10-02-2010, 10:50 AM
Quote:Horowitz: Right Treated Badly on Campuses
Friday, 01 Oct 2010 09:50 AM
By: Jim Meyers
Conservative activist and best-selling author David Horowitz tells Newsmax it is an “absolute disgrace” that left-wing radicals at American universities are so intolerant of right-wing views that he has to hire a bodyguard when he speaks on campuses.
Students are being punished for expressing opposition to the liberal views of any professor who is a "political ideologue,"? says Horowitz, author of the new book "Reforming Our Universities: The Campaign for an Academic Bill of Rights."? He is founder and president of the David Horowitz Freedom Center, founder of Students for Academic Freedom, and a Newsmax contributor.
Horowitz has long campaigned for academic freedom, maintaining that U.S. universities are hotbeds of radical leftist thought and urging professors to include conservative and pro-American resources in their curriculum.
In an exclusive interview with Newsmax.TV, he said universities have a code of political correctness that inhibits the free exchange of ideas.
"You have to believe that America is a racist, sexist, homophobic, imperialist, Islamophobic country to get through many courses in universities these days,"? he says.
"This is the mentality of communist parties and communist states. The people who are shaping our university classrooms today, or lots of them, and have totally infiltrated the Democratic Party think exactly the way the communists did 20 and 30 years ago."?
Asked whether students who disagree with professors are fearful of being punished with poor grades when they speak out, Horowitz responds: "Absolutely. They're fearful of filing grievances because there's no conservatives on the faculty to look after them.
"And I can't blame them. I know way too many stories of students who were punished.
"A student would write a paper challenging a professor, get a C-minus, and then decide there was no future in that because this professor was obviously a political ideologue. And so they would parrot back what the professor was trying to impose on them and get an A. It's terrible."
Horowitz bemoaned the fact that he needs a bodyguard when he is invited to speak at a university. "I share a bodyguard with Ann Coulter and Michelle Malkin,"? he tells Newsmax. "It's an absolute disgrace.
"You have on campuses, I have to call them communists because that's what they are, and Islamofascists. The Students for Justice in Palestine is a fascist organization, a Jew-hating fascist organization on most campuses. And if someone like myself or Ann or Michelle comes to the campus, they threaten violence and they intimidate students.
"I've had college Republicans who invited me say they are fearful for their safety. The universities will do nothing about this."
He also expressed dismay that conservatives don't use their "leverage"? to exercise more control over college curriculum. "The boards of trustees of private universities, the major donors, tend to be conservative,"? Horowitz says.
"If they paid any attention to the curriculum, if they would read this book 'Reforming Our Universities' and get a picture of the lay of the land there, they could do enormous good."?
Horowitz was asked how William Ayers -- an unrepentant 1960s terrorist who was involved in several bombings, including at the Capitol Building -- could be an education professor at the taxpayer-supported University of Illinois.
"Because the universities are hospitable to violent leftists,"? he says.
"Ayers traveled recently to Gaza to meet with Hamas. Ayers is an American Nazi, that's what he is.
"There are people in universities that despise Billy Ayers, but they're intimidated into silence.
"The dominant forces, the people that control universities, and most faculty Senates are radical leftists who approve of Billy Ayers."?