ok, i just got word of a major incident involving the College Republicans at University of California Riverside.
My friend was with her boyfriend at a 4th of July party that various CR clubs were hosting. There were heavy amounts of alcohol consumed. One of her "friends" brought a loaded gun to the party knowing that people were going to be heavily intoxicated. After a while my friend decided to leave the party and reached for her shoes, when she was tapped on the shoulder and found her friend who was drunk by this time pointing the gun in her face. She claimed she had never been that scared in her life.
Later, it was revealed that after she and her boyfriend left, some of the CRs brought illegal drugs like cocaine, ecstasy and crystal meth!
These incidents are not uncommon unfortunately amongst the California College Republicans. During the California Republican Party Convention, the CR Hospitality suite was described in a local Sacramento paper as a wild party from a scene in Animal House or Girls Gone Wild!
Is this just California? Do the College Republicans at UIUC act like this? What about the College or Young Democrats?
I am scared for my friend, because she has told me that she is still having nightmares after that incident. Is it time that more mature adults in the political world put our foot down and tell these immature kids to stop doing this behavior, its making the GOP look bad!
Any insight about this? This is not a partisan issue. Is anyone familiar with the party scene of College Democrats or Greens, etc?
Please pray for my friend as well.
RD... I'd like to be able to say that's merely endemic to California culture but I honestly can't say that with a straight face. Stupidity pervades our society even in the most ironic places sometimes. My Uncle is a UC Riverside professor, did any of this make the news, or did this all happen in the shadows? Is her "friend" in jail now? Any charges filed? Somehow I doubt this is indicative of College Republicans nationwide but drug use, violence, irresponsible behavior, etc is fairly common among college age people in the U.S. and it often transcends boundaries of rich and poor, and politics. People with money tend to have more to lose with such behavior and I think that helps discourage it to some degree but perhaps we're talking about people here who had enough money they thought they could get away with almost anything? Beats me. Not enough details. Perhaps it wasn't anywhere near that logical and we can just chalk it up to plain stupidity on a few really bad apples in an otherwise party-going atmosphere.
As for your friend I'd strongly encourage you to strong encourage her to discuss the event with a counselor. Recurring nightmares after a traumatic incident, especially one involving intense fear of death or injury, can be signs the mind is having a hard time dealing with trauma. The mind does all sorts of strange things to compensate to stuff like this so it would probably be in her best interests to deal with it early on before it has the chance to develop into a disorder (it's not guaranteed but the potential is there).
As for her "friend," friends don't stick guns in friends faces. I think I'd be pretty well done with anyone associated with that friend and move on to safer social groups. I'm a bit puzzled at the lack of any noting of charges, arrest, etc though. Was your friend involved in some of the illegal activities that would make this impossible? If that's the case it certainly doesn't deserve assault with a deadly weapon but surely deserves a stern talking to about the circles she's getting involved in. I'd still press her to seek counseling for the trauma and perhaps additional issues.
--
Glock21 Op/Ed
Too much Alcohol bad Idea, Drugs stupid, all together with a gun tradgic...
The closest thing I can think of at UIUC is that some of the Orange and Blue Observer staff were having a party with alcohol, and and angry protester said he was going to show up with his gun. He was protesting allowing responsible, law-abiding to carry concealed weapons. I guess he didn't want the competition.
But in general, there is lots of drinking involved with just about any kind of college club... I don't want to bash the future teachers, but those are who I've seen the most of (I was a future teacher once), and bar-crawls and heavy drinking after class are a regular part of most preservice teachers lives. Volunteer tutors in the local schools - going out and getting drunk is a favorite pastime for many of them.
A perusal of facebook will give you a good indication of what the kids are up to these days.
Robert Dunn Ex-Leftist, Born-Again Conservative American
No, no police were contacted, i dont think it made the news. The attitude of most of the California CRs is to "not narc or tell on my friends." I don't care what your political affiliation is, you break the law, you should go to jail, period!
