![](https://jonathanturley.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/hc-trinity-campus-closed-threats-20170621-003.jpg?w=600" alt="hc-trinity-campus-closed-threats-20170621-003" width="300" height="169" />There is a new controversy involving an investigation of a professor for statements made on social media. Trinity College Professor Johnny Williams has fled Connecticut after receiving death threats over his postings, including an inflammatory reference to people considered bigots and how we should "Let Them. F**king Die." Williams teaches classes on race and racism and clearly wanted to get others to read this hateful screed.</p><!--more-->As we have previously discussed (<a href="https://jonathanturley.org/2016/12/26/oregon-professor-causes-firestorm-over-black-face-costume-worn-at-party-off-campus/">including the recent controversies involving an Oregon professor</a> and a <a href="https://jonathanturley.org/2016/12/27/106981/">Drexel professor</a>), there remains an uncertain line in what language is protected for teachers in their private lives. The incident also raises what some faculty have complained is a double or at least uncertain standard. We have previously discussed controversies at the <a href="https://jonathanturley.org/2014/11/10/miller-young-and-university-of-california-sued-over-campus-assault-on-pro-life-advocates/">University of California</a> and <a href="https://jonathanturley.org/2015/05/22/news-calls-for-termination-of-saidi-grundy-after-disclosure-of-prior-criminal-impersonation-of-another-woman/">Boston University</a>, where there have been criticism of a double standard, <a href="https://jonathanturley.org/2014/11/10/miller-young-and-university-of-california-sued-over-campus-assault-on-pro-life-advocates/">even in the face of criminal conduct</a>. There were also such incident at the University of London involving <a href="https://jonathanturley.org/2015/10/07/university-of-london-diversity-officer-charged-with-threatening-communications-after-racist-and-sexist-comments/">Bahar Mustafa</a> as well as one involving a University of Pennsylvania professor.As is well known on this blog, I tend to favor free speech rights in all of these cases. In my view, this view does seem to be satire — bad satire but satire all the same. However, the standard remains entirely uncertain for academics as to whether their conduct or comments outside of school will be the basis for discipline. As a private institution, Drexel falls under a different standard than schools like the University of Oregon. Yet, free speech demands a bright line to avoid a chilling effect on those who want to challenge the status quo or popular views. Academics often write to challenge students and the public in exploring the edges of norms and beliefs.As you might expect, I view this latest controversy through the same free speech lens. The reaction to the social media posting in my view was overblown, including closing the entire campus by President Joanne Berger-Sweeney.<p class="column small-12 medium-10 medium-offset-1 large-offset-2 text size-1x-large line-height-large _10M0Ygc4"><img class=" size-full wp-image-119295 alignright" src="https://jonathanturley.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/300px-trinity_college_connecticut_seal-svg.png)
We previously discussed the controversy surrounding Trinity College Professor Johnny Williams and his posts against white people, including an inflammatory reference to people considered bigots and how we should “Let Them. F**king Die.” Williams teaches classes on race and racism and clearly wanted to get others to read this hateful screed.. As I am mentioned in the earlier post, I do not believe that Williams should have been punished for his postings as a matter of free speech and academic freedom. The College has now reached the same conclusion but the question remains whether the College will take a similar principled position for academics espousing such views about other races.
Williams wrote “I’m fed the [expletive] up with self identified ‘white’s’ daily violence directed at immigrants, Muslim, and sexual and racially oppressed people. The time is now to confront these inhuman [expletive] and end this now.” In another post he used the hashtag, “Let them f***ing die.” The professor also linked to an article by that title, which mentioned Senate Majority Whip Steve Scalise, who was shot in June by a gunman targeting Republicans.
As we have previously discussed (including the recent controversies involving an Oregon professor and a Drexel professor), there remains an uncertain line in what language is protected for teachers in their private lives. The incident also raises what some faculty have complained is a double or at least uncertain standard. We have previously discussed controversies at the University of California and Boston University, where there have been criticism of a double standard, even in the face of criminal conduct. There were also such incident at the University of London involving Bahar Mustafa as well as one involving a University of Pennsylvania professor.
As is well known on this blog, I tend to favor free speech rights in all of these cases. In my view, this view does seem to be satire — bad satire but satire all the same. However, the standard remains entirely uncertain for academics as to whether their conduct or comments outside of school will be the basis for discipline. As a private institution, Drexel falls under a different standard than schools like the University of Oregon. Yet, free speech demands a bright line to avoid a chilling effect on those who want to challenge the status quo or popular views. Academics often write to challenge students and the public in exploring the edges of norms and beliefs.
