52 CommentsSince the fallout from the events of October 4th just keeps coming, we present you with a digest of the latest.
Item # 1: Matt Mireles, Spectator staff writer turned New York Post hatchet man, thinks we’re all a bunch of privileged guilty white kids. Bwog wouldn’t want to get between him and Karina Garcia in a dark alley. Then, Clyde Habermas of The New York Times takes a leaf out of the Mayor’s book and heaves a huge sigh at the state of free expression at Columbia. The pathos.
Item # 2: Brown kids (calm down, the University) hate us for a different reason entirely. Sorry guys!
Item # 3: The two others who spoke with Walid Shoebat Wednesday night, Zachariah Anani and Hilmar von Campe, went on Hannity and Colmes last night. Seeming disappointed that students hadn’t shut down the event in violent protest, the interviewers moved back to their main story of the week, showing the same footage that Bwog is getting thoroughly sick of. Von Campe came through: the former Nazi likened the Minuteman protesters to stormtroopers, allowing Sean and Alan to shake their heads in righteous disbelief.
Also, many outsiders who RSVPed were excluded from the event, but it seems that Shoebat’s seven guests and five personal body guards had no problem. “Those appeared to be the biggest people I’ve seen in my life,” said Chaplain Jewelnel Davis, who is 4’11”.
Oddly, it seems that the Republicans have actually invited a legitimate scholar, Harvard’s James Russell, to speak on campus next Friday. Times, they are a changin’.
Item # 4: Bwog e-mailed the MSA baiter, Lee Kaplan, to confirm that he had indeed posted flyers all over the lower level of Earl Hall Wednesday afternoon. Here is an exerpt from his response:
“Why all the fuss? They were invited to come and even disagree with the speakers (but nonviolently, not like the week before). It’s high time the MSA stop using the misinformation and tactics of the totalitarian world on American campuses. The fact is, their failure to attend proved they shrivel up and make accusations of Jewish conspiracies by the light of day. Their goal is not peace in the Middle East, but rather peace with Israel non-existent and the Jews displaced by Arabs and Muslims. Messrs. Shoebat and Anani revealed to Columbia students smart enough to attend their speech the scam going on in the name of education at Columbia.”
– LBD
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52 Comments
@Mike Nargizian Deedle –
I’m not going anywhere, if you are in fact referring to me. However, a troll is most likely someone who uses a fake name, like ummmm…… Deedle.
Respectfully yours,
Mike
@Deedle I can’t wait until these outside trolls and their prayer-area-vandalizers go away.
@Anonymous I was 1 of the people who was shut out by Jewenel Davis probably acting on behalf of the higher ups at the University.
I received 3 confirmations for the event the night before.
The University then used a sly back door move to change the amount of outsiders to NONE and then to -0- then to 20 3 hours before the event.
I didn’t know that 2 guys that actually grew up in the West Bank and Lebanon, are/were Muslim, and did commit acts of terror are “unqualified” to speak?
I suppose that Ayan Hirsi Ali is “unqualified” to speak as well?
However, perhaps a white Professor who has a Phd in the MEast but has maybe visited there 3x in his life, but is 100% PC Liberal, IS MOST QUALIFIED to speak at Columbia?
I also suppose the fact that Muslim and Left org’s on campus purposefully confirmed seat and then didn’t show to the event so that the Hall would be half empty is OK as well?
I suppose the fact that Norman Finkelstein, a clever sly hater, was able to speak at Columbia, is not divisive /sarcasm/ and got 180 outsiders to attend his event, someohow does not make one pause at the HYPOCRISY?
Perhaps, Ms Davis could explain to me why I traveled all the way uptown on the subway after leaving a business meeting to attend this event but she and her staff mocked me and other “dangerous middle aged ladies” because they were “too dangerous” for the event? Yes, I know some 5’2″ 50 year old ladies that might storm the stage!!
Just a clever excuse for the University to display its bias, using the action of a leftist group to exclude attendees to an event the University does not like….
But perhaps these speakers were “divisive” and Mr. Gitlin and yourself can understand why their point of view woudl provoke violence, thus, Ms Davis and the Univ’s disgusting actions were simply providing “safety”?
Mike
@I bet that Chaplain Davis is a big-time liberal. I also bet that she was hired because she was black. At places where affirmative action and liberalism run rampant, a dark skin color is like a halo.
@she's actually from a republican family
@Chaplain Davis is a racist.
