Students who turned out to show compassion and solidarity with one side of the war in Gaza get an A for intentions — most of them — and an F for critical thinking.
For me, it’s deja vu. Students camped in tents under signs that said, “Make love, not war” in the 1960s. Then they skirmished with cops, damaged buildings and grounds, intimidated other students who just wanted to go to classes and made war to protest war.
Their simplistic idealism, they claimed, displayed their superiority to evil merchants and politicians who held the keys to the rooms where power decisions were made. They asserted their freedom of speech by shouting down opposing voices.
I hesitate to concede points for idealism when it’s really just another shrugging concession to the game of us versus them. Self-canceling logic fails, like using violence to demand an end to politics of violence.
Maybe a few activists in the “Peace not war” movement were more passionately anti-war because they were facing the draft.
Some of them went to campus riots. Others of us went to Vietnam. Not everyone had a choice. Peer pressure was strong on campus; Uncle Sam had some clout with the reluctant warriors.
Idealism. Lots of sales pitches out there for it, and plenty of innocent, well-meaning but gullible shoppers among the mobs trashing the grounds and buildings of universities.
Apologists for mob mayhem has always left me cold. Here’s some irony: I became a writer because my senior high school essays in English class led my teacher to push me to speak out against social injustices.
There was plenty to write about in the late 1950s. Racism, child neglect, poverty among the elderly, inadequate health care, imbalance of wealth and opportunity.
Plenty of things to be ticked off about, all the way back to the first breath drawn by the second human who arrived at the party of civilization.
With less than two years of college education, the case could be made that I lack standing for engaging in any dialog about the campus turmoil. Today I speak up for far too many would-be students, kids and adults who would love to have the opportunity to get an education and a degree, but are thwarted because of inadequate funds, guidance, support and awareness of how the world works.
When I see students who really do care about others rising to protest business as usual in American education, business and politics, I have mixed feelings. And a question: Have the protesters thought for a moment that being partly right is not a license to destroy things?
Do they consider the possibility that their wisdom is incomplete?
Protesting students seem to presume their own knowledge and wisdom to be superior to those holding responsibilities now. That’s hubris, born of passion.
Some targets of today’s students were among anti-establishment campus protesters a generation ago, but they’ve learned things. That’s wisdom and critical thinking, born of experience.
Today’s protesters might have to be patient and earn the credentials to lead the world, as our current leaders have.
In the meantime, they can learn how to exercise freedom of speech without crossing the line into vandalism. We have a system of government that limits power to power, but somebody always wants more than their share.
Dean Minnich writes from Westminster.