Williams shared a Medium article by an author who goes by the name of “Son of Baldwin.” The article attacks House Majority Whip Steve Scalise — who was shot during a congressional baseball practice and makes reference to his being saved by Capitol Police officers who are black. The article, which is remarkably shallow and hateful asked “What does it mean, in general, when victims of bigotry save the lives of bigots?” It adds “Saving the life of those that would kill you is the opposite of virtuous,” it added. “Let. Them. F—ing. Die.”
Williams appears to find such racist and hateful writings worth sharing, which he did on Facebook and Twitter. He used the hashtag #LetThemFuckingDie. Trinity then went into lockdown to deal with a potential “immediate threat.”
The college said the posts are protected by academic freedom rules.
Trinity President Joanne Berger-Sweeney told the College that the negative reports were fueled by misleading and incorrect reports of what he actually said.” However, she also says:
“Let me be clear: While I support Professor Williams’s right to express his opinions, as I have previously stated, I do not condone the hashtag he chose to use,” Berger-Sweeney said in her email to the community. “This was interpreted by some to be a call to let people die, though Professor Williams stated publicly that was not his intent. Nevertheless, the words used in that hashtag not only offend me personally, they also contradict our fundamental institutional values and run counter to our efforts to bridge divides and to promote understanding, both among members of our College community and between us and members of communities beyond our own.”
She does not however explain how these words were misconstrued. My concern is that, instead of simply saying that the words were protected speech, she attempts to draw an ambiguous line that they were misinterpreted. That might suggest that the College could punish those who they find “provocative” but reject suggestions of being misunderstood.
Williams insisted in an interview with the Hartford Courant that his posts were meant to reference a fatal police shooting in Seattle and not the attack on Scalise. He insisted “I’m calling for the death of a system, white supremacy, not the death of white people.”
As I noted earlier, I am less than convinced by the subsequent spin. Williams posted a hateful and frankly juvenile writing that used racial discrimination as an excuse to engage in racist and hateful writings. The fact that Williams views this type of low-grade discourse to be intellectually stimulating is disappointing. I am not familiar with his own writings but his taste in the writings of others is hardly inspiring. I view the writing as reprehensible and the posting as reprehensible but that is not relevant. Williams has free speech and academic freedom protections. This article was clearly posted as a provocative writing that Williams found important to share.
Williams will return to teach at Trinity in January.
Another beneficiary of affirmative action who’d otherwise be employed by the federal government. Trinity is doing the world a service by keeping this maladjusted fellow locked away in academia.
While I abhor the statements made by Prof Williams, I note in many posts exactly what he posted about..ie: Obama being communist, ( they were all ” No I’m not against blacks” deniers.As long as the hate continues we seem to be on the path to returning to the thrilling days of yesterday- Women shouldn’t have the vote , slaves were worth 3/5th of a vote, lyching was a good thing, kids should be forced to work ,and so on , and on, etc.Catholics, Jews Irish, Italians..all should leave.etc.
Mr. Curmudgeon
This is an incoherent word salad. Repost when you’ve sobered up.
Stone Cold Sober….
It seems that “Let Them. F**king Die.” is the type of statement that demonstrates a progressive direction. I didn’t hear anyone on this blog say that blacks should be slaves or women should be denied the right to vote.
Here’s a suggestion: close the sociology department and put the entire faculty there out on the curb. They hired this lout, so they’re self-discredited. It’s a reasonable wager the college is not under obligation to continue to employ faculty whose disciplines have ceased to be taught. The trustees should do this tomorrow.
In truth, it’s another indication of something that Turley will not acknowledge: the systemic population of academe with people of bad character. Ordinary Republicans are not welcome in academic graduate programs, get cut from the program after a year or two if they slip through the application process, discover they are unemployable in their field if they manage to earn a degree, get canned in interim reviews or denied tenure if they make it past the hiring gauntlet, and are subject to bogus disciplinary reviews if they receive tenure. Soi-disant ‘radicals’ outnumber ordinary Republicans by a margin of 12-to-1; it is an inauthentic discipline devoted to composing polemics and apologetics on behalf of contentious social propositions; it does not have to be that, but it is that.
In addition to all that, the dynamic of status competition among academics is such that they manufacture pseudodisciplines like ‘African-American Studies’ to create sinecures for professional black-nationalists (supplemented by professional feminists, professional hispanics, and professional homosexuals). Students have no interest in these programs (0.5% of all baccalaureate degrees are awarded in the whole portfolio of victimology programs). They’re also willing to tolerate rude louts like this man.
