Why they hate me: An Arab student speaks out

Whoever said that the university stands as a pillar of civilization has obviously never been to Arizona State. Arizona's public universities, now infamous for their broad progressive curricula composed of subjects to the likes of queer pulp fiction, postmodern pornography and special workshops on "sex workers," have always been a string of lone islands surrounded by a reality that remains alien to the hermitic Marxists lying within their academic workings.

There is indeed a dark underside lurking beneath the trite silliness of academic department heads – who for the most part missed out on the latest social and political developments of the 20th century (Pardon my boorishness professor, but didn't we win the Cold War?).

The nature of the story that I am about to tell can be best described by paraphrasing an old 17th-century adage: Hate doth never prosper, for if it prosper, none dare call it hate. How true were those words to prove within the confines of what I had perceived to be an institution where truth and freedom of thought were all that mattered. I was wrong … for my naivete, I paid dearly.

It all began last year when, immediately following the terror attacks of 9-11, a slew of "teach-ins" were held – sponsored in part by university funds – imploring fellow ASU students to "understand the reasoning behind 9-11." This, in turn, became a series of hour-long sessions dedicated to "educating" the students on how "imperialism" and America's lack of concern for "international social justice" led to the horrific attacks.

In essence, we were being sold the seditious lie that it was "America's fault," that the terrorists were merely reacting to far greater atrocities on our part. Never mind the fact that countless Arab and Muslim families like mine found refuge in the freedom and prosperity that this great nation bestowed upon them. Never mind the fact that no other Arab country on earth could provide my family the same luxuries and liberties that they enjoy now as American citizens.

I, as most people do, see this nation of ours as being fundamentally good and generous to those that have come to seek refuge from the tyranny and oppression plaguing the majority of humanity. The fact that my university was actively sponsoring an educational environment where that very goodness was being vilified and defamed, frankly, revolted and enraged me.

I had made a decision: This injustice being played out in front of my eyes could not be allowed to continue – something must be done. I owed that, at the very least, to my country. In my position as chairman of the student government finance committee, I introduced a bill before the full student senate that effectively left a slew of student-government-sponsored funds that went to fund these acts of hate financially impotent (this action in itself was really more symbolic, if anything, as Arizona State continues to fund – in the latest count nearly $250,000 – the Multicultural Student Center and Campus Environment Team which finances the bulk of the anti-American teach-ins and guest lecturers).

My unwavering stand against these institutional forces that, in my opinion, threatened to take our country back to a darker time of segregation and state-sponsored hate had turned me into a persona non grata to radical, leftist student organizations and university administrators alike.

It all began when the president of the campus Young Socialists, Fabricio Rodriguez, being the grand pooh-bah of the proletariat that he was, accosted me outside my student-government office, threatening that I "had better watch my back" in front of a half dozen witnesses. The university took no action.

Later, I discovered that my car's gas tank had been tampered with – so much sugar was poured in that it totally destroyed my car and posed a serious hazard to anyone driving the car at the time. Grave physical harm could have resulted had I not discovered this cowardly act in time.

How could this be? Was this the Twilight Zone? Was a true real live American Arab Muslim facing possible bodily harm and acts of oppression in a post 9-11 world, and no one from one of the most traditionally liberal institutions in American history was willing to come to his aid?

A couple of months following the 9-11 attacks, a handful of conservative friends and I stood outside the student commons playing patriotic music on loudspeakers (during the allotted time for amplification that the university mandates) and handing out literature decrying the pacifistic overtones being constantly echoed by university professors and progressive activists. We hadn't been standing outside for more than 10 minutes before a university official escorted by campus police (a reoccurring theme maybe?) cited us for "obstructing the student walkway" and proceeded to forcibly take away the amplifying equipment which we had paid a deposit for.

These storm troopers were so eager to silence us that they had no qualms whatsoever in ripping down – in broad daylight – a large American flag that we had draped over one of the loudspeakers.

No such action was taken when the campus Progressive Alliance placed a large mural depicting a map of the U.S. spray painted with slogans such as "Racist Nation," "What about the Arabs?," "Imperialist Oppressor," etc. right outside the student commons.

Not one to be easily dissuaded by the petty thuggery of these tyrants-in-training, I along with a group of conservative students decided to hold a teach-in of our own to commemorate the tragic events and to illustrate to our student populace that patriotism is actually (shock!) "cool."

So, we brought in guest speaker Dinesh D'souza, author of the recent bestseller "What's So Great About America," a prominent social critic and renowned intellectual. The university, in turn, sponsored a symposium titled "Sexual Politics and Globalization, post 9-11." (That's right, you guessed it, the hijackers being so distraught as they were with the societal rejection of their cross-dressing tendencies had no choice but to blow up 3,000 of our fellow Americans.)

