Posted on 04/15/2005 7:07:23 AM PDT by Flightdeck
Hey me too! Can't wait for it to happen.
Seems to me that the persons violating the idea of free speech were those who were using airhorns, etc., to drown out a speaker who had gone to the trouble of engaging a hall and attracting an audience. They have a right to disrupt a speaker, but no one has a right to disrupt them?
...and I would buy everybody in the world a puppy, so they could feel the love I feel....
Well, I have engaged Ms. Cloud through email, and so far it has been respectful.
I did point out to her that she and her peers ought to spend more time outside the towers. She would understand that to the general public her views on this issue and the behavior of the protestors are seen as childish, crud and uncivil and nothing close to the exercise of free speech. I told her that she would also understand why Mr. Horowitz's concerns resonate 'out here.'
Sounds like the protestors were the ones who were blocking speech.
Rose Bowl victory and a pro-Homosexual, socialist student body versus being a Big XII also-ran with a pro-military, conservative student body - I think I'll stick with my Ags.
I hope there are enough Horns like you that can root out the socialist scum prevalent on your campus. Texas is certainly big enough to have two conservative public universities.
Underlying motive alert.
How does a person get to be this nutty?
This idot professor doesn't even understand English or History. By definition Civil disobedience is CIVIL, therefor can not be unruly. If they were being unruly as she describes, then they should be rounded up and forced to leave. These idiots are actually proving Horowitz point that, the campus attempts to stiffle the conservative view point.
I have written to Ms. Cloud:
It is reported that people dissatisfied with Dr. Horowitz's ideas approached the platform he was speaking from (a move that someone who had recently been assaulted onstage might well view as threatening) and used noisemakers and an air horn to disrupt his speech. If that is true, isn't that a violation of Dr. Horowitz's rights to free speech? It seems to me that while these people had every right to air their views about Dr. Horowitz, it is not acceptable for them to do so by interfering with Dr. Horowitz efforts to present his own views. Considering that Dr. Horowitz had been invited by an interested audience for that express purpose, they were also interfering with that audience's right to listen to Dr. Horowitz. What would your viewpoint be if you were giving a speech to a group that had invited you do to so (and perhaps had paid to engage the hall you were using), and Dr. Horowitz's supporters decided to act in the same fashion, disrupting your presentation? Would they be justified in doing so?
And she replied (and granted me permission to post it):
Thank you for writing. I have begun to get a lot of mail and have developed a standard answer to queries like yours. I think it is completely appropriate for people to talk back to me; it is part of the rough and tumble of democratic contestation.
You are welcome to visit my classes. Unlike a public forum or other space where social movements break out, the classroom is a more sacred civil space where I would not heckle anyone; nor would I think it fair to students for someone to disrupt their learning. I have read Mr. Horowitz's statement on academic freedom, and find I meet all of his criteria for an ethical educator, by the way.
I had nothing to do with the various noisemakers of other activists. No one approached the podium to threaten Mr. Horowitz. It is my recollection and understanding that noisemakers were employed only after the hosts of the meeting threated to arrest those who spoke. Also, many of Horowitz's supporters made noises--clapping and cheering, for example--interrupting the flow of his oration. I do understand and sympathize with verbal and other outburts (although again, I didn't make any of those myself) when a speaker says absurd things like "the proof that racism doesn't exist is that Oprah Winfrey, a black woman with a weight problem, makes a lot of money." Or "I can argue circles around any leftist in the room."
He had the right to speak; we had the right to talk back. Democracy has always involved protest in the U.S. from the Boston Tea Party, through the ending of slavery, through civil rights and other progressive change. Being unruly is part of the tumble of democratic life, when it occurs in the open, in public. The classroom is not an ethical space for that kind of struggle. I would hope you would respect my students (you don't have to respect me) and save the heckling for a public lecture or rally. I am speaking at a rally on April 21 on the West Mall. That would be an appropriate place to heckle me.
I've been heckled many times. I've had death threats and other kinds of threats. I've had people asking for my job on a platter (oh, wait, that was Horowitz). I have NEVER called the police on anyone and would never have a heckler arrested in a public setting.
Horowitz has been confronted everywhere he goes because many faculty, students, and activists know what he's about, and it's not freedom of expression. He's on a tear to get rid of people like me. It's how McCarthyism started: the keeping of blacklists of suspicious persons in the name of freedom. When McCarthyists come for me, I'll be out there with signs and I'll use my voice.
You are certainly free to do the same. Again, for me the classroom is different. Perhaps I have convinced you. If not, please write again. Depending on the volume of mail, I may or may not be able to respond.
Sincerely,
Dana Cloud
LOL, who's doing the silencing, brainiac? HOROWITZ's free speech is being impuned when he can't continue with a lecture for which he was solicited to give by an interested party because of juvenile antics by those such as yourself.
Jim Quinn, TS host out of Pittsburgh, is fond of saying that one of his main "quinnisms" is - to understand what the left is doing or planning to do, look at what they're accusing the opposition of." And he's absolutely right.
What a freak.
Make no mistake: To the Left, "free speech" means the unhindered dissemination of the Left's viewpoint, and nothing else.
Lemme see, protesters were going to conduct 'unruly' civil disobedience in order to prevent Mr. Horowitz from speaking, therefor exercising his 1st Amendment right that he was invited there to do. However, because the protesters were breaking the law (civil disobedience involves breaking the law), this somehow is an infringement upon their first amendment right through an action that is equivalent to shouting 'fire' in a crowded auditorium. Makes sense to me /sarcasm
Just sent this email out:
"So, Dana, if I and some other persons barged into your class, lecture, or speech and made loud noises and disrupted your "free speech" message and/or lesson, that would be OK? Looking forward to meeting you someday soon."
I'll post if I get a response from the hypocritical fool.
Bravo to Mr. Horowitz and the brave right-minded students who brought him to Austin! I was testifying at the capital - or waiting my turn, which came at 3 AM - and regretted not being able to hear Mr. Horowitz. (Although, I mistakenly thought it would be similar to when Professor George spoke. I should have known better.)
Why do they push and push, until we have no option other than to react?
How heartwarming to know that my tax dollars go to this enemy of the USA, employed to brainwash students at UT! I guess we have a bunch of old, ignorant regents, friends of the governor, to thank for this nest of vipers in Austin.
True, true.
She specializes in "rhetoric " - Not truth.
Rhetoric of the labor movement? "Join the union. Pay me your dues. Or I'll beat you up and take your money."
Give her a taste of her own medicine, and see how she likes it.
Hogwash , honey....It is the lefty loonies that want (no demand) that all critical commentary cease!
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