More egregious excesses by offended students: demands for removing the name of “Lynch” from college building

December 9, 2015 • 1:30 pm

This tw**t, by FIRE’s director of speech-code research, alerted me to an article in PennLive.com news:

https://twitter.com/SamatFIRE/status/674597565430685696

According to the article, students at Lebanon Valley College in Pennsylvania are objecting to a building named after Clyde Lynch, president of the college from 1932-1950.

Students at the private college in Annville have demanded administrators remove or modify Dr. Clyde A. Lynch’s last name, as it appears on a campus hall, due to the associated racial connotations.

The demand was made at a forum on campus equality issues held Friday, capping a week of demonstrations calling for changes at the predominantly white institution.

In that time, organizers, including members of a Black Student Union group, have been calling for policy changes they say are needed to address long-standing “institutional injustices” impacting a variety of groups on campus.

(Note: the students have expressed willingness to compromise if administrators add Lynch’s first name and middle initial to the building’s title.)

Well, deal with the real injustices, and stop picking on completely irrelevant issues. Don’t the students realize that a demand like this renaming acts to trivialize their whole cause? Think of all the buildings that would have to be renamed because their donors have names that are “triggering.”

There is, of course, pushback:

A commenter going by the screen name “10xchamps,” who identified himself as a recent graduate of the college, said “Anyone with half a brain would know that the name has nothing to do with racial connotations. It’s the last name of a very generous donor who probably helped fund many of these students.”

According to its website, Lynch led the college through the Great Depression and World War II, helping to raise $550,000 for a new physical education building which was named for him following his death.

The building, which housed the college’s basketball court for more than 50 years, was “revitalized” into an all-academic center in 2003, now known as Lynch Memorial Hall.

My only comment is “oy.”

108 thoughts on “More egregious excesses by offended students: demands for removing the name of “Lynch” from college building”

  1. I thought a college is supposed to educate people. These students are ignorant and lack comprehension skills.

    1. Well, it is- it’s just that these “snowflakes” are spending more time whining about what “offends” them than getting educated!

    1. Guess you haven’t heard yet about her name-change … maybe she hasn’t heard yet, either.

  6. They shouldn’t rename Lynch Memorial Hall.

    But the building across the quad, named after the venerable John L. WhitePeopleRule, should probably be changed.

  8. Would this be a bad time to wonder if the apparently spineless university admins are just giving the students enough rope?

  9. Wow, shades of Philip Roth’s novel The Human Stain, where a tenured professor gets run off campus by the PC-police because he asked his class if a pair of students who hadn’t shown up all semester were “spooks” (as in ghosts or goblins) — or the contretemps that sometimes surrounds use of the word “niggardly.”

    Guess the University of Warsaw won’t be naming any on-campus theaters after Sidney Pollack, or any art galleries after Jackson Pollock, huh?

    1. Okay, we’re definitely banning the word “semester” too, because it comes from the Latin word “semenstris” which sounds like semen and therefore oppresses me as a woman.

      As Heather says below, if this is the best they can come up with in the Great Oppression Scavenger Hunt Of 2015, then society is actually improving quite a bit.

      1. So, Grania, you think this Lynch business could become the seminal event in a PC backlash?

      2. As a woman with the name, “Diana” I move that we ban the words “lunatic” and “hysterical”.

          1. As Diana/Artemis is, among other things, the goddess of the moon, I don’t know that one can all that easily do away with “lunatic,” eh? 😉

          5. I hate that song because my parents thought it was awesome to play it for me as a kid and as someone who doesn’t like attention on her, I found it really uncomfortable.

  10. If this is the biggest thing in their lives these kids have got to complain about, they’ve having a pretty great time of it.

    1. Can’t those kids understand that there are other kids in San Bernardino and Syria and Paris and Iraq that have their own problems?

      1. Do you think those kids even know that San Bernardino and Syria and Paris and Iraq exist???

      2. IIRC, some Black Lives Matter folks too offense at all the media attention given to the Paris murders (putatively taken away from them). Have any of them made similar complaints about the San Bernardino murders?