Immediately following our event, the left-wing coalition in the student senate attempted to remove all conservative students in student government who were involved in perpetrating this dastardly act of patriotism. By now, I had become simply too uppity for these tyrants-in-training, clad in academic tweeds.

Once this measure failed, university officials naturally reverted to the age-old Orwellian method of "erasing" the dissident. A personal decree signed by the dean for student judicial affairs immediately and unconditionally banned me from attending any student-government meetings or having any dealings whatsoever with any student-government related matter. In addition, I was suspended for the duration of two weeks without any semblance of due process or justifiable cause.

To add icing to the cake, the university dispatched five very intimidating police officers to come and "escort" me outside the premises of campus grounds on the threats of trespassing minutes before I was scheduled to take an important midterm. My lawyer and I would later learn that the university was officially making the dubious claim that I was an "immediate threat to campus safety." Coincidentally, university officials produced a "threatening e-mail" supposedly sent by me to another ASU student as "reason" for their actions.

But the university had failed to account for one crucial matter in their cynical plot to silence me. I happened to be doing a live on-air interview scheduled at the last minute with the local student radio station during the exact time period in which the university claimed that I "sent" the threats. So, following seven signed affidavits and a recorded audio and videotape placing me in the right place at the right time, the university finally relented and I was allowed to go back to school after having served a total of one week of suspension.

But the damage had already been done, I had missed a total of two crucial midterm exams that I was not allowed to retake – as well as falling far behind in the rest of my classes.

One would have thought that this game of crucifying the conservative would have ended there, but taking a page straight out of the legal codes of Stalin's infamous kangaroo courts, the dean for student judicial affairs made it clear that if the evidence proved my innocence, then well, more evidence was necessary to find otherwise. In a recent meeting, she handed down the claim that I was still a threat to the campus climate due to numerous "complaints" from "certain" students (she refused to inform us who actually did the alleged "complaining" or show us any of the complaints in writing) who were offended at the "hateful and offensive" nature of my "propaganda."

My original "sin" of being a conservative would not escape me in this ongoing delirious inquisition. As such, the university has permanently banned me from running for any student-government position and attending any student-government meeting despite the blatant civil-rights violation to my freedom of speech and right to attend public assemblies.

Sadly, this tragedy is being replayed in countless other universities; with more unknown students fighting the goliath of a corrupt university system that refuses to recognize their rights, much less their humanity. Mass burnings of campus conservative newspapers, physical threats, harassment and intimidation of the lone conservative voice have become regular features on university grounds all over the nation. From Berkeley to Brown, Amherst to Vanderbilt, conservative activists are being actively persecuted at the hands of a relentless progressive pogrom.

Yet, after having endured all this, I remain optimistic that one day the long, hard-fought road traveled by the civil-rights movement will reach the doorsteps of Arizona State. For it is apparent, now more than ever, that the American university must be reclaimed by the real America that I know and love – lest we face the cold bleak future of having to wake up one day to an America lost in the lunacy currently being preached within the impregnable walls of the ivory tower.

Oubai Shahbandar is one of the nation's leading young conservative activists and currently a senior studying philosophy and political science at Arizona State University. He currently holds the proud distinction of being the first and only conservative student activist barred by his respective university from holding or running for any student government office.

Left-Wing Campus Thought Police Harass Dissenters

Wes Vernon, NewsMax.com

Wednesday, Nov. 27, 2002

Arizona State University’s “political correctness” enforcers may be on the verge of wrecking the life of a conservative student who bucks their orthodoxy. It is further evidence that academia’s enemies of free speech have dropped all pretense at fairness. The case involves two students at ASU who tried bring balance to the campus lecture program, the “free marketplace of ideas” that campus leftists have used as an excuse for bringing in every Marxist advocate they champion.

Shanna Bowman, vice president of activities for the ASU student government, and her chief of staff, Oubai Shahbandar, have dared to invite some speakers who dissent from the conventional wisdoms of speakers whose appearances have been promoted by Young Democrats, Democratic Socialists, Progressive Alliance, the ASU chapter of ACLU, Minority Coalitions, Lesbian/Gay/Bisexual/Transgendered/Questioning Lambda League, Asian Coalition, American Indian Coalition, and El Concillo.

For merely advocating that the lecture program feature someone whose views differ, for example, from Mary Frances Berry, the hardline leftist chairwoman of the so-called U.S. Civil Rights Commission, Bowman and Shahbandar have been subjected to dirty tricks by supporters of the above left-wing organizations.

