Scroll down to read this post.

 

Readers!

 

The time has come for my annual short Thanksgiving/Christmas fund drive for Behind The Black. I must do this every year in order to make sure I have earned enough money to pay my bills.

 

For this two-week campaign, I am offering a special deal to encourage donations. Donations of $200 will get a free autographed copy of the new paperback edition of Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, while donations of $250 will get a free autographed copy of the new hardback edition. If you desire a copy, make sure you provide me your address with your donation.

 

As I noted in July, the support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.

 

In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.

 

Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.

 

Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:

 

1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.

 

2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
 

3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:

 

4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
 
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652

 

You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.


Today’s blacklisted American: Tenured professor objects to segregated-by-race training classes at university; school investigates and punishes her

Today's modern witch hunt
Burning witches: What the Lake Washington Institute of
Technology wants to do to anyone who expresses an
original and independent thought

They’re coming for you next: Because a tenured professor, Elisa Parrett, made a four minute statement objecting to the segregated-by-race training class the Lake Washington Institute of Technology was mandating for its teachers, the school instigated a nine month investigation resulting in a reprimand and rules forbidding her to speak on such topics again.

The investigation included the hiring of a private investigator, numerous interviews, public humiliation, and wild unsubstantiated claims that her remarks caused widespread trauma. The school removed her from her teaching duties, and worse, doubled down on its insistence that future sessions will be segregated by race. From the university’s president Amy Morrison:

That same day, Morrison devoted the entirety of her regular all-school email update, sent to thousands of people, to denouncing Parrett by name. “This email is a dramatic departure from the typical Amy’s Updates,” the 1,600-word message started. The incident at the training session, Morrison argued, “was so damaging that I asked the Executive Cabinet, EDI Council, and the Bias Response Team to assist me with this college-wide message.”

Morrison wrote to her community that she was “stunned, disappointed, angry, and shocked” by Parrett’s dissent during the training. Parrett was being removed from her teaching duties, she explained, to ensure “students are protected from conduct of the likes that she displayed last week.” In addition, LWTech would be establishing a new anti-racism task force and Morrison would be holding meetings with LWTech’s black employees. “We will continue race-based caucusing over the summer,” she assured her college, “for as long as it is needed.” [emphasis mine]

Note how this college president wants to “protect” students from hearing any dissenting viewpoints that she personally disagrees with. You can’t get more close-minded than that. Why would anyone want to attend such a school? More important, how can anyone trust the training of engineers coming from this so-called “Institute of Technology,” considering how it endorses racial segregation and discourages honest debate and discussion?

The school also instigated this investigation not because of what Parrett had done, but based on what her actions theoretically might do.

According to the LWTech administration, hundreds of her colleagues were rendered so distraught by her words they couldn’t even do their jobs. She also needed to be punished, according to Ames, for the harm she could commit against a hypothetical student from a marginalized background. [emphasis in original]

These charges are absurd and unprovable, but they have become the norm in academia and in the dominant leftist culture. You will be punished, not for what you did, but because your actions might someday hurt some unnamed individual somewhere in the greater universe.

Of course, freedom of speech is impossible under such circumstances. If according to the authorities your comments might offend someone somewhere and therefore must be silenced, the authorities have just given themselves the power to silence all opinions they don’t like, arbitrarily. And that is exactly what we have now on college campuses and corporate offices nationwide: an illiberal oppression based on mindless hate and the desire to control everything with the misuse of power.

Furthermore, consider how bigoted the school’s policy is. Not only is the school mandating segregation by race, Parrett had to be silenced because her words might have traumatized some helpless black person who is clearly incapable of hearing and processing alternative points of view, according to the school. Like the bigoted southern plantation owners, these white and bigoted college administrations are acting to protect their “negros slaves” from harm.

The Lake Washington Institute of Technology is a horror that has nothing to do with the America I was born into and that acted for more than two centuries to build human freedom and prosperity for millions, of all races. And worse, it is also publicly funded by the taxpayers of Washington state.

When will Americans rise up and stop supporting such organizations and the prejudiced thugs who run them?

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

23 comments

  • Ian C.

    Apartheid is actually good. Caucasians and East Asians on one side, the rest on the other. Why babysit other races? What do we get in return? I start to like Critical Race Theory. :)

  • Gary in Transit

    It sure sounds like she has a good basis for a lawsuit. Perhaps law firms fear the repercussions of such a suit.