Robert Dunn Ex-Leftist, Born-Again Conservative American
So, let me get this straight, this guy is protesting lawful gun use by using a gun? Was this when that Leo guy was their editor? I have heard some terrible things about that guy and his little band of followers. I don't have much respect for the Observer these days. Who remembers the infamous picture with a child at the Urbana Wal-Mart protest. The caption said that the protestors were exploiting retarded children and had a cartoon bubble that said "Kick me." I don't call that journalism or even commentary, but stupid junior high school bantor! When confronted about it, ALL of the staff just pointed to Leo. However, they could have put a stop to it and prevented that garbage from being published in the first place. So, the responsibility lies with the entire paper. I think that having an alternative paper on campus and the community that leans right-of-center is a good thing, however, it should have some substance to it. It should not be the rights equivalent of UCIMC.
I think the Orange and Blue Observer name should go and be renamed something else. A once great paper has been ruined by a group of immature kids who can't argue a single point, so they just resort to name calling and slander! They have done so much damage to themselves and the conservatives in this area that even the UIUC College Republicans have officially stated that they want nothing whatsoever to do with them!
Yeah. Leo did a lot of damage to the paper. The problem is that at that time there wasn't much of a staff or anything.. so it really was Leo alone doing those things. Nobody could have stopped him from printing what he did or e-mailing what he did because he just did it by himself.
I did most of my OBO writing in the pre-Leo days, and I think the paper had a better reputation then. People didn't like us, but it was because of the positions we took, not because of the stunts that Leo did.
Anyway, they had regular drinking events too. I think its a regular part of just about any RSO on any campus. Drugs and guns are something else, but It seems like that part of the story is 3rd or 4th hand.
Robert Dunn Ex-Leftist, Born-Again Conservative American
when did you do the Observer? The reason why i became interested in the Observer was because there was a piece online by someone in Student Peace Action who is more libertarian than liberal. He was on the staff.
my first memory of the Observer was the Pat Hoffman years!
I was involved mostly in 2003-2004. I joined when I started education grad school and found out that none of the professors in my department were Republicans. The Bush is evil / Bush is dumb jokes were starting to annoy me.
Robert Dunn Ex-Leftist, Born-Again Conservative American
Well, i started my conservative alternative paper called the San Bernardino Review right before i graduated!
I liked Pat a lot--we shared many heated discussions. I just got the impression that he hadn't seen much of the world and suffered from an inability to appreciate other folks' perspectives and experiences. But he was very bright and I imagine has done some good stuff with himself.
As to the alleged alcoholism of teachers and teachers to be--Having been in different workplace environments, I didn't see too much difference except for teachers and student teachers having a lot more stress to blow off. Personally, I don't do any drugs, alcohol included, but there were certainly those abusing different things.
The only exception I'd say was in the indie-software development field where my co-workers basically just ate ramen, abused caffiene and gamed 24/7.
So, let me get this straight, this guy is protesting lawful gun use by using a gun? Was this when that Leo guy was their editor? I have heard some terrible things about that guy and his little band of followers. I don't have much respect for the Observer these days. Who remembers the infamous picture with a child at the Urbana Wal-Mart protest. The caption said that the protestors were exploiting retarded children and had a cartoon bubble that said "Kick me." I don't call that journalism or even commentary, but stupid junior high school bantor! When confronted about it, ALL of the staff just pointed to Leo. However, they could have put a stop to it and prevented that garbage from being published in the first place. So, the responsibility lies with the entire paper. I think that having an alternative paper on campus and the community that leans right-of-center is a good thing, however, it should have some substance to it. It should not be the rights equivalent of UCIMC.
I think that amateur journalism combined with an ideological echo chamber just doesn't work. There's a risk that inappropriate or low-quality content will be accepted as long as it espouses the "right" political views. This tends to turn off better writers and artists, who often don't want their work appearing next to garbage. The vacuum is filled with an increasing amount of marginal content, and the credibility of the entire site drops. I think when it reaches that point, it may be best to just start something new, rather than trying to rebuild a badly damaged reputation.
It is not a political issue, but rather one of opportunity, age and alcohol.
Matters not, whether they were Republicans, Democrats, Green, Socialist, or non-commited. The opportunity to do "dumb" things presented itself, and they did. Remember a Professional Football team did about the same thing? A few years ago, a couple of baseball players, did the same thing?
Nope, it is the same thing we all suffered from in our youth. Opportunity to be young and dumb, and we seized it.
However of interest is, when I was younger and these parties availed themselves, they NEVER involved a firearm. Even though the gun laws were much more relaxed then, guns were NEVER at any of the parties which I attended. Makes you wonder why we have the gun laws that are supposed to reduce the incidences which involve the firearms, when the opposite is occuring.
