Discussion:

Discussion for article #234248

We need ten thousand more professors like this.

“I advocate violence against racists who choose to politically mobilize”

Violence against Nazis? Is there any other option?

What’s going on at ASU?

ASU Foundation links utility funds to anti-solar push

The nonprofit fundraising arm of Arizona State University gave $100,000 to a shadowy political group that spent at least $2.4 million on TV ads attacking state candidates who sided with the solar industry during last year’s election.

How did ASU “attempt to fire him”? It’s not clear.

I’m not defending ASU, either. It does appear, however, that this PhD student has managed to generate a good deal of publicity for himself by claiming that ASU tried to fire him.

None of the students who were frantically calling him were interviewed, and none of the faculty lobbying to make sure he wasn’t fired were interviewed, either.

So there’s only one source for these claims.

Also, what the heck is a “faculty associate”? Is that the title he uses? I’m not familiar with that. Instructor, assistant professor, associate professor, full professor—these are the standard terms for referring to someone’s rank, and given that he has not completed his PhD, my guess is that he’s an instructor.

Something is a bit sketchy about this.

This guy is as big an asshole as the people protesting him based on his quotes, but he’s strategically getting some wanted publicity. Next he’ll be on the FOX and MSNBC talk shows.

My goodness! Coming from a long line of WASPS, personally I didn’t realize how oppressed I am! Guess I’m just not aware of how difficult it has been for me to be a white man in the 21st Century!

** “It’s not easy being a conservative, upper middle-class, college-educated, non-handicapped, heterosexual American white Christian male these days!”**___Bill Maher

Rightie Entitled Cons and Baggers…Whatta’ bunch of tittybabies! _____♪┛♪┗"Nobody knows the truffles’ I’ve seen…" ♪┗┛♪┗┛♪
http://latinorebels.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/15693_1449307992253_1219803563_1302923_1695892_n.jpg

List of Things That Need Killing:

1. Nazis
2. Zombies

It is Arizona after all…

Are we sure that’s not David Cross?

Sorry, but he lost me at "I advocate violence . . . " If he didn’t exist already, David Horowitz would have to invent him.

I think I’m on this guys side (he may be too much an a spotlight seeker for my tastes) but the title of that class is silly and unnecessary.

University class titles shouldn’t sound like provocative art installations. Of course “the problem of whiteness” is gonna cause controversy and distraction no matter the content of the coursework. And getting the class shut down or shunned does nobody any good - so why glitterbomb with the title.

Hows about we be more thoughtful about these things and not just hand ammo to the reactionary-bigot army.

The fact that academic freedom should protect him doesn’t preclude the fact that the above was a stupid, stupid thing to say. I’m a university educator and administrator and I’d rather save my ammunition re/ academic freedom for way more substantive and meaningful battles than some loudmouthed grad student who hasn’t learned to avoid saying “I advocate violence…”

Stupid. Even if protected.

Why is it that when we see pictures of “white supremacists” they always look so spectacularly un-supreme?

“Ya’ll don’t know what it’s like…being male, middle-class and white!”

Faculty Associates

Faculty associates are appointed on semester or annual, fixed term appointments, are not eligible for promotion, and are not members of the Academic Assembly. Individuals in this rank are qualified by training and experience to teach university-level courses.

http://www.asu.edu/aad/manuals/acd/acd505-02.html

Use of the term may vary from one educational institution to another.

He called it that to create controversy and get people to sign up. And a course title like that is meant to further divide people, it serves no useful purpose for anyone…except him. Ego maniac. He also advocates violence, and it outspoken about it. Beyond stupid. President Obama and Eric Holder (not to mention Dr. King) would be appalled by this jerk. He’s no better than the “2nd Amendment remedy” nuts.

But he is getting the attention his ego craves.

He’s not a professor, and we don’t need anyone who advocates violence. He’s a punk with an ego looking to stir up controversy for his own self interests. The only person he is doing any good for is himself.

Yes we do!

Meh. I knew quite a number of Robert Poes, both fellow students and faculty when I was a university student in California during the the late 1960s and early 1970s. A few of them advocated blowing up the Bank of America and other buildings associated with the “oppressive class”. One, very attractive, young woman I knew was a firebrand Maoist. Only Maoist I ever knew who wore a [very brief] miniskirt. Poe’s comments are tame compared with what was being noised abroad then.

But then again, we didn’t have social media, selfies, cell phone videos or the instantaneous ability to delve into University class schedules or professorial bios. Nowadays, somebody, somewhere at any given time, on any given day is going to say something that has the potential for pissing some people off. Thanks to TPM and other similar forums, a whole lot of people are going to know about it, whether we want to or not, and pissed-off-ness will be actualized in a very brief time. The result: “Dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria.”

To me, the example of Robert Poe is just part of the “University Experience” and I’m happy to see there are still some glowing embers of academic passion, even in Arizona, where intellectualism is appreciated about as much as finding a dead, putrefying packrat under the hood of one’s car. I have to say, after years of watching the academy fall into a well of blandness, I find this rare sojourn from academic insipidness almost refreshing. A university that never generates controversy is not doing its job and not worth attending.

Not everyone can be Gandhi, nor should they have to be to have their basic rights respected. (I am wondering what white people would say if someone announced, “sorry, I won’t support your right to vote until there’s no more KKK.”)