The “free marketplace of ideas” used to hold allegations to a high standard of evidence. But when the ASU administration invited Berry to speak at the campus, it would have been impolite to ask her to produce hard evidence in support a report by her commission charging that minorities were discriminated against in the disputed presidential balloting in Florida in 2000. In truth, there was no evidence. But because Berry fits in with leftist orthodoxy and “political correctness,” she gets a pass.

Precrime Must Be Punished

First, they tried to have Bowman impeached for possibly accepting future gifts from Young America’s Foundation, including a “free trip to California” to visit the Reagan ranch.

“The impeachment failed,” Bowman explained in an interview with NewsMax.com, “because it was nothing that I had done. It was only allegations of what I may do in the future.”

The effort at a kangaroo court having failed, the left-wing extremists sponsored a campaign to have her recalled. The so-called “Progressive Coalition” paraded signs accusing her of “creating a hostile work environment.”

The leftists' argument, shorn of all the tortured rationale: We can do all the name-calling we want. But when Bowman writes an article in a student newspaper detailing how these “progressives” are actually regressive, that is grounds for calling her a bigot and attempting to drive her out of student government.

Compounding the contradiction is that the campus American Civil Liberties Union, which has advertised itself as advocating unfettered free speech, joined the mob movement to hound this student.

“They [ACLU] like to profess a love for free speech,” Bowman commented to NewsMax, “but when the free speech, at least on the student side, when the free speech doesn’t [fit in] often with leftist ideals,” then it apparently becomes a matter of whose speech is free.

To its credit, she said, there have been times when the state ACLU “has had to come in and demand that their [student] president issue apologies to groups and students that they had been protesting against or going after” when free-speech issues were involved.

There is still no record of such an apology in this case. But then, given that the ACLU on the Arizona campus is “just another branch of the Young Democrats,” says Bowman, what can one expect?

Anti-American P.C. Mania

Oubai Shahbandar, her assistant, appears to be in even deeper career-threatening trouble. His problems began last year when, as a student senator, he introduced a bill condemning the university for taking down American flags one week after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States.

As a reflection of the 1960s counterculture mentality that has again taken over campus life in America, the university said it feared the flags could offend international students and promote “a hostile environment.”

Someone apparently hacked into Shahbandar’s e-mail and sent a threatening message to a student senator who tried to impeach Bowman. Shahbandar says he did not send the message, that someone gained unauthorized access to his e-mail account and sent it. Witnesses have given the police six signed affidavits stating they were with him at the time the e-mail was sent and that he was nowhere near a computer. He was doing a radio interview at the time and had a videotape of the interview itself.

Further, a student who confronted Shahbandar in his office was leaving and stuck his foot in the door to stop it from closing just as Shahbandar was shutting it. That was all it took for the student to call the police and accuse Shahbandar of “assault.”

Destroy a Dissenter's Life

Despite the affidavits and the in-your-face student simply sticking his foot in a closing door, ASU had the police escort Shahbandar off the campus property 30 minutes before he was to take a philosophy midterm exam. He was given an interim suspension and faces expulsion pending the findings of an investigation. Furthermore, he was not allowed to make up the exam, so he was flunked.

That, of course, sets the stage for what the leftist hierarchy on campus apparently would like to do: Kick him out of school and wreck his career path. Shahbandar, a political science and philosophy major, has hopes of possibly going to law school and ultimately pursuing a political career, just the sort of potential future senator or governor the leftist establishment would like to head off at the pass before he even gets to the starting gate.

His scheduled graduation is, or was, a year from now, which means he has completed about three-fourths of his undergraduate studies. NewsMax.com found the young man not in a frame of mind to take the egregious treatment lying down.

“Absolutely,” he told us, “I’m already considering possibilities at the moment,” and if he is expelled, that would include whatever legal action his lawyers advise.

ASU Media Relations spokesman Keith Jennings told NewsMax.com the investigation was being conducted by the ASU Police Department and had not yet been resolved. When asked why Shahbandar had not been allowed to make up his exam, Jennings replied he could not comment, and that it was a separate matter.

Shahbandar said he was to appear today in the office of Dean Deborah Sullivan, presumably to decide his future, if any, with the university. The conservative student said that in a previous meeting, “Sullivan made it clear” that “in her opinion, I was a threat to the campus climate.”

NewsMax.com intends to monitor this case. Shahbandar has said, “As an American Arab, I have never felt as persecuted in a post-9/11 world as I do now at the hands of the leftist university administration.”

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