Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Monday, March 19, 2012
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Thomas Dingman
Above is the front cover for the latest American Dissident, issue #23. It features Harvard University, which recently placed civility on a higher level than democracy (i.e., vigorous debate, freedom of speech and freedom of expression). Depicted are Thomas Dingman, Dean of Freshman, Sue Brown, Ph.D., Resident Dean, Katie Steele, Director for Freshman Programming, Brandon Edwards, Assistant to Dean of Freshmen and Freshman Programs Assistant leading flagellant students of the new freshman class in a recitation of the pledge:
“I shall act with integrity, respect, and industry, and to sustain a community characterized by inclusiveness and civility. The exercise of kindness holds a place on a par with intellectual attainment.”
Sadly,one former student, Ralph Waldo Emerson, is imprisoned in a pillory and reciting a different pledge: “Go upright and vital, and speak the rude truth in all ways.” Emerson’s “Self-Reliance” used to be required reading by each new freshman class at Harvard… that is, until multiculti happy-face dogmatists took over. Unsurprisingly, not one of the above persons contacted deigned to respond to my correspondance.
Saturday, February 25, 2012
Eliza Griswold
Open
Letter to Poetry editors Christian Wiman, Don Share, and Fred Sasaki, as well
as Valerie Jean Johnson:
A satirical cartoon on Poetry magazine (Eliza
Griswold) is currently posted on The American Dissident blogsite (seewwwtheamericandissidentorg.blogspot.com). Will you actually be
curious… or like most average-Joe poets incurious? Of
course, I’ll probably never know. No
matter.
The fundamental flaw with
Poetry magazine is that its editors refuse to publish harsh criticism with its
regard, as well as with that of the established-order poetry milieu in
general. Byron and Pope hit the poet
laureate of their time with sledgehammers, but Poetry mag would never publish poems
like theirs today relative to one of our laureates.
The PC-multiculti
dogma reigns at Poetry, where ostracism and banning under the guise of
moderation are currently effected.
Apathy to ostracism and banning has become a pitiful trait of today’s
poets. The Academy of American Poets not
only censored my comments after having posted them, but also banned me, a poet,
from participating in its poet forums.
Do you care? It is highly
unlikely that you do or, at best, would justify the censorship and
banning. Poetry Foundation has
ostracized The American Dissident from its vast network in refusing to list the
journal with other literary journals listed.
In a nutshell,
censorship, banning, and ostracism form your protective cocoon, making it
happy-face bland and PC safe. You
represent that shameful aspect of far too many poets in America today.
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Minnie Bruce Pratt
Hear No Evil
An
Open Letter to the Professors of the Departments of Women's & Gender Studies and Writing and Rhetoric,
Syracuse University:
The citizenry is drowning in
hagiography, which is why I make it a point not to add to it.
One of your colleagues, Minnie Bruce Pratt, attracted my attention this week via Poetry Magazine. Statements she’s made incited me to sketch a
cartoon with her regard. It is posted
with this letter on The American
Dissident blogsite (wwwtheamericandissidentorg.blogspot.com). Hopefully, one or even several of you might
actually be sufficiently curious to examine the uncomfortable truths depicted
in it. The crux of the criticism
concerns Pratt’s assertion of wanting a socialist revolution. But there she sits comfortably enjoying
privilege under the current capitalist system, which also designates her as an
“eminent poet.” How strange, I’d thought: a revolutionary with established-order
chevrons and laurels.
The problem
with the so-called women’s liberation is that purported liberators like Pratt
have mostly been coopted by the established order, especially in the realm of
politics and academe. Hillary stands as
prime example of that sellout. After
all, what does it matter if a hack is female or male? Ah, but the old Sixties feminists a la Pratt
are quite contented with their positions in the established order. Hypocritically, they remain shamefully PC-silent
regarding, for example, Islam’s inherent misogyny. How disgusted I was to see the photo of feminist
Hillary wearing a hiyad head scarf in full solidarity with misogynist Islamists!