  • Skunk Bucket

    Welp, there’s one more institution we can scratch off the list of colleges my son might attend next year. I can only hope that Lake Washington gets sued good and hard. It’s probably the only way we’ll get this kind of crap stopped, short of an actual revolution that no one in their right mind really wants.

  • Col Beausabre

    “her remarks caused widespread trauma.”

    Are we really that fragile a society, that people are traumatized – so deeply shocked they can barely function – by mere words…..whatever happened to “Nah, nah, words will never hurt me!”

  • Milt

    Sadly, it appears that many, if not most of the residents of Washington State actually *approve* of such blatantly racist policies, and they would presumably support President Morrison’s actions along these lines. Grok *that*, if you can. And what, exactly, are “the rest of us” supposed to do when faced with an entire state that has gulped down the woke Kool Aid and no longer wishes to be a part of the “old” United States? Just wave goodbye and go on with our business? Worse, implementing these very same policies at the national level is now the official agenda of the Biden Administration. I guess that we are just supposed to go along with that, too.

    Perhaps the most astonishing / deeply saddening thing is the degree to which so many otherwise rational people have accepted the idea that human beings can be *harmed* by mere words or ideas. As Robert recounts:

    “According to the LWTech administration, hundreds of her colleagues were rendered so distraught by her words they couldn’t even do their jobs. She also needed to be punished, according to Ames, for the harm she *could* commit against a hypothetical student from a marginalized background. [emphasis in original]” So traumatized that they “Couldn’t even do their jobs…”

    All of this makes one wonder how our ancestors ever climbed down from the trees, marched (and sailed) across the entire earth, colonized the planet, and created the civilization that we live in today. I guess that back then, nobody ever said an unkind word or indulged in micro-aggressions. Or that nobody ever died of hunger during a drought, was lost at sea or in a blizzard making a path to a new territory, fought in wars, or did any of the other thousand and one other incomprehensibly difficult and dangerous things that human beings have done over the eons to make a more secure and comfortable place for themselves and their descendants. God, no; it was just TOO HARD. And people said *unkind words*…

    Or, in our more recent American history, how the grandparents of these supposedly delicate little college snowflakes of color could possibly have faced down the dogs, ax handles, and fire hoses of the very real racists who not only called them names, but were prepared to kill them.

    If I were a young black man or a black woman — knowing this history — I would be ENRAGED at being characterized as someone so weak and ineffectual that I might somehow be “harmed” by the words of some obtuse college professor or a classmate, and I suspect that most older people of color might agree with me. (How many soldiers and sailors, coming back from World War II, felt “threatened” by random unkind words and other subliminal slights from civilians who had not been “over there” with them? Not very many, I’d wager. Likewise, I doubt that Dr. King and the other veterans of the Civil Rights Movement were much afraid of “words.”) In the Peoples Republic of Washington — and in far too many other places across America — on the other hand, what were once actual human beings have apparently devolved into something like the Eloi that H. G. Wells wrote about in The Time Machine. And the Progressive Morlocks at the Lake Washington Institute of Technology appear to be more than happy to “take care of them.”

    Just like the nice folks in Washington, DC want to “take care of” America — if we let them.

  • Al

    Great comment Milt!

  • Cotour

    HERE IS A BIG MARXIST * * TO MOST AMERICANS, COMPLEMENTS OF THE BIDEN ADMINIOSTRATION

    “State Department Approves Black Lives Matter Flag Displays at US Consulates and Embassies on Anniversary of George Floyd Death”
    Does it make you feel good about your country and those who are in charge of its government at the moment?

    Not for long.

    Comments? Suggestions?

    https://ecp.yusercontent.com/mail?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thegatewaypundit.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2Fblack-lives-matter-flag-us-flag.jpg&t=1621908544&ymreqid=dc7face7-d905-7706-2f2c-5a006b010700&sig=kqbkLUjN0CGi_N8fo_sA6A–~D

  • James Street

    It’s hard to tell if Lake Washington Institute of Technology president Amy Morrison is a lunatic, or a godless commie in the know advancing the communist agenda. The Critical Race Theory is just one more attempt to implement communism.