If an administrator or gatekeeper faculty member ever made a decent, impartial, and defensible judgment on these matters, you’d be quite surprised. Gamesmanship and fraud is the order of the day, because that is who they are and what they do.
The trustees could do much to repair this situation. Charles Sykes gave his book on Dartmouth the title “The Hollow Men”. The hollow men in question were the Trustees of Dartmouth, who lacked the cojones to discipline Dartmouth’s faculty and hardly knew what was going on on the campus. Fat chance trustees will ever do squat.
What we need to do is take their toys away from them by stripping higher education of much of its function in sorting the labor market and inducing the public to consume less in the way of higher education. Let’s do it.
“Students have no interest in these programs”
DSS, if anyone does have an interest in those studies then they can go to the library and read about the subject and incorporate what they learn into broader topics. There are no jobs in these micro-themed courses except to teach others and no real skills required that cannot be obtained from the library and open discussion outside of the classroom meant for preparing an individual to learn on his own or learn course material that is tecnhnically difficult and requires assistance.
Williams’ overtly racist comments coupled with his laughable justification and Trinity ‘s timid response and abdication of authority point up the sad, corrupt state of higher education today. Academic freedom? Please. Exchange the races in his response and ol’ Johnny is on the next bus out of there. They’re afraid of Williams and loath to call him what he is. Worse yet, they let him back in a classroom! Given declining enrollments and reduced giving to institutions of so-called higher learning, many Americans might just be taking Johnny Williams’ crude advice and letting them f*cking die. RIP.
Who’s going to sign up for one of his classes, and what, exactly, is taught in those classes? I suspect the subject matter has more to do with personal grievances than scholarship. and correct political thinking will get you a passing grade. There is no place for political opinionating and this kind of fluff in a university devoted to serous scholarship.
How does the professor explain the facts that crime rates, illegitimate births, STDs are exponentially higher among blacks and they score only 75% of white scores on most standardized I.Q. tests.
Blacks and whites are distinct biological entities, and no amount of wishful thinking is going to change one hundred thousand years of adaptation to different environments.
Obama had foreign allegiances acquired from his father
who was an anti-colonialist foreign citizen from Africa
engaged in fundamentally transforming European “colonialists”
out of Africa.
What the —- do you think Obama, the closet communist believing fully that
“the ends justify the means” (i.e. lying is acceptable), meant when he said,
“We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America.”
Affirmative action is as wrong as slavery, unconstitutional and deleterious
The American Founders were conflicted by slavery.
The same conflict bears on America today as affirmative action.
The Founding Fathers knew that slavery was wrong while it created economic prosperity.
American constitutional scholars today know that affirmative action is wrong
but it mitigates their moral cowardice conflict as they would rather NOT
enforce the Constitution in order to feel better about themselves.
People must adapt to the outcome of freedom.
Freedom does not adapt to people.
Everyone should now know that printing something on the internet is always a potential liability and that one best be prepared to defend what one has posted and potentially to face consequences of some sort. Personally, I don’t think the free speech rights defended by Prof. Turley for other professors should be reserved only for those who are supposed to have academic freedom to say whatever they like but to all people. It is noteworthy when a hateful and ill advised sentiment is expressed by a person who is socially prominent and a minority. It’s regrettable and always unwise. But the reality is that most people have private sentiments they would never express to others prior to the internet which now get expressed and often lead to trouble. These momentary bursts of emotional overkill are often not at all reflective of the actual, day to day demeanor and sentiments of an individual. Another reality that we can all either face up to or pretend isn’t there, is that such inadvisable and often quite hateful racist, sexist, xenophobic and other unwise statements are made by white people so often and are so ubiquitous in our society that all but the most vile and horrible of them are simply not news. Everyone, including white Americans, knows how true this is. Is it because some people are bad, horrible humans who should be punished and endlessly shamed for this? Sometimes sure, but mostly this kind of thing simply highlights the fallibility of human beings and the truth is we are flawed and few live up to society’s standards of conduct and beliefs when it comes to many things not just these kinds of issues. People need to be more prudent: particularly the highly educated who populate the faculty of our institutions of higher learning. They ought to know better, but clearly not all of them do.
1st Amendment –
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
__________________________________________________________________________________
The unconstitutional artifice of affirmative action imbues inferiors
with courage they don’t naturally possess – as do welfare and unrestrained lawlessness and rioting.
