quote by saying Jeffersons words, although contradictory in his time, have become more applicable towards real equality in the modern day context.

Quoting Jefferson or any historical figure does not imply an endorsement of all the social structures and beliefs of his time, she said last November.

For those faculty and students, I made it clear that I disagreed with their argument, Sullivan said in her speech at the plenary session. At the same time, however, I said that I fully endorsed their right to speak out on issues they care about, including U.Va.s complicated Jeffersonian legacy.

According to Sullivan, the university leaders in attendance should stand in defense of all free speech.

As leaders in higher education, when free expression seems to be under attack from all sides of the political spectrum, we can set the right example by standing in the middle ground to defend it on all sides, Sullivan said.

The American Council on Education conference began March 11 and concluded March 14.

We were privileged to have President Sullivan deliver this years Atwell lecture," Jonathan Riskind,Assistant Vice President for theAmerican Council on Education, said in an email to The Cavalier Daily on Thursday."The Robert H. Atwell Plenary, named by the ACE Board of Directors for the former ACE president who served from 1984-96, is steeped in a history of thought-provoking talks by national higher education leaders, and President Sullivans address was very much in that distinguished tradition.

Campus free speech has become a topic of interest at the state level, with a bill concerning the increasingly contentious issue passing the General Assembly last month. Intended to protect First Amendment rights, the proposed law prohibits limitations on free speech on college campuses. Although the bill is largely supported, some opponents view it as unnecessary, and even as a potential invitation to hate speech on campuses. Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) has yet to take any action on the bill.

This article has been updated with a comment from Jonathan Riskind.

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Free speech under attack at UK colleges, report says – Fox News

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Censorship of free speech and cultures that have become increasingly PC are not just phenomena on campuses across the U.S. a new report shows that they are also having a chilling effect on more than half the campuses in the United Kingdom.

The British Internet magazine spiked, which focuses on politics and society,released its third-annual report on campus censorship in the United Kingdom, and the results paint a grim picture.

The Free Speech University Rankings (FSUR) looked at 115 universities throughout the U.K. using a traffic-light systemred light, being the worst, marks a prohibition on a certain type of speech; the yellow category prevents speech from being too provocative; and a green light rating marks a clean bill of health.

The 2017 analysis showed that 63.5 percent of universities in the United Kingdom actively censor speech, and 30.5 percent stifle speech through excessive regulation, creating what the magazine calls a steady rise in censorship during the past three years. Only 6 percent of universities in the U.K., the study says, are truly free.

They are regulating speech to a chilling degree across the board by restricting discussion of religion, transgenderism, offensive Halloween costumesyou name it and its cutting through most of the university sector, 25-year-old Tom Slater, coordinator of the Free Speech University Rankings at spiked, told Fox News. The underlying problem is political correctness. And, the problem is, if you allow that kind of censorship on campus, it tends to go unchecked and then its going to spread, with more and more people latching on.

Spiked said the reports results were produced through Freedom of Information requests and analysis of university student unions, published documents and policies, along with executive bans for universities over the past three years.

Examples of the regulations on free speech, according to Slater, including the ban of tabloid newspapers like The Sun as well as the censoring of Robin Thickes single Blurred Lines, which was banned at 25 universities in the U.K.

Greg Lukianoff, president and CEO of U.S.-based Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, or FIRE, told Fox News that political correctness is an American thing that has spread to Britain in the last five years.

Britain is in a dead sprint trying to catch up to American universities, and the problem is that [the U.S.] is protected by the First Amendment and theyre not, Lukianoff told Fox News. Its hard to directly compare to the U.K., but is there a problem there? Yes. Absolutely.

Both Slater and Lukianoff said the type of censorship being seen on college campuses is chilling.

If you make people have to guess whether or not theyll be arrested for something they say, that is a chill on the First Amendment and on free speech, Lukianoff said.

Slater said the suppression of free speech at U.K.universities was further fueled by the election of President Trump, which poured gasoline over a problem that was already there. But it is social media, he said, that created and spread the PC-culture in the U.K.

The Trump phenomenon has just brought to the surface the quite hysterical approach people have to opposing views, Slater said. Social media has played a role, because it lets politicos on both sides of the pond share ideas, and that has been somewhat of a catalyst.

Slater said that students in the U.K. suppress speech in the name of liberalism and progressivism.

Things have gotten so bad and everyone has gotten caught up in this, Slater said. But I dont see anything liberalor progressivein offending free speech.

Brooke Singman is a Reporter for Fox News. Follow her on Twitter at @brookefoxnews.

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Pitzer students debate free speech, student safety and cultural … – Inside Higher Ed

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Pitzer students debate free speech, student safety and cultural ...
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A one-line critique of the fashion choices of some white women leads to debate over journalism and cultural appropriation, and to threats made to Latina ...

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‘Political correctness’ on campus: A free-speech watchdog defends its questionable evidence – Los Angeles Times

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My critique this week of a free-speech watchdogs roster, ostensibly of efforts to silence speakers on college campuses because of their views, has drawn blood. The sponsor of the disinvitation database, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, struck back Tuesday to defend its work.