  11. the students have expressed willingness to compromise if administrators add Lynch’s first name and middle initial to the building’s title.

    Well long building titles are annoying but otherwise that seems like a reasonable compromise. Lebanon Valley College should just make it and move on, IMO.

    I wonder, though…if they’re going this route, shouldn’t they rename their college Lebanon Not The Place In The Mideast But The Place In Pennsylvania Valley College instead? I mean you wouldn’t want anyone who triggers at the mention of Lebanon or Lebanese people to be offended by the College’s name, would you?

    1. Name the building as follows:

      “Lebanon Valley College in Pennsylvania Memorial Hall and Former Home of the Flying Dutchmen Basketball Team in Honor of Dr. Clyde Alvin Lynch, President from 1932-1950, Who Raised 550 Thousand Dollars and Probably a Family”

      This can wrap all the way around the building.

      (Yes, I searched for his middle name)

      1. Flying Dutchmen? My grandmother’s brother was lost at sea, this reminds me of that. Safe space violation! Safe space violation!

        1. I’m offended by the word “trigger” in “trigger warning,” because I’m reminded of the trigger of a gun, and guns have been used to kill people. Quit it! If you don’t quit it, I’m tellin’!

      3. Flying Dutchman. Wagner lover?! Are you equating the basketball teams to Nazi’s? Of course you are. It always comes to that. 🙂

        1. You talkin’ about a Honus Wagner lover? The Hall-of-Fame shortstop for the Pittsburg Pirates during the dead-ball era? They called him “the Flying Dutchman,” too.

  12. All these kids are trying way too hard at being offended. It’s a joke. Am I just unaware of a national contest with a million dollar prize of who can be the most offended by the most trivial matter?

    And just think, 8 states now allow students to carry concealed guns on campus. Talk about a trigger warning.

    1. I’m just waiting for the moment when some nut shouts “Trigger THIS warning!” before going on a shooting rampage. You know it’s inevitable.

  13. How did “Jesus College” at Cambridge survive for so long? Isn’t that name terribly offensive to Jews, Muslims, and atheists?

    Then there’s “Corpus Christi College,” “Churchill College,” and (gasp!) “Darwin College.”

    There are lots of colleges in the USA that have to be renamed, like Jefferson Davis College and George C. Wallace Community College. I presume there are major student protests at those schools, right?

    1. Jesus College – I don’t know about Jews, Muslims and Atheists, but I’ll bet it’s popular with Mexican students.

      2. I’m reminded that some were offended that a U.S. Navy nuclear ballistic sub was named after the Texas city Corpus Christi. An apparent compromise was found in naming it the “City of Corpus Christi.”

        1. Yeah, that’s da Jesus I figured it was named after. Most likely their bowling team has lavender uniforms…

    2. Muslims believe that Jesus was a prophet and that the virgin Mary was his mother, as do Christians, not that any of this makes any difference except to those who believe in and and kill over the finer theological points of such mythological claptrap. They believe in Jesus as a prophet, not god, one in the line extending from the OT prophets to “the seal of the prophets,” Muhammad. You’ll find Muslim women named Maryriam or some variation thereof. But don’t know of any Muslim men with the Arabic equivalent of Jesus as a first name. Not saying there aren’t any.Dunno.
      Re Ken Kukek and Grania Spinies above, one must convene a seminar to discuss this matter of the semester. I recall that in the 70s or 80s, some radical feminists wanted to re-name seminars “ovulars.” This nuttiness has been going on for a long time. Why, doesn’t it say in Ecclesiastes there’s nothing new under the sun? See, the bible is correct! Just the other day, I heard someone complain about the continued use of “niggardly”; wanted the word retired. Etymology didn’t matter, it was the sound. All this is ridiculous. No end to it. Can I get someone to testify to that? Gotta castrate that word from the lexicon, too. At least find a way to neuter it. All this craziness gets me a-thinkin’ about the old Tower of Babel, in which this hard-core unbeliever nonetheless finds fascinating metaphors.

      2. “Muslims believe that Jesus was a prophet and that the virgin Mary was his mother, as do Christians, not that any of this makes any difference except to those who believe in and and kill over the finer theological points of such mythological claptrap.”