And Glock is right, a "friend" would NEVER point a gun at a "friend", NEVER, NEVER, NEVER. She should steer clear of that person at all costs. Guns do not have a conscience, they only have direction.
A sad occurence, but certainly one to be noted and carefully considered.
To that end, I am, and shall always remain;
Rex Bradfield
Robert Dunn Ex-Leftist, Born-Again Conservative American
well, maybe its also that College kids, i was once one about a month and half ago, have more time and energy on their hands and do not have to worry about the niceties of adult life, working an actual job, starting and raising a family, paying taxes, and premature greying and baldness or is that just me?
One question, what are Illinois' current laws about purchasing a handgun for defense purposes only? Are they are restrictive as California's is?
I do believe that alcohol and guns are a bad combination and should never be mixed together?
As to waywards comment, i disagree that you can have truly objective journalism. Due to human nature, our own perceptions and biases get in the way of objectively seeing things. I think we should strive for more balance of opinion in the media though.
Robert Dunn Ex-Leftist, Born-Again Conservative American
So, would you call the Public I and the IMC "amateur journalism?" What about National Review and the Nation?
You need a FOID card. Then you can buy a handgun and ammo, but IL doesn't allow concealed carry. Campus is a gun-free happyland, so don't drive through campus with a gun in your car, unless you are on your way to the PTI range.
You can't use deadly force to protect your private property, so be prepared to face the daunting scenario of proving your innocence by demonstrating that a reasonable person would think his life was in danger if you shoot at any intruders.
The picture was stupid at the time and I believe I told Leo that. As soon as the new staff got control of the website, I made sure they took it down but to be fair, pretty much everyone was already of that same mindset. The Leo days are long over. But Wendy is right that rebuilding a tarnished name takes time, luckily the student body turns over every 4 (oops, 5!) years and the institutional memory is correspondingly short. (Yes, I'm the advisor for the paper... No, I wasn't while Leo was the editor but did communicate with him from time to time).
--
j
Part-Time Pundit
Did Illinois ever pass that statewide home defense law? I seem to recall some guy in McHenry county shooting an intruder during his **second** robbery of that house, and the city trying to prosecute him for some local gun ordinance...
Illinois gun laws aren't terrible, per se. However, there is great inconsistency with the local ordinances, so you could theoretically be perfectly legit having a gun in your trunk and drive into a city where that's not so legit anymore. Getting a FOID here is disturbingly easy. I know of a kid (ok, young adult), who sent in his picture for the card with his holding up his middle finger right in front of his face. State police gave him the FOID with that picture. I tried to do that at the DMV when I renewed my driver's license, they threatened to kick me out. (Ok, that was a little flippant, but I did think about it...)
--
j
Part-Time Pundit
As to waywards comment, i disagree that you can have truly objective journalism. Due to human nature, our own perceptions and biases get in the way of objectively seeing things. I think we should strive for more balance of opinion in the media though.
<....>
So, would you call the Public I and the IMC "amateur journalism?" What about National Review and the Nation?
First, "amateur journalism" was my catchall term for bloggers, citizen journalists, and publications in general where most of the staff is unpaid. It was not intended as an insult. So yes, I'd call both Indymedia and OBO "amateur journalism." AFAIK, National Review and The Nation pay most of their staff and contributors, so they wouldn't be. By "echo chamber," I'm talking about strong ideology with little tolerance for dissent. UCIMC fits this bill, and I'm suspecting that OBO also has, at least in the past. The problem is that it's easy to get into a groupthink mode. "This person said what we want to hear! Clearly this is a great article, and anyone who disagrees must be a troll."
There was a well-known prank about ten years ago when a physics professor submitted a paper liberally salted with nonsense to a Cultural Studies journal called "Social Text." (http://physics.nyu.edu/~as2/transgress_v2/transgress_v2_singlefile.html) He used terminology that flattered their ideology, e.g. "liberatory postmodern science" that was "of some service to postmodern interests." (No, I'm really not making this up.) The paper was actually accepted for publication.
FWIW, I didn't claim that it was possible to have "truly objective journalism," though adhering to codes of journalistic ethics helps credibility. The problem isn't authors having opinions; rather, it's getting so wrapped up in ideology that you lose sight of quality and reputation.