On
another note, Syracuse University, which pays you quite nicely (to turn a
not-so-nice blind eye) boasts of being a bastion of freedom of speech (“Syracuse University is committed to
the principle that freedom of discussion is essential to the search for truth
and, consequently, welcomes and encourages the expression of dissent.”), while
simultaneously and hypocritically restricts that very freedom (see http://thefire.org/spotlight/schools/1143). For this, the Foundation for Individual
Rights in Education designated the institution a red-light university. “A
red light university has at least one policy that both clearly and
substantially restricts freedom of speech,” notes the Foundation. Therefore, I ask why you have done nothing at
all (turned a blind eye) to question and challenge—for the sake of your
students!—that shameful situation, or if you have done something—and I’d be
quite surprised—please let me know what the results were and inform the
Foundation of your efforts.
Finally, my
experience questioning and challenging academics over the past several decades underscores
the likelihood that just one of you will actually deign to respond and engage
in vigorous debate, cornerstone of democracy, is next to nil. So, the true purpose of this letter is not to
provoke a response from you—though hopefully it will educate you… a contrecoeur—, but rather to form part
of the public record. Thanks to the
Internet, this criticism of you and your university will be posted.
BTW, this letter
has also been forwarded to the student editors of The Daily Orange, though again my experience underscores that even
they will likely be nothing more than your ideological shadows and will also
likely not respond—thus has become higher education in America today.
PS: Please do
consider asking your library to subscribe to The American Dissident. Your
students might find the no-holds-barred, non-ideological criticism
refreshing. Perhaps, however, students
are not your real top priority, despite the usual proclamations. Institutional subscribers include Harvard University,
Buffalo University, Brown University, John Hopkins University, University of
Michigan, University of Wisconsin, Endicott College and, amongst others, New
York Public Library.
Thank
you for your attention.
Monday, January 16, 2012
Jen Day Shaw
Democracy in Peril
Open Letter to English-Department Professors, Lecturers,
and Adjunctors of the University of Florida:
[N.B: Not one English
professor contacted deigned to respond to this open
letter. The student newspaper editor did
not respond. The dean of students and
assistant dean of students did not respond.
The University of Florida is a PUBLIC university.]
This
open letter, published on The American Dissident blogsite, constitutes a plea
for you to become responsible citizens by removing your heads from the sands of
comfortable, conformist oblivion, then by educating yourselves as to the
unconstitutional policies or speech codes in effect at your very own university
(see http://thefire.org/article/14053.html),
and finally by activating yourselves to vigorously protest against them in the
name of freedom of speech, freedom of expression, vigorous debate, and
democracy. Those enacting such policies and codes should be openly lampooned,
if not demoted or even discharged. Yet
they seem instead to be congratulated and promoted. Because they rescind a policy here or there
does not necessarily mean they have changed their way of thinking.
Such
speech-restricting policies and codes clearly serve the university established
order by reinforcing a generalized state of self-censorship (often referred to
as collegiality and civility) and thus radically reducing the free and open
expression of ideas, as opposed to encouraging it.
This
open letter is a plea for you to consider inserting an instructional component
of democracy and dissidence into your writing and literature courses. Likely, you’ve already been obligated to
include a diversity-multiculti component.
So why not do the same for democracy?
If you would like to constitute an entire course on the subject, see my
attached proposal for an idea of what such a course might comprise. It was created several years ago for Tufts
Experimental College, which sadly is not very experimental at all. The course was rejected without reason,
though evidently due to the fact that freedom of speech and expression do not mix
well with authoritarianism.
Finally,
students should be made aware that criticism of the established order (including
and especially those who created UF’s speech codes) can constitute valid
literature in the form of poetry, essays, and novels. Let students, professors, lecturers, and
adjunctors, poets and writers make waves of democracy, buck the system of
self-censorship, and go against the grain of speech-stifling civility!
Thank
you for your attention.
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