“Activism: The policy or action of using vigorous campaigning to bring about political or social change”
Oh BYU, my alma mater. I just finished reading a damning report of BYU’s run-ins with academic freedom—The Lord’s University. The verdict: BYU only cares about academic freedom insofar as they can get away with keeping liberals out of the university while satisfying the accreditation committee that they’re not doing so. If it were up to the administration, they would require every faculty member and student to subscribe to their traditionalist worldview. But as the virtue of a university is universally recognized (outside Utah County) as being a sanctuary of free inquiry, the administration must use underhanded tactics to enforce their thought control.
This is what I feared as a Cougar. But a couple things surprised me as I read The Lord’s University. First of all that I was right, that there was a systematic effort in place to marginalize those who threatened the relationship between the university and Republican values and worldview. Secondly, that it was coming from the top. The First Presidency, as members of the university’s Board of Trustees, played intimate roles in everything from articles published in the Daily Universe to the firing of controversial teachers.
Back to the aforementioned underhanded tactics. The university over the years has fired faculty members who don’t fit the administration’s view of what a university professor should be. Is this acceptable at a private university? Sure. But in these firings there was (and still is) a pattern of a lack of due process and giving dubious reasons as the official causes of termination. You can’t exactly fire a professor by saying “We don’t like what you teach” without legal repercussions. So the pretense of poor performance is used bald-faced against professors with stellar records.
Who exactly gets fired at BYU? Feminists, primarily, and those with postmodern worldviews. Boyd K. Packer targeted feminists as enemies of the Church, along with gay rights activists and “so-called intellectuals and scholars.” But really, anyone who ruffles any feathers up the chain of command is dismissed, as evidenced by the firing of Todd Hendricks, a student employee who wrote an editorial critical of the BYUSA election process. Naturally, his performance was cited as the reason for his termination. Later, when it became clear that all of his performance reviews called him an excellent employee, the administration faulted him for not going through the proper channels.
And this brings us to the Machiavellian nature of BYU. Such things as “proper channels” exist for employees, not the university. The university is beyond reproach, for example, for faulting a professor for violating a policy that had never been implemented. Academic freedom, as it turns out, is to be enjoyed by the administration and not by the faculty or students.
Interesting, then, that the university’s statement on academic freedom reads:
“Individual freedom lies at the core of both religious and academic life. Freedom of thought, belief, inquiry, and expression are crucial no less to the sacred than to the secular quest for truth. Historically, in fact, freedom of conscience and freedom of intellect form a common root, from which grow both religious and academic freedom.”
Despite the official position citing no conflicts between religious and academic freedom, the freedom of thought, belief, inquiry, and expression is quickly curtailed when it runs up against the thoughts, beliefs, inquiries, and expressions of the administration and Board of Trustees. Needless to say, an unprotected freedom of dissenting thought is no freedom at all.
More double standards: liberal protests are deemed a childish embarrassment to the university, yet conservative protests earn an attentive ear. The university is supposedly not run by popular will, yet the administration frequently refers to the letters of complaining tithe-paying members in justifying its decisions. The university decries the politicization of academia, yet is one of the largest activist institutions for conservatism in the country.
Ernest Wilkinson, when he was president of BYU, campaigned to institute a policy through which bishops of student wards would keep tabs on “troubled” students. Faced with resistance from bishops and stake presidents, he promised that these lists would not affect their attendance at the university. With the policy in place however, Wilkinson denied registration to over 200 students based on supposedly confidential interviews.
This shouldn’t be surprising, as the university encourages anonymous snitching on Honor Code violators (and Wilkinson recruited students to spy on liberal professors). When a complaint is filed against you, even anonymously, you are treated as guilty, sometimes resulting in academic probation or expulsion, without so much as hearing. In a theology that claims free agency as a requisite for spiritual progression, how can a university that claims to subscribe to this theology use such Gestapo tactics?
