Is Liberty trying to make itself into a laughingstock?
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UPDATE: For those who think that Liberty is "standing on principle," especially with regard to abortion, the especially stupid thing about Liberty's move is that political parties don't have fixed principles, they respond to their members and what they think will get them votes. The Republican Party was a pro-choice party until 1980 when evangelicals got influence. If you were trying to influence the Democrats to have principles more to Liberty's liking, the dumbest thing you could do is ban its students from being involved in the party.
And of course American political parties are not monolithic. The Democratic Party nationally may not be going pro-life any time soon, but that doesn't mean that you can't elect pro-life Democrats to state offices or perhaps even federal offices in Virginia. Even the national party may be swayable on issues like partial birth abortions or parental consent. So Liberty is not just making an intolerant stand (or a stand on principle), but a plain stupid one.
On those premises, the decision makes perfect sense.
If you're pregnant, don't drink &drive on your way to your coven meeting, is the message I get from that.
Myself, I have always believed that, during the Flood, dinosaurs were taken on board the boat by Utnapishtim.
The martyrdom of failing accreditation would bring them millions of dollars in direct-mail solicitations, and the kind of person who graduates from Liberty probably is planning on a career where the school's accreditation status does not matter much to a prospective employer.
Or, to put it in the terms of the feminists philosophers of science, being a laughingstock is perspectival.
This is an extreme analogy, but that's sort of like saying "I disagree with [insert hate group here], but I admire their integrity in consistently excluding [insert hated demographic here] from their membership."
What it does say on the subject seems at least somewhat favorable. Lots of stuff about wine.
The problem with your example is not just that it is extreme, but that it is not an analogy at all. In what way is Liberty University like a hate group? In what way is declining to officially recognize a political organization like excluding a "hated demographic"?
On the original topic, I agree with those who have suggested that one cannot "become" what one already is, so Liberty isn't trying to become a laughingstock. That said, this is definitely not going to contribute anything new, surprising, and positive to their image outside of the small segment of the population that they view as their core constituency.
1. What "kind of person" graduates from Liberty?
2. Why would accreditation mean little to his prospective employer?
Likewise with the OIC's Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam: "All human beings form one family whose members are united by submission to God and descent from Adam."
War is Peace!
Freedom is Slavery!
Ignorance is Strength!
The Equal Access Act is a United States federal law passed in 1984 to compel federally-funded secondary schools to provide equal access to extracurricular clubs. Lobbied for by religious groups who wanted to ensure students the right to conduct Bible study programs during lunch and after school, it is also essential in litigation regarding the right of students to form gay–straight alliances.[1]
Sure it does.
John 2:1-11 He seems to approve.
And He has taste in wine. See Luke 5:39
Someone who plans to teach in a school of the same ilk?
If Christ showed up at Liberty, unshaven in sandals and a dirty smock with a posse of the broken and the dispossessed, with prostitutes, idle disciples, and other ne'er-do-wells, I think He would wind up proned out on the pavement with the boot of Lt. Jimmy-Bob Blessing of the Liberty Security Dept. on His neck inside about five minutes.
Liberty, as a private entity, gets to refuse to allow any sort of speech it likes (absent an applicable statute or being in a state like California with its appalling Pruneyard decision). That's part of Liberty's free speech and property rights. Our free speech rights include saying "Liberty, you keep saying 'University.' I do not think that word means what you think it means.'"
Let's not discuss the substance! Let's just laugh at them!
Wow ... that makes the debate so easy!
For a more authentic, and charitable, statement of this view, see John Paul II's papal encyclical, Veritatis Splendor, beginning particularly at section 31. While generally about contemporary moral theology, JPII specifically addresses what, at least in the understanding of the Catholic Church, "freedom" means. For a reflection on the role of democracy, see Centesimus Annus, starting from section 44.
If you've ever discussed this issue with a certain ilk of Southern Baptist, you've been ruefully amused at how swiftly a fundamentalist can be transformed into the most devious of textual critics.
The word "wine," you will learn, does not mean "wine," but rather Welch's grape juice or something of that nature.