    My summary of the Critical Race Theory based on this article I saw in Hillsdale College’s Imprimis magazine last month:

    Critical Race Theory | How to Fight It
    https://buildingblocksforliberty.org/critical-race-theory-how-to-fight-it/

    • Critical race theory is an academic discipline, formulated in the 1990s, built on the intellectual framework of identity-based Marxism.
    • In the 1960s Marxist intellectuals realized that workers’ revolutions would never occur in the West because of a large middle class and rapidly improving standards of living.
    • But rather than abandon their Leftist political project, Marxist scholars in the West simply adapted their revolutionary theory to the social and racial unrest of the 1960s.
    • They replace “equality” with “equity”, ultimately suspending private property rights, seizing land and wealth and redistributing them along racial lines, and creation of a federal Department of Antiracism which would be independent of the elected branches of government, and would have the power to nullify, veto, or abolish any law at any level of government and curtail the speech of political leaders and others who are deemed insufficiently “antiracist.”

    The author states there are three parts to a successful strategy to defeat the forces of CRT:
    • Governmental action – Our involvement and pressure at all levels
    • Grassroots mobilization – Join groups like FAIR (Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism)
    • An appeal to principle – employ our own moral language, for example, not “diversity” but “excellence”, a common standard that challenges people of all backgrounds to achieve their potential.

  • Ian C.

    Skunk Bucket,

    Check the colleges’ BLM pages. The worse they are, the more anti-White race agitation and Maoist indoctrination can you expect.

    LWTech’s is a rather extensive one. Enjoy some of the “Statements from College and Student Leadership,” it’s pretty good stuff, ranging from the usual accusations to Maoist struggle sessions.

    https://www.lwtech.edu/about/diversity/black-lives-matter/

    Another indicator is whether they “decolonize the curriculum.” It’s a bit harder in STEM, but don’t worry. One fine day American infrastructure or airplanes are based on ethnomathematics, “different ways of knowing,” and ethnic quotas.


    Col Beausabre, Milt,

    Nobody there is traumatized. At best it’s “learned fragility” because some want to believe this victim narrative when they found that it’s convenient and profitable. It’s just the usual Maoist spin that speaks in the name of some “oppressed group” to grab power.


    James Street,

    Usually I’d agree, but c’mon man, go with the flow. Learn to accuse white people of being racist, sexist, blind of their privilege etc., throw your competition under the bus while advancing your career. Just be sure to shoot first. Pretend to care about LGBTQIA, BIPOC, and other “marginalized groups.” Say how much you learn from them. If you’re in a position to hire, see to fill those places with “diverse people” who’re easy to control and dependent on you. Make sure to have a harem of impressible young women with blue hair, tattoos, and piercings (bonus points for them being disabled or drug abusers) who will attack your critics.
    Don’t be some defensive, fragile Whitey. Embrace CRT. It’s fun.

  • Milt

    If you would like a bit more insight into what now passes for life in the Peoples Republics of Portland and Seattle, check out

    https://groundzeromedia.org/5-24-21-pedagogy-of-the-oppressed-huddled-masses-yearning-to-breathe/

    and watch the embedded videos. Mr. Lewis’ commentary starts off by talking about a new zombie movie, but there is a point to this, and it relates directly to these communities’ descent into anarchy. Mr Lewis and the video producers, unhappily, prove to be worthy successors to Dante Alighieri, so buckle in and “enjoy” the ride.

    The amazing thing, again, is that all of the players that you would ordinarily think would be most concerned about these trends seem to be absolutely on board with them instead. Their local governments, their business communities, and their educational establishments all seem to believe that they are part of the enlightened vanguard, heroically creating a woke Erewhon, where all of the laws of nature and human nature have been suspended, and people can simply conjure utopia into existence by wishing for it — and perhaps sacrificing a few of their fellow citizens on the alter of “reparations.”

  • Not to worry,,
    graduates
    from Lake Tech So ethically prepared but will not be able to change a tire. No one will hire them.

  • Mark Nord

    Fear is the most powerful tool of the oppressor .

  • Cotour

    CRAZY MEDIA OBSERVATION DAY

    What is “Crazy Media Observation Day” about? Perception and image and the projection of a narrative into the public zeitgeist.

    Media and the politics / celebrity that it feeds and at the same time parasitizes, pumps different perceptions into the world and they do it for a purpose, its not a mistake. Sometimes it is overt, and sometimes it is subtle. But it has its psychological reasons and that reason is about manipulation of the public perception.