To refer back to the academic freedom statement, the university’s defense lies in this clause: “a limitation is reasonable when the faculty behavior or expression… contradicts or opposes, rather than analyzes or discusses, fundamental Church doctrine or policy.” The question over what exactly composes “fundamental Church doctrine or policy” is the source of concern both for BYU faculty and the accreditation committee, who complained that such language was too vague.
What kind of agenda might the university have that would justify occupying such ethically shady ground? Naturally, it would be protecting the university from the danger of secularization. That’s right, multiculturalists, feminists, and gay rights activists everywhere are trying to get into BYU so they can pollute the doctrinal purity of the university with their diabolical propaganda. Even the appearance of evil might weaken the university and make it vulnerable to adverse influence, hence the Honor Code with its emphasis on a clean-cut, modest appearance. We wouldn't want young Mormon kids looking like those liberal rabble-rousers at Berkeley.
In the university’s defense, the Church has suffered intense persecution of all kinds from its inception. Adding to its tenuous position, though, is its mission of proselytizing the world. We want to simultaneously be left alone and have everyone agree with us. In a university setting, we want to be universally regarded as a great university, but without acquiescing to the world’s standards of greatness.
Additionally, our narrative of a secure Zion that is under threat of infiltration jibes with the neoconservative Cold War worldview. Once the Cold War ended, the political right needed a new subversive enemy to unite around, and that enemy became the tenured radicals of the university, the multi-culturalists and other supposed enemies of the foundations of Western civilization. Conservatives, with the unlikely alliance of Brigham Young University, became the self-appointed defenders of our country’s moral foundations.
President Bateman specifically targeted moral relativism as the poison that threatens the pure well water of BYU. Out of this mindset comes the rationalization for all of BYU’s shadowy activism.
But what’s so wrong with this worldview? I will answer that question in part II.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Thursday, June 25, 2009
RIP Michael Jackson
A lot of people have been taking jabs at Michael Jackson after learning of his death today. It makes me a little sad that such a talented, tortured man became such a joke, almost as sad as the news of his death made me. I want to pay a sincere tribute to Michael Jackson, because without him music as we know it wouldn't be the same.
Not only did he have an amazing voice, he was an amazing songwriter. Not only was he an amazing musician, he was an amazing showman and the best dancer in the world. I remember watching a Thriller documentary that showed rehearsals of the choreography. They recruited world-class dancers for the video, and they spent all day learning the moves. Then Michael Jackson came in at the end of the day and caught up to the rest of them in minutes. He had a singular ability to pull off technical moves like the moonwalk with superhuman fluidity.
With such an abundance of talent, he had the makings of the world's biggest superstar, but that doesn't mean that being the world's all-time best selling artist was an easy task. Watching him perform, you can see the hard work and devotion he gave to his craft. I get chills watching concert footage of him. It makes me very sad to know that now I will never have the opportunity to attend a Michael Jackson concert in person. As such a critical person as I am, Michael Jackson gave me (and gives me) the rare, enjoyable experience of basking in pure greatness.
He is the King of Pop because he took pop music to a new level. It's extremely rare that I attend a dance party where at least one Michael Jackson song isn't played. He was the rarest of artists, the kind of high caliber who achieved extraordinary popularity. That is the ideal that I strive for, and his music reminds me that it is possible. Because of this, I pay tribute to a genius taken before his time.
Not only did he have an amazing voice, he was an amazing songwriter. Not only was he an amazing musician, he was an amazing showman and the best dancer in the world. I remember watching a Thriller documentary that showed rehearsals of the choreography. They recruited world-class dancers for the video, and they spent all day learning the moves. Then Michael Jackson came in at the end of the day and caught up to the rest of them in minutes. He had a singular ability to pull off technical moves like the moonwalk with superhuman fluidity.
With such an abundance of talent, he had the makings of the world's biggest superstar, but that doesn't mean that being the world's all-time best selling artist was an easy task. Watching him perform, you can see the hard work and devotion he gave to his craft. I get chills watching concert footage of him. It makes me very sad to know that now I will never have the opportunity to attend a Michael Jackson concert in person. As such a critical person as I am, Michael Jackson gave me (and gives me) the rare, enjoyable experience of basking in pure greatness.