__________________________________________________________________________________
Affirmative action is unconstitutional and must be struck down and/or repealed under the Constitution.
__________________________________________________________________________________
Let Freedom of Speech Ring!
Let Freedom Ring!
End affirmative action.
Affirmative action is unconstitutional.
Affirmative action is dictatorship.
Affirmative action must be repealed.
Not a chance of a snowflake in hell would the outcome of a race reversal be the same.
And I would sell my kids for medical experiments before I’d let them apply to Trinity College!
Do your research on the school you send them. Send your kid to a school to prepare him/her for a great paying job not to learn some progressive left racist indoctrination.
Create a business for your son or daughter. College expense is not worth the time and money.
There are two possibly three out of two thousand post high school colleges and universities. The others (minus military academies possibly) are all under the thumb of Department of Education and the NEA. Both of them . One is a technical college in Florida. The other two are Hillsboro.edu in MIchigan and Grove in Pennsylvania. These two do not accept any public funding unfortunately that includes GI Bill. The rest are automatically suspect unless as Clam stated you personally check them out.
Agreed! After all, college is nothing but a glorified trade school right? Higher education has no use other than to earn a significant paycheck. Why should we care if our institutions teach people things other than how to make money like ethics, an appreciation of history and culture and all those useless things that distinguish humans from mere animals? What’s the value in that right?
Why should we care if our institutions teach people things other than how to make money like ethics, an appreciation of history and culture and all those useless things that distinguish humans from mere animals?
I guarantee you that only a thin slice of distribution credits are earned in philosophy or art history or music appreciation. (And art historians have tolerated a river of charlatanry in their discipline and allied disciplines).
Faculty members are disciplinary partisans and lack the grace to concede the core curriculum to foundational disciplines like philosophy, mathematics, statistics, and history. The trustees could repair this, but they do nothing.
Replace the baccalaureate degree.
I think academic freedom relies on two assumptions I no longer find true.
The first is that the academy is self correcting. That bad scholarship will not be rewarded. That peer review and other mechanisms will keep academia largely progressing forward. But the rise of post modernism and the capture of so many taxpayer dollars to fund departments of evil like gender studies, critical legal theory, intersectionality, etc., the rise of theories that blacks cannot be racist, that racism = prejudice + power, the ever burgeoning costs of college to pay for $300,000 VPs of x, y, and z not associated with any degree, and the mandatory classes, and the anti-free speech activitiies taking place on campus, prove in my eyes, that academia is not self-correcting.
And so, the first assumption of academic freedom is lost.
The second is that without the academy, Galileo will have no place to publish his results concerning the motion of the earth around the sun. But with blogs and twitter, and FOX and NBC, and think tanks on the left and right, kickstarters, gofundmes and youtube series like feminist frequency it seems likely that Galileo can still be funded and do his research and publish it, even if he has a day job as a waiter in Manhattan.
And so, the second assumption of academic freedom is lost.
Basically, I personally don’t care about academic freedom anymore. The academics have pissed and shat on it for far too long.
I PERSONALLY HAVE HEARD ACADEMICS TREAT TENURE as more of a dick measuring, academic career benchmark, benefits package, negotiating point to be demanded and handed out as rewards, but not as a reward for good research, and so I wonder why I should respect it when academics do not.
ON TOP OF ALL THAT, I would fire this momzer because I have no idea how he can stand in front of a diverse class of all races and claim that he can teach his class fairly and without bigotry.
He can say whatever he wants, but if says something that makes it impossible for him to credibly perform his job as a teacher, then I have no problem ousting him.
I have only one question for this gumby: why should your students believe you can teach and grade them fairly?
Too many points, but consider the University of Missouri.
David Benson – I heard the University of Missouri was still losing students. Soon they will have to cut faculty and staff. Then, horror of horrors, administers. They probably have already cut adjunct and grad assts.
Yes. The question is why.
So some form of self-correction?
David Benson – they backed the wrong horse. The alums and their kids backed another. Kids are going to other schools.
In days of old– like in the 50’s and 60s, ’70s, Missou was a frat boy place. The other state schools are now better. Columbia campus is dying on the vine. Good Ol Boys from Ol Mizzou, Went in dumb come out dumb too. Hustlin round Columbia in their alligator shoes. They are keeping the Tigers down.
Your joking again.
I would agree, whites are not a ‘protected’ class so you can say what you want. Had he said this against gays, he would be looking for a new job.
What happened to free speech?
