Good for you for admitting your mistake.

Yeah Kaplan, go back to Boston

Kaplan is from Philly…

“And next time when a forum is held because of something you said, it might be prudent to attend.”

Yeah, it’s damn hard to have a kangaroo court without a defendent!

You should write about serious topics more often instead of ranting for 800 words about a stupid bike lane. You’re a good writer, don’t waste it.

To Nam Dao, you need to go back to Vietcom and learn about your culture first, I bet that you only little kid thats why you keep defend Mr Kaplan, and for all reader the Teacher is not a Professor, he just a MR Kaplan only, so forget about him, Nam Dao sorry but you need to go back to Vietnam so you look how to cook your best food ( Dog ) meat hahahaha sorry but it is true, and plus like you say it’s freedom of speech

Kaplan issued a statement. This should clear things up and demonstrate why the students should apologize to him.

Professor Kaplan must step down right away… He is a evil who does not cultural competent of other cultural. Pro. Kaplan is big mouth and racist.

To Nam Dao, he must not be a true Vientnamese and not a true Asian American. Racism and hatre can not be hide Mr. Dao…

To 3:51pm

You just a troll, or are really that much of an idiot?

It’s true Vietnamese like to eat dog, even white people who been to Vietnam say that too. If anyone don’t believe go to Vietnam and see for yourself.

It is important that we are fully responsible for what to said & not to said to other nationality. Mr. Cox, I understand your article, but we have freedom of speech in this great country. People commented as they wish about others, usually when they hate those individuals or groups. I don’t think Kaplan misquoted or misunderstood when he said Hmong men has no talent other than to kill, also Hmong second generation are end up in gangs. How can a professional person misquoted or misunderstood in such words. This is a direct insulted to our face. Kaplan did not attend the forum, you think he forgot, he disrespected the Hmong students, that why he ignored the forum.

About the Vietnamese student (Dao) I can’t wait until the next professor comments on Vietnamese and will see how he feels.

Suppose I am a professor in China University, Moscow, or Terhan, Iran, and give a lecture to hundred of students in those countries and said” All white men’s talent are evil, all they do is to steal and spy on others countries tech and claimed as of its own, and they are the biggest Liar of the Universe, and lastly, they are your best enemy today, but tomorrow they will be your worst enemy…what would you feel and think as if you were a white manority in that kind of evironment? I sure you would offended too, rite…racist people.

listen morons, read his statement, then you will see he is not a racist….

As a Hmong man, I prefer to turn Kaplan’s comments to a challenge and intend to prove in a civilized manner that he was wrong. My dad always said turn a big problem to a small problem and make a small problem disappear. There are times where negative compliments actually serve you better than positive ones.

Let’s get back to classes and get educated.

Glad to see you voice an opinion on the topic of “standing” regarding the application of social standards to speech, specifically those standards which delineate hate speech. Wisconsin used to have a faculty speech code whose ruling standard was whether a comment could be deemed disparaging by a person of average sensibilities who was also a member of the group disparaged. How one determines what is hate speech and what is merely debatable, or ignorant, or ill informed, or ill chosen hyperbole, or just a nasty sense of humor, is central to the delineation of free speech.

But if I read the statement, can I still make wild and unsubstantiated accusations of racism?

I need to think twice before I get some context on this matter.

I am not sure I am ready to abandon my baseless moral outrage.

I am a hmong student here at the university and it saddens to see that this has turned into “hmongs” vs. “non-hmongs”. Since I only learn about the issue through reading these articles, I can not come right out and judge. I believe there are always two sides to the story. I fully understand the Hmong students perspective since these types of stereotypes occur in the hmong culture as in any other culture. Being targeted and implying that all Hmong people act in this way is wrong. This does show that if you intend to teach something to your students, then teach it the right way no matter if you have an opinion about it or not! Think about it. Would you want your kids to be taught something so absurd and to carry this on throughout their professional career and re-teaching to others in the future? I understand there is a freedom to teach whatever you may choose but teach the truth! However, hearing the statements given by Kaplan on Friday, I also see how he may have been misunderstood. The main point however is that if he has been understood, why not clarify this to these students when the subject was brought up rather than allow it to go this far? If Kaplan’s point was to show that the government has done a poor job in implementing programs, etc to help those hmong immigrants who come to the U.S. transition into a new culture then yes, I agree. But yet again, this could have been easily dealt with if this “misinterpretation” was clarified before the issue made it in the media.
I really hope that the university can come together and resolve this issue. I feel sorry for the seven brave hmong women because they know as well as everyone else that they will be looked upon differently by their fellow faculty and students. But I will say that I am proud that they had the strength to stand up for their rights as with anyone else in this type of situation. We all have no reason to judge until we are faced with these situations ourselves, colored or not.