@as it turns out You’re right! She’s pretty awesome, isn’t she?
Except for the last quote. That one was actually Stephen Colbert.
@DHI Chaplain Davis? Was it Chaplain Davis? That is my guess!
@letter from a birmingham jail. i hope you’re not american so you have an excuse to not know that.
chaplain davis is quite awesome, but it wasn’t her.
@to 46 I’m an American, an American from the South, and don’t care for Martin Luther King, Jr. There are those of us from the South who still believe we should have won the Civil War. The country would have been better for it, and you liberals would not be hating yourselves for who you are. Martin Luther King Jr was wrong for the same reason that the French Revolution was wrong: You don’t do away with long-standing institutions like monarchy or slavery. Look at the result: You liberals have made yourselves slaves to the blacks in the name of political correctness and affirmative action. You can’t even think a thought that’s not politically correct. A sad state of affairs.
@John Klopfer Just to clear some things up regarding #s 23, 25 and 26,
I don’t have time to respond to everything you’ve said, but I don’t feel like leaving you carte blanche, so know this:
Avi went to speak on the Factor because it was an opportunity to defend this school’s reputation. Thank him if you run into him; I don’t think many people could muster up the courage to do that.
This is Bwog’s second semester.
Since we’ve been around, the Minuteman fiasco is the only on-campus fight that has so thoroughly worked its way into the mainstream media. Most everything else has been contested in-house; there have been ‘voices.’
From what I said before, if that’s the logic you’re contesting me on, nobody needs to ‘go after’ SEEJ, because they operate with a very low profile. And SHOCC, I remember seeing SHOCC roasted regularly on the Bwog last year.
But what I was suggesting is that you present your university in the best light you can—not lying, but speaking to its better traits. Giving testimony against your school to outsiders when it can’t help your cause is nothing but a waste of your school’s good reputation.
Interviews… tend to portray the interviewed in a favourable light. Do you suppose we should alter the transcripts to change that?
Don’t slash me with Bwog.
And a totally separate thing: DHI, we like your commenting. And you seem to like it far too much to be telling everyone it’s stupid.
@finally, try “During the lifetime of great revolutionaries, the oppressing classes constantly hounded them, received their theories with the most savage malice, the most furious hatred and the most unscrupulous campaigns of lies and slander. After their death, attempts are made to convert them into harmless icons, to canonize them, so to say, and to hallow their names to a certain extent for the “consolation” of the oppressed classes and with the object of duping the latter, while at the same time robbing the revolutionary theory of its substance, blunting its revolutionary edge and vulgarizing it.”
@or again “But though I was initially disappointed at being categorized as an extremist, as I continued to think about the matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label. Was not Jesus an extremist for love: “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.” Was not Amos an extremist for justice: “Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.” Was not Paul an extremist for the Christian gospel: “I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus.” Was not Martin Luther an extremist: “Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise, so help me God.” And John Bunyan: “I will stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my conscience.” And Abraham Lincoln: “This nation cannot survive half slave and half free.” And Thomas Jefferson: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that an men are created equal …” So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. We be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremist for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice? … Perhaps… the nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.
I had hoped that the white moderate would see this need. Perhaps I was too optimistic; perhaps I expected too much. I suppose I should have realized that few members of the oppressor race can understand the deep groans and passionate yearnings of the oppressed race, and still fewer have the vision to see that injustice must be rooted out by strong, persistent and determined action.”
@or try “I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the… great stumbling block… is not the White Citizen’s Councilor or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises… to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.
I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and that when they fan in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress. I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that the present tension in the South is a necessary phase of the transition from an obnoxious negative peace, in which the Negro passively accepted his unjust plight, to a substantive and positive peace, in which all men will respect the dignity and worth of human personality. Actually, we who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with an its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.”
@or maybe “We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”
@or maybe “You may well ask: “Why direct action?” … You are quite right in calling, for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent-resister may sound rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word “tension.” I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth. Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and half-truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, we must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.
The purpose of our direct-action program is to create a situation so crisis-packed that it will inevitably open the door to negotiation. I therefore concur with you in your call for negotiation. Too long has our beloved… land been bogged down in a tragic effort to live in monologue rather than dialogue.”
@guess who said: “You deplore the demonstrations taking place… But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations. I am sure that none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes. It is unfortunate that demonstrations are taking place… but it is even more unfortunate that the… power structure left the… community with no alternative.”
