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Unwelcome sunshine at UCLA
The American Thinker ^ | 1 18 06 | Thomas Lifson

Posted on 01/18/2006 7:26:58 AM PST by .cnI redruM

UCLA recruiters have long delighted in bringing star high school athletes to their campus during the winter months, when warm weather and sunshine prove particularly attractive to many from colder climes. But the sort of sunshine that operates as a disinfectant, public scrutiny, is proving much less welcome to campus leftists.

The Bruin Alumni Association, a year old group of conservative bent, is drawing fire for its activities aimed at exposing leftist indoctrination in the classroom. It has started UCLAprofs.com to collect and publicize information about faculty leftism, particularly as it verges into classroom indoctrination. The Los Angeles Times reports:

A fledgling alumni group headed by a former campus Republican leader is offering students payments of up to $100 per class to provide information on instructors who are “abusive, one-sided or off-topic” in advocating political ideologies.

The year-old Bruin Alumni Assn. says its “Exposing UCLA’s Radical Professors” initiative takes aim at faculty “actively proselytizing their extreme views in the classroom, whether or not the commentary is relevant to the class topic.” Although the group says it is concerned about radical professors of any political stripe, it has named an initial “Dirty 30” of teachers it identifies with left-wing or liberal causes.

Some of the instructors mentioned accuse the association of conducting a witch hunt that threatens to harm the teaching atmosphere, and at least one of the group’s advisory board members has resigned because he considers the bounty offers inappropriate. The university said it will warn the association that selling copies of professors’ lectures would violate campus rules and raise copyright issues.

The advisory board member who resigned is Stephan Thernstrom of Harvard, formerly a UCLA professor, and a man for whom I have the greatest respect. But I am not nearly as alarmed as he and others by the $100 payment.

It is true that a bounty could induce people to make up stories. But as I understand the practice, it is to be paid for recordings and notes documenting actual classroom misbehavior. Stories told by students are not enough. Columbia University notoriously whitewashed faculty classroom abuse toward Jewish and Israeli students in part because verbal accounts given by faculty and students differed substantially.

UCLA’s huffing and puffing about “selling” classroom lectures is just so much blather. Nobody is planning to sell lectures, they only plan to document abuse.

Predictably, faculty fools are already accusing the effort of “McCarthyism.” The charge is so logically vacant that making it justifies suspicion about the academic qualifications of those flinging the charge. The students are not government officials threatening the use of state power. They are not utilizing guilt by association. They are merely shining sunshine on faculty behavior.

Good for them. Public university faculty in particular owe a duty of fairness. Of course, nearly all universities are substantially benefitted by public monies, so the standards should be universal. Not to mention the small weight assigned to such qualities as “integrity” and “scholarly detachment.”


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Extended News; US: California
KEYWORDS: academicbias; alumni; andrewjones; bruinalumni; navarro; pcprofs; ucla
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As a Bruin Alumnus, I'm proud of these guys. Keep pounding them.
1 posted on 01/18/2006 7:27:00 AM PST by .cnI redruM
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To: .cnI redruM

Their website is a good read, if you like wandering through the demented rantings of Life's Leftist Losers.


2 posted on 01/18/2006 7:33:22 AM PST by randog (What the....?!)
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To: randog
Gawd, that guy McLauren....
You should see his website! It looks like the Che Guevara Fan Club page.
3 posted on 01/18/2006 7:35:29 AM PST by .cnI redruM (Shame, not sanctions - UN policy on Iran)
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To: .cnI redruM

Let the truth shine and root out the slugs and rats.


4 posted on 01/18/2006 7:40:34 AM PST by CROSSHIGHWAYMAN (expell the fat arrogant carcasses of Congress)
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To: .cnI redruM

Wow! You're right...
http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/pages/mclaren/fallsyllabus2.htm


5 posted on 01/18/2006 7:42:40 AM PST by Liberty Valance ("Chloe ... I need another way out of here..." ~ Jack Bauer)
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To: Liberty Valance

That folk song he plays in the background, too funny...


6 posted on 01/18/2006 7:43:14 AM PST by .cnI redruM (Shame, not sanctions - UN policy on Iran)
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To: .cnI redruM
Thanks for the post.

