Good Afternoon:

As some of you may know, I attend Wright State University, a young but major public university in the state of Ohio. Notable alumnus: David Albright. Few others. I’m dual majoring in international business and political science, and I’ve become increasingly angry at the international business program here for what I feel is a major lack of study abroad and internship opportunities. Even if the recession ended just recently, the program itself has no excuse for being as poor as it is. We have a top notch accountancy program here. I applied to Miami University (Oxford), one of the best business schools in Ohio and I’m looking forward to transferring there. But I digress.

I really have a problem with the student body here. As a majority they are politically inept and all profess to be liberals. When President Obama’s election results were announced the cheers were so loud that riot police were called in. Around 1/4 of the student body is black, and all the police around here are white so some people think it may have had racial motivation; but thankfully there was no drama. I have mostly black friends and even though many were Obama supporters and still are, they have the ability to formulate their own opinions. Most of the WSU student body, white or black, is under the control of what I call the Mass Media Mind Numb; believing everything they hear on MSNBC and/or being apathetic to politics, economics, military affairs, and instead diverting all their attention to Lil’ Wayne, reality shows and basketball. (This may have something to do with our low admissions standards) They don’t formulate their own opinions. It never occurs to them. I often get the “politics are stupid. I hate politics”, from people who are majoring in pre-med oriented majors or, much to my dismay, those in the business college. I try to tell them how important taking an interest in politics is to their fields and they refuse to listen.I want to turn your attention to something I like to call selective referencing, its quite reminiscent of what goes on in Muslim countries and should be considered an abomination to anyone who believes in the Bill of Rights.

The biggest problem I have with the Paul Laurence Dunbar Library and the californioleftist student body at Wright State University is their “banned books” campaign. If they’re so adamant about free speech in literature, why do they have so few books by intelligent conservatives regarding economics, especially when it comes to education? More importantly; why so few books that portray the negative aspects of the Quran and Muslims when they have a significant selection of books citing the historical violence of Catholics or Israel’s so called “attack” on Palestinians!? There are a significant amount of books relating to terrorism, and even Islamic terrorism. Probably because most of the faculty in the political science department is pragmatic and moderate and recommended it. But I did a paper on the history of Islamism in Afghanistan and the United States’ role in creating it last summer and I couldn’t find hardly anything on the truth about how violent Muslims were in the dark ages. I couldn’t find anything pertaining to Muslim conquests of Afghanistan. It was difficult to find, but I found how some were able to live in peace with Christians and Buddhists. I couldn’t find how the others killed non-Muslims.

There are many good works on the history of jihad and Muslim crusades. The only books on Jihad I can think of that are in Dunbar are by a Lebanese man, Walid Phares, of whom I am a fan. One of my favorite authors is a man named Robert Spencer, the director of Jihad Watch. He’s a Catholic, who I think is of Arab descent because he looks Middle Eastern and something he said in a documentary said his grandparents or parents lived in the Middle East, its hard to find a good bio on him. He’s not a Jew (many people say he is, mostly sociologically retarded Muslim Arabs). Not a single one of his works is in Dunbar. Not one! This upsets me. Now think about this. Why? Well, if you ever walk around Wright State you’ll notice we have an extremely large population of South Asians. We also have a lot of students from the Arab world. I’m almost dead certain I’m the only non-Muslim Arab at Wright State University.

I have a few Muslim friends. They’re actually Saudi Arabian. Now, most of the Saudis here I don’t like, because they hang on to Sharia law, which I believe is incompatible with American constitutional values, as well as Western secular democracy in general. Guess what? Most Islamists agree with me! These particular Saudis, two Shia and one Sunni, are modernists. As oppressed minorities in the KSA, the Shias tell me they are more open to other faiths, and distrusted the Saudi government. The Sunni, ironically enough, is a very nice guy, who modernized his faith personally and became an American citizen. He actually said in Saudi Arabia this benefits him because he can go to a place for Americans that sells alcohol! Wow, hypocrisy in the KSA (alcohol is illegal there)! He also has an Israeli friend, wants to go to Israel (but, like me, can’t because of security laws and lack of relations). He tells me personally that in Saudi Arabia, from the time they are young they are taught to virulently hate Jews and distrust Christians and other non-believers. Infidels who are not the People of the Book (Jews/Christians), mostly Hindu guest workers, are basically treated as slaves. They are even beaten, and there is no law to protect them.