It’s sad to hear such story! The USA is a country of free speech as some have said in their comments. But freedom doesn’t mean that you can say everything! It must not reach the bounderies of hurting the feelings of somebody. It’s always bad to stereotype people. Kaplan should know that! Next time, pay more attention to what you’re going to say or teach!

To Dao, the vietnamese guy. How do you fell when Mr. Kaplan says the older Vietnamese talent is to kill dogs (eat dogs) and the younger generation like you is to be in gangs and criminal. Is this free of Speech? If you said this is free of speech than you need to go to a better school man..

Here’s part of a letter from Dean Davis stating that Professor Kaplan was willing to meet with any other students or groups who may want to discuss the issue. And he has failed to do so. Here is the letter

Note: The following is a February 22 letter written by UW Law School Dean Kenneth Davis to the law school community concerning the controversial classroom comments of law Professor Leonard Kaplan:

“…Likewise, the Professor involved, Leonard Kaplan, has met at length with the students, and wants me to inform you that he stands ready to meet with any other students or groups who want to discuss his remarks.

He’s a law professor. If it took him this long to come up with his three page letter to the Dean of the Law school, there is no reason to believe he was “misquoted”. If he was misquoted as he stated in his letter, he would have responded sooner and would have attended the forum brought forth by the law school. He used his time wisely to come up with a defense that painted a picture of academic lecture and lacking of understanding rather than racist remarks and stereotyping the Hmong men. No wonder he’s a law professor.

As for Dao, is he really that afraid to stand up against the law professor? Yes, the professor can failed him, but he would be welcome elsewhere for standing and defending those that weren’t there to defend the stereotyping comments. He would have been praised for his action. But because he was to afraid to stand up, he’s now part of the problem. He should reconsider the field he’s going into.

4:20, that’s an ignorant statement about someone you know nothing about. Students overreacted to the whole thing, and now you are scrambling for excuses. Move on, and learn from your mistakes. And don’t charge another student with cowardice who has been willing to go on record saying things when people like you so aggressively and belligerently believed the opposite.

If there is a “problem” in this situation, it’s people like you, not Dao or Kaplan who are a part of it.

Learn. Then speak.

This issue is getting out of hand, seriously. Just calm down everyone, its done and over with. So what happens now? White people still have more power over Asian people in the school. Professors might give poor grades to Asian students. The Hmong students might be reprimanded! I’m afraid for Asian students, more so for the Hmong students.

I believe Kaplan’s comment whether it tries to invoke arguments or just simply an act of racism needs to be carefully examined. My professor talked about it in class as well regarding Kaplan’s intentions to invoke conversation among students in the class and many students argued that his intentions were to invoke arguments and someone might have taken his words out of context. I believe in my own opinion that there is a better way to approach such topics in class instead of stirring up racial emotions or singling out a particular ethic group with derogatory comments towards them. Students were calling the person who misjudged Kaplan’s intention stupid and idiotic, but is this really the case when you are Hmong and someone is talking down to you thinking there is no Hmong students in the class to hear it. Whether his intentions were to invoke class arguments or not, I did not hear an explanation on his part or specifically what his intentions were to begin with. Until this is proven, as a Hmong student, I feel that we need to intellectually voice our opinions in a manner that will make the system’s ear burst!

Why did he wait so long to issue a statement. How can people remember every single thing that was said and how it was said after such a long time has progressed. It’ll be easy to find people to collaborate on your story if it sounds like something they remember, even if it isn’t. I think we need to know why he waited so long to issue his statement. Why didn’t he issue the statement to the public when the issue was just beginning, when the words were still fresh in his students mind. Could it be that if he issued it earlier, his students would’ve disagreed. Don’t forget that he was also a psychologist and he is a law professor, so he should know a thing or two about how to get things to go your way. I am not accusing him of acting inappropriately, I am just saying, it’s easy to get just about anyone to collaborate on anything if you frame it a certain way. For example, say a group of people witnessed a car accident. Two weeks later, if the police question two witnesses and asked one if they saw the cars smash into each other while asking another if they saw the cars bump into each other, then ask each how much damage there was to each car. I’m sure we would get two different accounts, both from eye witnesses. I’m saying that can easily be the case here given the amount of time that has passed. This makes me suspicious of Kaplan’s decision to issue a statement so late after so much has happened.