@very bizarre that people are still calling the protest “violent.”
@Chaplain Davis should be fired.
@whoa “Lastly, why where their no voices when (a few years back) black students launched their campaign against the University? When the Jews did it two years ago and students right-of-center now, they’re the ones who are blamed? Or should we let institutional wrongs go unnoticed because it hurts your chance getting an IB job?”
umm, were you here? there were people talking shit about both of those groups. all the fucking time. if anything, this discourse is more considered..
@yeah right. talking shit about the bso’s protest was taboo becuase of the ‘racist’ word that would be immediately thrown around.
and spare me if you think seej or shocc get the type of backlash these folks do.
@Anonymous DHI,
For the most part, I agree with you.
Yours,
Meee
@Like “I do expect Ford Corporation to award me a certificate that a lot of people want to buy at a high price”
@DHI Last thing I will add that given some of Columbia’s history, extremist groups, and the presence of a few extremists on the faculty, you should have calculated the possibility of such an event, and gone to Harvard, Princeton, or Yale which seem to have more stable prospects (and a slightly lower price tag!). I would probably go for Yale – Harvard seems to be on a bit of a decline right now, and I think Yale has better connections than Princeton.
@Actually of everyone involved, BWOG has milked this story (for their own publicity) for all it’s worth. It was the Blue and White Editor who was one with Chris… but, of course, the criticism of Avi was kept to a minimium.
Second, Republicans are not inherently conservative. If Columbia students learned something about the conservative movement and the Republican Party, they would learn that the two have been in constant conflict since 64. Even today there’s a great number of liberal and moderate Republicans. Of the two parties, however, it’s the Dems who have gone farther to their extremes.
Lastly, why where their no voices when (a few years back) black students launched their campaign against the University? When the Jews did it two years ago and students right-of-center now, they’re the ones who are blamed? Or should we let institutional wrongs go unnoticed because it hurts your chance getting an IB job?
@whoops on*
@good point What about SEEJ? they’ve been attacking the admin for years now (slave labor, killing poor innocent kittens…) but why doesn’t BWOG/Klopfer go after them?
@true even w/regards to shocc, bwog had a interview w/one of their leaders in anthony walker which portrayed him and their group in a moderate and favorable light while their demands haven’t indicated any of that moderation
@John Klopfer Meee,
It’s not so much Chris Kulawik’s views that we’re bothered by; it’s the baiting. Everytime Chris manages to provoke people, we have to try to staunch the flow of blood. This last outburst is the biggest wound we’ve seen and it has taken a lot of effort to set the record straight—condemning your fellow students isn’t going to help you, and Chris’ cooperation with Fox hasn’t improved our image either.
The difference between you and Chris is that you are anonymous, while Chris now has solid, well-documented anti-leftist credentials. He benefits and all of you who want jobs with people who care have really lost out. He’s a clever guy and there’s something admirable in that, but objective reporting is not going to come in his favour.
I’m with you on not liking Columbia’s reputation damaged, but for different reasons: I’m not expecting to get hired by anyone who watches Fox news or reads American newspapers, but I don’t like to see one of the world’s strongest economics, human rights, and international affairs complexes besmirched by a crowd of uncontrolled undergraduates.
I’m not going to speculate as to whether our professors have failed to adequately teach our most politically active students, though it does seem that campus radicals on both sides have not been moderated by the education they came for. I’m not sure who to blame for that. Everyone, however, knows who brought the Minuteman Project here.
No matter what you think of the above, I suggest that you start singing the praises of Columbia whenever and however you can. Imagine you are interviewing a recent Columbia graduate. He says, “the professors [are] often crap teachers. i’m paying more to columbia because i want to get a highly-esteemed degree.” Can you imagine that you would hire that graduate? Stop attacking your school’s reputation: you depend on it if you want that degree to be an asset.
To all of you who care about the name on your degree: consider carefully every word you say about the institution that will issue it.
@dgell Was there actually a member of the MSA that stormed the stage that day? Why is he and other guys repeating this crap? If they’re arguments are solid enough why resort to outright lies?
@Yeah well that’s good for you. But is it what Columbia purports to give? Some of us are here for the experience itself and not because we’re prestige whores. Some of us were drawn to the school’s history in terms of caring about social injustice. Love it or hate it, the Oct. 4 incident is part of that storied history. So you can bitch and moan about this not fitting within your philosophical system, but just so all the smug trolls know: not all of us here prioritize our experiences at Columbia quite the same way the above poster does.
