Post by RPankn on Feb 25, 2005 22:13:28 GMT -5
Published Friday, February 25, 2005
By JOE FOLLICK
Tallahassee Bureau
TALLAHASSEE -- Battling what he calls a "quiet prejudice" against conservative views on university campuses, a Florida lawmaker is proposing a "bill of rights" that some claim is an effort to stifle the academic freedoms the bill seeks to protect.
Rep. Dennis Baxley, R-Ocala, filed House Bill 837 after he attended a meeting last year in St. Louis where well-known conservative activist David Horowitz railed against liberal biases on campus toward professors and students.
The bill borrows heavily from a template used in similar bills filed nationwide with the help of Horowitz's group, Students for Academic Freedom.
House Bill 837 promises to protect "free inquiry and free speech within the academic community." A portion of the bill says that students should not have their academic freedom "infringed upon by instructors who persistently introduce controversial matter into the classroom that has no relation to the subject of study and serves no legitimate pedagogical purpose." [Truly Orwellian because it's obvious the purpose of clause is to stifle academic freedom for a very sanitized, pro-U.S. worldview] Baxley said that simply means a science professor should stick to that topic and not let any digressions into other matters affect the class. [I didn't go to college in FL, thank God, but I don't remember my science class digressing into non-scientific topics, or any of my other classes doing the same for that matter. I wonder if Baxley has ever attended college.]
"I don't think it's the fact that (class discussion) is controversial that's the problem. The problem is inappropriate forums," Baxley said. "If the course is labeled as a political discourse on the evils of capitalism you expect that."
Baxley said he has no specific examples of problems in Florida beyond anecdotes. But he sees a trend of liberal proselytization on campuses. "What used to be an image in our universities as a place of open dialogue has moved to where we have a niche of totalitarianism almost where if you don't give the right answer (to meet the professor's political bent), you're out of the class or you get your grade knocked down."
Baxley says the bill would cut both ways, for example, protecting a student who supports abortion rights from retribution if he disagreed with a professor's anti-abortion stances.
But the bill worries academics who fear its true intent is to hinder any discourse out of the mainstream.
Pierre Ramond, chairman of the University of Florida faculty senate, said the bill is "dangerous."
"I think this is kind of an attempt to legislate what professors can and cannot say," said Ramond, a physics professor and director of the Institute for Fundamental Theory. Ramond said the fuzzy definition of "controversial" is the bill's largest problem.
"What's controversial? Who says it has no relationship to the subject of study? Who will tell if something has no `legitimate pedagogical purpose?' There are too many things the bill wants to define," Ramond said.
He added that stoking passions with what may be perceived as extreme views is a necessary teaching tool.
"You do not educate people with the dogma of the day," Ramond said. "You want to produce critical thinking. Shocking people with thoughts that appear to be out of left field might not be bad."
And Ramond said any stifling of discourse could hinder society's evolution.
"It wasn't too long ago that people thought other people of different races were not human and if you'd tried to teach against that, you probably would have been in trouble with this bill," Ramond said.
The bill would also make it a student's right to have their fees used on a "viewpoint-neutral basis with respect to substantive political and religious disagreements, differences and opinions."
"There is this kind of quiet prejudice that the leftist person or guest on campus gets the major auditorium and all the questions are screened and the conservative guest gets the little corner of the Fine Arts room and gets the open mike so everyone can let go on him," Baxley said.
The bill may bring a national debate to Florida. The liberal People for the American Way has put Students for Academic Freedom on its "Right Wing Watch," saying Horowitz has called universities "indoctrination centers for the political left." [Pot meet kettle, an indoctrinator of the Israeli hard right.]
SAF's Web site counters with accusations of universities blacklisting conservatives from teaching positions.
The bill's odds of success are unknown, but they're aided by Baxley's sponsorship. He is the chair of the House's Education Council. And earlier this week, Gov. Jeb Bush said Baxley was one of his closest allies in the Legislature.
Baxley said the bill was prescient given the recent uproar over University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill's statements in a book that complimented the terrorists who attacked the World Trade Center [Whoa, whoa, whoa. His essay and book did no so thing.]. "He's certainly an example of the discourse (at universities). I'm not a person that wants him fired. I want him accountable. I don't want him giving someone an `F' because they won't say the president should be tried for war crimes," Baxley said. [Tell me where Ward Churchill said that.]
www.theledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050225/NEWS/502250344/1134
By JOE FOLLICK
Tallahassee Bureau
TALLAHASSEE -- Battling what he calls a "quiet prejudice" against conservative views on university campuses, a Florida lawmaker is proposing a "bill of rights" that some claim is an effort to stifle the academic freedoms the bill seeks to protect.
