Student exposes prof's 'astonishing' anti-Trump diatribes
An exasperated student at Bridgewater State University decided Monday to expose her professor’s extensive rants against President Trump and his supporters.
Alyssa Hood, a junior at Bridgewater State, told Campus Reform that she noticed that her reading assignments for a course taught by Professor Garrett Nichols "emphasized Obama and Bill Clinton and even made fun of Bush,” explaining that she "put two and two together [when she] started getting into the reading assignments and realized that he was definitely a Democrat.”
Hood then decided to check out Nichols’ public Facebook profile, discovering a series of astonishing tweets that corresponded closely with her experience in class.
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“A classroom is somewhere politics should be left out of but it hasn't been and it has been clear in our readings and some class discussion as well as publicly posting on Facebook!” she wrote in a Facebook post. “Way to go Bridgewater for creating an uncomfortable learning environment brought on by one of your own Professors!”
Attached to the post was a screenshot of one of Nichols’ more inflammatory posts, in which he starts by expressing sympathy for students who “break down crying because they were worried that the way they dressed that morning might end up getting them killed,” then proceeds to declare “F**k Donald Trump...ANYONE who voted for Donald Trump...ANYONE who tries to explain to me the ‘real’ needs of people who voted for Donald Trump,” and more.
Nichols also posted an opinion piece on Medium the day after the 2016 election, sharing how he felt uncomfortable with then President-elect Trump.
“It pains me to hear he went through trauma like that but I don't believe he has any right to falsely accuse every Trump supporter of being an arrogant homophobe or racist,” Hood said in response to the article.
“I actually learned in his class some logical fallacies...for example the straw man fallacy which is basically when people oversimplify someone's views and attack the hollow evidence that supports it...and I think for him to teach this to us it's such hypocrisy as he is basically implementing this on those who support Trump,” she added. “It's really astonishing that he thought this was okay, especially publicly.”
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In his syllabus, Nichols instructs his students to be respectful of all members of the community, writing that "any talk, writing, or actions that single out or demean others are unacceptable and will not be tolerated.”
Hood, who has been a student at Bridgewater State since 2015, said she’s “had an amazing time here and loved this school” since she started.
“This is the first time something like this has happened...well, to my knowledge,” she added. “With his post I feel my work in his class would never be accepted if I spoke against his beliefs and that's clear in his post.”
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Jason Ross, Chairman of the Massachusetts Alliance of College Republicans and a student at Bridgewater State, echoed Hood’s sentiments.
“These statements made by the professor are not only wildly inappropriate, they are deeply concerning,” he told Campus Reform. “How can you honestly believe all Trump supporters belong in the KKK? How can you say fuck you to all Trump supporters, including your students?”
Ross shared Hood’s post on his own Facebook page, writing “looks like I'll be meeting with President Fred Clark again real soon. This is unacceptable from a professor.”
When asked if such anti-conservative sentiment was commonplace on his campus, Ross said that even though there have been previous instances, none have been as “serious as this before,” though he did note that his own College Republicans chapter had its posters vandalized last September.
Campus Reform reached out to Nichols for comment, but did not receive a response in time for publication.
Follow the author of this article on Twitter: @VSnitsarUSA
