Archive for 10/24/2003

Hey Kids!

Oct 24th

Posted by David Veksler in [...]

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Perhaps in response to the widespread ban of “Jewish” Barbie dolls in Muslim countries, an American company has created Razanne, a Muslim Barbie. Um…no comment.
Praying Razanne

In related news, a survey by a evangelical Christian group claims that that 81% of American’s believe in some sort of an afterlife, and 90% are open to the possibility, but only .5% believe that they are headed for hell. 48% of the younger generation believes that it is possible to talk to the dead, and 18% believe that they will be reincarnated. I wonder how many of them watch John Edwards, the “biggest douche in the universe?” No comment on this either, other than a favorite quote of mine from Thoma’s Paine’s “The Age of Reason“:

I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish Church, by the Roman Church, by the Greek Church, by the Turkish Church, by the Protestant Church, nor by any church that I know of. My mind is my own church.

Comments on the GLBTA/YCT Service Fee Debate

Oct 24th

Posted by David Veksler in [...]

3 comments

The university-funded “Gay Lesbian and Transgender Alliance” debated with the self-funded “Young Conservatives” tonight. Here are the comments I posted at a local forum:

The GLBTA president is a typical leftist. His sole argument was: “Students are not capable of deciding which groups they should support, so their money should be forcibly taken from them for their own good. This is justified because the free flow of ideas and my freedom of speech is limited if I can’t forcibly take other people’s money to promote views they oppose.”

The president of the YCT replied: “Students should be able to decide which groups they support by choosing which organizations their money will go towards.” (Of course if they do this, they might as well support them by paying dues.)

What he should have added:
The right to free speech is solely the right not to have the government forcibly stop you from presenting your views to others, not the “right” to force others to support your views. Governmental coercion is the only valid meaning of the word “censorship.”

I disagree with the conservatives because I think that universities should be able to limit what students can and cannot say on campus and where they can say it. The function of a university is to educate, not to provide a forum for different political views. While school-sponsored events like “Muslim Awareness Week” and “Coming Out Week” are thinly veiled attempts to brainwash students with leftist multicultural garbage, their conservative versions (school-sponsored religious groups, strict visitation rules, etc) are no more justified at a public university. While I believe that all education should be private, I think that private schools should implement the same guidelines.

New Essays

Oct 24th

Posted by David Veksler in [...]

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It’s been a few months since I added any essays to my site, so it’s time for a new one: “Creativity, the Man-Made and the Metaphysically Given” (Let me know if you have a better title for it.) I also added my essay on sex. I wrote it several months ago, but was never satisfied with the results. (Though the conservatives at Texags seemed to like it.) However after 6000 words, I’ve gotten so sick of the topic that I slapped on a “work in progress” and uploaded it.

I’ve been lazy about writing essays lately – mostly because my blog allows me to jot down my thoughts without the formality of writing a self-contained and structured theme. It doesn’t help that I’m taking a full load of classes and working. However, I’ve almost finished my first round of exams, and will try to write a few editorials before the next deluge of class work hits.