Spring Break
'Indoctrine U' raises brows, offers insight
Politics on Wheels
Emily Barry
Issue date: 4/14/08 Section: The Other
On Tuesday, April 2, the ETSU Society for Intellectual Diversity (SID) held a showing of the Evan Coyne Maloney film "Indoctrinate U." Held in the Brown Hall auditorium, the event attracted the attendance of students and faculty from a variety of departments and political persuasions.
The event was co-sponsored by the College Republicans and the Department of Sociology and Anthropology.
I decided to go to this event because I feel that, despite its decidedly conservative political undertones, the movement to ensure the rights of students and faculty at universities is an important one.
And after the show that David Horowitz, a prominent conservative advocate, put on last spring, I knew that an event hosted by SID would be thought-provoking if nothing else.
Chris Strode, the president of SID, gave a brief introduction detailing the organization's goals.
With obvious sincerity, he made it very clear that the purpose of the organization is to get the word out to students of their right to learn in an educational institution which is free of indoctrination to a certain ideology. I thought to myself, "That's something I can support. Maybe this movie will be better than I am expecting."
And in a way, it was. "Indoctrinate U" also served as commentary on the state of intellectual freedom on college campuses through the utilization of anecdotal evidence and "guerilla journalism."
"Indoctrinate U" told a few disturbing stories about the treatment of conservative students at universities such as Duke, Berkeley and the University of Tennessee.
The film was able to make me feel sorry for these students. It brought up an issue which needs to be talked about: is the liberal majority in our country's colleges and universities abusing its power, and if so, to what degree?
Unfortunately, that's where the effectiveness of the movie ended.
The film's basic premise is that both students and faculty at universities across the country are being discriminated against due to their political beliefs. The political beliefs in the film, however, were all conservative.
The event was co-sponsored by the College Republicans and the Department of Sociology and Anthropology.
I decided to go to this event because I feel that, despite its decidedly conservative political undertones, the movement to ensure the rights of students and faculty at universities is an important one.
And after the show that David Horowitz, a prominent conservative advocate, put on last spring, I knew that an event hosted by SID would be thought-provoking if nothing else.
Chris Strode, the president of SID, gave a brief introduction detailing the organization's goals.
With obvious sincerity, he made it very clear that the purpose of the organization is to get the word out to students of their right to learn in an educational institution which is free of indoctrination to a certain ideology. I thought to myself, "That's something I can support. Maybe this movie will be better than I am expecting."
And in a way, it was. "Indoctrinate U" also served as commentary on the state of intellectual freedom on college campuses through the utilization of anecdotal evidence and "guerilla journalism."
"Indoctrinate U" told a few disturbing stories about the treatment of conservative students at universities such as Duke, Berkeley and the University of Tennessee.
The film was able to make me feel sorry for these students. It brought up an issue which needs to be talked about: is the liberal majority in our country's colleges and universities abusing its power, and if so, to what degree?
Unfortunately, that's where the effectiveness of the movie ended.
The film's basic premise is that both students and faculty at universities across the country are being discriminated against due to their political beliefs. The political beliefs in the film, however, were all conservative.