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Thread: Rogue professor's Bush-bashing has Fresno State scrambling to keep donors

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    Obvious Rogue professor's Bush-bashing has Fresno State scrambling to keep donors

    By Lukas Mikelionis | Fox News




    A Fresno State professor who called the late Barbara Bush “racist” soon after her death Tuesday, and said she was glad “the witch is dead,” continues to face fallout as donors mull ceasing donations to the institution.

    Randa Jarrar, an English professor at the school (also known as California State University at Fresno), sparked outrage Tuesday just hours after the former first lady died at age 92, writing a number of tweets attacking Bush and the family.

    “Barbara Bush was a generous and smart and amazing racist who, along with her husband, raised a war criminal. F*** outta here with your nice words,” the professor tweeted. “I'm happy the witch is dead. Can’t wait for the rest of her family to fall to their demise the way 1.5 million Iraqis have.”



    Jarrar, a tenured professor, boasted on social media that because she has tenure, she won’t be fired from her job. She’s currently on leave this semester and was reportedly traveling overseas.

    Amid the backlash, someone on social media shared Jarrar's publicly available work phone number and email address, to which the professor responded with a phone number for a crisis hotline at Arizona State University, saying that’s her number, prompting a flood of calls to the hotline that normally receives just a few calls per week.

    A university investigation is underway. But several donors to Fresno State are reportedly considering whether the university deserves their contributions.

    Ed Dunkel Jr., who made sizable financial contributions to Fresno State, said he will await the outcome of the controversy before deciding whether to close his checkbook.

    “I have a lot of friends that I've been talking to, and these are people who donate now and talking about holding back, and some are even questioning whether to send their kids to Fresno State," Dunkel told the Fresno Bee.

    "I admire and have a lot of respect for President (Joseph) Castro and huge affection for Fresno State," Dunkel said. "But I have huge concerns. This represents such an embarrassment to the university and the community. It's hard to believe this is an isolated thing that just happened. I have to imagine people previously knew of this person's character and what she's about."

    Fresno State President Joseph Castro acknowledged that he’s been having conversations with donors regarding the controversy.

    "The conversations I'm having are more about their concern, and I share that concern. I understand where they're coming from. I'm asking them for understanding here as we work through the complexities of this issue,” he told the Fresno Bee.

    "They're outraged, and I'm outraged as well," he added. "This is behavior that is unacceptable as a university that models the development of leaders. We just cannot tolerate it."

    On Wednesday, the school seemed to make a point of posting on Twitter that campus flags were at half-staff in memory of Barbara Bush.

    The school's College Republicans also tweeted that they were "outraged" by Jarrar's comments.

    But while Jarrar is facing calls to be terminated, she attracted support from multiple advocacy organizations and professors who defended her right to free speech.

    “Jarrar’s tweets are unquestionably protected speech under the First Amendment and Fresno State has no power to censor, punish, or terminate Jarrar for them,” Adam Steinbaugh, senior program officer for FIRE (Foundation for Individual Rights in Education), said in a statement to Fox News.

    FIRE also joined other free speech advocacy groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), in opposing the university’s decision to investigate Jarrar, saying it conflicts with the First Amendment.

    Another controversial Fresno State professor, who was demoted after tweeting that President Donald Trump “must hang” in order to “save American democracy,” said the university is failing to live up to its promise to defend academic freedom.

    Lars Maischak, a history lecturer, wrote an article for the Bee claiming the university professor is siding with attackers of Jarrar rather than standing up to the “fascist threat to academic freedom.”

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    Fresno State Professor Randa Jarrar: The Psychology of Pure Hate

    By Alex Berezow - American Council on Science and Health




    Randa Jarrar, an English professor at Fresno State, is rightfully in hot water. In a Twitter tirade, she called the recently deceased Barbara Bush an "amazing racist" and said she was "happy the witch is dead." For good measure, she wished death upon the rest of the Bush Family.

    Let's set aside the issues of free speech and tenure to focus on a bigger underlying concern: The psychology of pure, unadulterated hatred. How does a person become so consumed with animosity for a fellow human being?