David Benson – you cannot say anything bad about a protected class. Lightning will strike you dead!!! Free speech is dead. Where have you been. 😉
Paul, there is a new meaning behind free speech and that is free politically correct speech or expect having a left wing mob riot and potentially do harm to the speaker. I note how many posters use their free speech to make whatever silly claim enters their mind, but they don’t avow themselves of free speech to prove their case. Instead in the larger world rioting of the left seems to be proof enough.
Now your joking twice
You seem to be conflating the law with arguments against it, presumably because you’re stupid. A “protected class” includes race, gender, and such, but not a particular race or gender or whatnot. “Black” is not a protected class, but “race” is.
The fact that many colleges bemoan this state of affairs and try to defy it does not mean the law conforms to their delusions — or your own.
Drew – are not white or black and race synonymous? BTW, I do know what the hell I am talking about.
I mean, clearly you do not. Race is a protected class, regardless of which race. I believe you fail to understand the term “protected class” and what it implies. Again, this is probably because you’re none-too-bright.
Also, I’m very certain you don’t even understand what a “synonym” is. Would you describe Bill Cosby as a “race man” or a “black man”?
Drew – I would describe Bill Cosby as an alleged criminal. Race has nothing to do with it.
You don’t live in the USA right?
. . . asks a person who writes in broken English. Stay in school, kid, and you may be eligible for an H-1B someday.
This is an example of who is brainwashing our university students. Our campuses have become cesspools that need to be drained.
Most misunderstand Academic Freedom. As there was nothing scholarly about his writing, I don’t think he has a defensible case.
More colleges and universities need to emphasize that regular tenure track faculty represent the university’s standards of scholarship 24/7.
What does Drexel have to do with this case?
David Benson,…
You can click on the blue highlighted words “Drexel professor” to find out.
Thanks. I missed that.
While I agree with you that the comments made by the professor were protected speech in the sense that no one should prevent him from making them, I do not agree that he should not have been fired because of them. The Constitution requires that speech be protected from legal consequences, but it does not require that the speaker be protected from the consequences of speech that is unwise or offensive. It is perfectly reasonable for people to lose jobs, homes, and friendships over hateful speech such as was made by the professor, and his frankly unbelievable attempts to justify the offensive attitude expressed in the hashtag “Let them f***ing die” do not excuse his behavior. Actions, as my mother used to tell me just before I lost privileges, have consequences.
Jane Surber,
Agreed. JT supports Drexel’s decision “as a matter of free speech”.
As a matter of free speech, he could eliminate the civility rule here, allow vile, racist rants and threats, in support of “free speech”.
It’s up to Trinity if they choose to retain this professor, but a decision to terminate him would not interfere with his ability to post these kinds of idiotic “thoughts”.
And Trinity is free to keep him if they think he reflects well on their institution.
Setting, and expecting, certain standards of civil behavior, whether it’s at Trinity or on this blog, is not an abridgement of free speech rights.
It seems we have two individuals making sense, Jane and tnash. The professor’s language outside of the classroom seems indicative of his behavior and beliefs. I don’t know whether or not he should be fired because I didn’t hear from him directly, but when looking at college campus’s and taking note that some of the professors had used violence in earlier years that led to the death of other people without disavowing such action leads me to believe our universities have lost control of who should teach and who should not.
All we have to do is consider the histories of Bernardine Dohrn and Bill Ayers. Some only look at the rights of criminals and don’t bother to look at the innocents they took part in killing.
The Constitution requires that speech be protected from legal consequences,
No, it does not. The man is not a public employee. The only claim he would have is that the college had a contractual obligation to continue employing him.
Had this caffirmative action cretin, instead, expressed a desire to let “professors” or “college administrators” die, would there have been a vastly different result, whereby the brain-dead college administrators would’ve been sufficiently terrified to take the appropriate action and can his a$$? I’d say, yes. Unfortunately, threatening whites is now perceived as freedom of speech and given the green light by law professors who mistate the law. Quel dommage.
Why would a university employ a racist to teach a class on racism, unless it’s in the how-to spirit?
If a Caucasian made such remarks about African Americans, he would be in the company of the Klan or the Arian Brotherhood, and I hardly see how he would be employable teaching classes about race and racism. And his call to let them die would have been met with nationwide riots and a few cities would have been razed.
He has a right to free speech. The university has the right to fire a blatant racist who has no business teaching any students of a race he openly hates. That exposes students to bigotry and bias, and raises the question of hostility on campus, harassment, and fairness. I am curious to know what his record, and if there have been any student reviews or complaints alleging bias or racism.
