Dr. P's letter

[ARon]

West knows that "controversies" like this raise his profile and his speakers fees.  He'd have preferred to be uninvited so he could claimed to have been silenced.

President Pestello did of good job of making the university's values clear and leaving the huckster to his own silly behavior.

[cgeldmacher]

The purpose in my forwarding the message that someone forwarded to me from West was to point out the imbalance of a conservative speaker being forced to have someone precede his comments, while dozens of liberal speakers have never had this happen.

H. Smith - I went to SLU undergrad and law school.  The law school does things differently and often presents speakers in a panel discussion because they are there to debate the law.  There is a long history of SLU and SLU student organizations bringing in controversial liberal speakers and the university has never forced a conservative voice before the speech to contextualize their comments.  This is the double standard I'm referring to.  I'm not defending West's comments.  I'm only complaining about the speaker being forced onto the listeners before his speech to offer a differing view.  That has never been required on the other side.

[bonwich]

John O. Shields. Another fond memory for us old farts.  

[bonwich]

Well, nothing like a good old fashioned peaceful protest. 

 

[DoctorB]

I went to the event last night, and witnessed the protest.  it was quite an impressive display.  I saw many hundreds of our students participate.  By 6:30 there were hundreds of people milling around outside, and the protesters had basically filled the floor of the arena, most of them wearing white shirts as organized somehow through social media.  Many security folks were stationed all around the building and clocktower area.  All the $$ raised from the cupcake sales (several hundreds, in fact they ran out) is going to the Syrian refugees.  People without SLU ID's (there were MANY non-SLU attendees) had to wait in a queue outside until about 6:50 or so to enter.  3 different people, one a student and one a recent graduate, introduced Allen West.  There was no "contextualizing" introduction, though that had been reported. It was in the Old Pine Gym, now called the CGC.

Finally West appeared, and row by row the students rose to leave.  It was quite a spectacle and took some time.  After which, the outsiders (presumably, fans of West;  I actually talked to a number of them in line to figure out who they were and why they were at SLU) and some students, mostly moved down into the floor.  The place was still full of people, and the students assembled around the Clocktower for a few short speeches.  The students who spoke, members of the Muslim Student Assoc., were absolutely blessed to see how many students came out to support them, against the wildly irresponsible charges that West had made on his website and elsewhere.  Everything was pretty orderly and certain conformed to the non-violent traditions of social protest.  Actually, if anyone was disorderly, from my perspective, it was the West supporters in the crowd!
 

What a night.  Very memorable.  Opinions vary about all sorts of things related to this event, but that really made me proud to be at SLU.  I'm so glad the president did not cancel the event or force it to be moved elsewhere.  -hb

[Tilkowsky]

22 hours ago, Cowboy said:

http://www.slu.edu/news/announcements/2016/september/message-from-president-pestello-sept28.php

-spot on

-well done Dr P

-if this is deemed political, mods remove it please

 

 

Can't let the cupcakes (students) to be subjected to anyone who challenges their beliefs or thoughts now can we?

[Bobby Metzinger]

9 minutes ago, Tilkowsky said:

 

 

Can't let the cupcakes (students) to be subjected to anyone who challenges their beliefs or thoughts now can we?

Metz?

[Billboy1]

Just don't understand the mentality.  No problem if you disagree with the speaker-just don't go. Why do you want to interfere with someone else's right to be there.

[Box and Won]

2 hours ago, DoctorB said:

There was no "contextualizing" introduction, though that had been reported. 

I am particularly glad to hear this.

Personally, I would've stuck around to hear him out.

[JMM28]

Sounds like it was handled pretty well from all involved. 

Wasn't there a scandal involving the ****** (axe wound) monologues in the early 2000's? I can't remember what but I feel like there were attempts made to keep that off campus. 

[cgeldmacher]

All politics aside, I found this to be a very responsible form of protest.  Glad that our students went this route rather than the lunacy we have seen at other universities in our state.  They made their point, they did so in a memorable way, they still allowed the speech to occur, and they raised some money for a good cause.  Good job students.

Now, please just start showing up to the basketball games.  Also, if you do and what you see on the court this season eats at your moral core, please don't walk out.  It will get better the next season.