    Hatred is a toxic emotion that can be understandable, such as when a person is the victim of a crime. Likewise, hatred of historical monsters like Adolf Hitler and Osama bin Laden are understandable, even if the crimes were committed against other people. Yet, even under these extreme circumstances, every major religion warns against hatred. Hatred consumes a person, and it makes one do and say things that are destructive. That's why, "Love thy enemy," is such an important (yet monumentally difficult) command. It helps keep society from falling apart.

    Despite the widespread prevalence and societal consequences of hatred, the psychology literature doesn't have much to say about it. Yes, there is plenty of research on racism, sexism, and other "-isms" or "-phobias," but this hatred is directed at entire groups of people. But there is little on the psychology of personal hatred, i.e., the hatred one person feels for another individual person. How does this happen, especially if the people don't even know each other?

    The Psychology of Pure Hate

    A behavioral analyst for the FBI provides some insight. In an article about the psychopathology of hate, Dr. Jack Schafer describes a "seven-stage hate model" for Psychology Today. Though his article is about the behavior of hate groups, such as Neo-Nazis, his model appears to have some applicability to personal acts of hatred toward individuals. In summary, the seven stages are:

    1. The haters find other haters to validate their hatred.
    2. The hate group defines itself through symbols, rituals, and mythologies.
    3. The hate group disparages the target.
    4. The hate group taunts the target.
    5. The hate group attacks the target without weapons.
    6. The hate group attacks the target with weapons.
    7. The hate group destroys the target.

    Obviously, Steps 5-7 don't apply here. But, Steps 1-4 certainly do.

    Step 1. It's clear from her own words that Jarrar hates the Bush Family. It is rather easy to find plenty of other people who feel the same way in academia and especially online. During the 2000's, the hatred of President George W. Bush was so common (and irrational) that psychiatrist and TV pundit Dr. Charles Krauthammer coined the tongue-in-cheek term "Bush Derangement Syndrome."

    Step 2. If you have the stomach to do so, Google the term "Bush protest" and look through the images. Protesters regularly portrayed the President as Hitler or a terrorist and burned, hung, or stabbed him in effigy. The images are quite sickening. Jarrar harkened back to this hateful mythology when she referred to the Bush Family as "genocidal."

    Step 3. Without question, Dr. Jarrar disparaged the target of her hatred, the Bush Family. If somebody (perhaps a Fresno State investigative team) does some digging, it probably wouldn't be difficult to find a very long history of her engaging in this type of behavior against the Bush Family and probably many others.

    Step 4. Once again, without question, Dr. Jarrar was taunting the Bush Family. Her mockery of Barbara Bush recalls the callousness and hatred displayed by the Westboro Baptist Church at soldiers' funerals.

    Thankfully, her hatred did not progress further, but Step 4 is bad enough. Randa Jarrar is in need of some serious self-reflection and soul-searching, as improbable as that seems.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Teh One Who Knocks View Post
    But while Jarrar is facing calls to be terminated, she attracted support from multiple advocacy organizations and professors who defended her right to free speech.

    “Jarrar’s tweets are unquestionably protected speech under the First Amendment and Fresno State has no power to censor, punish, or terminate Jarrar for them,” Adam Steinbaugh, senior program officer for FIRE (Foundation for Individual Rights in Education), said in a statement to Fox News.

    FIRE also joined other free speech advocacy groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), in opposing the university’s decision to investigate Jarrar, saying it conflicts with the First Amendment.
    Um... read the First Amendment again, peeps. Congress shall make no law, etc etc etc... Fresno State is not Congress, and your employer can tell you to shut the fuck up, or fire your ass for not doing so, any damn time they feel like it.


    Warning: The posts of this forum member may contain trigger language which may be considered offensive to some.

    Music was better when ugly people were allowed to make it.

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    Quote Originally Posted by DemonGeminiX View Post
    Um... read the First Amendment again, peeps. Congress shall make no law, etc etc etc... Fresno State is not Congress, and your employer can tell you to shut the fuck up, or fire your ass for not doing so, any damn time they feel like it.
    Yup, while everyone has the right to free speech in this country, and I fully support the First Amendment unequivocally, using your right to free speech doesn't come without consequences.

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    Exactly..

