I so completely agree with you, Dr. Reich. It is in engaging with others who have different opinions or work from a different set of facts that not only do we have the greatest impact, but ourselves engage in the greatest growth. Certainly, universities and colleges should encourage such dialogues.
This is all part of the right-wing agenda to turn universities into glorified community colleges designed to turn out identical, well-indoctrinated, unthinking replaceable human robots who will do what they're told and, of course, vote GQP (as long as voting is still permitted).
I am a graduate of Columbia University. Columbia College '86. Mailman School of Public Health '04.
I will speak soon to student protestors empathetic toward the plight of Gazans who even the police—that arrested them when Columbia removed them from the campus lawn for sitting with signs that was peaceful, not hateful, and an expression of solidarity with those being killed in Gaza—said were some of the most respectful, peaceful, good-natured protestors they had met.
Why do people tend to presume that those who support freedom for Palestine are anti-Semitic while not making the same presumption—that they are Islamophobic—of people who support the right of Israelis not to be executed by those in Hamas who targeted innocents.
People who believe in freedom for Gazans are not by dint of that position anti-Semitic. People who believe in the right of Israelis to not be summarily executed or kidnapped are not by dint of that position Islamophobic.
And yet, if we are to look at Columbia University and its official pronouncements regarding antisemitism and Islamophobia on campus, those who advocate for Gazans, when they protest are the target of such broad swipes at their humanity, that you get the distinct sense that Columbia University is playing a dangerous game here.
There is no doubt that since the United States refuses in politics to separate itself from a Christian ethic that antisemitism at Columbia University, in New York City (which has one of the largest population of Jews outside Israel), in New York State, in the United States exists.
Antisemitism exists regardless of political conservatism or progressiveness because the United States most often defines itself not by its Judeo traditions but by Christian traditions that target Jews. That is clear.
That same Christian ethos, ridden with Islamophobia, sometimes nationalistic in fervor, targets Muslims because of their Islamic faith. That much is clear.
But, if one listens to pronouncements from Columbia University, from the New York Governor, to the President of our nation even as Muslims celebrated Ramadan and Eid last month and Jewish folk celebrate Passover this month, the university speaks largely of antisemitism.
Rarely has it spoken of Islamophobia even as those who have peacefully demonstrated have been suspended and targeted and expelled not ostensibly for violating rules. They actually followed the rules of protest for the most part and engaged in a peaceful civil disobedient action to challenge and invoke a right to protest against targeting civilians for war.
Because they speak for people of Arab descent, those rules have been applied in a way that has been as disingenuous as it is practical to silence those who speak of the grave, horrific policies of a nation state, a pseudo theocratic state now run in coalition with an alliance with a religious party that spoke openly of killing Gazans years before Hamas with depravity targeted Israeli innocents.
*
I graduated from Columbia in 1986 and was a student leader of the anti-apartheid/pro-divestment movement at the college. I was one of seven students who fasted for 13 days. We held a sit-in that lasted 22 days.. Our protest started on April 4, 1985, which marked the 17th year since the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.
The month before we started our protest, there was a massacre of student protestors in South Africa. White Afrikaners gunned down students who were treated no less than fodder for rubber bullets and live bullets in the back.
Together, hundreds of students, which grew to be thousands, blockaded Hamilton Hall, renamed it Mandela Hall, and said we would stay until Columbia University divested.
The university president at the time was Michael Sovern. In terms of the hunger strike, our request was not that Columbia divest, but that President Sovern meet with us. He invoked the name of Desmond Tutu to criticize the protest. Tutu responded that he supported the students. Due to faculty supporters, when two of us (one native South African) were hospitalized, Michael Sovern met with us.
Across what seemed a great divide, one of my fellow students mentioned to President Sovern that we had heard about his wife who was suffering from cancer.
She spoke on behalf of all of us, as she acknowledged Sovern’s family’s pain and spoke of our empathy for what he, his wife, his family faced. Too, we spoke of what moved us to risk health to put before the university in clear relief what the university might do to unlink itself to apartheid.
Seven of us participated in the hunger strike. Two were native South African. Three were African descendant like me. Two were White/European American, one whose family heritage connected him to Great Britain. The other was Jewish. This was a coalition of concerned students who did not hate Whites but were pro Black and knew racist investments were immoral.
