Tag Archives: Campus

News

McGill University and University of Calgary censor pro-life students

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The headline should be that these Canadian universities both continue to censor pro-life students.

Remember how students at McGill shouted down a pro-life debater and how the police arrested pro-life students at the University of Calgary? (See related posts below) There is no such thing as free speech in Canada, because the secular left has decided that they cannot stand to hear anything that offends them and so they will just censor and/or coerce anyone who says anything they disagree with.

Life Site has the latest from McGill University:

The Student Society of McGill University (SSMU) has reinstated the club status of Choose Life, the campus pro-life club, but only after forcing them to submit to special requirements that restrict the club’s ability to share the pro-life message.

The SSMU Council voted April 1st to reinstate the club, but also required them to attach an appendix to their constitution in order to “facilitate their compliance” with SSMU’s equity policy.

Natalie Fohl, Choose Life’s president, said that she was pleased with the return of their status, but denounced the special restrictions on their pro-life voice.  “I think it’s a double standard, and it’s very disappointing that they think that this is justified, and I hope that at some point it will be rectified,” she told LifeSiteNews (LSN).

In particular, SSMU has banned Choose Life from “advocat[ing] or lobby[ing] for the criminalization of abortion through the use of SSMU resources.”  According to Fohl, this means that they will not be permitted to do so in the Student Union building.

[…]SSMU has also disallowed the presentation of graphic images, such as those depicting aborted babies, in open public spaces.  Even in closed spaces, the document demands that such images never be shown “without the ability of the copyright owner to demonstrate that all images were legally obtained.”

“We don’t want [Choose Life] to be going around … trying to shame or shock students with graphic imagery,” said Dooley.

Life Site also covered the latest from the University of Calgary:

On Thursday, Campus Pro-life, the University of Calgary’s pro-life club, set up a pro-life display on campus – the Genocide Awareness Project (GAP).

Last year, the university charged the pro-life students with trespassing for erecting the same display, which has been displayed on campus peacefully and without incident twice per year since 2006.  The crown prosecutors withdrew the charges prior to trial, however.

But in an e-mail sent to the students’ lawyer Thursday, the university against stated that it “requires that Campus Pro-Life turn the Genocide Awareness Project signs inward so that the University community does not have to view them,” and threatened the students with sanctions for non-academic misconduct.

The pro-life students say that at Thursday’s event campus security initially appeared as if they would not intervene, simply standing on site as the group’s exhibit went ahead without incident.  However, in mid-afternoon that changed when U of C security went around the exhibit handing out notices to pro-life students, indicating that if they refused to turn their signs inwards, they could be subject to a fine up to $2,000 ($5,000 for further trespass), arrest, civil action, or non-academic misconduct.

Campus Pro-Life (CPL) president Leah Hallman remarked that, “To our knowledge, no other group has ever been asked to turn its signs inwards.”

Montreal (McGill) is one the most leftist cities in Canada, and Calgary is the most conservative. But the universities are all liberal to some degree or other. The academic left uses the power of the lectern and the grading marker to impose their views on generations of students. They use techniques like speech codes, expulsions, degree denials and promotion denials. The secular left is intolerant of other points of view. They don’t want to debate, they want to suppress. Hearing other points of view is too difficult for those on the academic left, so they put their hands over their hears and scream for the police.

It happens in New Zealand, which like Canada, is dominated by the fascist left.

What can we do to stop it?

This 15-minute podcast from Jennifer Roback Morse came out a while back and it talked about free speech on campus and the work of the Alliance Defense Fund to defend free speech rights from the academic left. I’ve listened to it twice, and I found it good. You young law students should consider going to work for firms like the ADF – they do good work. Canada has nothing like the ADF. And remember, Canadians trust the government because they depend on the government for their health care and other social programs. Purchasing health care privately is illegal in Canada. It’s really hurt their sense of individual rights and freedoms.

Relate posts

News

Do universities really feature a diversity of thought on intelligent design?

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Check out this article from Evolution News.

Excerpt:

We were delighted to discover that students at the University of Arizona are getting a well-rounded education. “Evolution, Intelligent Design Face Off at Humanities Panel,” reports the Arizona Daily Wildcat. Hey great, finally a serious academic institution is taking the time to make sure kids hear both sides of the evolution debate! Reading down the article we noticed only a couple of things they might have been done differently and better.