Hegel, from his very different premises, entertained a similar notion, IIRC. Or similar Concept, should I say?
It's also funny how they explain that when Jesus said "This is my body," he was only speaking figuratively. You know, the way the author of the first chapter of Genesis wasn't.
An uneducated one.
The fact which most scholars choose to ignore is that oinos in Koine Greek could be understood as grape juice. The Septuagint translates the word yayin as oinos in Isaiah 16:10 where a substance that could not possibly be alcoholic is mentioned. The Greek of the Septuagint is practically the same as that of the New Testament. This establishes beyond doubt that oinos may be unfermented grape juice in the New Testament. Jesus would not tempt people to commit the sin of drunkenness. Therefore, since oinos may be grape juice fresh from the press, what Jesus made must have been such a drink.
One hesitates at how to correlate this view with the wedding guests' opinion that the miraculous (non-alcoholic) grape juice was much better than the nonmiraculous (alcoholic) wine they had been drinking.
Perhaps they were merlot fans.
I actually believe that. Not on the basis of any so-called textual criticism, but because I've had Welch's grape juice. It's so good, surely only Jesus could've made it.
NOMNOMNOM. (Or whatever the appropriate drinking noise is.)
"'I think people should start thinking about other people rather than trying to feel sorry for themselves and thinking that the administration is trying to thwart their creativity,'” Trachtenberg said. 'They’re not using their own intelligence. … We have to think of the people who might be affected by seeing real-life weapons.'"
The idea that those "people who might be affected" ought themselves to "use their own intelligence" understandably did not occur to Ms. Trachtenberg, who evidently wasn't adept at using her own.)
The people at The Onion, talented as they are, could not have made that up.
You could have just said "Your mom." It would have been at least as clever and would have been no less suited to moving the discussion along.
It's a fair analogy. Thought and speech gets beaten down on campuses quite regularly, it seems. Liberty holds no franchise on this, certainly.
Yes, that would've been better, actually. Sorry, Byomtov, you missed the low-hanging fruit there.
So why is one acceptable, but not the other? Or is it fair to say both Liberty and the Ivies are behaving badly? Of course I suspect many of the good Ivy leaguers will defend their alma mater's right to be selective (let us not say 'discriminate,' please, the word has such unfavorable connotations)about which organizations may function on campus.
Where’s the grape juice/wine scoffing? We all know that taking an extreme position of one person applies to all who could fit within the same rubric, let’s have some more examples already!
Hey! I know of this Christian who actually believes that abortion is wrong, but supports the death penalty – we all know that correct thinkers see it the other way, right?
Heaven (can I use that word here) forbid there is an actual on-topic discussion about the issue presented.
Look, Liberty Univ. as an institution considers abortion to be in the same morally repugnant category as slavery and murder. No one would criticize them if they delegitimized a KKK group or some such thing. But hey, it's Liberty U, so free licks on the backwoods laughingstocks.
This is not a public university. Liberty is a private institution. There is a place for educational institutions that stand for something. Personally, I'm not sure I agree with the decision, but I'm thrilled to see a university refusing to bow to the relativism that is so dominant in universities these days.
But no one considers Harvard a "laughingstock" for excluding ROTC. Or if a Jewish university refused to officially recognize a political club because the affiliated party held positions contrary to the Torah, I doubt the VC crowd would heap ridicule on them -- even though they believed in creationism and abstained from pork. It's just so much more fun to pick on the fundies.
When Notre Dame boots the Democrats off campus, get back to us, okay?
Why is it different?
Would Bernstein have said that the Catholic Church turned itself into a laughingstock for criticizing Notre Dame for having Obama speak at graduation?
Differences:
(1) Notre Dame did in fact invite Obama, a Democrat, to speak at its commencement. The "Catholic Church" did not criticize Notre Dame, unless you are aware of some Vatican pronouncement I have overlooked.
(2) Whether or not some Democrat guy speaks at commencement bears very little relation to the "liberty" of Democrat students at Liberty U (a subset I have trouble imagining, to be honest) to enjoy the same ability to meet on campus, etc. that their Republican classmates enjoy. The former does not affect the students' own political organization and advocacy; the latter does.