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    Remember what happened to the Dixie Chicks? Arguably the most popular and biggest country band/group at the time and their lead singer Natalie Maines ran her mouth (free speech) at a concert saying she was ashamed to be from the same state as then President George W Bush. Ruined their careers. Country stations stopped playing their music. People stopped buying their CD's. People stopped going to their concerts. They were done.

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    In the same way, the donors choose to speak with their wallets. I would respond with "don't blame the donors for harm done to a University who employs professors with such a lack of human decency".
    I wanted to be a Monk, but I never got the chants.

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    Update Fresno State prof blasts farmers as 'stupid' Trump supporters in video rife with F-bombs

    By Benjamin Brown | Fox News




    A video posted online this week includes profanity-laced clips from past interviews and speeches by embattled, Bush-bashing Fresno State professor Randa Jarrar, in which she says farmers who support President Donald Trump are "just f---ing stupid."

    The nearly 4-minute YouTube video, published Wednesday under the username Vigilante Goose, was emailed Friday to university officials -- including university President Joseph Castro, the Fresno Bee reported.

    Jarrar, an English professor at the school, also known as California State University, Fresno, ignited a firestorm Tuesday, just after news broke about the death of Barbara Bush, whose funeral is scheduled for Saturday in Texas.

    In Twitter posts Tuesday, Jarrar called the late first lady an “amazing racist,” and said she was “happy the witch is dead.”

    WARNING: VIDEO CONTAINS GRAPHIC LANGUAGE



    Outrage over the posts has had Castro and other university officials worried about alienating key donors -- and sparked debate among the faculty over the professor's free speech rights.

    As part of the fallout, the university also has been dealing with reports that Jarrar listed the phone number of a student crisis line in Arizona as being her own number, resulting in a flood of calls to the crisis line.

    'The bigger person'

    The video posted this week opens with Jarrar commenting about the agriculture industry, which is vital to the Fresno area.

    “A lot of the farmers now are Trump supporters and just f---ing stupid,” she says, adding that she “can’t f---ing stand the white, hetero-patriarchy.”

    At another point, Jarrar talks about guns, and criticizes "the left" for being too "gentle" in dealing with "the other side."

    “I don’t give a f---. I’m buying guns. I’m an American, I’m buying guns,” Jarrar says. “You know what, the other side is doing some stupid s—t. I’m going to do some stupid s—t. I'm tired of, like, being the bigger person — literally am, usually — but, like, I'm also just tired of the left being, like, f---ing stupid and being like, ‘No we have to, like, be gentle' … no, don’t be f---ing gentle.'"

    To some, the video may appear to be intended to embarrass the professor by recycling her most controversial comments, but the professor herself appears to view it differently, calling the compilation “iconic.”

    "A troll made a beautiful clip of all my recent greatest hits,” Jarrar wrote on Twitter this week, and included a link to the video, the Bee reported.

    Jarrar has since made her Twitter account private following the slew of tweets about Bush, in which she also said she “can’t wait for the rest of her family to fall to their demise the way 1.5 million Iraqis have.”

    As for the fallout her posts have generated, Jarrar taunted that she “will never be fired” as she is a tenured professor making $100,000 per year, and “will always have people wanting to hear what I have to say.”

    University president responds

    Castro took to Twitter himself Thursday to address Jarrar’s comments that sparked national outrage, saying that he too was “upset” and believes it is “important for us to condemn that part of what was done and said,” while stressing the need to “continue to role-model leadership” while upholding the First Amendment rights.

    “A single set of tweets does not define the success of our university,” he said.

    The video shows Jarrar’s profanity-laced comments eliciting different reactions from audience members who heard her speak. But at one point it shows people walking during an appearance in Indiana, the Bee reported.

    What was Jarrar's reaction?

    “I’m so proud when people walk out of my talks," she says.

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    “A single set of tweets does not define the success of our university,” he said.
    Um, yes it does. If you sit idly by and the only thing you do about it is serve up platitudes, then it definitely reflects upon your university.

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    Update Professor who tweeted anti-Barbara Bush comment applauded at arts festival

    By Lukas Mikelionis | Fox News




    The embattled Fresno State professor who tweeted out against Barbara Bush last week was hailed on Saturday by a local literary community and received backing from civil right groups.