@TITCR This is the credited response
@alum “Some of us were drawn to the school’s history in terms of caring about social injustice.”
Columbia really doesn’t have an institutional or student history of caring about social injustice, apart from the well-publicized events provoked by small groups of students on campus in the past four or five decades (yes, even in ’68 only a fraction of students participated).
Moreover, I would argue that the various riots and protests were as much, if not more, about being hip or dealing with guilt issues than actually caring about social injustice.
As an example, the relatively few graduates who have devoted their professional careers to various social causes (n.b., I’m not including the many alums who have held political office or who perform pro bono work as lawyers, doctors, etc.) were almost never involved in extreme activism or shouting matches while they were students. As for the students that liked to shout and never have a civil discussion…well, I haven’t really heard about them except for the few that crop up in the alumni notes as having made partner at a New York law firm (or in a particularly amusing note, the one who dropped a line stating he was enjoying his early retirement sailing around the world).
Finally, including the appalling October 4th incident with the far more effective (and peaceful) civil rights efforts for minority students and South African blacks is insulting.
Mr. Mireles makes some good points in his article. I hope at least some students ask themselves whether they are truly committed to the causes they “fight” for…protesting on campus for a cause, while a wonderful social bonding opportunity, does little to advance the cause outside of the campus gates (even if the NY Times and Fox News pick up the story).
@dictionary college republicans are pretty much inherently conservative. not to be all tautological up in this shit or nothin’, but it’s part of what the words mean.
@not really true. 3 of their last four presidents were moderates who were definitely pro choice, pro gay marriage and who really were only staunchly conservative on defense
@staunch conservative on defense… and Israel
@not true ask some of the older board members about the first CR president who definitely thought more of Said, Dabashi and Khalidi than of israel.
@if you went to the CR meeting at the start of the year, they have at least three ivy league conservative profs lined up for the year; they’re also going campaigning with Lieberman. Try as you may, you can’t paint them as some conservative group
@who invited James Russell?
@messclea This Kaplan guy is nuts. He assigns all this racist conspiracy shit to the campus muslim group just because…they’re muslim? Where are all this accusations about MSA COMING FROM? What the hell is he talking about? He’s propping up all these assumptions and assigning all this ignorance to them out of the blue– which is racist in itself. Just like the moron who went on national tv saying the arabic on the banner said that the holocaust did not happen. Not to mention conflating muslims with “the official line of Arab Student groups”. What a goddamned retard. What’s scary is that these things don’t have most people batting an eyelash. I’d love to hear what he thinks of the same behavior being directed at a Jewish group on campus. Something tells me he won’t be saying “Why all the fuss.” This person is a mess.
Nice to know the kind of company Kuluwik keeps. Who cares about his politics. It’s his endorsement of scum like this that shows who he really is.
@damn! Can’t anyone just say that a small group of Columbia students were involved in the protest? They were “leftist.” Fine. They, in one way or another, stopped the speaker from delivering his whole speach. Fine. But, none of this implies that everyone at Columbia is interested in being a whatever-the-insult-of-the-day-is (lberal leftist anarcho communist marxist trotskyist leninist hitler-esque facist priviliged guilty white scumbag). This is a fucking isolated incident. The majority of us came to Columbia to partake of some kind of education — not embark on an ideological endeavor to storm stages. Stop stroking yourself as you engage in some kind of irrational “left versus right,” blue-balls inducing debate.
@maybe if the football team started a winning streak, it’ll deflect the glare!
@Anonymous I like politics. But I’m getting tired of the minutemen (I didn’t like them in the first place), the bureucracy, the protesters, statements, discliplinary actions and everything revolving around October 4th.
@DHI By the way, though, anybody who says this “no free speech for racists” bullshit that some of the protestors spit can join in the eating of that dick. That wasn’t mean to be some grand support of this shit, nor is this supposed to be support of the Minutemen, although Paul Revere was a great man.
@DHI Look, I’m tired of people saying “this devalues my degree” for every fucking thing they don’t like. If the reason you went here is because of the perception strangers have of you and the job opportunities, then you made a fucking investment decision and if you lose, you fucking lose. That’s how any investment works: stockholders shouldn’t get self-righteous when their stock falls. If you want to complain about losing real or social capital, fine, but don’t bring any fucking ideology into it. You don’t have some divine right of getting to decide how everyone acts just because you pay a lot of money to go here. You have an interest, yes, but it’s not our fucking duty to protect your investment.
