Posted on 12/17/2005 9:29:53 AM PST by aculeus
It shouldnt have taken a threatened law suit and being held up to nationwide public scorn but Washington State University officials have stopped paying student hecklers who shout down speakers with whom they disagree.
Unfortunately, the stench remains strong at Washington State University of a Stalinist suppression of political views that deviate from the politically correct academic liberal orthodoxy.
Regular readers of this space will recall from this July column that the controversy began when it was learned university administrators were paying students to heckle the production of a controversial play by a student author.
Student playwright Chris Lee warned attendees before his production was staged on campus that it would likely offend everybody and indeed some Mormon students who paid their own way to see the play silently protested its content.
But 40 other students repeatedly shouted I am offended and did everything in their power to shut down the production, including threatening performers on stage with physical harm. These protesting students were all Black, as is Lee.
It was not merely that the Black students insisted on disrupting the production that set them apart from others like the Mormons in the audience who found Lees play disturbing. Guess who paid for the hecklers tickets? Washington State Universitys very own Office of Campus Involvement, headed by Raul Sanchez. The same office helped organize the heckling. Lane Rawlins, the schools president, even praised and defended the hecklers.
[balance at link]
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So shouting someone down is now officially an exercise in free speech?
For your ping list? Any WSU grads?
SOURCE:
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2005/07/18/play
"The protesters, angry at the satire depicting the last of two days of the life of Jesus, forced the show to stop several times. At the behest of campus security guards concerned about a potential riot, Chris Lee, a theater major who wrote, directed, and portrayed the cross-dressing Lucifer in the play, self-censored one of the shows songs. Instead of singing I would do anything for God, but I wont act black, a parody of Meat Loafs I would do anything for love, but I wont do that, the black was changed to blank.
"Along with jokes about gay people, AIDS, Hitler, and the use of nigger, another chorus that roiled audience members was the And I will always hate Jews refrain in the parody of Whitney Houstons hit I Will Always Love You. And of course there was the scene where newborn babies were shot onto the stage, apparently from a Mormon mothers offstage womb, and Jesus, like a good outfielder, caught all 16 of them."
ROFLOL
Indication number 1006 that we pay too much in tax.
take a look at this
Why wouldn't they simply extend a hand with a "thumbs down" gesture? It is a dignified and traditional way to express disapproval without producing disruption. Some good manners ought to be caned into them.
I find this hard to believe. The school administration was paying hecklers? You know, a lot of people fought a long time for academic freedom. And this school is paying to close free speech down? That's an intolerable situation. The State is responsible for doing something about it.
It's the grimy, sticky residue of 8 years of the Clintonites.
I don't know, but this all sounds pretty amusing to me. In the South Park mode, which sometimes I love it and other times I turn it off and won't let it be shown. The christmas singing turd for example, that went way too far for me.
Just forwarded it to a freind who works for (Up yer) WAZZU.
AND I'm glad my niece ISNT going there, as was once planned.
Evergreen State ping
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Ping sionnsar if you see a Washington state related thread.
WOW....and the State thinks we should give them MORE AND MORE MONEY all the time! How special.
Agree. Why do you suppose the school is nicknamed WAZZU?
They even fought a legal battle so no one is allowed to call them WAZZU on TV anymore. LOL!
http://admissions.ucsc.edu/discover/faq/finances.cfm#a1
$40K a year to go to UCSC! What are his parents thinking!!!
Tuition is only $7000 a year for UCSC. This kid pays $17K in out of state tuition and the rest is expenses.
Who would send a kid to UCSC for $40K a year! He should be holding a sign saying how stupid he is.
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