Who's Really Oppressing OWSers?

By the way, I hope everyone had a very happy and enjoyable Christmas holiday. I certainly did, but it sped by at an unimaginable - breakneck, even - pace. Now, with my husband back at work and my kids back at their schooling, I can again, think my thoughts out loud.

Today, I received an email from a man who has been a college professor. He was commenting on an article, "Queer and Then?" published in the Chronicles of Higher Education.

After commenting on how generally awful today's colleges are, he says,

You do not fix academia by bashing academics in general. You fix it by getting society to work right.

I tend to agree.

My father is a journalism professor at a big state college. He is a WONDERFUL professor and, at 77 years of age, gets better reviews than any of the younger profs! He is no pushover and certainly in no way puts up, or commiserates with, the liberal/progressive profs on campus, which puts him in the DEFINITE MINORITY!

For the record, I'm neither horrified by this article, nor the journal in which it was published.

I AM horrified that this garbage is allowed on campuses paid for by unsuspecting taxpayers and parents who choose to pay for their student's education without continuing to parent that student dependent.

If I were to pay for my kids' college education (and I haven't the older and won't the younger) I would DARN sure make sure I knew, A) what courses my dependent was taking and B) what exactly that dependent intended upon doing with the education I was proffering up for them.

To parents who feel their child is OWED a higher education, God bless you, but you are either a Progressive/Democrat or woefully ignorant of the world of today and unbearably indulgent. The courses they teach in PUBLIC universities are, generally, as dumbed-down as they are in public secondary schools and as irrelevant as the Progressive/Democrats who teach them. If you don't believe me, PLEASE get the book, One Party Classroom by David Horowitz and read about some of the classes offered on PUBLIC college campuses today.

I don't care WHAT they teach at private universities! I don't pay for that. It's the PUBLIC institutions that bear intense scrutiny today, as they churn out more and more liberal graduates using MY money to pay for classes that in no way resemble my world view.

I hope, when the Occupy Wall Street'ers have finally been robbed and raped enough by their own, they will realize they are not ultimately fighting big corporations, but BIG EDUCATION who has lied to them and stolen from them (and/or their parents) by telling them if they paid for classes in Women's Studies they would even SORT of be employable and enjoy any kind of well-paying job in the real world.

Occupy Wall Street on Public Education

HOLY COW!

I get a regular email from EdWeek that details various articles posted either on their blogs or the publication itself. A man named Greg Jobin-Leeds had posted a story earlier last week on OWS and education. It so offended me I posted it on our Facebook page.

Today, in my email update, I received a link to the following blog post by Jobin-Leeds, "Occupy Wall Street's Goals and Public Education". Obviously, it was a must-read!

I usually don't take time to comment on articles because, well, frankly, I don't have time! Today, I absolutely could not stop myself. Please read the article when you have a moment. It will make it easier to understand my response:

Greg. One of the websites from which you are pulling information is the planetANARCHY.net site?

Do you know what anarchy is?

"Occupy activists think increasing access to "the commons" (public goods -- starting with the public squares themselves -- that belong to all humanity) is the route to liberty."

It's NOT the route to liberty. The LAW is the route to liberty. What you're describing is the TYRANNY of ANARCHY!

You apparently have nothing more than a textbook definition of the word 'anarchy' - it is clearly not an actualized term to either you or OWS. Can you actually imagine anarchy played out on American soil? I think you THINK you can, but I venture to bet you can't. It's actually a concept full of death and destruction to the tune of Egypt and Iraq and all those "Arab Spring" (read Islamic Fundamentalist Spring) countries we've seen, heard, or read about in recent months.

"The Occupy Movement is creating a future that is being collectively imagined."

What is collectivism? Have you seen Cuba - or RED China - or Russia? THAT'S collectivism at its finest - right there. I can assure you none of those countries will be excepting of a dissident crowd 'collecting' in St. Petersburg Square, let alone sleeping or protesting their government there. Good grief man, do you really not remember Tiananmen Square? Has it been that long in your limited view of history?

I guess that's the difference between you and me Greg, I'm not an intellectual - I'm a reasoner. I study and REASON issues - I don't fantasize or idealize concepts - I research them through to action historically or personally. If you and the rest of the OWS'ers would put books in your "library" like Hayek or Bastiat instead of simply Al Gore, Howard Zinn, and Mother Jones, you might develop a world perspective more akin to that atop my horse than your unicorn.

But then, you don't really want to do that, do you? Reality stinks. It's much more emotionally satisfying to live in a world uncluttered of reality where you can pin your problems on others and force a community to support your desired lifestyle and belief system by stealing what they have earned through hard work.

