11/10/2010

My son Roger has another op-ed on liberalism on Campus

Roger's newest piece can be seen here.

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posted by John Lott at 10:24 AM

3 Comments:

Blogger John said...

Your son got schooled. Welcome him to college for me.

http://thedartmouth.com/2010/11/11/opinion/coffey

11/12/2010 2:08 AM  
Blogger John Lott said...

Sorry, that you don't allow any way for me to directly contact you, but if you actually read Roger's and Coffey's pieces carefully you would see how inaccurate Coffey's claims were.

***First, Mr. Lott make a series of embarrassing factual errors: Orozco was not a communist; he does not depict a socialist utopia anywhere in the mural; he did not help found “multiple organizations”; and his relationship with Rivera and Siqueiros can, at best, be described as a highly competitive rivalry (the “Three Greats” engaged in vigorous public debate, often condemning one another’s work, even as they collaborated loosely to further the project of public art in Mexico).***

1) What Roger actually wrote on the communist point: "Although Orozco avoided entanglements with the Mexican Communist Party — which merely considered him a “bourgeois skeptic” — his friends were the definition of extreme communists." Roger thus explicitly said the opposite of what Coffey claimed.

2) Dartmouth's own publication describes the mural as socialist. Indeed, the piece was written by Mary Coffee.
"Orozco’s mural is less an indictment of Dartmouth in particular than a radically unorthodox expression of socialist humanism or even anarchism. While acknowledging its location, his mural addresses the broader plight of humanity under the conditions of private ownership, exploitation, and social inequality that capitalism entails."
http://hoodmuseum.dartmouth.edu/docs/orozcobrochure.pdf
3) I haven't had a chance to look up the "multiple organizations" claim, but I wouldn't be surprised if this were wrong also.

4) There are a number of sources that describe David Siqueiros and Diego Rivera as friends of Orozco.
http://www.diego-rivera.org/influentialfriends.html
Others describe them as sometimes companions.
http://www.phs.poteau.k12.ok.us/williame/APAH/readings/Mexican%20Muralists,%20Diego%20and%20Frida%20in%20Krull.pdf

11/14/2010 3:53 PM  
Blogger John Lott said...

Complete end of post.

Others describe them as sometimes companions.
http://www.phs.poteau.k12.ok.us/williame/APAH/readings/Mexican%20Muralists,%20Diego%20and%20Frida%20in%20Krull.pdf

11/14/2010 3:54 PM  

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