We were not violent. We were angered by a university steeped in the traditions of liberalism and free speech could not see its way to separate itself from investments that literally buttressed the South African government via corporations who were willing to exploit conditions in South Africa in which Africans were required by law to be separated, where Africans could not roam freely, where their borders were under strict lock-down for no other reason than they were Black.
*
Apartheid is an Afrikaner term. It literally translates into "Separateness."
There is little difference between the conditions of Africans under apartheid and Palestinians in Gaza except that ostensibly the government of Israel was elected by all citizens of Israel as its citizens collectively chose a path that its own Israeli citizens had to know was coming when they elected Benjamin Netanyahu who intentionally formed a coalition with a political party so far right and so founded and practiced on hatred of Gazans that its ministers as part of its political mandate justified settlor violence against Gazan citizens who were summarily executed to be "relieved" of land they occupied.
But Israel is not without citizens who wanted for Palestine the same freedoms they as Israelis enjoyed. Those Israelis were not a political majority, but they existed, including likely, among those who were executed at gun point by Hamas, kidnapped, and targeted for no other reason that they were celebrating a festival based on Israeli culture, tied to Judaism defined by a God that like the God of Islam is linked to the prophet Abraham.
*
Back to Passover. Its tale is not dissimilar to those evoked by other faiths.
During Passover, the God of the Old Testament literally murdered every single first born child of Egypt in order to convince the Pharaoh to let the Israelites go. Passover celebrates not only the liberation of the Jewish people but CELEBRATES HOW the Israelites were liberated in Old Testament lore. Christians embrace this lore as their own.
It's as if Passover is repeated in Gaza.
*
And it’s not only Passover in which wars are invoked in the name of holiness.
What of the End Times of Armageddon in Christianity? Of heavenly rewards in not only Christianity but also Islam for warriors of God.
Why do we embrace as liberation lore, any religion justifying the slaughter of innocents ruled by dictators who could care less if they lived or died.
I say “any religion” to make clear that such tales are not limited to Judaism.
President Obama—God Bless him, I suppose—told an audience that, though it is difficult to accept, children will be casualties of war. Spoken like a President who has dropped bombs from drones and killed children.
And yet, because so called progressives believe Trump a common enemy, we look past our bombs obliterating children as revenge for a barbaric massacre of innocent Israelis. Dutifully, the calculus is we vote for a president who says he loves an Israeli Prime Minister that intentionally partnered with a settlor political party that called for the obliteration of Gaza decades before Hamas executed or kidnapped Israeli citizens.
*
And on the eve of Passover, those who speak for children in Gaza are libeled anti-Semitic.
Israel. Hamas. United States. Rwanda. Bosnia. Armenia. Turkey. Russia. Japan. China. Syria. El Salvador. Nicaragua. Chile. Italy. Germany. Not only Nazis invoke terror though the Nazis in 20th century were one of the most efficient in their quest to rid the world of peoples—Jews, gays, and others—in the name of religion.
Leaders who know better—Joe Biden, Donald Trump, Barack Obama, Benjmain Netanyahu, Mohammed Deif (Hamas military leader), Ismail Haniyeh (political leader of Hamas)—offer comfort to those who target innocents ostensibly claiming a moral high ground NONE OF THEM can claim.
And what of our responsibility?
*
We CHOOSE to NOT undo a cycle of hatred tied to suspect moralities invoked by leaders manipulating the human penchant to faith in a God in order to kill each other.
And we call that what?
Godly.
We need to pass over, and not in the Biblical sense, those who manipulate the truth to libel those who in seeking liberation do not exalt hatred. The protest at Columbia against the actions of Israel are not in and of themselves anti-Semitic. It’s time for all peoples to stop equating being anti-Israeli and anti-American war policy in Israel as antisemitism.
Many of us were raised in homes where disagreement was not possible. In my family, disagreeing with a parent was a crime that warranted a physical attack. To attend an open-minded campus where all points are considered and nonviolent ways of dealing with viewpoints is the norm was a breath of fresh, living air for us. Let’s keep that sacred, without hurting individuals. Just look at what closed-minded thinking has been doing to the US of late. Let’s keep that from infiltrating our campuses, our centers of *higher* learning.