Phin - you speak of the "eloquence" of Occupy protesters when they speak about their 'engagement'. What is eloquent about a Mic Check? Really? How about public defecation (or rape or theft)? How eloquent is that? Oh wait, maybe a dousing with pepper spray because you refuse to follow local rules is a definition of eloquence?

Just a question, how are you Communitarians going to survive when you can't follow ANYONE'S rules? Even the OWS has rules.

Frankly, I'm glad for OWS. The 'movement' has forced labor unions such as the OEA (and other such irrelevant organizations) out of the SOCIALIST closet into the bright sunlight of truth. No hiding in the shadows anymore! At least the entire country is getting a really good look at your idea of CHANGE in America! Good luck getting those of us who have studied American history - and still believe in the Founder's vision - on board with that!

While OWS Occupy The Parks Who Occupies Their Brains?

I have heard some frankly hysterical commentary about the OWS crowd lately - hysterical to me because outside the three years I embraced liberalism in college (I need to develop a vaccine for incoming college freshman against the academic small pox that is the liberal professor) I've worked harder than most women I've known and identified with a family tree sprouting oak-sized Republican branches.

Some of the more spot-on hilarity came from Former NY Mayor Rudy Guliani, who provided the OWS'ers a bit of advise "...occupy a job!". Two brothers, finally sick to death of being thwarted by the OWS crowds in their attempt to get to work on Wall Street, found a way to occupy some neon green poster board with the words, "Occupy A DESK!" and return with gusto the heckles showered on them by the unshowered protestors. Even Jon Stewart found it in him to jab the feckless campers in the eye with their own stick.

I fear, however, that while many of us watch the various exchanges between the Occupy crowds and the media in a running hot and cold mixture of disgust, contempt, pity and/or amusement, the more sinister pillars of the effort will be missed.

Apparently, the OWS movement has an agenda:

• elimination of all private property,
• forced unionization of all workers
  
• 6 hour work days with 6 weeks paid vacation,
  
• universal health care,
  
• a ban on gun ownership,
  
• fierce separation of church and state AND
  
• “Make homeschooling illegal. Religious fanatics use it to feed their children propaganda.”
  

"Who cares if OWS'ers have a list of demands? These people are only as strong as their weakest link and have you looked at any of them in the bright sunlight or smelled them up close?", you might say.

This is a point, however, the whole OWS movement really should be viewed through the lens of our current president. Here are the impressions of ABC's Jake Tapper after an interview with the current Oval Office resident:

Obama said the most important thing he can do as president is express solidarity with the protesters and redouble his commitment to achieving what he described as a more egalitarian society.

Feckless, smelly, over-mollified campers become a bit less feckless when backed by a sitting president with a Marxist background and a penchant for all things communal.

But wait, what about the education establishment itself? What thoughts exist in this arena? Try the post from this new blog (The International Occupy Movement and Public Education) on the prominent EdWeek website on for size;

After my mother graduated from high school in the mid 1940s, she went to Queens College in New York City, which was practically free back then. Tuition was without charge. All she paid for was her books. She left college with no debt and was able to build a successful self-sustaining life. The Occupy Movement -- from Wall Street to Oakland, CA to the growing political youth movement in Chile -- is demanding the same opportunity that my mother and many in the US once took for granted.

Here, Occupy Wall Street is raising critical issues and exposing how our education system reflects larger economic inequalities. Looking internationally, we have great lessons to be learned from students around the world who are similarly mad at how some of the 1 percent of super wealthy exert excessive control over politics, university fees and the economy that all 100 percent live in. From students in Chile we can learn both policy reforms and action strategies.

In this first series of blogs, I will begin by developing a conversation about how education problems mirror the money-making system. I will highlight those who are working to change this economic arrangement and opportunities for education and movement leadership. I will point to past successes and discuss ideas that have emerged about where we can go from here.

Comforting. Quite apparently, the Dewey chickens have come home to fully roost in the public education system of America today. We are now full circle. John Dewey trains under Marxists, trains up Marxists at the Teachers' College he created at Columbia University and Marxists descend upon public educational institutions where they train up little Marxists who find it hard to live in the real world of capitalism, morality and responsibility and move into Zucotti parks all over the nation.

Sadly, I expect this to be a fight that will need to be fought in the near future. I don't expect this movement to tuck tail and run like Zucotti Park residents forced to actually work for their rent. I see their manifesto as a credible threat to our American way of life just as does Bill Whittle at Pajamas TV. I hope you will too. After all, the only good defense is a good offense.