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Letter to the Editors
By Shamal Stegeman
Published May 31, 2012 at 3:45 pm

I want to congratulate City on a Hill Press for its public exposure of the vile racism and hate speech that lecturer Tammi Benjamin offers to this Campus year round. Finally the truth comes out when she admits her belief that, “advocating on behalf of the Palestinians is advocating against a certain people and a certain national group” (CHP May 24th 2012, pg 9) To be clear, advocating for Palestinians right to self determination from military occupation is NOT advocating for anti-semitism, or even anti-Israeli. For example, advocating against US military occupation of Afghanistan is not Anti-American, it is a critique of America’s current policies of military intervention and the anti-Arab/anti-Muslim racism in this county post-9/11. This “Investigation” is nothing more than a McCarthyist witch hunt to eliminate Palestinian voices and experience from the UCs, similar to how militant right winger and racist David Horowitz and his book “The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America” called out two of UCSC’s most popular professors Bettina Aptheker and Angela Davis. Ms. Benjamin’s accusations are clear to most UCSC students who realize her position follows along that of racists like Glen Beck, David Horowitz, Daniel Pipes, and Andrew Breitbart in their fostering and promotion of the media driven islamophobic hysteria that has taken over this country.

As a side note, CHP’s title of its article, “Anti-Semitism in the Quarry & the Classroom” is a blatant attack on the student run, SOAR sponsored organization Committee For Justice in Palestine’s organizing efforts on the UCSC campus, of which I have participated in for the majority of my four years at UCSC. The same week this article came out, CJP was having its annual “Palestine Awareness Week”, with events in the quarry all week long, all of which were, if anyone from CHP attended, very far from anti-semitic.


This piece here represents solely my views and opinions, not that of CJP, SOAR, or UCSC.

Comments
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  • Concerned

    Perhaps the author of this letter should read the article from March 24, 2012 a little closer and realize the article was restating the language used in the complaint filed against UCSC.  There was no attack against any organization except those stated in the complaint.  Actions such as yours are the reason advocacy groups get such a bad name and looked to as militant children rather than intellectuals with a real purpose.

    • Also Concerned

      great dude! so when you start looking at the bigger picture rather than specifics you let me know ok? lets start: instead of CHP restating racist language from a  BS report, they can question why there is such a racist title in the report to begin with. maybe the person who is wrting the report is ____. anyway you get the PoinT.

  • concerned student

    The Title VI complaint filed by Tammi Benjamin has got nothing to do with CJP, an organization committed to spreading lies and inciting hatred against students who support Israel.
    Shamal, have you read Tammi’s complaint? Because had you done your due diligence, you would have quickly realized that the complaint filed by Tammi Benjamin deals with academics indoctrinating their captive audience (i.e. students) to hate Israel by delegitimizing, demonizing, and applying a double-standard against the Jewish state.
    What’s so racist about asking academics to not use thier classroom to spread what often-times morphs into an anti-Semitic political agenda?

    • More concerned

      Concerned student, you obviously have not actually read the complaint yourself, look at section 4 for starters. Also the way you just described CJP is extreme, hateful, and just could not be farther than the truth. You realize there are Jews and Israelis in that group right? Or are do they not count because they disagree with you?   http://www.zoa.org/media/user/images/Benjamin-Complaint-6-25-09.pdf.