2008 Woodie Awards
Interview with Horowitz
A one-on-one interview with David Horowitz about academic freedom.
Jami Furo
Issue date: 11/4/05 Section: News
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David Horowitz came to campus to speak about his Academic Bill of Rights on Tuesday, and The Sandspur got a chance to sit down and talk with him beforehand in an exclusive interview at his hotel.
Horowitz came to Rollins to highlight two main aspects on which the Academic Bill of Rights is based. The first is an element that he calls "academic manners."
The concept of academic manners, according to Horowitz, is the appropriate behavior of professors in a classroom with regard to their expression of political agendas. Horowitz holds that professors are hired based on their expertise in a particular subject matter, whether that is English, math, history, or whatever, and they are not hired to preach their own personal political ideas. Horowitz believes that such behavior is inappropriate in a classroom setting.
"If you go to a [medical] doctor for an examination," he stated, "you don't expect to get a lecture about the war in Iraq…If we expect this kind of professional behavior from our doctors, why don't we expect it from our math teachers and our English teachers?"
Horowitz found it significant that he encountered several professors who expressed "hostility" toward him and toward the students organizing the event, saying that it concerned him to find that kind of opposition toward his push for "academic freedom," as he calls it.
The other major point in his Academic Bill of Rights is "intellectual diversity," which allows students to access different points of view. Horowitz believes that professors are in a position to preach to and demand from their students a particular political idea, having the power to alter those students' grades based on their agreement with or opposition to that idea.
"[Professors] should have enough self-control not to leak their political prejudices into their classrooms," Horowitz asserted.
He went on to say that it can harm students' educations to only hear one viewpoint. However, he said it may not be in the way that the professors expect.
Horowitz came to Rollins to highlight two main aspects on which the Academic Bill of Rights is based. The first is an element that he calls "academic manners."
The concept of academic manners, according to Horowitz, is the appropriate behavior of professors in a classroom with regard to their expression of political agendas. Horowitz holds that professors are hired based on their expertise in a particular subject matter, whether that is English, math, history, or whatever, and they are not hired to preach their own personal political ideas. Horowitz believes that such behavior is inappropriate in a classroom setting.
"If you go to a [medical] doctor for an examination," he stated, "you don't expect to get a lecture about the war in Iraq…If we expect this kind of professional behavior from our doctors, why don't we expect it from our math teachers and our English teachers?"
Horowitz found it significant that he encountered several professors who expressed "hostility" toward him and toward the students organizing the event, saying that it concerned him to find that kind of opposition toward his push for "academic freedom," as he calls it.
The other major point in his Academic Bill of Rights is "intellectual diversity," which allows students to access different points of view. Horowitz believes that professors are in a position to preach to and demand from their students a particular political idea, having the power to alter those students' grades based on their agreement with or opposition to that idea.
"[Professors] should have enough self-control not to leak their political prejudices into their classrooms," Horowitz asserted.
He went on to say that it can harm students' educations to only hear one viewpoint. However, he said it may not be in the way that the professors expect.