Rep. Dennis Baxley, R-Ocala, filed House Bill 837 after he attended a meeting last year in St. Louis where well-known conservative activist David Horowitz railed against liberal biases on campus toward professors and students.
The bill borrows heavily from a template used in similar bills filed nationwide with the help of Horowitz's group, Students for Academic Freedom.
House Bill 837 promises to protect "free inquiry and free speech within the academic community." A portion of the bill says that students should not have their academic freedom "infringed upon by instructors who persistently introduce controversial matter into the classroom that has no relation to the subject of study and serves no legitimate pedagogical purpose." [Truly Orwellian because it's obvious the purpose of clause is to stifle academic freedom for a very sanitized, pro-U.S. worldview] Baxley said that simply means a science professor should stick to that topic and not let any digressions into other matters affect the class. [I didn't go to college in FL, thank God, but I don't remember my science class digressing into non-scientific topics, or any of my other classes doing the same for that matter. I wonder if Baxley has ever attended college.]
"I don't think it's the fact that (class discussion) is controversial that's the problem. The problem is inappropriate forums," Baxley said. "If the course is labeled as a political discourse on the evils of capitalism you expect that."
Baxley said he has no specific examples of problems in Florida beyond anecdotes. But he sees a trend of liberal proselytization on campuses. "What used to be an image in our universities as a place of open dialogue has moved to where we have a niche of totalitarianism almost where if you don't give the right answer (to meet the professor's political bent), you're out of the class or you get your grade knocked down."
Baxley says the bill would cut both ways, for example, protecting a student who supports abortion rights from retribution if he disagreed with a professor's anti-abortion stances.
But the bill worries academics who fear its true intent is to hinder any discourse out of the mainstream.
Pierre Ramond, chairman of the University of Florida faculty senate, said the bill is "dangerous."
"I think this is kind of an attempt to legislate what professors can and cannot say," said Ramond, a physics professor and director of the Institute for Fundamental Theory. Ramond said the fuzzy definition of "controversial" is the bill's largest problem.
"What's controversial? Who says it has no relationship to the subject of study? Who will tell if something has no `legitimate pedagogical purpose?' There are too many things the bill wants to define," Ramond said.
He added that stoking passions with what may be perceived as extreme views is a necessary teaching tool.
"You do not educate people with the dogma of the day," Ramond said. "You want to produce critical thinking. Shocking people with thoughts that appear to be out of left field might not be bad."
And Ramond said any stifling of discourse could hinder society's evolution.
"It wasn't too long ago that people thought other people of different races were not human and if you'd tried to teach against that, you probably would have been in trouble with this bill," Ramond said.
The bill would also make it a student's right to have their fees used on a "viewpoint-neutral basis with respect to substantive political and religious disagreements, differences and opinions."
"There is this kind of quiet prejudice that the leftist person or guest on campus gets the major auditorium and all the questions are screened and the conservative guest gets the little corner of the Fine Arts room and gets the open mike so everyone can let go on him," Baxley said.
The bill may bring a national debate to Florida. The liberal People for the American Way has put Students for Academic Freedom on its "Right Wing Watch," saying Horowitz has called universities "indoctrination centers for the political left." [Pot meet kettle, an indoctrinator of the Israeli hard right.]
SAF's Web site counters with accusations of universities blacklisting conservatives from teaching positions.
The bill's odds of success are unknown, but they're aided by Baxley's sponsorship. He is the chair of the House's Education Council. And earlier this week, Gov. Jeb Bush said Baxley was one of his closest allies in the Legislature.
Baxley said the bill was prescient given the recent uproar over University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill's statements in a book that complimented the terrorists who attacked the World Trade Center [Whoa, whoa, whoa. His essay and book did no so thing.]. "He's certainly an example of the discourse (at universities). I'm not a person that wants him fired. I want him accountable. I don't want him giving someone an `F' because they won't say the president should be tried for war crimes," Baxley said. [Tell me where Ward Churchill said that.]
www.theledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050225/NEWS/502250344/1134