FIREs willingness to engage in debate, via an article by Ari Cohn, director of its individual rights defense program, is a commendable nod to its stated mission of defending freedom of speech and other such rights on campus. But Cohns response actually makes my case that its database, which encompasses 331 disinvitations of campus speakers since 2010, including 43 last year, is shallow, overly inclusive, and dependent on anecdotes that dont support its claim that freedom of speech on campus is in decline.

It is utterly illiberal to demand that anyone who would like to hear from the speaker not be allowed to do so, Cohn writes. Thats true, as far as it goes. But many of the cases FIRE includes in its roster dont involve demands to prevent speakers from speaking at an event or others from attending. As I pointed out in my original column, many involve simply protests or the airing of objections that themselves amount to expressions of free speech.

Lets examine Cohns defense.

First, Cohn takes issue with my point that even if the database did comprise every attempt to silence speakers or force them to withdraw, it represented a tiny percentage of the tens of thousands of speaking invitations issued every year by Americas more than 4,000 colleges. Therefore it cant serve as evidence of a trend toward more exclusion. While there may be 4,000 colleges and universities, he writes, the universe of schools to which controversial, big-name speakers are invited is likely significantly smaller.

That may be so, but FIREs universe is fairly inclusive. Its database includes big campuses like Berkeley and the University of Michigan, but also places like Earlham College of Indiana (enrollment 1,019) and Anna Maria College of Massachusetts (1,462). So whats the real size of the universe? Cohn doesnt say. Nor are all the targets appearing on his list big name speakers: They include state legislators, authors of self-published political screeds, and local activists unknown outside their homes and surrounding counties.

The bigger issue, however, lies with FIREs claim that its database tracks calls to silence or disinvite a speaker. Cohn writes that disinvitation teaches students the wrong lesson: that keeping anyone on campus from hearing views with which some people disagree, rather than the more difficult task of engaging in critical thinking and refuting those views, is an acceptable and successful tactic. The truth is that many of FIREs cited incidents are nothing of the kind.

I mentioned a couple in my original piece, including a protest against the joint appearance of former Vice President Joe Biden and former House Speaker John A. Boehner at Notre Dames 2016 commencement. FIRE listed the event but didnt cite any evidence of an effort to disinvite the speakers. Cohn defends the inclusion by arguing that some students wrote that they strongly objected to the invitations. Whether this is an implicit call for the revocation of the invitations is a matter upon which reasonable minds can disagree.

But there can be no disagreement about the letter Cohn cites. It says, We do not wish to endorse or refute either awardees worthiness to receive this honor, but simply call on dissenters of the Universitys decision to acknowledge the importance of all Catholic Social Teachings, not simply those they believe are the most important. In other words, it doesnt come close, even implicitly, to calling for disinvitation indeed, it explicitly disavows any such intention. Why is this episode on FIREs list?

There are other such examples. Appearances by former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright at Scripps College and Syracuse University made the database. But neither seemed to involve a call for disinviting her. At Scripps, her commencement appearance inspired a commentary in the campus newspaper about her supposed role in fostering genocide; but that free expression of opinion should hearten, not disturb, the people at FIRE. At Syracuse, FIREs evidence for disinvitation is a report of a small protest outside the hall while Albright was speaking inside. How is that a disinivitation attempt?

Cohn takes issue with my argument that commencement speakers should be distinguished from those invited to participate in a campus discussion or panel or give a substantive talk. My point was that a colleges invitation to address commencement confers an implied institutional imprimatur on the speakers career or views. Thats especially so when it comes packaged with an honorary degree, as is typically the case. Under the circumstances, the selection of a commencement speaker should be subject to the most vigorous debate and even reconsideration by the campus community.

Cohn writes, Commencement speakers are generally invited because they have a message to students that would be valuable as they move forward with their lives, often drawing upon their own histories and experiences. Uh-huh. Would that the average commencement keynote met this high standard. But Ive been to a few such events, and I know, as I bet Cohn does too, that his Pollyanna-ish statement could have come right out of a college press release.

Finally, Cohn disputes my assertion that a speakers fitness to appear on campus at all should be a legitimate topic of discussion, debate, and reconsideration. He writes: Those extending campus speaking invitations are surely tasked with determining from whom they would like to hear. Once the inviting party has determined that they would like to hear out a particular speaker, it is certainly not the place of others on campus to determine for them whether or not such a speaker is qualified.

Here he begs an important question. Tasked by whom? At many campuses, almost anyone can invite a speaker, provided that a free classroom or hall can be found for the event. Surely not everyone tendering an invitation is doing so in the name of the university. Judgments of whos qualified to speak at a campus venue are made all the time on virtually every campus. Why any one individuals decision to offer a platform to any speaker should necessarily be the last word, immune from criticism, objection, or revocation, is a mystery, and Cohn doesnt solve it.

Keeping an eye on efforts to suppress free speech on college campuses is a worthy calling. But FIREs assertions that such efforts are on the rise indeed, that they set a record in 2016 cant survive scrutiny, at least not based on the evidence it provides. Anecdotes can be useful, but not when they deflate at the slightest poking.

Keep up to date with Michael Hiltzik. Follow @hiltzikm on Twitter, see his Facebook page, or email michael.hiltzik@latimes.com.

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