Student Investigated for Reading Mao at UMASS Dartmouth? NOT!!!

My original post is below, but as a helpful commenter alerted, there was a follow-up story and this was a hoax. This poor student clearly needs help.

Follow-up Story About Student Hoax

Aaron Nicodemus, writer for the New Bedford Standard Times reports:

NEW BEDFORD — A senior at UMass Dartmouth was visited by federal agents two months ago, after he requested a copy of Mao Tse-Tung’s tome on Communism called “The Little Red Book.”

Two history professors at UMass Dartmouth, Brian Glyn Williams and Robert Pontbriand, said the student told them he requested the book through the UMass Dartmouth library’s interlibrary loan program.

The student, who was completing a research paper on Communism for Professor Pontbriand’s class on fascism and totalitarianism, filled out a form for the request, leaving his name, address, phone number and Social Security number. He was later visited at his parents’ home in New Bedford by two agents of the Department of Homeland Security, the professors said.

The professors said the student was told by the agents that the book is on a “watch list,” and that his background, which included significant time abroad, triggered them to investigate the student further.

“I tell my students to go to the direct source, and so he asked for the official Peking version of the book,” Professor Pontbriand said. “Apparently, the Department of Homeland Security is monitoring inter-library loans, because that’s what triggered the visit, as I understand it.”

The poor student this happened to is afraid to have his name in the paper about it, “for fear of repercussions.” Meanwhile, the professor who taught the course is now reconsidering teaching a course on terrorism, for fear of putting his students “at risk.” What a sad state of affairs for a country that prides itself on intellectual freedom.

4 thoughts on “Student Investigated for Reading Mao at UMASS Dartmouth? NOT!!!”

  1. Communists? We’re investigating Communists? What–did I go to sleep and wake up in 1952? I thought we were concerned about the Global War on Terror. Last I heard, Red China (seems like such a quaint term now, doesn’t it?) wasn’t backing or supporting Al Qaida. But then, neither was Iraq, and look what that got us.

    Communists? I own a copy of “Capital” and a copy of “The German Peasant War;” should I expect a visit?

  3. Hey Bathus,

    Thanks for the helpful follow-up. This serves as a good reminder not to believe everything you read.

  4. Yes, it’s definitely a hoax, and says as much about sloppy journalism as anything else. Apparently the newspaper that printed the original article never even talked to any of the librarians at the UMass Dartmouth library to verify any of this, but took the student’s word at face value. Here’s another article from The Boston Globe.
    The really sad thing? Next time someone complains about a (genuine) breach of their civil liberties, they might be dismissed as an attention-seeking hoaxer.

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