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Today’s blacklisted American: Law professor under investigation for criticizing China

Cancelled Bill of Rights
Doesn’t exist at the University of San Diego.

They’re coming for you next: A law professor at the University of San Diego, Tom Smith, is now under formal investigation and could possibly be fired for a blog post on his own webpage where he strongly criticized China and its role in the start of COVID-19.

When he first published the March 10 post, the USD Law School placed him under investigation, citing complaints of bias. Now, the law school has sent his case to administration for a formal review.

The review comes as a petition circulates demanding Smith resign or be fired, alleging he has a history of saying and writing things some find offensive.

Signed by the USD Law Student Bar Association presidents for this school year and the next, they claim in the petition Smith’s alleged comments have left some in the USD law community feeling vulnerable and helpless so that students cannot balance their studies or “prepare for our futures in the legal profession.” [emphasis mine]

Beside the fact that it is utterly wrong for the university to investigate this man for simply expressing his opinion on line, the highlighted words — “feeling vulnerable and helpless” — illustrate starkly the total close-mindedness of the left’s modern blacklisting effort to any opinions outside its frame of reference.

Freedom of speech means giving everyone the right to express any opinions, no matter how much they offend you. If you are open-minded and tolerant, you listen calmly, absorb the reasoning (if there is any), and decide whether you need to include that opinion in your conclusions. If anything, accepting the right of others to offend you not only strengthens your own opinions, giving them more depth by including ideas they may have missed, it strengthens you as a person. You grow stronger, because you have refused to allow your childish emotions to rule you. You are acting like an adult.

You don’t cower in fear, “feeling vulnerable and helpless,” as do very young children. If you do, and you are older than ten, you are a very sad and pathetic human being.

Moreover, this logic applies all the more to those holding leadership positions in any organization, be it university, corporation, or social media site. When someone comes complaining that another person’s opinion has made them “feel vulnerable and helpless” and demands the blackballing of that person, those leaders shouldn’t cower in fear themselves and obey these demands. They instead should take a quick look, recognize that the demands are only responding to an opinion the complainant doesn’t like, and then shrug, thank them politely for their concern, and do nothing. Such infantile behavior does not deserve respect. Nor does it justify any action against the offending speaker, in almost any situation.

Or at least, that’s what sane, tolerant, and mature people do. What we have today is a society where those in leadership positions have bought into this leftist childish dogma that those on the left have the right to never be offended by anything. Someone throws a tantrum like two-year-old toddler, everyone else is expected to immediately feed them candy to shut them up.

Worse, for university officials to bow to such tantrums is exactly what university officials should never do. Universities are supposed to be in the business of teaching their students to be open-minded, thoughtful, mature, and thinking individuals. To become so requires exposure to as many points of view as possible, in order to train the person to be able to consider them all, and not cringe in fear from ideas they think are wrong or radical.

Instead, modern American universities, as shown here at the University of San Diego, seem to be in the business of teaching the exact opposite. Students are allowed to shout down and destroy those they disagree with so that diversity of opinion is squelched. What we now have in academia — and at the University of San Diego — is a sterile, empty, and armed camp, with no freedom of thought at all.

This has to end, or else civilization will fall. Assuming that it isn’t too late and civilization hasn’t fallen already.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

14 comments

  • Geno

    I wonder if this University has an Outpost of the Confusicus (sp) on it’s campus. That would explain why criticism of China drew such a quick and angry response.

  • Andi

    According to this

    https://www.ciuscenter.org/locations1/

    University of San Diego does not, however San Diego State University does.

  • Brendan

    And thus we come to the end of the Republic.

    As with Rome, the future is dictatorship and tyranny.

  • Andi

    But as has been pointed out, Rome did not have a Constitution and we do. There’s hope yet.

  • Col Beausabre

    Rome did have a constitution, The Twelve Tables

    https://www.worldhistory.org/Twelve_Tables/

    “The Twelve Tables (aka Law of the Twelve Tables) was a set of laws inscribed on 12 bronze tablets created in ancient Rome in 451 and 450 BCE. They were the beginning of a new approach to laws where they would be passed by government and written down so that all citizens might be treated equally before them. Although not perhaps a fully codified system, it was a first step which would allow the protection of the rights of all citizens and permit wrongs to be redressed through precisely-worded written laws known to everybody. Consequently, the Roman approach to law would later become the model followed by many subsequent civilizations right up to the present day. “

  • Jack O'Leary

    While Rome is a cautionary tale, the US isn’t Rome. Rome was a deliberate empire, we are an accidental one, temporarily, due to our victory in WWII. Rome sent it’s prosperous farmers, most of the population, to expand the empire for many years, making them poor and weak. We’ve sent a few percent and not for much longer. At least 50 percent of our population is seething over the leftist trend and has the means to push back, once pushed too far. College enrollments will drop as a start.

  • Jeff

    Paper Chase – 1973
    https://youtu.be/yQLW7v3s7KQ
    1:35

    Can’t believe it been 48 years since this movie.

  • Ironic … Rome sent its farmers to conquer the world, while our farmers have led the way in feeding the world without even leaving home.

    College enrollments will drop as a start.

    And not just because of disgust with Leftism … more and more of us are realizing that sinking six figures into a designer-label school for the potential connections, er, elite education, is not a good return-on-investment.

  • GWB

    Andi
    April 29, 2021 at 5:44 pm

    But as has been pointed out, Rome did not have a Constitution and we do. There’s hope yet.
    The Constitution can’t protect us from diddly-squat. It’s the people who have to do the protecting. And a large chunk of our electorate is not interested. The only way there’s hope is if those who do revere the Constitution make the effort to evangelize and teach others, and succeed.

  • pzatchok

    Just parrot those professors and they will think your a genius.

    Its the best way to pass. Soon it will be the only way.

  • Edward

    Robert wrote: “What we have today is a society where those in leadership positions have bought into this leftist childish dogma that those on the left have the right to never be offended by anything. Someone throws a tantrum like two-year-old toddler, everyone else is expected to immediately feed them candy to shut them up.

    The left have the right to never be offended, but the right has no such right. The right is continuously offended, but its outcries are not heard. Indeed, the right is more than just offended, it is continually cancelled any time it makes its view heard.

  • Cotour

    AS TIME PASSES AND PANIC DIMINISHES REALITY BECOMES APPARENT

    “A peer-reviewed research has claimed that global ivermectin use can end the COVID-19 pandemic, as the medicine significantly reduces the risk of contracting the deadly respiratory disease when used regularly.”

    https://osf.io/wx3zn/

    “Led by the Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance (FLCCC), a group of medical and scientific experts reviewed published peer-reviewed studies, manuscripts, expert meta-analyses, and epidemiological analyses of regions with ivermectin distribution efforts all showing that ivermectin is an effective prophylaxis and treatment for COVID-19.”

    “We did the work that the medical authorities failed to do, we conducted the most comprehensive review of the available data on ivermectin,” said Pierre Kory, MD, president and chief medical officer of the FLCCC. “We applied the gold standard to qualify the data reviewed before concluding that ivermectin can end this pandemic.”

  • Cotour

    A bit more wisdom on Covid from “Dr. Fauci”:

    https://youtu.be/YzSgXonr0X0

    Dr. Fauci’s wisdom and council on Covid as we all know, is more better.

  • wayne

    Doctor Fauci / Doctor Robert [Parody]
    [The Beatles: Revolver 8-5-1966]
    https://youtu.be/KYnV6910Ktk
    2:14

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