Among the Intellectualoids / My Life With "The Kids "
London, Herbert I.
"Among the Intellectualoids / My Life With The Kids" by Herbert I. London The age of the sixties passed, but for me it left none too soon. I confronted student radicals and found them to be intolerant, inhumane,...
...On May 11, 1970, the faculty council, of which I was a member, met to discuss what action we might recommend to the entire faculty in response to campus agitation...
...Two days later a contingent of revolutionary action students visited my office, again demanding that my files be opened for inspection...
...It is patently extreme to compare this era with the rise of Nazism...
...There he urged that we "use our natural s t r e n g t h s . . . t o replace (in Marina v.N...
...From my perspective, this position totally disregarded the rights of those who had paid for and wished to attend classes...
...But in those days it was one thing to pass a motion and quite another to follow it through...
...She was 17, had been raised in upstate New York, and was pumped up with social justice slogans and eager to assist the downtrodden...
...This was the year of the strike--of the Cambodian invasion and Kent State...
...Air mail rates sent on request...
...Persuasion and compromise" are as loathsome to the Rev...
...When I inquired about it, he said, "Because you're a conservative, we don't believe you can adjudicate radical claims fairly...
...In the New York Times he wrote that our media "defamed [Khomeini] in many ways, associating him with efforts to turn the clock back 1,300 years, with virulent anti-Semitism, and with a new political disorder, 'theocratic fascism.' " In the 1930s there was t h e America First movement...
...This meant that school would remain open, but demonstrators would have the right THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JANUARY 1980 27 to be absent without penalty...
...Yet on one issue, noted by Peter Gay in The Weimar Culture, there does appear to be a similarity: As the need for absolute morality increases, the concern for human decency decreases...
...To make the matter perfectly clear, I mentioned the case of a homosexual who f e l t discriminated against by one of his professors...
...I softly responded, "You' re welcome to try...
...Most of our enemies want nothing to do with liberal democracy, and some even bray at material riches...
...After considerable wrangling over the wording of a resolution, it was agreed that: "At their option [my italics], students may be excused from classes and finals for the duration of the semester...
...They also alleged that I was a racist and elitist because the white victim in my story was murdered in an ostensibly nonwhite neighborhood...
...Even so, the demonstrators pelted me with eggs and tomatoes, and forcibly prevented me from entering my office...
...The basic moral force that exists in our system" is repugnant to him, and to the comrades and colonels of this orb "moral force" is the stuffof comedy...
...Considering what appeared to be their sincere expressions of concern, it seemed only reasonable to accommodate anti-war _9 protestors, yet at the same time give those who wished to attend class the opportunity to exercise that right...
...The fundamental tenets of the America Lasters were pithily set out by Mr...
...I smiled, clenched my fist, asked them Herbert L London is Dean of the Ga/latin Division of New York University...
...Holbrooke reminded us that "we still possess...
...In 1975 I met such an idealist...
...Falk found the old scowler progressive, and the dreaded Yankee in error...
...But I felt if my students were in the classroom, I had a moral and legal obligation to be there as well...
...The faculty approved, as an olive branch to the minority, another motion which opposed United States military action in Southeast Asia...
...The gang of political inquisitors left, mumbling obscenities and threats about future confrontations...
...What I wrote was a fable that intentionally altered the facts of this one case, but, I hoped, contained the spirit of a generational tale...
...Holbrooke hoped "that we will recognize that we do not need to dominate the world in order to live safely in it . . . . And above all, we must retain our belief in the exceptional nature of our system of democracy...
...One now hears glib denunciations of the McCarthy era on campuses all over the country...
...One week prior to their demonstrations against me, I had surgery on my knee and was forced to use crutches...
...Abu Abdul Rasoul AlRida spoke for millions when he said, "The West, whose civilization is visibly crumbling in a morass of hedonism, unbridled mmerialism, social indiscipline and the rule of special interest groups, naturally fears the rise of a rejunvenated Islam and the alternative moral values it posits to the West's discredited myths of democracy and liberalism...
...Those who opposed the motion maintained that the "heinous crime" in Cambodia warranted symbolic action by the faculty in the form of a total strike...
...I could not--in fact, still cannot-accept the distinction between "creative oppression," which radical stu...
...S e v e r a l springs passed, and I managed to stay out of the path of the hurricane...
...could not make decisions...
...Khomeini singing of his superb character and commitment to "social justice...
...She used her university experience as a way to get involved with the "real people" in the inner city...
...Since I applied no political test to the cases I exacnined, and since I had only the power to recommend matters to the dean, the charge seemed silly, and I dismissed it out of hand...
...A reporter listened politely to my account for about ten minutes and then said, "If I accept your explanation then we have no news story...
...As the elected ombudsman representing student grievances, I found the request (I would not acquiesce to a "demand") most unusual...
...In a letter in the November 10 issue of the Economist, a Mr...
...Khomeini as underwear ads and toothpaste...
...In the end, all the talk about conscience and morality did not mean much when pitted against student pressure...
...Box 1969 Bloomington, Indiana 47402 Please enter a [ ] new [ ] renewal subscription to The American Spectator for: [ ] 12 issues for $12 [ ] Best offer: 36 issues for only $30 [] Payment enclosed [ ] Bill me later PLEASE PRINT Name Address City State Zip Canadian and foreign subscribers, please add $2 per year for postage...
...A generation has been paralyzed by its moral outrage...
...I pushed my way through the angry crowd amid shouts of "fascist pig, fascist pig...
...This time the issue had nothing at all to do with the confidentiality of my files~my term as ombudsman having e x p i r e d - - b u t with the equally important matter of using force to inhibit classroom attendance...
...I spoke of the universally felt remorse at the Kent State tragedy, the need to preserve academic freedom, and the importance of respecting the rights of non-striking students...
