RUTHFULLY YOURS

http://www.spiked-online.com/free-speech-university-rankings/analysis#.WRbfQsYpCUk

The Free Speech University Rankings (FSUR) is the UK’s first university rankings for free speech. We survey British universities, examining the policies and actions of universities and students’ unions, and rank them using our traffic-light system. Read our analysis below and get clued up on the bans and bureaucracy stifling free debate.

Data accurate up until January 2017.

“Why is There So Much Politics in Arabic Class?”
I’ve been browsing the Spring 2017 issue of the Swarthmore College Alumni Bulletin. It’s clear that along with all the other socio-political stances that comprise the often bizarre and contradictory (women’s rights, Islamophilia) package deal of ideologies and attitudes of the Left, an anti-Israel default position is integral to that publication.

Regular readers of my blog may remember that not so very long ago I exposed the sympathetic publicity given by the Bulletin to visiting professor and alumnus (class of ’06) Sa’ed Atshan, who deplores Israel’s very existence.

The current Bulletin assures us that he has again

“completed his annual class trip with his Swarthmore students to Israel and Palestine. He’ll continue to inspire future generations as as assistant professor of peace and conflict studies.”

There’s plenty regarding Atshan by Canary Mission here

Under the heading “Global Thinking” the current Bulletin has a feature article by staff writer Elizabeth Slocum about another anti-Israel activist, Missoula, Montana high school Arabic teacher Brendan Work (’10).

Beneath the title “Speaking the Same Language: His immersion in Arabic became a lesson in empathy” Slocum tells us:

‘Brendan Work ’10 jokingly tells his students that they are learning “an enemy language.”

“They sometimes ask, ‘Why is there so much politics in Arabic class?’” says Work … “Well, when you’re learning Spanish or French, there just isn’t an international conflict with the U.S. that involves those speakers now.”

This is important context for his students, who must work through so much history and tension tied up in the study of the language through class discussions on the Israel-Palestine conflict, the Iraq War, and Syrian refugees. He seeks to offer them a point of view beyond bias or preconceived notions that he honed as a reporter. [Emphasis added here and below]

“I knew I wanted to find employment at the intersection of Arabic and journalism,” says Work, who studied the language at the College as a comparative literature major. “I was looking for the big story, so I bought a one-way ticket into the occupied territory,” at a time when Palestine was submitting its statehood bid to the U.N.

Work secured a job at a small press agency in Bethlehem where he improved his language skills …before heading into the field as a reporter and photographer. As Work detailed the struggles of those in the conflict zone, he realized the Arab narrative was often told from a limited perspective.

For example, while covering a planned protest near the West Bank wall on the day of the statehood bid, a clash escalated and a Palestinian teen was struck by a tear-gas canister. (A Reuters photographer captured an image of Work aiding the boy moments after the violence.) Denied access to the nearest hospital because it was on the other side of the wall, the youth ultimately lost his eye. Later, out of concern, Work met with the teen’s parents…

“Their thinking was, ‘Resistance is our reality. In America, I thought, protests happened out of a sense – rather than a reality – of injustice.”

Last Monday, I appeared at the University of Buffalo at the invitation of the courageous students of Young Americans for Freedom. They have to put up with campus Left-fascist thuggery on a daily basis, while I was able to leave Buffalo the morning after the event.

I say I “appeared,” because to say “I spoke” would be exaggerating a bit. Rather, I spoke a few sentences and made a couple of points in between being screamed at by Leftist and Islamic supremacist fascists who think they’re opposing fascism.

The Spectrum, the student newspaper of the University at Buffalo, reported:

Robert Spencer couldn’t speak for more than 30 seconds without students shouting and cursing at him.

…

Spencer planned to speak to students about “the dangers of jihad in today’s world” but constant heckling from the crowd made it near impossible for him to complete a full sentence.

Indeed. The raucous student mob, of course, believes it represents the side of all that is good and righteous. These students have been hoodwinked into thinking that “Islamophobes,” rather than jihad terrorists, are killing people around the world.

For example, one man held a sign that read “Queers Against Islamophobia.” The crowd booed lustily when I attempted to read from Islamic authorities about Islam’s death penalty for homosexuality. Even to read from Islamic sources is hate, apparently, at the University at Buffalo — unless, of course, one endorses such penalties rather than oppose them.

By shutting down any discussion of the motivating ideology of the jihad threat and consigning it all to the realm of “hatred” and “bigotry,” the student mob at the University of Buffalo enables that threat to grow. One day, the Leftists who screamed, heckled, and booed as I tried to speak may very well experience the consequences of their actions, carried out by those with whom they thought they stood in solidarity.

The Spectrum article did capture one thing I managed to say:

The attempt to silence someone who has a differing viewpoint was a “quintessentially fascist act, and you are manifesting it in a wonderful way tonight,” said Spencer.

There was also this:

Spencer frequently discusses terrorism by Muslims as being religiously motivated, an argument that has put him in the cross-hairs of American Muslims who say his interpretation of Islam is dangerously inaccurate and perverts their faith.

Those American Muslims have a big problem on their hands, because in reality, I offer no interpretation of Islam at all. I only report on how Muslims interpret Islam, which all too often involves justifications of and exhortations to violence. They are anxious to silence me because they don’t want Americans to know how jihadis use the texts and teachings of Islam to justify hatred, violence, and supremacism. CONTINUE AT SITE

We are living in weird times:

The state of Texas has to pass a law to get some county officials to follow the law;

Harvard University approved a “black only” graduation; and

A school in Detroit is holding a prom for Muslim girls: With the goal of creating a “safe space” in mind, a Detroit school has set out to hold a girls-only prom to celebrate traditional Muslim customs.

It’s being created for girls who would otherwise be prohibited by their ultraconservative Muslim families from going to regular proms, where attendees are allowed to have fun and dance with members of the opposite sex in good old American tradition.

Hamtramck High School’s girls-only “Princess Prom” was first organized in 2012 by a group of five Muslim girls to give them the opportunity to go to a “safe space” prom.

In 2016, 230 girls showed up. This year, they’re expecting at least 250 attendees.

Let me show respect for Muslim traditions. I understand that prom nights, or the way that some girls dress up, may violate some of their religious principles.

However, this is a public school district. I thought that we settled that issue back in the 1950s when President Eisenhower sent troops to Little Rock, Arkansas!

What about a prom for ultraconservative Catholic families who want their daughters and dates in a separate environment away from talk about Roe v Wade or same-sex marriage opinions? Or Jewish kids?

The left’s silence about all of this is the other story. Where is the outrage and editorials?

With all due respect to the parents of these young girls, they should send their daughters to a private school if they want this kind of special treatment. Again, it’s a public school and no one gets a special prom.