I want to know if any of you who read this article are from the class or not and if you did hear exactly what the teacher had said, I want to hear what your comments are and what you had heard because my professor brought up this issue in class and said that whoever heard Kaplan’s statment may have taken his words out of context. Whether this is true or not, students in my class were arguing that the students in Kaplan’s class took his words out of context and specifically saying these students are “stupid, dumb, or not paying attention to his initial intention, which is to invoke discussion”. Now, I want to hear if you all agree with the students and the teacher in my class had said about this situation?

Whether or not the comments were taken out of context, it is important for Kaplan to apologize for offending people…and move on. He should’ve done that immediately after the class during which the alleged comments were made.

Hello Mr. Cox,

I just wanted to thank you for your article on the matter. I must say some clearification was very much needed…

It’s pretty much true, Viet people do eat dogs. So keep your little puppies away from all Viet because they will have them for lunch. Offensive to Vietnamese? You better believe it. Context people, context. What context would that be? This is my point. It doesnt matter what the context was, its still offensive and Mr. Kaplian needs to understand that. Period. Here is freedom of speech for you. Nam… DAOMA

Mr. Cox, high five Brother! You rock man! I completely agree with you. Oh, by the way I ain’t a brother :), but that’s besides the point. And incase anyone is curious, “Kuv yog hmoob.”

Contextual or not why isn’t Kaplan coming forth to give everyone his version, the truth, of the lecture that day. He’s a law professor and isn’t it justice/truth he is obligated to educate all of us about?

Let me preface this by saying that I am a Hmong American. For the past year, I have read various articles and commentary about the brouhaha involving Professor Leonard Kaplan and some Hmong students at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Some say that this incident from February 2007 is much ado about nothing. That is an opinion. I believe there are those who champion academic freedom but have become disoriented by its own beauty.

I don’t know what Kaplan said nor will I pretend to. Only he and those students who were present on that eventful day know for sure. Regardless, I agree that the professor is entitled to his opinions and comments due to the freedom of speech and academic freedom. We live in a democracy, one based on free thought and free speech. Unfortunately, many of Kaplan�s supporters are hypocrites when they belittle the reaction from the Hmong community. Although they themselves were not there to bear witness, they question the credibility of the Hmong students but attest to Kaplan�s credibility and integrity without objection. They invoke academic freedom but criticize the Hmong students� for overreacting and disagreeing with their own rationale. They fault the Hmong community�s rush to judgment for using second and third-hand accounts while failing to recognize their own incognizance and mob-like mentality.

Baseless comments such as “they were overly sensitive�they overreacted�didn�t understand the sarcasm and humor�missed the point� are not only insulting to me, the students, and other Hmong Americans, they are insulting to most homo sapiens. These individuals can express themselves in whatever manner they please, but we are told that we shouldn�t feel the way we feel. How is it possible to determine the proper dosage of sensitivity for others? Since when did Kaplan and his supporters become the moral compass of human emotions and free thought?

Human beings don’t think alike. What is a casual, innocent comment to some may be offensive or insulting to others. Let’s pretend that Kaplan complimented the Hmong as being God’s gift to the planet. Even so, these Hmong students would still have the right to disagree and to tell him to take a hike. Is it a surprise to Kaplan and his supporters that we Hmong can think, feel, and act for ourselves? Or do they prefer that we just nod our heads in agreement, sit back in awe, and go along with them? Is this their idea of academic freedom? Academic freedom allows people to engage in open dialogue, discussion, and debate. Academic freedom includes disagreements, contrasting perspectives, and conflicting ideologies.

Contrary to the opinion of some Hmong, I don’t believe that racism played any role in this situation. I also do not believe that Kaplan needs to be censored, disciplined, or forced to apologize. The majority of us don�t need an apology in order to go about our lives. What has transpired since that lecture, however, borders on complete hypocrisy. It reeks of cultural arrogance and personal egotism. At a recent Rotary Club function, Kaplan attempted to explain the purpose and intent of his lecture. He concluded, �I offer my remarks here in the Rotarian spirit of doing no harm, or as little harm as possible, but recognizing that truth, like learning, may sometimes be painful.� From whose perspective is this supposed harm, truth, and pain?

Kaplan and his supporters have continuously cited academic freedom, yet it appears that they only value academic freedom when it benefits them or justifies their own cause. Indeed, Kaplan has the right to express his views free of censorship and without apology. He should be able to instruct, provoke thought, and initiate discussion however he chooses. He wants to prepare these law students for the real world where they will face real dilemmas. Well, here it is professor � with warts and all. We Hmong will assess, feel, and react however we please. Just as others want to judge us, we will judge them. After all, it is our right. The last time I checked we still live in a democracy or so they say. Let us not forget.