UCLAprofs.com looks like a great tool by which to steel my kids against such idiots, as is watching specials on Stalin to show them where that idealogy leads.

7 posted on 01/18/2006 7:45:09 AM PST by Carry_Okie (There are people in power who are truly evil.)
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To: .cnI redruM

Bumperoo


8 posted on 01/18/2006 7:46:17 AM PST by roaddog727 (P=3/8 A. or, P=plenty...............)
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To: .cnI redruM
Predictably, faculty fools are already accusing the effort of “McCarthyism.”

In a sense, they're right. The efforts of both McCarthy and this group have Communists as their targets. :=)

9 posted on 01/18/2006 7:49:18 AM PST by Bob
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To: Bob

And, like the UCLA Alums, McCarthy had a point...

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1556698/posts


10 posted on 01/18/2006 7:52:42 AM PST by .cnI redruM (Shame, not sanctions - UN policy on Iran)
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To: Liberty Valance

And I'll bet if you don't spew the same type of Garbage hes teaching back to him you fail....


11 posted on 01/18/2006 7:56:47 AM PST by SouthernBoyupNorth ("For my wings are made of Tungsten, my flesh of glass and steel..........")
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To: Liberty Valance

This is in an AMERICAN SCHOOL!


12 posted on 01/18/2006 8:03:57 AM PST by ROLF of the HILL COUNTRY (( Terrorism is a symptom, ISLAM IS THE DISEASE!))
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To: .cnI redruM

We need more websites like this one "outing" commie/liberal profs. You bet there are many university administrators, who might decry them in public, but who hang on their every new post.

Go get 'em, guys. I'm proud of you.


13 posted on 01/18/2006 8:05:34 AM PST by NaughtiusMaximus (DO NOT read to the end of this tagline . . . Oh, $#@%^, there you went and did it.)
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To: SouthernBoyupNorth

bump for later


14 posted on 01/18/2006 8:12:03 AM PST by joe fonebone (Woodstock defined the current crop of libs, but who cleaned up the mess they left?)
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To: .cnI redruM

If you like this stuff make sure you check out TheFIRE!

Http://www.thefire.org

It is a real eye-opener.


15 posted on 01/18/2006 8:36:02 AM PST by Personal Responsibility (Amnesia is a train of thought.)
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To: NaughtiusMaximus

I wish I'd thought of it. These guys are awesome!


16 posted on 01/18/2006 8:37:34 AM PST by .cnI redruM (Shame, not sanctions - UN policy on Iran)
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To: .cnI redruM

If only this happened on EVERY college/university campus. Especially the state run schools, even in the red states.


17 posted on 01/18/2006 8:39:26 AM PST by originalbuckeye
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To: .cnI redruM
Sure he's a Marxist and all, but that doesn't stop him from requiring HIS OWN BOOK for the course in order to force students to buy it and provide him royalties.....

He only want to take away YOUR right to make money via capitalism....

18 posted on 01/18/2006 9:08:15 AM PST by Onelifetogive (* Sarcasm tag ALWAYS required. For some FReepers, sarcasm can NEVER be obvious enough.)
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To: Liberty Valance
Required Books

Life In Schools (4th)
Mclaren
ISBN: 0205351182 Edition: Volume: Pub: Prentice Hall

I see Dr. Peter "Call me 'Che'" McLaren isn't so dedicated to the cause that it stops him from making a few bucks by requiring the suckers in his class to purchase his book.

19 posted on 01/18/2006 9:08:18 AM PST by Semi Civil Servant (The Main Stream Media: Al-Qaeda's most effective spy network.)
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To: Semi Civil Servant
"Call me 'Che'" McLaren isn't so dedicated to the cause that it stops him from making a few bucks by requiring the suckers in his class to purchase his book."

LOL! I noticed that as well. I mean how are you supposed to start a revolution unless you shake down your class for the money to start one. ;o)
20 posted on 01/18/2006 9:13:29 AM PST by Liberty Valance ("Chloe ... I need another way out of here..." ~ Jack Bauer)
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