Like you I teach at a university. Like you I am frustrated, angry even, at the lopsided view of the administration of my institution. It wants to "do right" but often stops short of what many faculty, students, and yes, progressives, want. Why? It is painful to say this, but money. Funding is the main priority of the administration, not education, not ethics, not building a place of learning that heals the planet. It is just money. The state keeps cutting educational funding, so the university increases tuition and relies on increased gifts from wealthy alumni. Unfortunately those wealthy alums are disproportionately conservative when it comes to economics, foreign policy, and sometimes social issues. They support the Israeli government likely with a kind of American misunderstanding of Zionism rooted in conservative evangelicalism. Allowing students to protest the actions of the Israeli government threatens that funding, so you create an ethical disjoint between administration, faculty and students. Universities chose leaders based on their ability to raise money (favoring majors that produce wealthier alumni) not their ability to educate for the greater good. In a sense, universities like mine and Columbia, Harvard, and many more are as broken as Boeing. It is a sad situation when football, or AIPAC, become more important than redirecting our system away from the self-destructive consumption of fossil fuel energy that is destroying our only home.
I remember the killing of four students at Kent State. It was shocking to learn of peaceful , unarmed protesters gunned down. They went to college to learn and were expressing their freedom of speech. It was shocking and awful. Ohio is still very "Conservative". Vietnam was seen by reasonable people as unnecessary. Kids were drafted into that war against their wills. Without knowing why they must go fight and risk their lives while killing people they did not even know.
Thank you Professor! I thought I was going nuts for not understanding what's happening at Columbia. It is pretty sad that free speech is being suppressed and punished on some college campuses, and yet, we have Trump claiming "free speech" right for his vile, hate-filled rant.
Free speech, even when expressing an unpopular opinion, must be respected. Calling out individuals or entire groups on the basis of a supposed belief can be countered by active witnessing and intervention. If not at the University, then where can we learn these vital skills?
All I can say is that I am so glad I am NOT in college these days. I was there when we protested the wars in Vietnam and Cambodia. Today, I would absolutely be torn by my loyalty to Israel and my disgust at the way Netanyahu is conducting this war. I despise HAMAS and am at a loss to understand why some Palestinians support it. We need a viable and enforceable 2-state solution but will this solve this age-old enmity? I don't know. OY!
As a grad of Columbia and a Professor emerita of Yale University I agree that the student demonstrations against the genocide in Gaza is not antisemitism. The students must speak and must be heard.
One of the reasons we are where we are is because (mainly) MAGA and Republicans are so entrenched in their beliefs. No room for questioning or discussion. I learned from mrs Bitter ( no joke), a German language teamchef, that learning codes from a thesis, an antistress which develops a New thesis. Having had that instilled upon me in high school made me open to opposite view on subjects. I vehemently disagree with my best friend, but we always end up with a glass of wine to celebrate our differences. We too are entrenched, and unkikely to change our point of view but that is ok. Unlike people Who lost friendships and family over political disagreement, unfortunately. Debate and be kind and respectful. Kind regards from Belgium to all!
I totally agree that students should be welcomed and encouraged in their questioning of anything and everything they might be concerned about, as long as they do so with respect for others.
This fits with my life-long practice of questioning, which I started expressing this way while I was in collage in the late 1960s: "Question everything, including the questions."
My mother used to read to me a lot, from well before I could begin to read for myself. When I got to be an adult, she told me that I would often interrupt her reading to ask: "Is that really true?" or "Is that real?" I'm in my late 70s and I've never stopped asking.
I mostly agree. My problem is it seems like the term “peaceful protests “ is being taken too far out of context. Not everything is a Peaceful Protest. They sometimes take things too far out of hand. Total Disruption of life around them isn’t a peaceful protest. Going off campus and shutting down traffic on vital bridges and highways is not only ignorant but dangerous. When you anger the majority of people your protest is no longer making its point.
I so completely agree with you, Dr. Reich. It is in engaging with others who have different opinions or work from a different set of facts that not only do we have the greatest impact, but ourselves engage in the greatest growth. Certainly, universities and colleges should encourage such dialogues.