He is the King of Pop because he took pop music to a new level. It's extremely rare that I attend a dance party where at least one Michael Jackson song isn't played. He was the rarest of artists, the kind of high caliber who achieved extraordinary popularity. That is the ideal that I strive for, and his music reminds me that it is possible. Because of this, I pay tribute to a genius taken before his time.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
FIMY reviews the curious case of benjamin button
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, based on a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald, contains a fantastic premise: Benjamin is born as an old man, and instead of growing older throughout life, he gets progressively younger.
The genius of the movie, however, is that the emotional weight of the movie comes from the entirely normal parts of Benjamin's life--meeting people, falling in love, leaving, watching people die. It doesn't take a person growing younger to experience the discomfort of life's changes.
It is in this sense that Benjamin Button is a truthful movie, in that it exposes through a narrative conceit our collective fantasy of permanence. Since we all grow older, we perpetuate a delusion that we are all traveling along the same timeline, something like traveling together on a train. Benjamin Button explodes this myth by creating a character that is traveling the opposite way on the tracks. The other characters in the movie seem to regard him as some sort of abnormality, which thrusts his entirely normal life into relief.
The myth of traveling along the same timeline, like a train on tracks, fools us into thinking that there is a path that all of our lives follow. But the movie, through Benjamin's "unusual" situation, shows us how impermanent our lives are, how subject to change through others and ourselves.
Amidst all this deconstruction, there are a couple of thematic threads in the narrative that I don't entirely agree with. The American ideal of a disassociation from history is present, even romanticized. Benjamin ultimately returns from his wanderings to be with Daisy, but the mooring to his past is seen as willful. By contrast, The Great Gatsby offers a much sterner critique of the American idea of total reinvention.
Furthermore, the movie uses the premise to glorify the adult adolescence of Benjamin, indulging a male fantasy of ditching responsibility in favor of wanderlust. Benjamin's forgiveness seems to come merely by virtue of Daisy's love for him, which continues through her maternal care of him as an infant, another male fantasy.
The cinematography and directing reinforces this critique of timelines, with clearly stylized ocean scenes and frequent references to time. Through Benjamin's story, we realize that the other characters' adherence to these fictions of temporality is a frame of mind rather than a hard and fast external reality.
Conclusion: overall, a really good movie. Really good performances, good pace, good directing. Better than Slumdog.
The genius of the movie, however, is that the emotional weight of the movie comes from the entirely normal parts of Benjamin's life--meeting people, falling in love, leaving, watching people die. It doesn't take a person growing younger to experience the discomfort of life's changes.
It is in this sense that Benjamin Button is a truthful movie, in that it exposes through a narrative conceit our collective fantasy of permanence. Since we all grow older, we perpetuate a delusion that we are all traveling along the same timeline, something like traveling together on a train. Benjamin Button explodes this myth by creating a character that is traveling the opposite way on the tracks. The other characters in the movie seem to regard him as some sort of abnormality, which thrusts his entirely normal life into relief.
The myth of traveling along the same timeline, like a train on tracks, fools us into thinking that there is a path that all of our lives follow. But the movie, through Benjamin's "unusual" situation, shows us how impermanent our lives are, how subject to change through others and ourselves.
Amidst all this deconstruction, there are a couple of thematic threads in the narrative that I don't entirely agree with. The American ideal of a disassociation from history is present, even romanticized. Benjamin ultimately returns from his wanderings to be with Daisy, but the mooring to his past is seen as willful. By contrast, The Great Gatsby offers a much sterner critique of the American idea of total reinvention.
Furthermore, the movie uses the premise to glorify the adult adolescence of Benjamin, indulging a male fantasy of ditching responsibility in favor of wanderlust. Benjamin's forgiveness seems to come merely by virtue of Daisy's love for him, which continues through her maternal care of him as an infant, another male fantasy.
