Our government has been carrying out monstrous and patently illegal policies – invasions that, according to the UN Charter, constitute the gravest war crime of all (attacking a country that has not attacked you first, WMD or no WMD); torture; indefinite, “preventive detentions” without recourse to habeas corpus (preventive detentions were a practice that constituted one of the explicit reasons for the American Revolution) - along with unparalleled cynicism and unequalled skill in the manipulation of public opinion, extraordinary violations of fundamental civil liberties such as due process, being informed of the charges against you, being able to confront your accusers in court, protections against invasions of our privacy by government snooping into all of our phone calls, Internet activity, movements, associations, and financial transactions, agents provocateurs dispatched without apology into dissenting groups by government agencies in order to frame such groups, “preventive” arrests of people planning to exercise their freedom of speech and assembly before they get to exercise such rights and charging them as “domestic terrorists,” the classification of massive amounts of information that should be and in most cases was previously public information as government secrets, outing a covert CIA agent in order to punish her spouse for calling out the White House on their pre-war lies, the list goes on and on.
In times such as these we have more need than ever for people of conscience to step up and blow the whistle, hell, set off the factory whistle, blow the damn ship’s horn, bang the drums, yank the rope on the church steeple bells till your ears are buzzing and the whole town’s awake and in the streets.
The fact that a liberal like Miller is calling for muzzling might appear on the surface to be peculiar. But Miller shares some common ground with the people who are celebrating the institutionalization of students’ lodging official complaints against professors delving into areas that some students, expert as these students are about what belongs and doesn’t belong in the courses which they are taking precisely because they don’t already know all that there is to know about a subject, are loathe to tread.
The commentary on this that I want to highlight is by Carolyn Foster Segal and it’s published in the Irascible Professor. Segal writes:
“The online daily Chronicle of Higher Ed contained a news story earlier this year about several public universities, including Penn State and Temple, ‘that have adopted special procedures allowing students to complain. The process lets students file complaints if they think professors are one-sided in presenting course material or if they think professors have introduced subject matter that is not germane to the course.’ Moreover, the vice provost for academic affairs at Penn State ‘said he is proud of Penn State’s complaint policy, which is “far more than most universities have . . . We encourage students to submit complaints” (Robin Wilson, "Using New Policy, Students Complain About Classroom Bias on 2 Pa. Campuses," 23 July 2008.)
“Students need encouragement to complain? With or without such a questionable 1984-like policy and a coach like David Horowitz, who ‘worked with the Penn State students in shaping their complaints,’ students need no invitation to complain.
“They complain about grades of F and D and B+ and A-. They argue about the unfairness of attendance policies, rules on plagiarism, and being called upon in class (‘the teacher picked on me’). They find fault with their mattresses; the food in the café; the color of the walls of their classrooms; guest speakers; and their instructor's creed, nationality, suspected sexual persuasion, and tone of voice, the last because most of them don't understand irony. They object to assignments: ‘novels are too long,’ ‘have confusing plots,’ or ‘use too many words.’ They file grievances about grading systems and course content.
“The campus atmosphere is already a culture of criticism….
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