Robert Dunn Ex-Leftist, Born-Again Conservative American
Well John, from seeing Facebook pictures from the past, it appeared that a lot of the antics was not just Leo, but some current Observer members took part in his shenanigans. Hopefully those others have had a change of heart.
Robert Dunn Ex-Leftist, Born-Again Conservative Americans
Well you could also say that ideology has crept into the classroom as well.
A local friend told me horror stories of how certain UHS teachers were so wrapped into ideology that they would humiliate students who would express a thought different from their own.
I have read that one, its by Alan Sokal.
My experiences as well was in a class called "Perspectives on Gender." My mistake was to point out a contradiction in the professors statements that "homosexuality was natural/biological, then later on saying that lesbianism was a political statement. She kicked me out of class, would not sit down with me to talk this over, i wanted to reconcile, however, she did not see me as a student anymore, but as an ideological enemy who needed to be defeated and destroyed. From what i have heard from other students across all political spectrums, this is not unusual in the contemporary university environment. It seems that the ideologues in higher education are coming more from the far-left to where a lot of college classes are identical to UCIMC. Students are not taught to think for themselves, but are taught what to think. That is not education at all, but indoctrination, whether from the Left or the Right. I have yet to hear about conservative professors calling their students pigs, racial slurs, etc when there is a disagreement. When i started my paper, my managing editor was spat on by one of CSUSBs women studies professors.
Are there any other stories about the abuse of the classroom for political purposes at UIUC or elsewhere? I ended up becoming an activist for David Horowitz campaign for bringing true academic freedom to college campuses and now even k-12! check out www.studentsforacademicfreedom.com and www.thefire.com. I am for debate about political issues, but just not in biology class. I think its totally inappropriate to be watching Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9-11 when we should be dissecting frogs!
Robert Dunn Ex-Leftist, Born-Again Conservative American
The OBO did allow for differing viewpoints. The thing that caught my interest was reading an article by a former member of Student Peace Action by Neil Parthun. He is more of a libertarian/almost anarchists person. However, his article was attacking the nanni-statism under Gov. Blago. I think for the most part, the Observer leaned more right of center, but has allowed other writers of different poltical stripes in. Again the problem was not that OBO would not allow differing views, but that under Leo, the paper was mostly about covering his and fellow travelers obnoxious antics. If i were to rewrite some of those articles like the Wal-Mart article with the kick me photo in it, i would have come up with a defense of Wal-Mart. A recent article about the banning of Christmas was appropriate but missed its main point when the author, Ms. Erin Jones stated that people get offended too much and claimed that she was offended. That is more of a case of someone not reading over the article for it to make sense or not. Most of the folks on the Observer did and do a tremendous job. Mrs. Sheena Smith did a wonderful investigative report on McKinley Health Centerand how they were writing prescriptions to underaged girlst for the abortion pill without parents notification.
We at CSUSB did a similar expose where i and our managing editor posed as boyfriend/girlfriend, and she claimed that she was under 18 and still in high school. Our story was that she became pregnant by me and I did not want the kid and so we both agreed she should have an abortion. Without any questioning, we both were referred to an abortion and were given tips on how to hide it from her parents. Wow, so if our story were true, the Womens Resource Center at CSUSB aided and abetted statutory rape! That is what infuriated them so much, we exposed them. We did not editorialize but allowed our target to make themselves appear guilty.
Robert, I certainly don't intend to defend the professionalism of kicking out a student with a differing viewpoint. But surely you can see the potential danger of calling people's sexual identity a political statement?
You certainly shouldn't have been kicked out or ignored, but I would probably cut you off and sit down with you afterwards so that we could work together on the medium between free expression of one's opinion and using identity politics to conduct personal attacks on people.
I would certainly do the same if a student (of either political affiliation) said that it's common for people with small penises to switch political affiliations ;P
People should be encourage to develop their own opinions, and to express them, but there is a way to express them that doesn't destroy the discourse in a way that we have seen on this blog as of late. If as a teacher, you can't moderate between the two, you are not doing your job.
I've tried to read Horowitz's work, but if you want a boorish ideologue from the right, there he is...
That's what the professor said, not Robert, and that idea is a fairly common one in the queer theory realm.