The cinematography and directing reinforces this critique of timelines, with clearly stylized ocean scenes and frequent references to time. Through Benjamin's story, we realize that the other characters' adherence to these fictions of temporality is a frame of mind rather than a hard and fast external reality.
Conclusion: overall, a really good movie. Really good performances, good pace, good directing. Better than Slumdog.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
gripe
I'm annoyed for several reasons, and I don't know what else to do about it, so here goes. The Protons ended up having to pay $10 for the privilege of playing in Velour's Battle of the Bands. Thanks, Corey Fox! Mind you, this is in addition to the FREE LABOR that we already provided in writing, rehearsing, and performing our songs (without which he wouldn't have any attraction for people to pay him $5), promoting the stupid thing, and moving our gear and bodies down to Provo. Can I get you a drink, too, Corey? Need your feet rubbed? Thanks soo much for providing little Provo with the coolest venue ever, without which Provo's "scene" would surely dry up and blow away.
After the show I was offered some unsolicited dating advice from someone who has no knowledge of my dating life. Wtf?
On my way out of my favorite city in Utah County, a police officer on foot had set up camp with a radar gun on the corner of Center St. and 500 W. He shined a flashlight at me and told me to pull over. Apparently I was going 28 in a 15 mph zone. After he informed me of this, he went back to his police car and made himself a cup of tea and watched an episode of Sanford & Son, or at least that's what he could have done with the amount of time he was gone. His partner meanwhile pulled over another speeder, who happened to be a Velour crony who liked the Protons. The cop came back and told me he would give me a ticket, but for 24 mph instead of 28 mph, as if he was doing me a f****** favor. He wouldn't tell me what the fine was, because I have to call a number after 4 days but no later than 15 days on the 3rd wednesday of a waning gibbous or some equally byzantine arrangement.
I've been wearing mesh bottoms all day.
To top it all off, I live in a society that persecuted a beautiful religion to the point where it had to bury its most profound, peculiar doctrines and live in some freakish Disneyland simulacrum in order to survive. By all indications, the leadership and most of the membership of said religion are still preoccupied with demonstrating to a particular American demographic its loyal patriotism to American values, even though said demographic will never accept us and probably barely exists anymore anyway, unless you count the members of the religion who now seem, oddly enough, to be keeping afloat the values of the same culture that for generations tried to extinguish said religion. And, in the thick of the bizarre machinations of this P.R. stunt I'm getting chewed up and thrown to the wayside because I represent in my thinking and speech EXACTLY THE SORT OF RADICAL, ICONOCLASTIC RELIGION THAT THE CHURCH USED TO STAND FOR.
And one last thing while I'm bitching. People who worry about being cool are insecure and overprivileged.
After the show I was offered some unsolicited dating advice from someone who has no knowledge of my dating life. Wtf?
On my way out of my favorite city in Utah County, a police officer on foot had set up camp with a radar gun on the corner of Center St. and 500 W. He shined a flashlight at me and told me to pull over. Apparently I was going 28 in a 15 mph zone. After he informed me of this, he went back to his police car and made himself a cup of tea and watched an episode of Sanford & Son, or at least that's what he could have done with the amount of time he was gone. His partner meanwhile pulled over another speeder, who happened to be a Velour crony who liked the Protons. The cop came back and told me he would give me a ticket, but for 24 mph instead of 28 mph, as if he was doing me a f****** favor. He wouldn't tell me what the fine was, because I have to call a number after 4 days but no later than 15 days on the 3rd wednesday of a waning gibbous or some equally byzantine arrangement.
I've been wearing mesh bottoms all day.
