Charles Murray: Middlebury Mob Was “repudiation of what the university is all about”
“Faculty members bragged about not reading my stuff”
In March of this year, the sociologist and writer Charles Murray visited Middlebury College to deliver a lecture. Before he could even begin, the event was set upon by a mob of students who shut it down and ultimately sent a professor to the emergency room.
Students who participated in the mob received no real punishment but the incident drew national attention to the issue of free speech on college campuses.
Last night, Murray made his first televised appearance since then on Tucker Carlson’s show. He described the scene at Middlebury as the opposite of what higher education should be.
From the FOX News Insider:
Charles Murray: Protests Are a ‘Repudiation of What the University is All About’
Libertarian sociologist Charles Murray discussed protests against his speeches on college campuses.
Murray wrote “The Bell Curve,” and often speaks about the “growing class divide” that has led to the rise of President Trump.
Murray said he was stunned that many of those protesting his speech at Middlebury College in New England proudly said they never actually read his work.
“Faculty members bragged about not reading my stuff,” he said. “But they still knew I was a bad guy.”…
He said that the Middlebury incident is not necessarily an epidemic but that it is “toxic” to the belief that universities are spaces for intellectualism.
“What went on inside that lecture hall was a repudiation of what the university is all about,” Murray said.
Watch the video below:
In the weeks following the protest, the Southern Poverty Law Center was named as one of the inspirations for the mob. Yet now, even the SPLC is defending Murray’s right to speak.
Michael Gryboski reports at the Christian Post:
Charles Murray Has Right to Speak on Campus, Says Group Cited by Violent Protesters
The Southern Poverty Law Center has stated that a scholar they labeled “extremist” for purportedly advancing “racist pseudoscience” had a right to speak at a public college where he was violently protested against.
In March, controversial American Enterprise Institute researcher and author Charles Murray was intensely protested at Middlebury College by students who did not want him to speak on campus. The students cited SPLC as their source when claiming Murray was too extreme to be allowed to speak.
In written testimony submitted to the United States Senate Committee of the Judiciary on Tuesday, SPLC President Richard Cohen explained that while his organization labels Murray an “extremist” who advances racist ideology, he has a right to speak on a college campus.
“No matter how repugnant one may find a speaker’s views, as long as the college has a policy of allowing student groups to invite people from outside their campus to speak, they cannot pick and choose based on the views the speaker holds,” stated Cohen.
Murray responded to the SPLC’s false allegations of racism months ago:
1/ @nytimes @wapo Ask SPLC for page reference for anything I’ve ever written that remotely says I’m a white nationalist.
— Charles Murray (@charlesmurray) March 5, 2017
2/ @nytimes @wapo If SPLC can’t do it, stop giving credence to an utterly false, libelous allegation.
— Charles Murray (@charlesmurray) March 5, 2017
Featured image via YouTube.
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Comments
Since the so-called “Dark Ages” (which were not all that dark in many respects), the idea and ideal of a “university” was a powerful component of the drive to the Enlightenment…maybe THE essential component.
The counter-revolutionaries of the Collective aptly target the ideal of a university in their campaign to reverse the Revolution (American, that is).
It all starts with unhinged NeverTrumpers. Like you.
Max, I disagree with Rags on Trump as well, but can you PLEASE refrain from attacking his every comment – before the election I quite enjoyed his posts – well thought out and generally even in tone. I enjoy it when I see those types of posts from him again. No need to be snotty.
That wasn’t an “attack.” It was a statement of fact. You’ll know when I attack.
Funny that you would argue someone who is vociferously opposed to our President and voices his opinions loudly from the treetops would be “anti free speech.” Kinda doesn’t make sense. At all. Even remotely.
I know, right…???
But Minimillion and his buds are the Statlinist ThoughtPolicing goons of this blog. They do it every day.
How could anyone with any understanding of history or rational thinking “down-vote” what is a simple statement of historical truth?
Of course, it isn’t about the truth. It’s about hating on me. For the team. And that’s all they have become. Just a team, or tribe. Cults are like that…
I’m perfectly well-hinged, and I have much LESS connection with the counter-revolutionaries of the Collective than you do, T-rump sucker.
Who’s trying to silence me by defamation every day but you of the T-rump turd-swirl here?
Your Great Goad Cheeto is a Progressive. Always was. Is today. Will be tomorrow.
How do you feel about IvankaCare, dupe?
Middlebury College – Students leave indoctrinated in the narrative provided by the anti-intellectual left.
What’s with the SPLC? When did they start supporting freedom of thought?
I wouldn’t jump to such a conclusion. I’d speculate that it’s profit motive. The SPLC needs ogres as targets for its fundraising rants. Ogres which are visible are much more profitable than ogres which have been driven back to their caves. Nothing makes the totalitarian Left reach for its checkbooks like an ogre giving a public speech.
SPLC originally did some good, and was a voice against the kkk and others.
Then the leftists took over, and it’s become a crapfest, cited as an authority figure to disparage anyone on the right.
Much as the leftists infiltrated the education system, the judiciary, and the government services organizations.
[class] diversity. One step forward, two steps back. Progress.
Murray said he was stunned that many of those protesting his speech at Middlebury College in New England proudly said they never actually read his work.
And they don’t need to. They’re like the all knowing, all seeing, all telling, all omniscient Carnac the Magnificent. One of the advantages of being a super intelligent leftist.
Similar commentary can be said about all those Western “leaders” (from this Pope, to John Kerry, to Merkel, to Theresa May, et alia) who “know” all about Islam, proclaiming to the rooftops that Islam’s a religion of peace WITHOUT ever having read Islam’s “holy” (gag) texts. Those texts explain that Islam is very much a religion/system of force and intolerance, and Muslims are very proud of that fact and openly proclaim it.
Charles Murray is an old out of touch fossil who hasn’t been paying attention. Middlebury was exactly what college campuses are in 2017. Murray needs to wake up and re read his own book Coming Apart, and stop pretending that America is still in the early 1960s.
Murray has been the Chicken Little on race for decades. Unfortunately, his information is the kind that many do not want to hear and accuse him of being a racist. His intention, of course, was to show where improvement in the education of minorities would help them attain the same level of intelligence as the rest of society. This was totally unwanted info and he has been labeled every name in the hate handbook. In fact, the actions of Middlebury show that he has been right all along!
Evidently he didn’t accuse the mob of date-rape while carrying a mattress.
My alma mater, I’m ashamed to say. Situated in a gorgeous natural setting, but, infected by the same moral and intellectual rot that has seemingly pervaded most of the allegedly hallowed halls of academia. An institution that has become merely another Leftist indoctrination camp, incubating the next generation of self-righteous, self-congratulatory, obnoxious and bullying Leftist jackboots.
And, really — how utterly magnanimous of the perpetually Southern Poverty Law Center to deem that Mr. Murray — this so-called “extremist” — has a right to speak at universities!