Robert, regarding your question about what happens in the classroom. There is a professor in education policy studies named Lawrence Parker.. he did a little stunt in class once where he pretended to be a troubled kid in class.. not able to read, trying to get a date with a girl next to him, walking to the front of the room, throwing a chair, saying something about racists, and storming out of class.
He came back in and tried to get the class to think that there was some racial component to the whole thing. It was funny because nobody in the class took the bait and said no matter what the color of the student, its a behavior problem. Anyway, it was a memorable moment of attempted indoctrination that flopped.
Thanks for the correction--the missing quote threw me off when I was skimming. I really need to read more thoroughly.
I see what you are saying now. I guess the context matters though, right? I mean being of African descent or dark-skinned is certainly biological, but it was still political to point that out definitively--so political that medals were stripped for doing so.
But you certainly shouldn't have been kick out for it, unless you poured sugar in someone's gas tank at the same time or something.
As to your anecdote, wasn't that a scene from an Adam Sandler movie ;P?
Robert Dunn Ex-Leftist, Born-Again Conservative American
Billy Madison was the movie.
The professor was the one who said that lesbianism was a tool of the feminist movement. In fact, was it not a famous feminist that said "all heterosexual sex is rape?'" My point is is that education should not be a place where teachers and professors turn the classroom into a political rally. I had a teacher in high school that took us to an anti-chief rally and lecture as part of class. We had to hold anti-chief signs and march with the PRC. If OBO/College Republicans/ or Students for Chief Illiniwek were to hold a rally with half of the rally attenders consisting of a high school class that were forced to go because it was "part of class," there would be calls for the banishment of those groups.
From hearing about recent events at UHS, a recent grad of UHS informed me that her AP Spanish class was forced to watch Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth." In English, not Spanish. What does Gore's propaganda film have to with the Spanish language?
In one of her other classes, she told me that her Psychology teacher made the class go to an AWARE event as part of "class."
Colleges and Universities pride themselves on "Diversity and Tolerance." However, it is not usually given to those who do not share the far-leftist views of the professoriate. Unfortunately, these politically correct professors are training K-12 educators to be just like them. They think their profession is to bring "social change" instead of teaching children how to read, write, compute, and think. No wonder our public schools are in such a disaster.
Heh... yeah, pretty much that's what was acted out by prof. Parker.
Robert, regarding teachers viewing their profession as bringing "social change". I think probably most teachers are just interested in a nice paycheck and good job security, just like everyone else. But the education professors are very much interested in pushing their social / political agenda. But to them, that's good education policy, so they teach it as if it were true... in the mean time, kids aren't reading and adding too well. But that doesn't concern education professors as much as ensuring that we have equity.
Robert Dunn Ex-Leftist, Born-Again Conservative American
Kids can't read, write, add, or subtract basic numerals, but they know about diversity and tolerance, and can put a condom on a cucumber! I actually had to put one on a cucumber at Urbana Middle School in 6 grade. Dare to suggest that you at least wait till marriage, you are being intolerant and unrealistic. No wonder i am now seeing 12 year mothers! Yikes!
There were always 12 year old mothers. The average age of first-child is older now than it's ever been.
Robert, I couldn't disagree more. My extensive experience with failing school environments has taught me that a main reason why the kids are having trouble with basic math and language arts is because they have more than we did to worry about during our school years. As a result, the traditional approach doesn't work. You make it sound as if there's some vast majority of teachers in these schools pursuing the agenda you describe. It's usually the opposite--there's a whole bunch of teachers who know there stuff forwards and backwards, and stand at the front of the class teaching it, and many kids are not listening because they don't think it has anything to do with them.
What I would agree with is that indoctrination has no place in school. What I would disagree with is turning the classroom into a political rally is bad. The question is whether it is being done so with the students making the choices or the professors. I tend to spend most of my energy during class discussions of political issues supporting the conservative students, because there are only one or two in my classes.
I sometimes push a conservative viewpoint; sometimes the opposite. My students all know that they get nothing for simply agreeing and in fact, often I will take a position that I disagree with just to give them something to box with.
But these political issues and skills are exactly what my kids need--it energizes them and gives them tools to combat the issues in their lives. Sorry, when your neighborhood is ultra-violent and you are losing a classmate each month, math problems seem pretty far away. Of course they need those skills, but just saying so is not going to accomplish anything.