Terrorists Off-Limits But Christians Fair Game
By Brian Yates (12/07/04)
The faculty at UC Berkeley has a set of guidelines designed to keep professors from pushing their personal agendas on students. These guidelines were established to keep the campus from becoming a sanctuary for communist professors. Teaching should “stick to the logic of the facts.” This policy was largely forgotten until recently when a course catalogue for a “Politics and Poetics of Palestinian Resistance” class warned that “conservative thinkers are encouraged to seek other sections.”
This type of agenda is to be expected at Berkeley; I doubt too many of you are surprised. It’s somewhat less expected; however, here at U of L.
While “Social Stratification” sounds somewhat less threatening than the Arafat love-fest mentioned above, and its course description neglects to warn students of any political persuasion to “enter at their own risk,” the lack of tolerance for conservative opinion is no less prevalent.
The Thursday following President Bush’s resounding reelection, K.C. Martin walked into a class discussion of the election among the students and her professor, Dr. John McTighe. With much of the class upset over the outcome, one student asked how we managed to reelect “such an idiot” president.
Many exit polls suggested that voters considering morals made up a significant part of President Bush’s voting block. Dr. McTighe took this one step further when he said, “It was the religious zealots who say they are voting on morals. I think we should all buy AK47’s and shoot them all! That’s what I would suggest, if it were allowed.”
McTighe saw no problem with making this type of statement in class because apparently he felt among friends. According to Martin, “on several occasions the teacher [McTighe] said we were all liberals, so he probably assumed it was okay to bash Republicans.”
Understandably, Martin was upset: “I was offended that he would say such a thing…he has no idea what I believe. I don’t think that gives him the right to assume every student is a liberal and he can say whatever he wants.”
McTighe contends that he qualified his outrageous comments by saying “Yes, I’m being sarcastic,” and that while he does believe “religious zealots” were partly responsible for the president’s reelection, his reference to guns came while discussing the “implications of a widely perceived connection between fervent religious beliefs and support for gun ownership.” Not to get off the subject here, but maybe this “widely perceived connection” could be more that people who support the First Amendment also just happen to support the Second Amendment as well. You know, all those nuts who actually believe in upholding the Constitution.
McTighe told university officials that he said people should buy a weapon to protect themselves from those in the gun ownership movement. (Note: it’s not a movement; it’s a constitutionally-protected right.) He may as well have claimed that he was suffering from “post-election selection trauma” and knew not what he was telling his class.
The scorn for all of us professing to believe in God is clear in McTighe’s obscene remarks to his sociology class. The reason for this is simple: liberals feel threatened by God. Op-ed pages across the country were echoing with shouts that voters making decisions based on their morals is bad for America. It’s not bad for America; it’s bad for liberals.
Let’s put this in perspective here: liberals have spent the past three years whining about the need to protect the rights of terrorists. Remember the uproar over classifying detainees at Guantanamo Bay as enemy combatants? We were told that we should have more concern for the rights of terrorists. What about giving Saddam the death penalty? Oh, how inhumane! Liberals won’t allow us to shoot terrorists and murdering dictators, but if you believe in God, not only should you be shot, but they want to use an assault weapon.
Many of you are probably incensed at McTighe’s words right now; however, I’m prepared to let him off the hook. He’s understandably upset following a difficult election. He is in luck though; the American Health Association is offering free counseling for those afflicted with Post-Election Selection Trauma. He seems to be in dire need.
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