...At this point I was dean of a EDITORIAL (continued from page 5) are dozens more yawps like this and there are thousands more solemn idiots propounding them...
...Anyone who entered the building encountered fierce invective and jostling...
...For an hour and a half I shouted...
...Almost one year to the week later, I was once again put to a test by student radicals...
...He said he represented a student revolutionary action group interested in protecting students from "political harassment...
...But it wasn't easy...
...I had no choice but to give my lecture over the ubiquitous bullhorns...
...Our present peril issues from the fact that we have allowed our foreign policy to be dominated by popinjays...
...They refused...
...Richard Holbrooke, our President's Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, in a 1976 issue of Foreign Policy...
...Some students were so outraged by the soon designated "pusillanimous decision" of the faculty that they vowed to shut down the college...
...Moreover, I argued that I was protecting the confidentiality of my records which, if abrogated, could cause harm to individuals who trusted me with personal information...
...Whitman's words) 'leadership based on hegemony with leadership based on persuasion and compromise.' " Moreover, Mr...
...I confronted student radicals and found them to be intolerant, inhumane, and insipid: But the key point is that they prevented me from doing what the university paid me for doing, and prevented my students from obtaining the knowledge they had a right to receive...
...There were no takers, but one of the self-styled revolutionaries asked, "Why do you think the protection of property is worth as much as the protection of person...
...Since only the demonstrators were interviewed on camera, I called the station to offer my side of the story...
...This sanctimonious vaporing has inspired three years of foreign policy blundering for which the civilized nations of the world will be paying dearly for years to come...
...It was amusing to see signs in front of my office which read, "London is racist"--I immediately thought of Anglophobes who were protesting British immigration policy...
...At the very least, I maintained, idealism should be tempered b y a healthy respect for risks...
...28 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JANUARY 1980...
...Perhaps I was so enervated by the events in May 1970 college, proud of the progress my division had achieved, and generally well regarded by colleagues and students as a sound administrator...
...dents maintained was essential for a responsive university, and repressive oppression, of which I was alleged to b e culpable...
...These people maintained that I had maligned the girl's character in order to convey a message: " a condemnation of idealism practiced by today's youth...
...when they did, it was at meetings hastily called, on poorly drafted motions, after debate unworthy of being called rational...
...Finding myself the reluctant leader of a caucus that felt uneasy about its position, I prepared my first major address to the faculty with caution and tact...
...They are self-righteous and intolerant, and choose facile slogans for hard thought...
...Despite a few guerrilla-theater types who shouted "shut it down," on the whole the meeting went smoothly...
...I would not, and could not, permit this rabble to drive me from my position, particularly since most of my opponents were neither students in my college nor students in the university...
...The result of my efforts was another confrontation with radicals...
...Then he hung up...
...However, I had never mentioned the race of her assailant...
...It is painful to recall those days, but it is worth doing so in the interest of setting the record straight...
...The very next day there was a cordon of student radicals in front of the building in which my class was to be given...
...On a spring day in 1969, I received a visit from a student who demanded to see my files...
...This illustration of nameless characters seemed to do the trick...
...Since Vietnam's fall our foreign policy has been in the paws of an America Last movement, and I only wish I could have been in Istanbul-pen and pad in hand--to record Mr...
...With little or no consideration of the issues, university students were willing to jeopardize two hundred years of tradition in the name of "the revolution...
...Professors SCRIBEI I AMERICAN SPECTATOR ITODAY THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR P.O...
...It wasn't good deeds that I criticized, hut an inabiIity to recognize our own limitations...
...After several months of working on a project on the Lower East Side of New York, she was brutally beaten to death...
...In the vote that followed, the faculty approved the council motion by a margin of 120 to 103...
...Exhausted at the end of the session, I discovered to my astonishment that mine was the only class that had been held...
...I decided to tell her story...
...Yet very few of those doing the denouncing trouble to examine their own actions during the sixties and early seventies...
...Whenever I think about this alleged distinction, I'm reminded of Dostoevsky, who wrote that "the difference between left and right wing oppression is like the difference between cat and dog excrement-anyway you look at it, it's still excrement...
...I kept my position, and ultimately had a chance to refute some of the charges made against me...
...Professor Falk, for instance, returned from his visit with the Rev...
...For a perceived moral principle, they were willing to disregard the rights and welfare of others...
...that I could no longer marshal the .--~ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . _9 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . strength to oppose the latest activist cause...
...whence they derived the authority to make this "request," and invited them to leave...
...I managed to weather this storm, too...
...the basic moral force that exists in the principles of our system of government...
...Since my file cabinet contained the only copy of a manuscript that took two years of my life to complete, I pointed out that I might--depending on the circumstances--be willing to put up a fight in order to protect my property...
...I responded by pointing out that the purpose of my story was to prevent episodes of this kind from being repeated...
...MY LIFE WITH "THE KIDS" by Herbert I. London The age of the sixties passed, but for me it left none too soon...
...Clark's reaction as he was repeatedly denounced by the Holy Man and his sweating disciples as a "dirty character...
...A campaign was launched in the student newspaper and in mimeographed hand-outs for my resignation...
...While students demonstrated in front of the auditorium, the faculty met to discuss the motion...
...It was apparent to me that academe during that time bore a strong resemblance to Elsinore...
...That settled the issue, or so I thought...
...My amusement came to an abrupt end when the demonstrators had a CBS affiliate cover their pseudo-event for the six o'clock local news...
...This condition, however, did not prevent anti-war protestors from using their "idealism" to try to solve other problems...
...On the other hand, there were far fewer causes...
...A spokesman, obviously trying to muster all the courage he had, said, "Suppose we take matters into our own hands...
...That explanation fell on deaf ears...
Vol. 13 • January 1980 • No. 1
