Republican Viewpoints Not Welcome on Campus

At the September General Meeting of the Queens Village Republican Club, State Senator Frank Padavan (R-Queens) spoke about his accomplishments in the community and took questions from the audience. One question concerned the status of a bill he co-sponsored, the Academic Bill of Rights (ABOR). The bill was devised to address the assault on individual rights occurring on our college campuses, and it has been languishing in committee for almost two years. When asked when it will come to the Senate floor for a full vote, the Senator said that it is customary that such legislation takes several years to pass and it was no longer in his hands. He said we would have to lobby the Higher Education Committee and suggested we all write letters to pressure the committee to take action on this urgent measure in order to put an end to the scourge of political indoctrination in the classroom and the curriculum.

Speech codes banning offensive sounding words, jokes and “suggestive looks,” political bias in faculty hiring and promotion, lack of ideological diversity and diminishing academic standards are the prevalent trends today. Evidence of dismal standards are demonstrated by the results of a nationwide multiple-choice test, in which 64% of college seniors couldn’t identify the father of our country, George Washington as the victorious general of American forces at the battle of Yorktown, the final battle of the Revolution. Shockingly, General Ulysses S. Grant was chosen as the correct answer by 36% of the students. Some campuses ban the display of the American flag, the singing of patriotic songs and reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, fearing it may offend foreign students.

American history is no longer considered essential in the core curriculum. The blame for the watering down of standards lies in part with multiculturalism, the root of monolithic thinking in academia. It presumes that we are all subject to Western cultural prejudices and the conceit that Western civilization is superior to all others. The objective is to break free from the trappings of this cultural conditioning, rejecting traditional American values in favor of a diversity of foreign cultures. One result of this brainwashing process is that anyone who links terrorism and suicide bombing with Muslims is denounced as “racist” or “Islamophobic.” The future of America is not secure if we can’t even identify our enemy or recognize our own identity as the greatest nation in the world.

Republican students and faculty are all too familiar with the hostile learning environment that prevails on campus. They know the frustration of having to hide their political views and religious beliefs fearing that they may be penalized for their opinions. They learn in class that speaking up may result in lower grades. A student described his experience taking a class in Modern History at Borough of Manhattan Community College. The professor spent the semester teaching 9/11 conspiracy theories as fact and that secret societies such as Skull and Crossbones rule the world. He taught that the collapse of the World Trade Towers was an inside job that the Bush administration knew ahead of time. He indicated as a fact that Tower 7, although it was not directly hit, came down because of a planned cover-up to hide secret government documents, proving that President George W. Bush was behind 9/11. When this student, a Republican and devout Christian disagreed and argued in defense of America and our president, the professor criticized him for being “stupid” and gave a lecture on the conflict between rational thinking and religious faith stating that “it is impossible to be a free thinking educated person and believe in a god.” As a result of expressing his views, his grades plummeted to finally failing the course. Fortunately, after hearing about ABOR, and that state lawmakers are looking out for his rights as a student, he felt empowered to fight for the grade he deserved. He contacted another professor who reviewed his coursework and fought for an entire semester for a fair grade. In due course, he won the grade he deserved and his crackpot professor was peer reviewed and demoted to an adjunct.

This is one of many examples of student experiences in institutions that should promote the free and open exchange of ideas and opinions but are more akin to totalitarian societies that trample free speech. But now, students and professors are fighting back and they need our support. We can support their battle by writing to the New York State Senate Higher Education Committee to send ABOR, bill #S2300, to the Senate floor for a vote as Senator Padavan advised. The same applies to the Assembly version, bill #A04406, sponsored by Assemblyman Anthony Seminerio (D-Queens). As stated in the summary, this non-partisan bill “creates an academic bill of rights that ensures an academic environment for both students and faculty members that allows freedom of political viewpoint, expression and instruction; requires institutions of higher education to publish such bill of rights and to adopt a grievance procedure to address complaints of violations of such rights.”

Senator Kenneth P. LaValle (R-Suffolk)
Higher Education Committee Chairman
Legislative Office Building, Room 806
Albany, New York 12247
Phone: 518-455-3121
Fax: 518-426-6826
E-Mail: lavalle@senate.state.ny.us

Assemblywoman Catherine Nolan (D-Queens)
Chair, Education Committee
Legislative Office Building 836
Albany, NY 12248
Phone: 518-455-4851
Fax: 518-455-3847
nolanc@assembly.state.ny.us