Dan Choi, who just days ago chained himself to the White House fence, spoke last night in the HUB Auditorium as they keynote address for Penn State's Pride Week. He referenced his recent arrest, saying, “It’s a strange feeling getting arrested for something you know is right…nothing is more liberating, nothing is more freeing.”
Choi's demonstration was a protest of the military's Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy, a topic he brought up again in his address; he called DADT “the most despicable law because it institutionalizes shame.”
Have you been to the HUB lately? If so, you’ve probably seen the boardwalk in the Pollock Road entrance. While that is not the class gift itself, it’s meant to excite people for what’s to come: the Marsh Meadow Boardwalk and Overlook at the Arboretum.
The Arboretum finally opened to the public this year, and the class of 2010 chose to present the University with a gift that reflects both their time here and has use in the future. Seniors have already pledges tens of thousands of dollars to fund the building of a boardwalk and overlook across the James J. and Lynn D. Ramage Marsh Meadow in the Arboretum.
If you’d like to keep up with the 2010 Senior Class Gift, check out their blog, their website, or even just walk through the HUB.
This Thursday, March 25th, former US Assistant Secretary of Defense Mary Beth Long will be speaking at The State Theatre from 8-9PM - for free! Long has been an extremely influential woman in terms of our nation’s security. She’s helped with the U.S.-Iraq status-of-forces agreement negotiations, missile defense agreements with the Czech Republic and Poland, and she's helped improve relations with Middle Eastern allies. Long formulated the US response to Russia’s invasion of Georgia and has helped to cut down Taliban’s narcotics revenue, just to name a few things.
Long is the 15th speaker in the annual Mark Luchinisky Memorial Lecture series. Former speakers include Kurt Angle, 1996 Olympic Gold Medalist in Wrestling; Peter Klein, Professor and former CBS News Producer; and even our very own JoePa, among many other impressive people.
Come on out Thursday to listen to Long’s lecture, entitled “Terrorism, Nukes, and Cyber Warfare: Are We Prepared?” Learn a thing or two from someone who knows a thing or two!
Lieutenant Dan Choi was arrested along with Jim Pietrangelo - both are gay Iraq vets who have been discharged from the army (Choi’s is pending) - because of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” The men were taken into Park Police’s Anacostia station on charges of “failure to obey lawful order”—they handcuffed themselves to the White House fence.
Choi is scheduled to speak here this upcoming Wednesday, March 24th in the HUB at 7:30 as a part of Pride Week. As of now, Lt. Choi is still going to speak as planned; his agent said he “should be out soon.” Read on for a video of the arrest and details about Choi's scheduled speaking appearance.
Maya Angelou, the fourth speaker in this year's Distinguished Speaker Series, will be addressing the Penn State community on Tuesday March 23 at 8:00 pm in Eisenhower Auditorium.
Angelou is an author who has won the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize, a Grammy-Award-winning poet, an Emmy-nominated actress and screenwriter, and a political activist. She has served on two presidential committees and she served as the northern coordinator for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference per request of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Free tickets for the event will be available starting Monday March 15th for students and Friday March 19 for the public. Details are after the jump.
On Wednesday, Radio Free Penn State interviewed Professor José Texidor. If you haven’t heard, Texidor has quite a controversy surrounding him, which was the subject of his interview.
The whole thing started in July 2007 when Texidor received a letter from John McCarthy, head of the department of sociology and crime, law and justice questioning the difficulty of two of Texidor’s classes (CJ 100 and CJ 451).
Read on for more about the controversy.