NOTE: Faculty, if you are interviewed and quoted by news media, or if your work has been cited, and you have an online link to the article or video, please let us know. Contact us at news@csusb.edu.
CSUSB professor discusses importance of new ethnic studies requirement (in Spanish)
Noticias Telemundo
Aug. 31, 2020
The Spanish-language television network interviews Enrique Murillo Jr., Cal State San Bernardino professor of education and executive director of Latino Education & Advocacy Days (LEAD), for a segment about the new state requirement that requires California State University students take an ethnic studies class in order to graduate. Murillo explained the importance and impact of the new law recently signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom.
Watch the segment, in Spanish, at “Estudiantes universitarios en California deben tomar clase de estudios étnicos para poder graduarse.”
CSUSB professor offers perspective on news that gunman in Portland shooting may be tied to left-wing extremist movement antifa
VOA News
Sept. 1, 2020
For the first time, a self-identified member of the extreme left-wing movement known as antifa has been implicated in a fatal shooting and is reportedly under investigation in the killing of a supporter of President Donald Trump on Saturday in Portland, Ore.
A relative identified the suspected gunman, though there was no immediate confirmation by law enforcement officials. If that person is implicated, it would mark the first time in recent years that an antifa supporter has been charged with homicide, said Brian Levin, director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino.
"Unlike the white supremacist and the far right, which glorifies mass violence by loners and small cells against minorities and enemies, hard-left violence has generally been less fatal and more directed towards property, racists and to a lesser extent police and journalists," Levin said.
Before Saturday, no antifa member was known to have carried out a killing in the name of the movement.
"What is significant about the Portland killing, though is that earlier the hard left generally adhered to a more toned-down template for conflict that focused on confronting and exposing bigots, seizing turf and low-level criminality," Levin said.
Read the complete article at “Antifa protester suspected of killing Trump supporter in Oregon.”
CSUSB professor discusses use of social media in organizing counter protestors in Kenosha and Portland
KCRW Radio Los Angeles
Aug. 31, 2020
Brian Levin, director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino, was interviewed for a program that focused on the role of social media the recent protests in Kenosha, Wisc., and Portland, Ore.
“I’m not saying that caravans of people who support the president or the GOP are malicious or terroristic. ... We’re seeing these kinds of mushrooms of meeting places pop up on social media. But they’re not just organic. Oftentimes, they’re local political leaders, or some kind of event planner or political folks involved,” says Brian Levin, director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino.
Levin says Portland in particular is interesting because that’s where left is producing sustained violence. “In that place, we had a coalescence of more hard-left activists. … This is the first hard left extremist … suspected homicide that we’ve seen. The alleged suspect posted, ‘I’m 100% Antifa.’”
He continues, “So what we’re seeing is white supremacy, far right. And then populism kind of reached into the mainstream from the right. And we’re also seeing some instances from the hard left of folks trying to glom onto peaceful demonstrations and political rallies.”
Listen to the segment online at “Social media’s role in organizing Trump supporters to confront protestors in Kenosha and Portland.”
CSUSB professor writes on the topic: ‘How does optimism and pessimism influence your well-being?’
Psychology Today
Aug. 31, 2020
“Opinions about when the pandemic will end are like mouths: everyone has one,” wrote Anthony Silard, a CSUSB public administration professor for the blog “Art of Living Free.” While optimists predict a flattening of the curve and a workable vaccine within six months, pessimists forecast that we’ll be flattened by the curve and will never return to our pre-pandemic way of life.
“So which is better? To be an optimist and maintain a strong sense of hope and risk future disappointment or a pessimist and be riddled with depression and anxiety about imminent doom and then feel elated when the worst is overcome?”
Read the complete article at “Predicting the end of the pandemic: Optimism vs pessimism.”
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