        Except Muslims categorically reject the central message of this “prophet” (that he is the Son of God sent down to save mankind), so it’s a bit more than finer theological points that are in disagreement. You make it sound like Muslims and Christians believe essentially the same things about Jesus, which is not the case.

        1. I think that her point was just that Muslims shouldn’t have an issue with something named after Jesus. Though, I’d add, you never know who will have issue with what.

        2. My point was precisely as maymarkov stated below; however, I did specifically state that Muslims do not believe Jesus is divine, and so it follows that they would categorically “reject the central message…that he is the Son of God”; I certainly agree with you on that. I thought that simply stating that Muslims deny the divinity of Christ was sufficient but, indeed, I should have added the corollary.

          1. And my point is this. Figures like Abraham, Moses, etc., whose alleged preachments seem to be less contradictory to Islam, can probably be more easily integrated into a chronological and theological narrative leading up the bestest prophet of them all, Mo.

            But in the case of Jesus, he can only be considered consistent with Islam if you reject basically his entire message. In fact, this message is so contradictory that it would seem to be hostile from a Muslim point of view.

            So either Islam does some extreme surgery on the New Testament to make Jesus a “prophet” within the continuum of revelation leading up to Mo, or there actually is some antagonism to the name of Jesus within Islam.

            I get the feeling that this view of “Muslims just see Jesus as another prophet” is another mushy sentiment proffered by well-meaning folks to try to smooth over religious differences.

  14. Palo Alto has a Gunn (sic- 2 n’s) High School which no one has ever suggested renaming.

    I remain amused that I attended a Hyer (pronounced “higher”) elementary school.

    Lynching is named after a Charles Lynch who incarcerated multiple British soldiers without trial during the American revolution.

    1. Thanks for that last bit of info.

      I’m surprised these students aren’t demanding that everyone named Lynch change it to Linch.

      1. Change the name of the building to the “Lunch Building” and make it the cafeteria.
        Boom! Fixed it.

        1. I’m on a diet and I take offence at this … oh, you know the score.
          Count the number of bricks in the building ; raise it to the power of the number of floors in the building ; take the middle 11 digits of the resulting number as the building’s new name, and (not accidentally) it’s new telephone number.

  15. Given how unlikely it is that “unfortunate” names correlate with racist tendencies in the populations at large, I’m wondering if these students are sincere. Perhaps they’re doing this as a form of theatre – or, at the extreme, as a form of self-serving fantasy – rather than because they would soberly expect it to serve an important cause. “Do enough to look morally active and daringly rebellious against the racist establishment, but without actually sticking our necks out for anything.”

    It’s pathetic. A self-proclaimed tiger-hunter could kidnap kittens and be taken more seriously.

    1. I tend to agree, and as weird as this sounds, they seem like the sort of students that think peaches grow in cans.

    3. …how unlikely it is that “unfortunate” names correlate with racist tendencies …

      So appellation is not destination?

  16. Since Lynch is an Irish name, I assume these students are just continuing the bigoted views about Irish people held by some 19th century Americans. Help help I’m being oppressed!

      1. Is this the Paddy safe space part of the thread? Let me in! Lurid green décor, Guinness on tap, complete strangers sidling up to you, asking, ‘How’s yerself?”, diddley-dee singalongs and Prods weeping for the good auld days of 1690. x

        1. Pretty much. Anyone wanting to join has to sing the first 74 verses of Summer in Dublin and / or Fields of Athenry (preferably both) as proof of their commitment.

          1. But I demand a sub-safe space for us discriminated-against ginger-nuts. Céad mile fáilte.

          2. As an Irishman, I object to the colonialist and imperialist Anglo-centric spelling of the ‘Lynch’ building at Lebanon Valley College. This house demands that the name be changed to the Irish Gaelic spelling. To…erm…oh…’The Lynch Building’.

            To sign the petition, visit change.org (7 signatories so far).

