This is another action being taken by the Florida Legislature that should be of concern to most common sense Americans. It was sent to me by a retired professor.
**************
Sieg Heil
EDUCATION - FLORIDA BILL TARGETS "DICTATOR PROFESSORS":
(and Ohio too - see footnote [3])
Conservative Florida legislators are pushing a bill that aims to stamp
out "leftist
totalitarianism" by "dictator professors" [1] in the classrooms of
Florida's universities.
The so-called "Academic Freedom Bill of Rights" legislation is yet
another state spin-off of
right-wing activist David Horowitz's campus crusade to prohibit [2]
public and private college
professors from introducing "controversial matter" into the classroom
and shift oversight [3] of
college course content to state governments and courts.
"According to a legislative staff analysis of the bill, the law would
give students who think
their beliefs are not being respected legal standing to sue professors
and universities," the
University of Florida's student newspaper reports.
Students would also have the right to sue if they believe their
professor is "singling them out
for 'public ridicule' - for instance, when professors use the Socratic
method to force students to
explain their theories in class." [1] The bill has two more committees
to pass before it can be
considered by the full House.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Capitol bill aims to control ?'leftist' profs
THE LAW COULD LET STUDENTS SUE FOR UNTOLERATED BELIEFS.
By JAMES VANLANDINGHAM
Alligator Staff Writer
TALLAHASSEE ?- Republicans on the House Choice and Innovation Committee
voted along party lines
Tuesday to pass a bill that aims to stamp out "leftist totalitarianism"
by "dictator professors"
in the classrooms of Florida's universities.
The Academic Freedom Bill of Rights, sponsored by Rep. Dennis Baxley,
R-Ocala, passed 8-to-2
despite strenuous objections from the only two Democrats on the
committee.
The bill has two more committees to pass before it can be considered by
the full House.
While promoting the bill Tuesday, Baxley said a university education
should be more than "one
biased view by the professor, who as a dictator controls the
classroom," as part of "a misuse of
their platform to indoctrinate the next generation with their own
views."
The bill sets a statewide standard that students cannot be punished for
professing beliefs with
which their professors disagree. Professors would also be advised to
teach alternative "serious
academic theories" that may disagree with their personal views.
According to a legislative staff analysis of the bill, the law would
give students who think their
beliefs are not being respected legal standing to sue professors and
universities.
Students who believe their professor is singling them out for "public
ridicule" - for instance,
when professors use the Socratic method to force students to explain
their theories in class -
would also be given the right to sue.
"Some professors say, ?'Evolution is a fact. I don't want to hear about
Intelligent Design (a
creationist theory), and if you don't like it, there's the door,'"
Baxley said, citing one example
when he thought a student should sue.
Rep. Dan Gelber, D-Miami Beach, warned of lawsuits from students
enrolled in Holocaust history
courses who believe the Holocaust never happened.
Similar suits could be filed by students who don't believe astronauts
landed on the moon, who
believe teaching birth control is a sin or even by Shands medical
students who refuse to perform
blood transfusions and believe prayer is the only way to heal the body,
Gelber added.
"This is a horrible step," he said. "Universities will have to hire
lawyers so our curricula can
be decided by judges in courtrooms. Professors might have to pay court
costs ?- even if they win ?-
from their own pockets. This is not an innocent piece of legislation."
The staff analysis also warned the bill may shift responsibility for
determining whether a
student's freedom has been infringed from the faculty to the courts.
But Baxley brushed off Gelber's concerns. "Freedom is a dangerous
thing, and you might be exposed
to things you don't want to hear," he said. "Being a businessman, I
found out you can be sued for
anything. Besides, if students are being persecuted and ridiculed for
their beliefs, I think they
should be given standing to sue."
During the committee hearing, Baxley cast opposition to his bill as
"leftists" struggling against
"mainstream society."
"The critics ridicule me for daring to stand up for students and
faculty," he said, adding that he
was called a McCarthyist.
Baxley later said he had a list of students who were discriminated
against by professors, but
refused to reveal names because he felt they would be persecuted.
Rep. Eleanor Sobel, D-Hollywood, argued universities and the state
Board of Governors already have
policies in place to protect academic freedom. Moreover, a state law
outlining how professors are
supposed to teach would encroach on the board's authority to manage
state schools.
"The big hand of state government is going into the universities
telling them how to teach," she
said. "This bill is the antithesis of academic freedom."
But Baxley compared the state's universities to children, saying the
legislature should not give
them money without providing "guidance" to their behavior.
"Professors are accountable for what they say or do," he said. "They're
accountable to the rest of
us in society
All of a sudden the faculty think they can do what they want and shut
us out. Why
is it so unheard of to say the professor shouldn't be a dictator and
control that room as their
totalitarian niche?"
In an interview before the meeting, Baxley said "arrogant, elitist
academics are swarming" to
oppose the bill, and media reports misrepresented his intentions.
"I expect to be out there on my own pretty far," he said. "I don't
expect to be part of a team."
House Bill H-837 can be viewed online at
www.flsenate.gov.
[2] David Horowitz, Champion of Open Debate
Conservatives in the Ohio State Senate are considering a bill that
would prohibit public and
private college professors from introducing "controversial matter" into
the classroom and shift
oversight of college course content to state governments and courts.
The language of the bill
comes from right-wing activist David Horowitz's "Academic Bill of
Rights," which recommends states
adopt rules to "restrict what university professors could say in their
classrooms" and halt
liberal "pollution" on campus.
Horowitz, who is the driving force behind the movement for "academic
freedom" in Ohio and other
states, has a distinguished history of intellectual defamation,
historical inaccuracy and
political bullying. He has freely compared American liberals to Islamic
terrorists, slandered the
Democratic Party and John Kerry for criticizing the war in Iraq and
made a habit out of accusing
his detractors of racism. Most recently, when African-American
historian John Hope Franklin
questioned Horowitz's 2001 claim that black people benefited from
slavery and owed a "debt" to
white America, Horowitz responded by calling the eminent historian "a
racial ideologue rather than
a historian" and "almost pathological." Horowitz has no academic
credentials and routinely
distorts facts - exactly the crime he accuses "liberal" professors of
committing - to fit his
political bias. Posted by Think Progress Team February 16th, 2005 9:14
am
[3] Ohio Senate Bill 24
The Ohio Senate is considering a bill that would censor Ohio colleges
and universities. The
so-called "Academic Bill of Rights" is truly as a misnomer, as it is
really an "academic bill of
restrictions." The ACLU of Ohio opposes passage of this bill because it
could be used to curtail
academic freedom and to encourage thought policing in our institutes of
higher education. The bill
would have a chilling effect on freedom of inquiry on Ohio's campuses.
For example:
· The bill forces the board of trustees, of both public and private
schools, to adopt policies
about what can and cannot be taught.
· Under the bill, faculty would be discouraged from teaching anything
"controversial" - a vague
term that could pertain to any number of topics including evolution,
history, or religion.
· If they do raise controversial issues, instructors would have to
present alternative views
regardless of the merits of those views or their own beliefs about
them.
· Senate Bill 24 would shift the responsibility for course content and
student evaluation from
highly trained faculty to the state government or the courts. (Source
: ACLU
