Free Republic

Conformity is now the new dissent Community Organizer wants to organize us all. DISSENT IS THE HIGHEST FORM OF PATRIOTI… No, wait, that bumper sticker expired January 20th. Under the stimulus bill, there's a new $1.3 trillion bills-for-bumpers program whereby, if you peel off old slogans now recognized as environmentally harmful ("QUESTION AUTHORITY"), you can trade them in for a new "CELEBRATE CONFORMITY" sticker, complete with a holographic image of President Obama that never takes his eyes off you.

During the week of October 22-26, David Horowitz and his Freedom Center held a series of events at 100 campuses for Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week, intended to counter standard academic nitwitery about the war on terrorism ("America is evil," "We brought it on ourselves," "9/11 was a Republican conspiracy"). Admirable though this was, attention must be called to an even more imminent threat. By the authority vested in me (by myself), I hereby designate the week of November 5th Left-Fascism Awareness Week -- a time to consider the clear and present danger to free speech emanating from the left, from academic...

This week, the world gasped in awe at the raw heroism of Jean Rohe, the student at the New School who gave a speech attacking the commencement speaker, Republican Sen. John McCain, at the commencement ceremony. We mostly heard about Rohe's bravery from Rohe – and, really, who is in a better position to judge? As Rohe herself put it: "If there's one thing that I know about myself, it is that I care for people, and in that sense I have a great deal of character." According to her posted biography, Rohe "grew up singing and performing folk music...

A new study uses advanced brain-scanning technology to cast light on a topic that psychologists have puzzled over for more than half a century: social conformity. The study was based on a famous series of laboratory experiments from the 1950's by a social psychologist, Dr. Solomon Asch. In those early studies, the subjects were shown two cards. On the first was a vertical line. On the second were three lines, one of them the same length as that on the first card. Then the subjects were asked to say which two lines were alike, something that most 5-year-olds could answer...

Artists concerned tattoos losing nonconformist lure By Walker Simon Mon May 16,10:37 AM ET NEW YORK (Reuters) - As models flaunted head-to-toe body art and hard rock pulsated in a cavernous ballroom, veteran tattoo artists at a New York convention on Saturday wondered if their once taboo artistry was losing its nonconformist lure. Practitioners from 12 countries posted thousands of designs as crowds packed makeshift corridors and organizers created a carnival-like air with giant freak show canvases draping the walls. Americans, especially women, are embracing a practice once considered seedy. A growing number of people are subjecting themselves to the...

September 11th strengthened the bond between the United States and Israel. Ilan Berman, Vice President for Policy at the American Foreign Policy Council, explained: "Israel's stable, pro-Western and democratic character, its robust defense infrastructure and modern military, and its strategic location in the volatile Middle East have only grown in importance to the United States since September 11." Both nations are also engaged in a war against the same terrorism. But unlike the United States, the legitimacy of the Jewish State is still questioned on a daily basis. September 11th has also put academia on the defensive. Many professors defended...

"When he started talking about innate differences in aptitude between men and women, I just couldn't breathe." - Nancy Hopkins (MIT biology professor) "We live in strange, strange times . . . An entire era - call it the "New Deal-Great Society Epoch" - is drawing to its inevitable conclusion. And those who draw power and wealth from the decaying Welfare State are marshalling their forces for a life-and-death defensive struggle." - Rush Limbaugh Strange indeed! The Society of Professional Journalists, at their recent convention, took a vote on the proposition "Journalists should cover both sides of an issue" and...

The purpose of FreeRepublic.com's multiple message boards is to limit the topics for each board to particular topics. Posting the same message on all the boards defeats the purpose of multiple-boards for special topics. It is very annoying to see the same message on every bulletin board. PLEASE! DO THE READERS A FAVOR. STOP CROSS-POSTING YOUR MESSAGES!

It’s company policy at The New York Times that opinion columnists may not officially endorse presidential candidates. Still, there was no doubt during the past year which man most of the page’s writers were backing. A trio of hysterical pieces published Nov. 4 confirmed that, each claiming that a nationwide outbreak of religious zealotry had led to Sen. John Kerry’s defeat. “The president got re-elected by dividing the country along fault lines of fear, intolerance, ignorance and religious rule,” wailed Maureen Dowd. Not to be outdone, Tom Friedman chipped in, “We don’t just disagree on what America should be doing;...

One month to the day after the Republican club at Wells College (an all-women’s college located in Aurora, NY) published a study revealing a grossly disproportionate number of left-wing professors on its faculty, the student government denied recognition to the club as an official campus organization. On November 7th, the Wells Republicans issued a press release describing the study they had conducted of the political party registrations of the members of the social sciences and humanities faculties at the college. The study revealed that members of parties of the Left (Democrats, Greens, Working Families) outnumbered Republicans by a ratio...

The following is a miniplay which emphasizes the central conflicts in today's aesthetics, and academia, focusing on the realm of music to carry its message: Characters: DR. PATRICK SILK, 51, professor and director of musical composition at Princeharvnell University. ATHENA MILTON, 19, student and amateur composer at Princeharvnell University. Setting: An early April evening in 2005, within the hundred-year-old office of PROFESSOR SILK, lined with wall panels and furniture of a finely carved but faded dark wood. An equally antique grand piano, having been turned into a condition of ideal sound, stands in the center of the room, alongside a...

The recent brutal hazing incident involving high school students from a wealthy suburban Chicago community highlights the profound dystrophy that permeates the culture of America's modern youth. It is both an astonishingly disappointing incident and a prospectively wholly beneficial occurrence for future generations, should it be dealt with in a responsible and strategic manner. Why would dozens of otherwise highly respectful and capable teenagers commit such horrific acts? They were forced to, and by a most unlikely party: themselves. On an early Sunday afternoon in May, dozens of students of the academically excellent Glenbrook North High School of Northbrook, Illinois,...