Now actually this meee character might not be doing what I’m talking about, because (s)he’s not really saying that the value of his/her degree is a moral part of the equation, just that what they are doing has a negative impact on “meee”: that’s fair if you’re honest about it. But people who think they’re entitled towards the value of their degree being held in great esteem by everyone who goes here can eat a herpes-infested dick.
@Anonymous so you want to talk about a columbia education as an investment? fair enough, i’m making an investment by going to columbia. and i can deal with columbia’s reputation going up and down. i can deal with fluctuations in the value of my investment.
but i think i have every right to complain about idiotic downturns that could easily have been prevented. just like someone might complain about amaranth’s rogue trader. i have the right to complain about the minutemen rioters. they shouldn’t have resorted to violence. the university should have provided some real security. and the university should have rapidly taken decisive action to show the media that columbia means business when it supports free speech not violence. a couple of ‘slaps on the wrist’ a month later isn’t going to cut it.
i don’t expect any particular person to hold my degree in high esteem. but i do expect the university to award me a degree that a lot of people hold in high esteem. i’ve worked for it and paid for it. i could have had almost as good an education somewhere else for 0 to 1/4 of columbia’s tuition fees. so what justifies paying columbia more? certainly not the professors who are often crap teachers. i’m paying more to columbia because i want to get a highly-esteemed degree and then a high-paying job. if you think there’s something morally wrong with that, then you’ve got a problem with your philosophical system. my philosophical system says it’s a good thing – not a bad thing – to try to get ahead in life.
@DHI I’m talking in the terms of your moral system – and what I’m saying is that while you can get pissed, you can’t expect anybody to feel bad about it. The only entity you could justifiably say is doing some wrong is the Columbia organization – which seems to be what you are doing in this post – because they sort of made an implicit agreement to give you a good degree. However, they made no guarantees, and I think your anger should be more along the lines of “fuck, I’m getting screwed” rather than “it is Wrong of you to allow this to happen”. I’m not criticizing your moral system here, unless that moral system assigns moral values to other people’s decisions based on the economic effects for you.
Again, it is fucking stupid to argue on the internets
@Now That is a reasonable person, bravo!
@Anonymous thanks.
@meee when the protestors rushed the stage, the first thing i thought was ‘this is big, it’ll be in the new york times’. but i didn’t think it would last quite this long.
i can’t express how much i hate those leftist/socialist rioters. they have fucked up columbia’s reputation. i don’t care so much that donations will fall and applications will fall, but columbia’s reputation is really really important. i don’t want to have paid such a fortune for a degree that everyone thinks is from a shit university. it’s not that the violence has had any effect on my education; it’s that i could have had just as good an education at say brown (had i accepted the offer) but without all the connotations of revolutionary violence.
and i’m angry that i can’t be as morally corrupt as the socialist rioters and say: “socialists are not a legitimate voice on this campus.”
fuck the rioters. fuck the socialists.
and as for chris kulawik… could bwog please stop messing around with him? maybe you don’t like his views. but at least he actually takes the effort to invite speakers.
@Anonymous making an effort to invite speakers isn’t worth anything if they are just meant to strike up controversy and draw attention.
many groups invite speakers. the culinary club invites speakers, that doesn’t mean Kulawik shouldn’t have to defend his views like everyone else (although I will give it to you that being a conservative on campus he has to defend his views 100 times more than our liberal jihad).
@def agree we have to look at the PURPOSE of bringing in speakers. If the Minutemen had such intelligent and well thought discourse on immigration issues I think they’d have to understand where the opposition comes from. Lets face the fact, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to tell me illegal immigrants are here illegally, which is what Gilchrist and the other guy basically said with their 45 minutes (The other guy talked about 18th and 19th century law, last time I remembered immigration law wasn’t really enforced until the 20th century). Maybe Gilchrist would have said something intelligent after he was interrupted by the protestors, but words like “You hate yourselves” really don’t come out of rational human beings.
BTW Anyone who was there, do you remember them saying they were starting to patrol the Canadian border? If so, thats gotta be one of the most boring things ever. Maybe they shoot Canadian geese to pass the time (or senior citizens trying to take Canadian perscription drugs over the border)…