Hear! Hear!
This is all part of the right-wing agenda to turn universities into glorified community colleges designed to turn out identical, well-indoctrinated, unthinking replaceable human robots who will do what they're told and, of course, vote GQP (as long as voting is still permitted).
I am a graduate of Columbia University. Columbia College '86. Mailman School of Public Health '04.
I will speak soon to student protestors empathetic toward the plight of Gazans who even the police—that arrested them when Columbia removed them from the campus lawn for sitting with signs that was peaceful, not hateful, and an expression of solidarity with those being killed in Gaza—said were some of the most respectful, peaceful, good-natured protestors they had met.
Why do people tend to presume that those who support freedom for Palestine are anti-Semitic while not making the same presumption—that they are Islamophobic—of people who support the right of Israelis not to be executed by those in Hamas who targeted innocents.
People who believe in freedom for Gazans are not by dint of that position anti-Semitic. People who believe in the right of Israelis to not be summarily executed or kidnapped are not by dint of that position Islamophobic.
And yet, if we are to look at Columbia University and its official pronouncements regarding antisemitism and Islamophobia on campus, those who advocate for Gazans, when they protest are the target of such broad swipes at their humanity, that you get the distinct sense that Columbia University is playing a dangerous game here.
There is no doubt that since the United States refuses in politics to separate itself from a Christian ethic that antisemitism at Columbia University, in New York City (which has one of the largest population of Jews outside Israel), in New York State, in the United States exists.
Antisemitism exists regardless of political conservatism or progressiveness because the United States most often defines itself not by its Judeo traditions but by Christian traditions that target Jews. That is clear.
That same Christian ethos, ridden with Islamophobia, sometimes nationalistic in fervor, targets Muslims because of their Islamic faith. That much is clear.
But, if one listens to pronouncements from Columbia University, from the New York Governor, to the President of our nation even as Muslims celebrated Ramadan and Eid last month and Jewish folk celebrate Passover this month, the university speaks largely of antisemitism.
Rarely has it spoken of Islamophobia even as those who have peacefully demonstrated have been suspended and targeted and expelled not ostensibly for violating rules. They actually followed the rules of protest for the most part and engaged in a peaceful civil disobedient action to challenge and invoke a right to protest against targeting civilians for war.
Because they speak for people of Arab descent, those rules have been applied in a way that has been as disingenuous as it is practical to silence those who speak of the grave, horrific policies of a nation state, a pseudo theocratic state now run in coalition with an alliance with a religious party that spoke openly of killing Gazans years before Hamas with depravity targeted Israeli innocents.
*
I graduated from Columbia in 1986 and was a student leader of the anti-apartheid/pro-divestment movement at the college. I was one of seven students who fasted for 13 days. We held a sit-in that lasted 22 days.. Our protest started on April 4, 1985, which marked the 17th year since the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.
The month before we started our protest, there was a massacre of student protestors in South Africa. White Afrikaners gunned down students who were treated no less than fodder for rubber bullets and live bullets in the back.
Together, hundreds of students, which grew to be thousands, blockaded Hamilton Hall, renamed it Mandela Hall, and said we would stay until Columbia University divested.
The university president at the time was Michael Sovern. In terms of the hunger strike, our request was not that Columbia divest, but that President Sovern meet with us. He invoked the name of Desmond Tutu to criticize the protest. Tutu responded that he supported the students. Due to faculty supporters, when two of us (one native South African) were hospitalized, Michael Sovern met with us.
Across what seemed a great divide, one of my fellow students mentioned to President Sovern that we had heard about his wife who was suffering from cancer.
She spoke on behalf of all of us, as she acknowledged Sovern’s family’s pain and spoke of our empathy for what he, his wife, his family faced. Too, we spoke of what moved us to risk health to put before the university in clear relief what the university might do to unlink itself to apartheid.
Seven of us participated in the hunger strike. Two were native South African. Three were African descendant like me. Two were White/European American, one whose family heritage connected him to Great Britain. The other was Jewish. This was a coalition of concerned students who did not hate Whites but were pro Black and knew racist investments were immoral.