            Dlúthpháirtíocht (Solidarity), Díärmûid Ó Súileaúileailabhainbhainlabhain (Dermot C)

          3. Oh come here to me, you can do better than that. You should have at least held out for Mac Loingseacháin.

          4. Gráinne, can ye not be washin’ orr dorty linen in public an’ cummin’ o’er all knowledgeable about God’s owun language? Sure as hell, the Long Maaan hisself would be proud o’ ye.

            Oh yeah, you’re right. And ‘Lynch’ is from Donegal, me roooots.

            Spingies 1-0 Ó Súileaúileailabhainbhainlabhain . x

          7. Ha, Haggis! Dagnabit, I think he’s the other one who’s spotted that there are rhymes for ‘orange’: binge, cringe, fringe, ginge, etc. x

        2. It is and there will be a group session with a counsellor to overcome the existential dread of all Irish people…Have I left the immersion on?

          1. Nobody has commented on this, Kieran, but I genuinely laughed out loud at this. And I don’t like laughing. That was my entire childhood, and I’d forgotten it, so thx for that.

      2. I’m half brown and I’m half proud!
        eh?
        the white half can barely tolerate this kind of talk, precious thinks we’re in here together..

      3. But you buried the lede (or, rather, cut it out completely):

        The Irish are the blacks of Europe;
        And Dubliners are the blacks of Ireland;
        And the northside Dubliners are the blacks of Dublin.

        So say it loud …

        I’ve been a big fan of Alan Parker’s films ever since (well, actually, even before, because Angel Heart).

      4. And while we`re at it, as someone of what used to be called the `Mosaic persuasion`(though I am unpersuaded), I demand the renaming of the months Jewn and Jewly.

  17. And we can probably assume that these students would be fine using expressions like, “don’t Jew me,” and more…

    Just sayin’

    1. Or as not a few pious Southern Baptists over many years have been accustomed to having proudly and shrewedly “jewed down” a car dealer on the price of a car. (As if a pious East Tennessee Christian, residing on the Buckle of The Bible Belt, is somehow no less empowered to so negotiate.)

  18. I think about myself as a student. I would not have had the nerve to make such a ridiculous demand. Are these students really so unaware of how absurd they look?

  19. One of the most recognizable left-wing icons of the 20th Century was a Lynch.

    Che Guevara’s full name was Ernesto Guevara Lynch de la Serna.

    His father was Ernesto Guevara Lynch. The family was (mostly) Irish and Basque, I believe.

  20. They get away with this behaviour for the same reason that Pro-lifers get away with theirs.

    Marketing.

    Pro-life. Who on earth would want to be anti-life?

    Same thing. They claim to stand for equality. And who wants to be branded as anti-equality? So, if you are a good liberal, but you oppose the more absurd claims/demands etc, they label you as a bigot. If you don’t swallow *all* of the koolaid, you may as well be Rush Limbaugh.

  21. It seems everyone wants to get in on the act.
    at Cornell University:

    The Black Students United made demands of the administration in a secret letter, and became upset when the letter was leaked to the press, apparently by someone in the administration.

    Among the demands: change the name of Cornell Plantations, a botanical resource dating only to 1875 which has never had any association with slavery.

      1. Not to make light of this, but d’ya think the current LGBT community will be offended by the name Straight Hall?

  22. My field had a convention in New Orleans a couple years ago. A colleague stopped wearing her name tag off the convention grounds because she was getting odd reactions. Her name is Katrina.

  23. So Hugo Black’s name will have to change and Barry White. Those Native Americans who prefer to be called Indians need to stop, since that is the intellectual property of India. Well, you get the idea.

  24. I suggest they rename it the Frolicking Puppy Rainbow Coloring Book Beanbag Multicultural Pantheistic Non-denominational I’m Offended Safe Space Hall.

  26. As noted by a few people above, there seems to be some sort of competition going on, and I think I’ve got it.

    Its all an entry for next year’s Turner Prize.

  28. To provide contrast, if the students want to see the sort of ‘lynch speech’ it is reasonable to protest about, here is an example. Still probably legal speech, but I would definitely classify this as the sort of bad speech deserving of a loud and vocal good speech response.

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