    Randa Jarrar, a tenured English professor at the school (also known as California State University at Fresno), sparked outrage after she called the former First Lady “an amazing racist” moments after she died and said she’s happy “the witch is dead.”



    Jarrar has since left the country and is currently on leave this semester. A university’s investigation is underway.

    Although the professor was widely condemned for her remarks, a local Fresno literary festival applauded her each time they heard her name.

    Jarrar was set to headline LitHop, a day-long festival for the art community, but withdrew just days before the Fresno event due to the controversy.

    "I support Randa Jarrar's free speech and I also denounce any violence against her or threats of violence against anyone else," Lee Herrick, founder of LitHop, told the audience of around 100 people, The Fresno Bee reported.

    Juan Luis Guzman, director of the festival, said the controversy over Jarrar’s remarks brought the community together. "I saw a lot of people showing their love and support for Randa," he said.

    Carmen Giménez Smith, a poet and the new headliner of the festival, dedicated a poem to Jarrar that included the passage “a writer is dangerous,” according to The Bee. The poet said Jarrar is a writer who tests the limits and pursues liberty through her literature.

    Jarrar also received support from a Fresno State lecturer who claims to have been demoted after tweeting that President Donald Trump “must hang” in order to “save American democracy.”

    Lars Maischak, a history lecturer, wrote Wednesday that the university and the professor is siding with Jarrar’s attackers and is failing to stand up to the “fascist threat to academic freedom.”

    Multiple advocacy groups came out in support of the professor as well.

    “Jarrar’s tweets are unquestionably protected speech under the First Amendment and Fresno State has no power to censor, punish, or terminate Jarrar for them,” Adam Steinbaugh, senior program officer for FIRE (Foundation for Individual Rights in Education), said in a statement to Fox News.

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    i've bashed some bush before, and I enjoyed it

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    Update Fresno State professor who bashed Barbara Bush won't be disciplined

    By Samuel Chamberlain | Fox News


    A Fresno State University professor who celebrated the death of Barbara Bush in a profanity-laced rant on Twitter will not be disciplined, the university's president said in a statement late Tuesday.

    In a note to the "campus community," Joseph Castro said that English instructor Randa Jarrar's comments about the late first lady were "insensitive, inappropriate and an embarrassment to the university," but "are protected free speech under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution."

    Castro added that Jarrar would remain on leave through the spring semester, "which she had previously requested before this incident."

    Jarrar drew outrage when she tweeted hours after Bush's death on April 17 that the wife of one president and mother of another was "a generous and smart and amazing racist who, along with her husband, raised a war criminal." She added, "F--- outta here with your nice words."

    Jarrar also said she was happy that "the witch is dead" and bragged that she wouldn't be fired for her remarks because she had tenure.

    "I make 100K a year doing that," she told one Twitter user. "i[sic] will never be fired. i[sic] will always have people wanting to hear what I have to say."

    In his letter, Castro wrote that the university's action "is an issue of free speech and not related to [Jarrar's] job or tenure."

    A change.org petition calling for Jarrar to be fired had garnered more than 45,000 signatures as of Tuesday evening.

    "Our duty as Americans and as educators is to promote a free exchange of diverse views, even if we disagree with them," Castro wrote near the end of his letter. "At Fresno State, we encourage opinions and ideas to be expressed in a manner that informs, enlightens and educates without being disparaging of others."

    Jarrar grew up in Kuwait and Egypt and moved to the United States after the Gulf War, according to her university faculty page.

    She describes herself in her Twitter messages as an Arab-American and a Muslim-American woman.

    In an email to New York magazine Tuesday, Jarrar said that she "absolutely" stood by her comments about the Bushes.

    "The Bush family — including Barbara Bush — supported policies that harmed and destroyed the lives of millions," she wrote, adding "I am not the only person who has stated the belief that Barbara Bush was a racist. But women of color routinely have their tone policed, their justified anger painted as hatred, and their criticism of injustice framed as racism toward white people."

    The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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    Thats OK.. Let them face the consequences.. Go economics.

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