We were not violent. We were angered by a university steeped in the traditions of liberalism and free speech could not see its way to separate itself from investments that literally buttressed the South African government via corporations who were willing to exploit conditions in South Africa in which Africans were required by law to be separated, where Africans could not roam freely, where their borders were under strict lock-down for no other reason than they were Black.
*
Apartheid is an Afrikaner term. It literally translates into "Separateness."
There is little difference between the conditions of Africans under apartheid and Palestinians in Gaza except that ostensibly the government of Israel was elected by all citizens of Israel as its citizens collectively chose a path that its own Israeli citizens had to know was coming when they elected Benjamin Netanyahu who intentionally formed a coalition with a political party so far right and so founded and practiced on hatred of Gazans that its ministers as part of its political mandate justified settlor violence against Gazan citizens who were summarily executed to be "relieved" of land they occupied.
But Israel is not without citizens who wanted for Palestine the same freedoms they as Israelis enjoyed. Those Israelis were not a political majority, but they existed, including likely, among those who were executed at gun point by Hamas, kidnapped, and targeted for no other reason that they were celebrating a festival based on Israeli culture, tied to Judaism defined by a God that like the God of Islam is linked to the prophet Abraham.
*
Back to Passover. Its tale is not dissimilar to those evoked by other faiths.
During Passover, the God of the Old Testament literally murdered every single first born child of Egypt in order to convince the Pharaoh to let the Israelites go. Passover celebrates not only the liberation of the Jewish people but CELEBRATES HOW the Israelites were liberated in Old Testament lore. Christians embrace this lore as their own.
It's as if Passover is repeated in Gaza.
*
And it’s not only Passover in which wars are invoked in the name of holiness.
What of the End Times of Armageddon in Christianity? Of heavenly rewards in not only Christianity but also Islam for warriors of God.
Why do we embrace as liberation lore, any religion justifying the slaughter of innocents ruled by dictators who could care less if they lived or died.
I say “any religion” to make clear that such tales are not limited to Judaism.
President Obama—God Bless him, I suppose—told an audience that, though it is difficult to accept, children will be casualties of war. Spoken like a President who has dropped bombs from drones and killed children.
And yet, because so called progressives believe Trump a common enemy, we look past our bombs obliterating children as revenge for a barbaric massacre of innocent Israelis. Dutifully, the calculus is we vote for a president who says he loves an Israeli Prime Minister that intentionally partnered with a settlor political party that called for the obliteration of Gaza decades before Hamas executed or kidnapped Israeli citizens.
*
And on the eve of Passover, those who speak for children in Gaza are libeled anti-Semitic.
Israel. Hamas. United States. Rwanda. Bosnia. Armenia. Turkey. Russia. Japan. China. Syria. El Salvador. Nicaragua. Chile. Italy. Germany. Not only Nazis invoke terror though the Nazis in 20th century were one of the most efficient in their quest to rid the world of peoples—Jews, gays, and others—in the name of religion.
Leaders who know better—Joe Biden, Donald Trump, Barack Obama, Benjmain Netanyahu, Mohammed Deif (Hamas military leader), Ismail Haniyeh (political leader of Hamas)—offer comfort to those who target innocents ostensibly claiming a moral high ground NONE OF THEM can claim.
And what of our responsibility?
*
We CHOOSE to NOT undo a cycle of hatred tied to suspect moralities invoked by leaders manipulating the human penchant to faith in a God in order to kill each other.
And we call that what?
Godly.
We need to pass over, and not in the Biblical sense, those who manipulate the truth to libel those who in seeking liberation do not exalt hatred. The protest at Columbia against the actions of Israel are not in and of themselves anti-Semitic. It’s time for all peoples to stop equating being anti-Israeli and anti-American war policy in Israel as antisemitism.
Many of us were raised in homes where disagreement was not possible. In my family, disagreeing with a parent was a crime that warranted a physical attack. To attend an open-minded campus where all points are considered and nonviolent ways of dealing with viewpoints is the norm was a breath of fresh, living air for us. Let’s keep that sacred, without hurting individuals. Just look at what closed-minded thinking has been doing to the US of late. Let’s keep that from infiltrating our campuses, our centers of *higher* learning.
Like you I teach at a university. Like you I am frustrated, angry even, at the lopsided view of the administration of my institution. It wants to "do right" but often stops short of what many faculty, students, and yes, progressives, want. Why? It is painful to say this, but money. Funding is the main priority of the administration, not education, not ethics, not building a place of learning that heals the planet. It is just money. The state keeps cutting educational funding, so the university increases tuition and relies on increased gifts from wealthy alumni. Unfortunately those wealthy alums are disproportionately conservative when it comes to economics, foreign policy, and sometimes social issues. They support the Israeli government likely with a kind of American misunderstanding of Zionism rooted in conservative evangelicalism. Allowing students to protest the actions of the Israeli government threatens that funding, so you create an ethical disjoint between administration, faculty and students. Universities chose leaders based on their ability to raise money (favoring majors that produce wealthier alumni) not their ability to educate for the greater good. In a sense, universities like mine and Columbia, Harvard, and many more are as broken as Boeing. It is a sad situation when football, or AIPAC, become more important than redirecting our system away from the self-destructive consumption of fossil fuel energy that is destroying our only home.
I remember the killing of four students at Kent State. It was shocking to learn of peaceful , unarmed protesters gunned down. They went to college to learn and were expressing their freedom of speech. It was shocking and awful. Ohio is still very "Conservative". Vietnam was seen by reasonable people as unnecessary. Kids were drafted into that war against their wills. Without knowing why they must go fight and risk their lives while killing people they did not even know.
Excellent! Columbia needs to take a good, hard look at itself.
Thank you Professor! I thought I was going nuts for not understanding what's happening at Columbia. It is pretty sad that free speech is being suppressed and punished on some college campuses, and yet, we have Trump claiming "free speech" right for his vile, hate-filled rant.
Free speech, even when expressing an unpopular opinion, must be respected. Calling out individuals or entire groups on the basis of a supposed belief can be countered by active witnessing and intervention. If not at the University, then where can we learn these vital skills?
All I can say is that I am so glad I am NOT in college these days. I was there when we protested the wars in Vietnam and Cambodia. Today, I would absolutely be torn by my loyalty to Israel and my disgust at the way Netanyahu is conducting this war. I despise HAMAS and am at a loss to understand why some Palestinians support it. We need a viable and enforceable 2-state solution but will this solve this age-old enmity? I don't know. OY!
As a grad of Columbia and a Professor emerita of Yale University I agree that the student demonstrations against the genocide in Gaza is not antisemitism. The students must speak and must be heard.
I am disgusted.
Have you seen the protesters call, for the slaughter of Jews?
If not, you aren’t looking, because they aren’t hiding it.
Robert. I've had people actually shoot at me -- here and in war -- and when people actually tell me they want to kill me I call the cops.
One of the reasons we are where we are is because (mainly) MAGA and Republicans are so entrenched in their beliefs. No room for questioning or discussion. I learned from mrs Bitter ( no joke), a German language teamchef, that learning codes from a thesis, an antistress which develops a New thesis. Having had that instilled upon me in high school made me open to opposite view on subjects. I vehemently disagree with my best friend, but we always end up with a glass of wine to celebrate our differences. We too are entrenched, and unkikely to change our point of view but that is ok. Unlike people Who lost friendships and family over political disagreement, unfortunately. Debate and be kind and respectful. Kind regards from Belgium to all!
I totally agree that students should be welcomed and encouraged in their questioning of anything and everything they might be concerned about, as long as they do so with respect for others.
This fits with my life-long practice of questioning, which I started expressing this way while I was in collage in the late 1960s: "Question everything, including the questions."
My mother used to read to me a lot, from well before I could begin to read for myself. When I got to be an adult, she told me that I would often interrupt her reading to ask: "Is that really true?" or "Is that real?" I'm in my late 70s and I've never stopped asking.
I mostly agree. My problem is it seems like the term “peaceful protests “ is being taken too far out of context. Not everything is a Peaceful Protest. They sometimes take things too far out of hand. Total Disruption of life around them isn’t a peaceful protest. Going off campus and shutting down traffic on vital bridges and highways is not only ignorant but dangerous. When you anger the majority of people your protest is no longer making its point.