Continued from Part 2
3. “Free speech is a right.”
Free speech is indeed a right. Since free speech and free expression are guaranteed by the First Amendment, this right is also an entitlement. Students Fight Back claims that “school administrators censor opposition to the status quo of worker and student exploitation, while giving racist and bigoted hate speech a free pass.” Such a claim immediately raises two questions: (1) What the hell are they talking about? And (2) Can they provide documentation for violation of First Amendments rights concurrent with tolerance of public bigotry? Unless they provide hard evidence, they are LYING.
Most of the cases where school administrators stop rallies or demonstrations from occurring, it is justified by Heckler’s Veto. Heckler’s Veto is at best a shaky foundation for curtailing of public demonstrations, especially since it is ridiculous to try predicting a party’s violent behavior in response to another party’s demonstration. However, Heckler’s Veto can at certain times be justified when it is clear that violence and disorder is an immediate consequence.
If students are simply demonstrating peacefully and using their First Amendment right as a tool to raise awareness about problems and possible solutions, then the use of Heckler’s Veto by school administrators is inappropriate and unconstitutional. The problem is that the demonstrations in which Students Fight Back members participate in are, if not organized by Marxists, usually vanguarded or agitated by Marxists. Furthermore, given that student Marxists tend to at least partially subscribe to Leninist ideas, their ideas of demonstrations often go hand-in-hand with uprisings. Lenin’s record shows he had no qualms with using violence as a means to an end.
Free speech is a right. Violent uprisings are covered nowhere in the Bill of Rights. Self-defense is one thing; downright offense is unacceptable and does a tremendous disservice to one’s cause. Another disservice these students do, not only to the cause, but also to the people they try to appeal to, is their lack of honesty and intentions.
They claim they are fighting for people’s “rights,” including people’s Constitutional rights, but in reality they are fighting for their abstract concept of “social justice.” Social justice makes no provision for actual justice, but rather seeks to enforce absolute equality among all people in society rather than preserving people’s equal chances and privileges under the law. Social justice includes redistribution of wealth and a planned economy. To the poor and the unemployed, this may seem like actual justice. To the majority who are not unemployed, including the formerly unemployed and the ever shrinking number of small business owners, this is a far cry from justice and akin to outright thievery. The only difference in this case between the thievery of Wall Street and the thievery of the social justice revolutionaries is that one set of sticky fingers comes from above while one comes from below.
4. “Students should have a say in running our schools.”
This claim is actually grounded in legitimacy. The true purpose of a student union and its student body organizations is not to waste time in trivial distractions like planning school dances and sports rallies, but rather to make the concerns, grievances, and suggestions of students known to the faculty, administration, and governing school board. If the boards of governors of colleges and universities and/or the elected school boards of public schools are ignoring their student unions, then they do a grievous disservice to their main consumers: the students—the reason for their employment. In this case it is appropriate for the students to organize under the leadership of well-informed cool heads and explore methods of civil disobedience until their rights are honored and they are given a voice that is heard.
However, students must never forget that they are not businessmen. What many people forget is, though the purpose of all schools public and private is to educate and award degrees to those who have earned them, schools are businesses and if they are not run for profit, they must at least earn back their operating cost. Many students want to implement “free this” and “free that” for everyone while having little understanding of the costs, the benefits, and more importantly the consequences. There is a reason why schools are run by elected boards and not by hot-headed nineteen and twenty year olds.
Continued in Part 4: Apparently the university system encourages homophobic bigotry…
In the mean time, Are College Boards of Governors Qualified?
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