... But now I am indeed curious: who are these Liberty U Democrats?
If there were no association with university the case would be clear, I cannot start the Yale University Genocide Club without running afoul of the Yale University brand unless I have some connection to Yale University. If however I am a professor at Yale what right does Yale University have to prevent me from using the name Yale University Genocide Club, as I am a member of the Yale University community?
Not sure how I fall on this one, to some extent I agree with the LU administration, LU has to have some power to control how the University name is used it seems reasonable that this power would reside with the administration. But the Democratic society is a group on the University campus, meets on campus and is composed of LU students so they have some right to use the Universities name in describe themselves. Perhaps a compromise could be arranged and the club could call themselves the liberty University Progressives?
BTW what's all thi9s talk about kicking the club off campus? The e-mail from the Administration indicates that the derecognition only extends to the use of the LU name by the club.
One, if you read the e-mail you linked, it not only sets forth a policy forbidding on-campus activity by an unrecognized club, it also includes this:
They may not engage in any activity on or off campus that would compromise the testimony or reputation of the University or cause disruption to Liberty's Christian learning environment.
So, reading the whole e-mail, it certainly seems that OFF-campus pro-Democrat activity would be forbidden. (Cf. "Bong Hits for Jesus.")
Last year, Prof. Volokh had a post in which he argued that it was more rational for a voter to vote for the party that most closely stands for his beliefs, even if an individual candidate from that party was distasteful (or if a candidate from another party seemed more appealing). Without being able to recall all of Eugene's analysis, one of his main points was that the national party would exert considerable influence over an individual member. That's certainly true here, where a local Democratic club would be working to get Democrats elected. The university might rationally decide that it did not want to officially support such a club, even if particular Democratic candidates were unobjectionable.
Oh, brother.
What does a party's views 29 years ago have to do with a decision this month?
Presumably, if political parties don't have fixed principles, then Universities don't either? If, in 29 years, the Democratic Party changes its stance on abortion, is it theoretically possible that Liberty would change its view on the Democratic Party as well?
If you weren't trying to influence the Democracts, but simply trying to express your disapproval, perhaps you would do exactly what Liberty is doing.
You shouldn't have added the update: When in a hole, stop digging.
Sk
btw:
"Liberty's decision was that it would no longer recognize the Democratic club as an official university organization: no use of the Liberty name, no on-campus meetings, and no university funding. Liberty did not purport to ban students from being Democrats or otherwise participating in non-university-sponsored political events."
This really seems key. If accurate, it makes Liberty's decision almost non-controversial.
Oh, wait. They're fundamentalists, so they must be stupid.
while the policy could (possibly, have to read the entire code to be sure) be used to kick the club off campus etc, the actual e-mail only requires the club to "cease using Liberty University's name, including any logo, seal or mark of Liberty University. They are not to be used in any of your publications, electronic or internet, including but not limited to, any website, Facebook, Twitter or any other such publication." and is based upon the objectionable "using LU or Liberty University and Democrat in the name, the two are associated and the goals of both run in opposite directions."
Without an announcement from the administration (and not the president or adviser of the club who, from the article, have axes to grind) that LU is banning the group from campus, it is foolish to conclude that LU is going to take any other action as part of derecognition than the one which they have actually taken. Until LU actually prevents the group from meeting on campus etc. they are not prohibited from meeting on campus etc.
(1) I know of no Vatican pronouncement, as I am not currently on their listserv.
(2) Liberty U. has the freedom to regulate what messages are spread on its campus, even by students. I just don't see how it's irrational or absurd for the university to prevent students from promoting (on its property or under its aegis) a national political party that officially supports practices considered anathema to the university's religious mission? Certainly, posters have every right to criticize the university's policy, but I haven't seen a convincing argument on why the university's approach is "stupid" or "laughable". Moreover, I took DB's comments to mean that Liberty's decision was "laughable" because of the supposed lack of political merit of the decision, not because it somehow repressed student liberty.
Well, yes, on some level.
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