To top it all off, I live in a society that persecuted a beautiful religion to the point where it had to bury its most profound, peculiar doctrines and live in some freakish Disneyland simulacrum in order to survive. By all indications, the leadership and most of the membership of said religion are still preoccupied with demonstrating to a particular American demographic its loyal patriotism to American values, even though said demographic will never accept us and probably barely exists anymore anyway, unless you count the members of the religion who now seem, oddly enough, to be keeping afloat the values of the same culture that for generations tried to extinguish said religion. And, in the thick of the bizarre machinations of this P.R. stunt I'm getting chewed up and thrown to the wayside because I represent in my thinking and speech EXACTLY THE SORT OF RADICAL, ICONOCLASTIC RELIGION THAT THE CHURCH USED TO STAND FOR.
And one last thing while I'm bitching. People who worry about being cool are insecure and overprivileged.
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
music
All I want to do is music. So imagine my delight when I came across 8 or 9 old bits of songs lately that I can turn into real songs. Imagine your delight when I drop a couple on you pretty pretty soon. The Super Midnight stuff was a detour, so I'm going back to pop music. But I'm keeping the ambient drones. Plus distortion.
Also, I've got Adam and Darcie in the live Straight Up! show, and I think it's sounding pretty good. You should all come June 19 to the Au Revoir Simone show. (A&D's new album is terrific, btw)
In addition to Straight Up!, I'm also going to play in an emo band with Phil Smallwood called Will Darkness Listen. And there has been talk of a Neil Young cover band. And I've been talking to Mr. Rook about recording, because I've been serving him up some fresh beats. Best summer ever.
Also, I've got Adam and Darcie in the live Straight Up! show, and I think it's sounding pretty good. You should all come June 19 to the Au Revoir Simone show. (A&D's new album is terrific, btw)
In addition to Straight Up!, I'm also going to play in an emo band with Phil Smallwood called Will Darkness Listen. And there has been talk of a Neil Young cover band. And I've been talking to Mr. Rook about recording, because I've been serving him up some fresh beats. Best summer ever.
Monday, June 01, 2009
speaking up days XII and XIII: personal virtue and mass rape, respectively
Ok, so I missed a Speaking Up Day in May. I meant to do it, but didn't have time in my busy schedule of bike rides to the library and playing with Susan the dog.
May's Speaking Up Day wouldn't have really fit the form anyway. Going along with my manifesto post, I want to challenge those of you who would accept to improve yourself as a means of social change. Specifically, find the one thing that makes you the angriest, find the worst criminal you can imagine, and purge yourself of that very impulse; find the proverbial beam in your own eye.
June's Speaking Up Day has to do with mass rape. Rape is often used as a weapon of war and terror, but doesn't tend to get acknowledged as such. During the Civil War in Liberia from 1989 to 2003, 75% of Liberia's women were raped. In an article, Nicholas D. Kristof (who I really like) describes how this atrocity of war persists to the present.
So I'm piggy-backing on his idea:
"This is one of those fields where links and support from around the Web could create a groundswell to focus more attention on sexual violence, and that’s the first step toward getting respectability for the cause — and, then, for prevention efforts" (from "Silence is the Enemy").
If you're concerned, read the article, link to it, write your Congressperson, do something that will break through our distaste for discussing sexual violence.
UPDATE: There is now a Facebook group.
May's Speaking Up Day wouldn't have really fit the form anyway. Going along with my manifesto post, I want to challenge those of you who would accept to improve yourself as a means of social change. Specifically, find the one thing that makes you the angriest, find the worst criminal you can imagine, and purge yourself of that very impulse; find the proverbial beam in your own eye.
June's Speaking Up Day has to do with mass rape. Rape is often used as a weapon of war and terror, but doesn't tend to get acknowledged as such. During the Civil War in Liberia from 1989 to 2003, 75% of Liberia's women were raped. In an article, Nicholas D. Kristof (who I really like) describes how this atrocity of war persists to the present.
So I'm piggy-backing on his idea:
"This is one of those fields where links and support from around the Web could create a groundswell to focus more attention on sexual violence, and that’s the first step toward getting respectability for the cause — and, then, for prevention efforts" (from "Silence is the Enemy").
If you're concerned, read the article, link to it, write your Congressperson, do something that will break through our distaste for discussing sexual violence.
UPDATE: There is now a Facebook group.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