    What is the crazy reality adjustment I am identifying today?

    How tall is governor, Andrew Cuomo? A general inquiry results in the answer, 5′ 11″. Not an overly physically big man, but certainly not a small man either. And so when you see this picture with governor Andrew Cuomo standing in a posed picture at the Tri becca Film Festival he appears much taller than his brother, Chris Cuomo.

    Cuomo says he gets advice from ‘journalists’ besides brother (nypost.com)

    And then you find out that Chris Cuomo is apparently in reality a bit taller than his brother Andrew. Chris is stated to be 6′ 2″. But the posed picture clearly indicates that Andrew, the governor is much taller than his brother.

    Why is this done? Andrew is clearly being made to look bigger and taller in both stature and gravitas for political perception reasons.

    These are subtle things and the media and the people who handle these politicians and celebrities, people in the public eye, “Leaders” in both politics and culture are being presented in different ways for varying reasons. Its just very interesting to me when these things are so overtly but subtly done with such what is clear intent to my eye.

    Its all done for a reason, and YOU are the reason.

  • I lived in the middle of segregation for three decades and remember it as the best time of my life. There was no worry about what could happen when you went to the store, the movies, shopping, restaurants, or on vacation. Your wife and kids could walk any street in America 24/7 without fear. The crime was very minimal and all criminals were arrested and prosecuted equally. White schools required all students to qualify at their highest levels to graduate. Respect for the law was paramount everywhere.

  • El Trumpo

    Where is her Union as a Tenured Professor? The Union probably agrees with the Admin’s goal.

  • Cotour

    Perfect timing for the initiation of, “Crazy Media Observation Day”:

    https://youtu.be/zre2p7mg64g

    John Cena, just like the Rock, the epitome of American masculinity and America itself. And they both have chosen to bow to the great money God and abandon America, their country.

    And I am certain that both Cena and the Rock are full blood American, but they are under great pressure to bend to the Communist Chinese, and Cena bows for something he said about Taiwan being an independent from China country, in MANDARINE!

    Its all about perception, and its YOUR perception that counts.

    Understand and remember all of this America, and make them pay a heavy price at the ballot box.

  • Erisguy

    Congrats to Lake Washington on training many future AA hires.

  • SDN

    “short of an actual revolution that no one in their right mind really wants.”

    And which no one in their right minds doubts is going to be required, because everyone in their right minds knows that the alternative is certain enslavement and death.

  • Cotour

    SAVE THE BABY!

    ​And where will that “Saving” of the baby be happening? In the bloodied streets of America? Through fear to speak freely? Through terrorism and threats of losing ones job in companies or universities here or in England, like what Rev. Dr. Bernard Randall is experiencing? No.

    The “saving of the baby” will be happening through law suits and establishing evidence for all to see, with competent LAWYERS, In
    Court, and of course, with plenty of MONEY. Lawyers, Courts and Money!

    Warren Zevon: Lawyers, Guns and Money. (We will not be needing the guns): https://youtu.be/F2HH7J-Sx80

    This kind of current political turmoil in America that fundamentally threatens us all is the primary reason the Constitution was formulated and it was designed by the Founders to get stronger the more pressure was put upon it.

    ​But there are no guarantees, any degree of freedom in this world does not come with guarantees. JGL 5/17/21

  • wayne

    SDN-
    Good, stuff!

    Star Trek Original
    “Mirror, Mirror”
    https://youtu.be/7v5fHuSNZQw
    1:42

  • Cotour

    “Cellular modems have been found inside voting machines across the nation. Their presence indicates the voting machines may be susceptible to hacks and outside interference and ultimately the final results may not be accurate.”

    This is what is apparently going on with “Dumb” technology. Can you imagine where we will be when AI takes over?

    All voting needs to be done using paper ballots and hand counting.

  • Sam L.

    In my submarine in Lake Washington, I am about to release four torpedoes at LWIT…

Readers: the rules for commenting!

 

No registration is required. I welcome all opinions, even those that strongly criticize my commentary.

 

However, name-calling and obscenities will not be tolerated. First time offenders who are new to the site will be warned. Second time offenders or first time offenders who have been here awhile will be suspended for a week. After that, I will ban you. Period.

 

Note also that first time commenters as well as any comment with more than one link will be placed in moderation for my approval. Be patient, I will get to it.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *