Student makes political stand, exposes teachers
Dennis Lennox is a junior at Central Michigan University where he is president of the CMU Young Americans for Freedom and Students Against Gary Peters, the target of his political crusade. Clips of his paparazzi-style tactics are being posted all over the web, as he follows Peters with a video camera and takes it into the school offices where Dean Pamela Gates physically lashes out at him.*
This use of free speech seems unprecedented for a student, in an institution that is accustomed to treating adults like children behind closed doors. Although students are noted protesters around the world they are expected to waive their citizenship and be submissive toward their academic superiors, most of them living on their parents' dime with nowhere else to go. Now the faces of their "educators" are on public display for what they really are (the dean's ugliness and violence reminds me of my own enrollment). Youtube and other video portals, like all new technologies, revive equality like shining a flashlight in a dark cave (just as they have affected the presidential campaign).
Lennox's cause is actually Prof. Peters' campaign for public office while remaining a prominent member of the faculty even though he teaches class only once a week. Lennox says "I'm speaking for the hundreds of students, alumni, taxpayers and even legislators who have complained because Gary Peters won't pick between Congress and campus.".* (Peters is a democrat and Lennox a conservative republican.) Personally I don't see anything wrong with keeping one's day job while campaigning, it would certainly be the least of academic mischiefs. If he is breaking his commitment to teaching it assumes that commitment itself is not bogus (much like the commitment to public office). Lennox is not antiacademic and even goes so far as to tell Peters he will attend his courses himself if the prof will return fulltime.* The school is now citing him for distributing anti-Peters flyers during one of the professor's forums, to which he responds "I'm flabbergasted my school is seeking retribution against me".**
He may be a proud member of the student body but Lennox is acting like a citizen and administrations don't like that. They can take away everything he has built for himself, it's just a matter of majority vote. They require no logic to chew him up and spit him out. Until people realize "education" is not in their own hands they will continue to walk into this trap. Hopefully his efforts will start a trend in all campuses until students realize they are citizens with no more reason to take abuse than the patrons of any other institution. Then school officials will plot specifically against student citizenship and expose themselves as un-American. Blogs about Dennis can be found through this portal, along with his videos. Many kudos to him.
*http://news.aol.com/story/_a/student-hounds-professor-seeking-office/20071025091409990001?ncid=NWS00010000000001
**http://www.mlive.com/newsflash/michigan/index.ssf?/base/politics-1/119336156676330.xml&storylist=newsmichigan
Question of the Week: How should student civic movements be organized so that they can't simply be shut down by the school? Should they be run by a non-student? Off campus? Should membership be secret so individual members are not targeted and their futures jeopardized? Send your thoughts to russo@richmondliberty.org.
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