Is this really the type of school we want our children being "educated" from?
That was the question I left my readers with yesterday after posting about the noose left on Professor Madonna Constantine's door, which is being investigated as a hate crime.
Columbia first "stonewalled" that investigation by refusing to turn over the security tapes, then after the police did the paperwork and got the judge to sign a court order for the security video, Columbia decides that it would cooperate after all.
Toady we see reports that there is another hate crime investigation is being conducted because of anti-semitic graffiti that was found in a bathroom stall in Lewisohn Hall yesterday.
Lewisohn is home to the School of General Studies, which serves students who undertake a non-traditional education. The NYPD reported that the graffiti, inscribed in black ink, included a caricature of a man wearing a yarmulke above a swastika. The incident comes in the midst of a particularly tumultuous time for the University.
Better yet is the statement made by Lee Bollinger:
The best thing that can happen is for the entire community to say this is intolerable, "I just think everybody needs to say ... that this is unacceptable, and it is terrible, so that ... people [who] might be contemplating doing something like this [will] feel the full weight of condemnation from the community.”
What exactly did Bollinger expect after having invited and welcomed an anti-semitic, Jew hating, holocaust denying Iranian leader that says "Israel should be wiped off the map"?
Is no one else thinking that Lee Bollinger invited this type of behavior into his school by giving Ahmadinejad a public forum to spew his hatred and excuses?
"These kinds of hateful crimes directed against the Jewish community or any other individuals or groups will not be tolerated," GS Dean Peter Awn wrote out in an e-mail to those in the school "Let us seize this occasion to renew our commitment to the values of inclusiveness, respect, and toleration that we all cherish. And let us make clear to one another that we will not allow such cowardly hate-mongering to divide our community."
Toleration?
Inclusiveness?
Respect?
Where was this "toleration" and "inclusiveness" when another invited speaker was violently attacked by the students of Columbia, with no action taken by security to stop them and NO repercussions after it happened, last year?
Where was the "respect" to the Jewish students when an admitted anti-Semite was invited to that school?
This is at least the second time in two years that police have investigated a swastika which was scrawled on a campus wall. In December, 2005, a swastika was found inscribed on the door of a room in Ruggles Hall along with racist and homophobic epithets.
hmmmmmmmmm
Was anything done about that previous incident?
Nope.
Students expressed that they were shaken by the events of the past week. "Pain isn't being addressed. People are scared and upset. I still don't feel safe. I really want some answers about what will be done to relieve that plan because it's really palpable," Caitlin Shea, TC '08, said. "At TC the student body has a lot of pain which people can't articulate, but you can feel it in the air, collectively. We need group counseling sessions in a space that is safe. We've had more forums than actual action in terms of helping us heal."
The students do not feel safe.
In a meeting with Bollinger Wednesday, many students said that they believed that the recent bias incidents have stemmed from a hostile campus environment.
“For me this event is not just a single isolated event, it is about a context and it is about a culture,” Bryan Mercer, CC ’07, who is a member of Students Promoting Empowerment and Knowledge and the Black Students Organization, said yesterday.
Bollinger refuted that today. "I think these [actions] are committed by individuals who violate norms that are deeply held and subscribed to by our community. I do not think they spring out of a kind of racism or anti-Semitism that is pervasive or systemic in the institution. I don't believe that," he said.
The students feel the hostility on campus and yet Bollinger waves that away... perhaps Bollinger should start listening to the students that are scared and warning him.
Just yesterday we showed reports of another principle that ignored students warnings, blew them off and that resulted in four people being shot, in Cleveland.
Remember?
ABC reports that the brother of the 14 yr old shooter has been arrested.
That isn't the most troubling portion of the report though.
A classmate said Thursday that he and others had warned their principal about threats by Asa Coon and said the attack could have been prevented.
The student, Rasheem Smith, said on CBS' "Early Show" that despite their warnings, principal Johneita Durant told them she was too busy.
"I told my friends in the class that he had a gun and stuff," said Smith, 15. "He was talking about doing it last week. I don't know why they didn't say nothing.
"We talked to the principal. She would try to get us all in the office, but it would always be too busy for it to happen," Smith said.
What is it going to take before Lee Bollinger gets his head out of the sand, recognizes there is a problem, one HE contributed to by allowing the Jew hating Ahmadinejad to step foot on Columbia's grounds and when is he going to start understanding the dangers the students are alerting him to, instead of denying it?
When are the parents of those students going to understand that Columbia, under Bollinger's leadership, has become a dangerous place for their children to be?
I will ask again, what I asked at the bottom of yesterdays post:
Is this really the type of school we want our children being "educated" from?
[Update]Columbia isn't the only place where this is occurring.
Oxford is now planning to follow the bad example Bollinger has just set, by inviting Holocaust denier David Irving to come speak at the university.
The announcement has sparked controversy among students and anti-fascist activists, according to The Guardian.We wonder what is happening to our children today? We wonder why violence and hatred and hate crimes are rising in todays society?
"It will be a disgrace if these discredited speakers are allowed a platform at a forum on free speech. They have an embarrassing history of disregard for legal restrictions on it. It will certainly go down as a black mark on the reputation of the Oxford Union," Oxford Jewish Society co-presidents Daniel Bloch and Steven Altmann-Richer said in a joint statement.
According to the report, Irving denied having been formally approached by anyone from the Oxford Union but said he would accept such an invitation if offered.
"I have had many invitations to speak there in the past but they normally get withdrawn after threats of violence and intimidation. It is a pity because I think there are a lot of students who would like to hear what I have to say," he said.
Look at what is happening to the schools we are sending our children to. Schools that used to have great reputations are now destroying those reputations by allowing hatred into their schools and calling it "commitment to free speech."
There is your answer.
More at Daimnation.
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Ann Coulter is Bad For Christianity & Humanity from StormWarning's Counterterrorism...
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