The panel at UA included an evolutionary biologist and two religious studies profs, but no one actually representing the ID side. Only ID critics were allowed to participate. Well, that is disappointing. It’s like staging a “debate” between the Democratic and Republican contenders for a particular public office but inviting only the Democratic candidate, joined on stage by his campaign manager and chief of staff.

Also, no one on the panel even seemed to know what intelligent design means.

[…]Professor Karen Seat confused ID with Young Earth Creationism, explaining to students and colleagues that it was all about a defense of “the traditional, literal meaning of the Bible.”

[…]Professor Lucas Mix, who’s an ordained Episcopal priest, got tired of paying lip service to the idea of a “face off” on intelligent design and spoke instead about “creationism,” which, again, means something very different.

[…]Joanna Masel, the evolutionary biologist, summed up with a non sequitur: “Once you pick out a theology that is incompatible with evolution, it becomes incompatible with all science.”

This is what your children get for paying tens of thousands of dollars a year in tutition and fees. They get an indoctrination, not an education. (Assuming they don’t get expelled or denied their degree for disagreeing with their secular leftist overlords). It’s a perplexing problem – how can you raise world-changing children if this groupthink is what they’ll face on the university campus?

Does anyone else find it sickening that the radical left can be paid to GRADE STUDENTS to force them to agree with views at odds with their own parents, and reality as a whole? Darwinism is – like global warming, Marxism and feminism – the equivalent of flat-earthism. Why pay to learn that? And why be coerced to agree with grade-granting flat-earthers who only know one side of every issue?

News

New studies on promiscuity at Catholic colleges and cohabitation

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First, women at Catholic colleges. (H/T Andrew)

Excerpt:

Researchers from Mississippi State University looked at a survey of 1,000 college students nationwide and were surprised to find that “women attending colleges and universities affiliated with the Catholic Church are almost four times as likely to have participated in ‘hooking up’ compared to women at secular schools.  A “hook up” is defined as a casual physical encounter with a male student, without the expectation of an ongoing relationship.

[…]Overall, the study found clear differences in the sexual activity of Catholic students who attend weekly Mass.  Whereas 24 percent of Catholic women who attend Mass weekly have “hooked up” (compared to 38 percent of nonreligious students), the rate more than doubles to 50 percent of Catholic women who attend Mass infrequently — far more than their nonreligious peers.

[…]In the same journal issue, Calvin College professor Jonathan Hill reports on his study comparing the experiences of students at Catholic colleges, mainline Protestant colleges, and generally more fervent evangelical colleges.  Hill examines student attendance at religious services and finds a marked difference at the more conservative Protestant colleges, where religious convictions are shared and embraced by strong “moral communities.”

And then the study on cohabitation. (H/T Andrew)

Excerpt:

Dr. Pamela J. Smock, a research professor at the Population Studies Center at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, has published a study in the Journal of Marriage and Family of data gathered on cohabitation in the United States and the implications of cohabitation on relationship stability.

“From the perspective of many young adults, marrying without living together first seems quite foolish,” said Prof. Smock. “Just because some academic studies have shown that living together may increase the chance of divorce somewhat, young adults themselves don’t believe that.”

“Cohabitation is increasingly becoming the first co-residential union formed among young adults,” the study said. “As a result of the growing prevalence of cohabitation, the number of children born to unmarried cohabiting parents has also increased.”

[…]However, the study revealed that, with differences based on race and ethnicity taken into account, children born to cohabiting versus married parents have over five times the risk of experiencing their parents’ separation, showing an exponential increase in relationship failure for couples currently or ever cohabiting.

[…]The study concludes that couples who live together before they get married are less likely to stay married than those who don’t move in together until engagement or marriage.

The social costs of irresponsible and immoral choices about sex, marriage and parenting are $112 billion a year in the United States, charged to the taxpayers.

Those who make poor decisions about sex and marriage will often turn to taxpayer-funded social programs as a means of equalizing life outcomes with those who do not make poor decisions about sex and marriage. The net effect is that the frequency of responsible, moral choices about sex and marriage decreases as the benefits decline while the frequency of irresponsible, immoral choices about sex and marriage increases as the costs decline.

It’s true that many people can get away with making irresponsible and immoral decisions because they are wealthy and well-educated and can avoid many of the consequences. But what happens when ordinary working people start to take on ideas like hooking up and cohabiting? Does that help them to make ends meet? Does that help their children to succeed? Shouldn’t we be encouraging more sexual restraint and stronger marriages instead?