Back to Robert Spencer. Spencer is not afraid to write about this. He has studied Islam extensively, all the way back to the formation of the religion/political order. Why wont his perfectly credible books be in a library at a major public university, with a mostly moderate and pragmatic liberal arts faculty? Why is he nonexistent at a school that talks about banned books, and even has a “Banned Books Week”. I’ll tell you why. Western sympathizers, neoliberal apologists, maybe even a Californioleftist student body. But even that doesn’t cover it. What does is that with so many Muslims international students here, so few of them modernist (I see the Hijab way to much. Turkish scholars claim that it isn’t even in the Quran), the people in charge of selecting the books for the library don’t want to offend the Muslims. Awwwwwww, they don’t want to make the Muslims cry. (Actually, they are probably afraid of Muslim protests that would ensue!) Yet they have books that talk about Israelis in a negative light. They have books that talk about the Catholic crusaders. Apparently when it comes to whack-jobs like Pentecostal “Quad God”; who offends everyone from Atheist to Zoroastrian, Wright State administration respects the First Amendment. The Quad God is this crazy old man that goes around college campuses telling everyone their going to burn in hell, Catholics, Mormons, Jews, and especially gays.

Before you call me as biased as the book selection I’m condemning, consider this. Sometimes the right has a problem with banned books too. Christian Coalition types will often want books on atheism, secularism, pornography, or with suggestive themes of promiscuity, sexuality, or violence banned. They have their reasons, but they also have the choice to not read them. Many Christians simply choose not to read them. Others lobby for their removal from local libraries or schools. See, the religious-right has the same problem, just on a smaller scale than political correctness pandering neoliberals.

I have a big problem with this hypocrisy! I would expect this from a small, private, liberal arts college with no accreditation. I would to a much greater extent expect it from a public university within the University of California system. Wright State University is too recognizable and well-respected of an Ohio educational institution to be reduced to this, and there needs to be drastic change in this type of selective referencing. Don’t get me wrong. Dunbar Library is huge, and has an excellent selection for almost every subject. I simply find it hypocritical that there aren’t enough conservative-minded books on certain subjects, nor books on Islam that are offensive to Muslims.

Am I being mean? Hell yes! But I’m also being fair. Being truly fair will always be interpreted by someone as being mean, especially when it comes to history. Blacks will not want to see biographies of slave owners. White will be ashamed of them. German-Americans will feel regret about the holocaust. Russian-Americans will feel regrets about communism. Japanese-Americans as well as WWII veterans will have their resentment about fighting each other, when the nations are now economically inseparable. History is full of offensiveness. But we are to learn from it. There’s a Chinese proverb that a man who makes no mistakes never learns anything. How can you avoid failure if you don’t know what causes it? History is unfair. It will especially, from a logical and secular point of view, treat Muslims offensively.

Its truly unfair to have books that are offensive to Christians, or Jews, or Hindus (haven’t seen one but there probably is one somewhere) and have virtually none that are offensive to Muslims. Its especially unfair in a secular nation with freedom to worship or not to worship. With freedom to criticize, or not to criticize. The great polemic writer of the Enlightenment, Voltaire, who fearlessly criticized the Catholic rulers of his time, is often recognized by his famous words “Je désapprouve ce que vous dites, mais je me battrai jusqu’à la mort pour que vous ayez le droit de le dire” or in English “I disapprove of what you say but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it”. The only difference between a biased book collection and banned books is a statute!

A Harvard educated professor I had last year told our class something during a discussion and it has become one of my favorite quotes of all time. He said “if you want to keep people in bondage, don’t give them John Locke”. An unbiased book collection is the most obvious way to remove the shackles of ignorance and prejudice. Our founding fathers recognized this. Its why they wanted freedom of speech, the press, and the right to worship as one chooses. It allows people to expand their minds and solve problems that an oppressive regime, like those still found in Saudi Arabia, Iran, and other countries still prevents as of the 21st century.