Posted by
Gabrielle Cusumano on Tuesday, April 08, 2008 1:48:40 PM
"I am offended not by cartoons, but by more mundane things like beheadings of civilians, cowardly attacks on public buildings, suicide murders, murders of Catholic priests (the latest in Turkey!), burnings of Christian churches, the continued persecution of Coptic Christians in Egypt, the imposition of Sharia law on non-Muslims, the rapes of Scandinavian girls and women..." Michigan State professor named Indrek Wichman
The Muslim Student Association at Michigan State University
Over the next two weeks, Frontpage will publish profiles of individual chapters of the Muslim Students Association and Muslim Student Union on a variety of campuses around the country, showing how they work to advance the cause of radical Islam and to lead the effort to stigmatize Israel. These profiles are compiled in our new booklet, "The Muslim Students Association and the Jihad Network." To read the introduction, click here, "The MSA at UCLA," click here, "The MSA at Berkeley, click here, "The MSU at UC Irvine," click here, "The MSA at Brown," click here, and "The MSA at Columbia," click here. – The Editor
In April 2006, MSA-MSU members held a rally protesting a Danish newspaper’s recent publication of a series of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad. According to the group, the cartoons in question constituted “hate speech.”
In response, a Michigan State professor named Indrek Wichman sent an e-mail to MSA-MSU, which read as follows: “Dear Muslim Association: As a professor of Mechanical Engineering here at MSU, I intend to protest your protest. I am offended not by cartoons, but by more mundane things like beheadings of civilians, cowardly attacks on public buildings, suicide murders, murders of Catholic priests (the latest in Turkey!), burnings of Christian churches, the continued persecution of Coptic Christians in Egypt, the imposition of Sharia law on non-Muslims, the rapes of Scandinavian girls and women (called ‘whores’ in your culture), the murder of film directors in Holland, and the rioting and looting in Paris France….If you do not like the values of the West -- see the 1st Amendment -- you are free to leave. I hope for God’s sake that most of you choose that option. Please return to your ancestral homelands and build them up yourselves instead of troubling Americans.”72
In response to this email, MSA-MSU (along with twelve other student and advocacy groups) demanded not only that the University administration reprimand Professor Wichman, but also that it institute mandatory diversity training for faculty and a seminar on hate and discrimination for freshman.
Six months later Michigan State University, after lengthy negotiations with the Muslim Students Association and CAIR, announced that it would offer non-mandatory diversity training – including an Islamic awareness workshop facilitated by MSA-MSU and funded by the University – for its faculty and student body. Said Paulette Granberry Russell, Director of MSU’s Office for Affirmative Action Compliance and Monitoring: “We’re working with the MSA to identify the things that they want to discuss. Then we’re going to use those ideas as a basis for developing educational programs.”73
In August 2007, pressure from MSA-MSU resulted in a decision by the University of Michigan to spend $25,000 to install foot baths for Muslim students in its campus ...