An update to the UVic Students’ Society ban on the military story;
It’s interesting. In the past few days, my feelings have run the gamut from shame, to anger, to excitement, to pride, to hope.
Today was a victory for democracy and freedom of choice. In an overwhelming display of disapproval for the UVic Student Society board of directors’ paternalistic and elitist attitude toward the student body, we packed over 100 students into the upper lounge of the Student Union Building (SUB) for the UVSS meeting. Many spoke of their frustration over the motion passed earlier this month, students abhorred by the decision of the board to give in to the demands of a small faction of the student body who wished to “send a message to the military” by banning them from recruiting in our SUB and condemning our men and women in uniform as “war criminals” on nothing but allegation.
At the beginning of tonight’s meeting, a motion was added to the agenda to put the matter of the ban to a student body-wide referendum at the annual general meeting, a movement which was passed. What ensued was more than 2 hours of speeches from students, both for and against overturning the motion from earlier this month to ban the Canadian Forces, though admittedly, we outnumbered the UVic Students Against War (SAW) group by an extremely wide margin.
The SAW crowd claimed that they were not suppressing freedom of speech or freedom of choice. They brought forth their usual tirades about “imperialism”, “militarism of Canadian society”, “allegations of torture”, etc, which they felt justified them in campaigning to the board on September 10th, even without a representative of the military present to defend the CF. One anti-war activist stood up and accused us of attempting to intimidate them by organizing and rallying our numbers to the meeting, saying that in fact it was US who were in the minority. I sincerely doubt that. They had just as much warning about the meeting as we did, organized appropriately, and brought out everyone who supported their argument. It just so happened we did the same thing and brought nearly ten times their numbers. One of them even played the race card, denouncing our side as “mostly white” privileged and upper-class students. When one member of our side, a student-soldier who had served seven months in Afghanistan, spoke of the merits of the Canadian Forces’ work in that country as well as emergency responses in crises at home, the minute SAW crowd interrupted with cries of “whatever!” “bullshit!” and “shut up!”
The motion to overturn the ban until the vote at the AGM was carried easily. Most of the board members who voted in favour of the ban abstained, while the remaining directors unanimously voted to overturn it.
So, for the next few weeks at least, the Forces are still welcome in our Student Union Building. The matter will go to a popular vote, as it should have in the first place. If the movement to permanently ban the military should win, I will of course be disappointed, but so be it. What counts is that the student body as a whole now has the opportunity to decide for themselves, not a board elected by 8% of all, manipulated by leftist radicals and voting on their own politics, rather than the voices of those who elected them in the first place.
This has become a movement which transcends the political spectrum of left and right. It is a matter of freedom of choice and the right to hear a pro-military voice in this institution, as well as pursue a career in the armed forces should we so desire. We = have the momentum, and I believe we will win the vote at the AGM in the end. If I am wrong, then at least the matter will have been settled by open democracy.
Graham Noyes
3rd year Political Science and Military History student, University of Victoria.
Update – Graham Noyes was interviewed by Charles Adler today. You can download the segment at the CJOB audio vault (beginning at 3:44).
Does this collection of “learned” azzhats receive public money?
If so and they want to bar the people that preserve their freedom; Their funding should be cut off.
Indeed. Tax cut now please.
In the mean time, way to go Graham Noyes. Nice smackdown.
Re the “SAW” crowd:
It amazes me how this campus utopian freak show can go on generation after generation with the same tired dogmatics accepted on faith, unrevised by reality and historic record…are campus politics stuck on stupid?…has the body count of self-destructive altruism become an unknown on campus? …just WHAT is it in this utterly debunked utopian leftist dogma that attracts the weak minded like moths to a bug light?
Two thumbs up for Graham Noyes! I agree, if these anti military students enjoy their freedom so much (ie: the right to vote) then maybe they should smarten up and realize that their freedom was obtained by good men and women that have fought for their freedom so they could grow up and be asshats!
What is going on with this society?
Go U Vic students
Great to learn that many more than a few of the students have finally decided it is time to take action of the extreme political correctness of Minority Rule.
May the smackdown on referendum be overwhelming
I agree, Good Job Graham,,,,,,,
The Voices of Freedom will not be silenced.
,
Had a prof that used to refer to these people as “Little Red Guards”, I concurr and add they are Little Stalins in waiting.
When I was in university in Ontario the student society was a leftist hive filled with students who were just barely passing their courses (and in some cases failing altogether).
I hated those organizations then and I hate them now.
I had to pay fees to support their low-quality newspaper, and I had no choice – had to pay! What a total scam it was.
So none of this surprises me. My father and I were just commenting how sad it is to see that universities are slowly being taken over by people who are not interested in the truth. Just walk down the corridor of any liberal arts department and look at the propaganda on the office doors to see what I mean.
It does not bode well for the future.
Good for them.
