UCI Anteater (school mascot)
Reference is made to my previous posts describing the efforts of Peter Lancz to get the University of California at Irvine to place a bust of Raoul Wallenberg on the UCI campus as a tribute to the Swedish diplomat who saved tens of thousands of Hungarian Jews at the end of World War II including Lantz's father, a famous sculptor, who subsequently made a bust of Wallenberg in gratitude.
http://garyfouse.blogspot.com/2012/01/wallenberg.html
As previously reported, the request was initially turned down. The current position of UCI is that they will accept the bust as a gift if all the costs are covered by donations-including the cost of erecting it. In addition, Lantz was also told that he could not solicit UCI donors and contributors-since, apparently, they were needed for more important ventures (like the Olive Tree Initiative), I presume.
Here is the estimate of how much money is needed.
The cost of the monumental bronze bust, including transport is $35,000. The granite plinth or column on which the bust would rest is approx. $10,000. Then there is the brass plaque describing Wallenberg's exploits affixed to the column and other miscellaneous installation costs. This comprises the ball park figure of $50,000.
Obviously, this is above and beyond what I can ask my loyal Fousesquawk readers to chip in for. What I would appreciate is any suggestions as to possible donors who would like to fund such a venture. Believe me, the UCI campus needs it-even if they don't recognize that fact.
11 comments:
Another flying pig moment???
Arch-Conservative Gary Fouse trying to get a public university to host a statue paid for by public/private funds on its grounds.
If the statue is built should UCI charge rent for its placement on campus like the fee food vendors have to pay?
If not, is their any compelling reason or connection for UCI to host this statue besides that one of its part-time instructors has an obsessive affinity with Jews, Judaism, and Israel?
Forget a bust of Raoul Wallenberg. But I do believe they will raise a statue to Yasser Arafat soon.
What is the point about Bernadotte, Anonymous? The discussion is about Wallenberg. You oppose a statue of Wallenberg, do you not? What is the objection? Could it be your anti-Semitism?
"If not, is their any compelling reason or connection for UCI to host this statue besides that one of its part-time instructors has an obsessive affinity with Jews, Judaism, and Israel?"
Spoken like a true Jew-hater, Anonymous. That's why you are anonymous as opposed to me. I always sign whatever I write.
I'll tell you something else. This project should be supported by the UCI Cross Cultural Center (which it isn't), and they should be proud to erect it on the patio outside their building-the one closest to the UCI Library-if you get my drift.
Isn't that the Muslim students have taken as "their"... Like they have come as conquerors.
I am more of a Jew-skeptic than a Jew-hater.
But my original point remains.
Why do you not want to raise the funds for bust/statue privately and then place the piece in a synagogue or Jewish center?
Why are you insisting on public funds being spent on the sculpture, which is then to be placed on University property, and then additional maintenance costs?
UCI did the right thing by saying "NO". The next time should be a "HELL NO".
Anonymous Muslim,
It happens that the man was a hero. His heroics happen to be that he saved, at great personal risk, thousands of Jews in the Holocaust. I suppose the last fact, that it was Jews that he saved, should disqualify him from being honored.
You are being disingenuous when you say anyone is insisting on public funds on the sculpture. These funds may be collected from individuals who are inclined to donate ....it is not financed by tax money that most are forced to pay and have no direct say in what it should be spent on.
I would have the same view if there were a Muslim hero of some type... but I never heard of one with the humanitarian attributes that this one hero had. Kinda gives you pause, doesn't it? Why doesn't the Muslim religion produce humanitarians (or so very few Nobel Prize winners)?
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Anonymous,
You really need to read my posts carefully before commenting. I am asking for privately-donated money to provide the statue and erect it. As for placing it in a synagogue, that would be carrying coals to New Castle. On a university campus it would have a true educational value for a lot of students who are being exposed to nothing but negative messages about Jews.
Now perhaps you can explain what a Jew skeptic is. If you used that term and substituted Jew with Muslim, black, Hispanic, etc, you would be excoriated from all sides. Why is it acceptable to use it with Jews? Keep in mind you did not use the term, Israeli or Zionist.
This is why you choose to remain anonymous. Smart move.
Miggie,
You forget that great man of peace, Yassir Arafat. Our own head of the OC Human Relations Commission, Rusty Kennedy, used tax payer funds to travel to S Africa to help fete Arafat when he won the award. remember?
What an inexcusable lapse! How could I forget two such great humanitarians? They both eclipsed all the great Muslim humanitarians over the last 13 centuries! (If there any)
The only sensible conclusion is to remember that if every university accepted every statue of every worthy person that some sincere devotee wished to offer, there would be no place left to walk on campus.
Worthy of memorialization or not, it is simply not the duty of any campus to accept a bust because someone offered to give it to them.
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