College Republicans' 'Catch The Immigrant' Game Catches Flak (The Nation)

[marmar]

Is there a less-evolved group of cave dwellers than College Repugs? - OP's comment


Yesterday, Nation intern Elizabeth Schuster and I went to NYU to check out the College Republicans' ever-so-tasteful "Catch the Illegal Immigrant" game. The stunt works like this: College Republicans give a student a name tag that reads "Illegal Immigrant" and players scour the campus to find him or her. The winner gets a gift certificate.

This kind of event has been staged by College Republican chapters all over the country. There were about a dozen College Republicans and several hundred students who opposed them. The event demonstrated, once again, how fast word gets around on Facebook, and how powerful this tool can be for campus activists.

It was impressive to see so many passionate students protesting this offensive prank--but it's a shame that this is what it takes to get students out on the streets. Why should the biggest political event of the year at NYU be a response to a provocation by Republicans? Isn't it time for progressives to come up with our own creative tactics for getting students to show up and actively participate?

Video link at: http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070312/young_repulblicans

[Lautremont]

1. I'm just glad they've stopped the "Lynch the Negro" and

"Gas the Jew" games. I mean, they practically had to be ordered to by college officials, but at least they did it.

[ninkasi]

2. College Republicans disturb me

They seem, for lack of a better word, unwholesome. Youth is the time to push your limits, expand your boundaries, and to embrace people, and ideas, which are different. Of course, I turned 17 in 1960, when the limits were being pushed, so that might color my thinking. These young people seem to me to be bitter old codgers, trapped in a youth's body. They seem to have no joy that does not involve expressing disdain and hatred for people, or ideas, that are different.

I am trying to imagine my brothers and I not only clinging to our parent's ideas of what was proper, but actually forming societies with other young people and perpetuating those narrow minded ideas. Unless it expresses itself in hatred for, or violence against, the poor, the needy, the elderly, the children, and all the less fortunate, I can tolerate a great deal of rebellion in young people. These are not NORMAL young people, at least to me.

When I read about their escapades, all of the hate-filled "skits" they apparently delight in, I can see, in my mind's eye, my grandmother's more narrow minded friends, suddenly possessed of youthful bodies, writing the scripts, and performing in the very acts these young/old people delight in. I'm almost 64, so you can only imagine how conservative the mindset of my grandmother's peers was.

All that comes to my mind, unbidden, when I read about these poor deluded young people is what the cry that preceded lepers long ago...
the cry is..."Unclean, unclean..."

[GreenZoneLT]

3. There's a quote about that

I'm not sure who said it. "Anyone under 30 who is not a liberal has no heart, and anyone over 30 who is not conservative has no brain."

Can't say I ascribe to it 100 percent, but I'm certainly a lot more conservative about some things (economics, mainly) at 45 than I was at 25.