Back when I was at SFU a small group monopolized the Student Union and Newspaper simply because they showed up and stood for election and voted. As a consequence the leadership was far more radical than the student body. The solution was/is simple stand up and be counted and drown those silly radical voices with the voice of the majority.
Graham Noyes – I’d like to applaud your extremely intelligent and articulate outline of the whole situation – and the work you and your fellow students have done to ensure that, at UVic, free speech operates within a requirement that decision-making must be based on reason and evidence.
recalling the words of U.S. Marine Corps Padre Dennis O’Brian
It is the soldier,not the reporter,who gives us freedom of the press
It is the soldier,not the poet,who has given us freedom of speech
It is the soldier, not the campus organizer,who has given us the freedom to demonstrate
it is the soldier,not the lawyer, who has given us the right to a fair trial
it is the soldier,who salutes the flag,serves under the flag and whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protester to burn the flag.
Cheers Bubba
Has anyone heard? Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is a guest speaker at one of those universities in California. Check out http://www.frontpagemag.com for more details.
Wow, democracy at work. What a concept, although I think Graham has learned more from this political exercise than SAW.
I think the lesson for us all is that the “silent majority” cannot be silent anymore lest they find the loons running the asylum.
“”When I was in university in Ontario the student society was a leftist hive filled with students who were just barely passing their courses (and in some cases failing altogether).””
Sounds all too common TJ…this was my experience as well…way back in the day when these utopian reds had true monopolistic control of campus politics, the only hive of “counter revolutionary dissent” was in the Business admin and engineering departments…we hated these commie asswipes with a passion…primarily because we all knew when we had graduated (and they didn’t) it would be the productivity of the business and engineering grads that these red parasites would rob to live in comfort…just like they did on campus.
We had no time for fancy counter demonstrations and political movements on Campus…we were too involved passing our semesters…but we did make strikes at them….like the time they monopolized the campus press for their propaganda…one of the guys from engineering got a key to the press room so we snuk in at night and reversed the polarity on the press motors….that kept their vile paper and flyers off campus for a while…eventually we monkey wrenched the press completely, effectively shutting them down and allowing some new blood to come in to student council.
Shows that campus commies are a clone of their soviet bretheren….their fortunes rely in monopolizing propaganda mediums and political boards…and doing both on someone else’s stolen cash.
Isn’t it amazing how ‘power of the people’ only works one way in lefty land?
If you are not on comrade ‘x”s side, you are a tool of the imperialists!
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Week Released: September 17-21, 2007
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I disagree with Mr. Noyes with regards to part of his last paragraph.
“This has become a movement which transcends the political spectrum of left and right.”
In my opinion he should have written:
“This has become a movement which defines the political spectrum of left and right”
Since the student council has banned a Federal Department of the Government from “their” campus the Feds should suspend all funding to UVIC until it is resolved. All Federal Grant money for studies, all student loans and bursaries should be called back. Any grants to Professors from any Federal Department should be audited.
Any research grants should be frozen, especially to the Humanities and Social Sciences since they appear to have already made up their minds and require no further research funds.
It is amazing how being cut off from the public purse will clarify the thoughts of these people.
These people are BULLIES! The way to combat them is to not take their BS. Bullies take over by intimidation and all lefties are schooled in the art.
So UVic will be attempting to defeat the motion the proper way. It will be interesting to see if the left accepts a democratic result….my bet is no. To them there is only one path in History and it is to them. Anything else is a deviation.
At the end of the day freedom of speech is being restricted by banning a group from recruiting for no other reason other than others dont like their job.
Solve it locally to put them in their place. But worse comes to worse…yank the funding, the military should sue the student union and bankrupt them….that is way to do things.
These arguments are all too familiar to me from 20 years ago. Not much has changed. Budgets that are disconnected from the priorities of the student body.
Maybe its a good lesson for the future.
“….just WHAT is it in this utterly debunked utopian leftist dogma that attracts the weak minded like moths to a bug light?….”
The key element of that question provides the answer! ” weak minded ”
Congratulations to Mr.Noyes for standing up to the brats!
He is well on his way to being a responsible adult.
Good on Mr. Noyes for not only participating, but for keeping me informed.
Funding reductions to the applicable departments seems appropriate. They sure as heck won’t go out and earn the money to make up the difference.
Thanks,
Pat Patrick
Thank you Graham. Very much.
Bravo Mr. Noyes. Thank you and your compatriots for standing up to those deluded sniveling parasites.
When will they ever learn.
hi everyone. no thanks neccessary, this is an ongoing collective effort.
if anyone is interested, i’ll be on the Charles Adler National Radio Show at 4:30 eastern time.
…hey this is university, what did you expect?
TJ wrote, “My father and I were just commenting how sad it is to see that universities are slowly being taken over by people who are not interested in the truth.” Only one disagreement here, TJ: the universities were rapidly taken over by people averse to the truth back in the sixties! (I was there and, like most of us here at SDA, have lived unhappily with the fallout in Canadian institutional life–schools, courts, churches, commissions, police boards, unions, etc.–ever after.)
Graham Noyes, well done! Give ’em hell–and get your supporters out to whip those ignorant, arrogant brats around the block! It couldn’t happen to a more deserving group.
It’s been said of Universities that the politicking is so vicious because the stakes are so small. Leftists seem to have a visceral fear of allowing others to choose freely. Thus their frequent attempts to ban, disrupt, shout down, silence, coerce, threaten, blockade, interfere, harras, vandalize, ridicule, attack ad hominem . . . in short anything but engage in a rational discussion of differeing points of view and accept at the end of the day that others may continue to hold a viewpoint differing from theirs. This incident is a perfect example — deny others the option to make a choice for themselves.
Lefties do not like to compete.
It’s a pervasive mindest that lies beneath their actions, inactions, attitudes, ethics, relationships with others, and solutions to problems.
…speaking of universities and colleges, just a question regarding the administrative/executive support staff in those places?
How many men work there? I don’t notice any. One place I contract at, I think I’m the token male sometimes.
Nothing wrong with a lady working, but the balance seems to be off me thinks.
Old saying “Too many hens make a lot of clucking.”
They’re getting fed up in Colorado too.
“300 at CSU urge firing of editor over anti-Bush profanity “
http://tinyurl.com/34h6gg
Congratulations and thanks to Graham Noyes and the other UVic students who refused to be silenced and who stood up for the right to their own opinions. The west in general, and western universities in particular, continues to show an unhealthy, self-defeating deference to those claim that their self-reported righteous indignation is caused by the fact that others won’t shut up.
Someone’s got to call the bluff. The activist left’s influence on our universities is far greater than their actual numbers merit, and I think a lot of it stems from their mob-rule mindset. They are a hundred times more willing to make public displays — to disrupt meetings, to heckle, to form mobs, to break windows, etc., — and this gives them a level of prominence and influence that is far out of whack; even when the agitating forces aren’t present to back them up, as at the UVic AGM, they still evince that same mob mindset which suggests that the time for debate is passed, that it’s time for “action”, their own opinions are correct and conclusive and unassailable — note the SAW’s students’ cries of “Shut up!” and “Whatever!” when an opinion opposed to their own was being voiced.
Again, thanks and kudos to Graham Noyes and the others. It may have been just a UVSS meeting, but what went on there was significant, and a very hopeful sign.
Reducks
****reversed the polarity on the press motors….****
these wouldn’t have been AC motors , would they??????
These UV elitist act just like those over at rabble.ca. Disagree a smidgen and micheal the femanazi, white male hating hero jumps in and shuts you down pronto.
Series AC/w cap assist start…like all the ancient AB Dick offset presses…you can make em run in reverse with removing 4 bolts and changing the PTO point to the press transmission.
“…just WHAT is it in this utterly debunked utopian leftist dogma that attracts the weak minded like moths to a bug light?”
The answer is easy. The aquisition things that were not earned. This is the basic fundimental of left-wing socialist policy.
“The aquisition of[sic] things that were not earned”
Including, but not limited to: freedom of speech and assembly, law and justice, safety and security…
The good-for-nothing’s want
something for nothing.
The opposite of diversity is monotony.
David E Toronto: Where does simple stereo (with a subwoofer or two) fit in?
Mark
Ottaw
Rumours are swilling around campus that the student newspaper will be joining the fray by publishing a newspaper with the headline F*#K BUSH.
WL Mackenzie Redux I thoroughly enjoyed that story of yours. And your comments are smack on. Thanks!
The solution to problems such as that which occurred at UVic are to eliminate student unions as they simply serve to attract deranged individuals who view them as the first step in their journey to leader of the people. During my student days I protested the payment of student dues every time I had to fork out this money for no obvious benefit. In my undergraduate days I had enough free time that I ran for biology department representative (a position I got primarily because no-one else wanted it) and decided to spend the funds allocated on providing low cost beer for the students at various functions. I was criticized for not providing any educational component so once I hired one of the physiology profs to give a talk about the pharmacology of ethanol before we all headed for the free wine and cheeze purchased with our funds. I managed to get an arrangement with the engineers to run TGIF’s which, against all expectations, made money even though we sold beer for $0.25. The “progressive” types did things like waste their funds in bringing in speakers such as David Suzuki; I saw him over 30 years ago and my first impression was that this guy is an idiot (an opinion I’ve had no need to change since then).
In graduate school and medical school I no longer had the time to get involved with how my student fees were spent as I was more concerned about getting a degree. Fortunately nothing as egregious as what happened at UVic occurred at the universities I was attending during this time as this would have gotten me riled up enough to take action.
Three cheers for Graham Noyes. Kate, please continue to keep us apprised of this story.