If someone said online to let all the Jews die, or let all the Muslims die, or let all the blacks die, would he still be employed at a university teaching a class on race and racism? I think not.
One standard for all.
Parents – vote with your wallets.
Excellent post Karen. I no longer donate to academia and don’t believe government should be providing so much funding to many universities. When students riot and cause harm those students should pay a penalty and if they are on assistance they should be warned and removed from all assistance if they involve themselves further with activities that could cause harm to others. They are given assistance to help them educate themselves, not to riot or interfere with academic pursuits. They will have plenty of time after the university when they are working and not requiring others to take care of them.
Academia needs to have an honest reexamination of the utility and effect of having minority and women’s studies departments. For many institutions they serve a purpose in sewing discord and greatly contributing to racist strife on campuses.
On the utility side, one has to ask what the employability of a graduate majoring in these programs outside the realm of academics itself. For those returning to academics from these programs it often serves to perpetuate the problems manifest with these departments.
We have seen through numerous blog postings by our host and other contributors that it often is the case where faculty members of these departments are above sanction because often administrators and other faculty are afraid to confront the racism of some of these faculty or more often the students, for fear of being labeled bigots and haters.
Frequently we have seen how the spark of racial disintegration of student life and culture often has origins in these departments. I suspect that in time they will become a greater liability to these colleges in terms of lowered enrollment, alienation of alumni, and loss of goodwill.
As long as opportunists and bureaucrats with vested interest in furthering the racist narrative continue to inflame the issues the acceptance of others as equals will perpetually be unattainable.
Society in general is better served by defunding these programs and moving on to more culturally and economically beneficial lives for students and others.
Such as equal pay for equal work.
As researched in minority and women’s studies programs.
It is hard to reassemble what you wrote so that one can understand it. I assume you are discussing equal pay for equal work whether a man or a woman. There is always a contention that one party isn’t being paid enough. It’s hard to prove it one way or the other. Womans study programs, however, don’t seem to be able to pass a fair judgement on that score either. In fact from what I have seen, admittedly limited, woman sutdies departments have been anything but fair and have done a lot of harm.
“Equal pay for equal work” is a false antithetical and unconstitutional contrivance.
Americans are equally free to engage in free enterprise by starting a business.
Americans are free to take a job to help another man conduct his business.
Freedom and free enterprise mean that workers are purchased from the free and open labor markets.
Business owners are free to purchase the best labor at the lowest price.
Workers are free to leave their jobs or strike.
Enterprise owners are free to hire replacements for strikers.
You have imposed dictatorship based on communistic principles.
You have no concept of the American thesis.
You never heard the mantra “equal pay for equal work”
from the American Founders or founding documents.
That came from Karl Marx who concluded with great deliberation that he hated freedom
after six decades of freedom’s existence.
You make up your collectivist redistribution and socialist engineering as you go along;
as if you have any constitutional authority to do so.
Such as equal pay for equal work. As researched in minority and women’s studies programs.
I don’t think you’re going to find many competent econometricians in victimology programs. There are economists who call themselves ‘feminist’, but their interests tend toward the economic dimension of family relations.
Darren re “Society in general is better served by defunding these programs and moving on to more culturally and economically beneficial lives for students and others”
I agree with you although I do think that African American History/Literature/Music is a valid program.
Autumn, most things are valid programs, but univerities are there to teach not to politically indoctrinate.
Those could only be niche programs which an odd school here or there instituted as a local signature – if they were at all interested in what prospective students were interested in studying.
Consider a state college with 11,000 students (FTE). That’s about normal for the baccalaureate colleges in the CUNY system. It will have (on average) north of 600 faculty (FTE). About 12% of the faculty manpower will be devoted to post-baccalaurete programs. About 82% of the post-baccalaureate degrees are awarded in this country in vocational subjects and absent the issuance of research degrees, the share should actually. be about 100%. At the undergraduate level, you devote just north of 30% of your faculty manpower to courses to fulfill distribution credits (all in academic subjects and the arts). In re the remainder, about 2/3 of your manpower should be devoted to vocational subjects and 1/3 to academics and the arts.. The math works out as follows: .12 + (.88 x .685 x .666) = .52; ergo, you’d expect about 52% of your faculty to be teaching vocational subjects. Some disciplinary sets have an academic and vocational aspect (e.g. communications, psychology, and information science and technology), so you’d prorate the faculty there according to the precise composition of the programs in question.
That would leave you with just shy of 300 faculty (FTE) in academics and the arts. Let’s posit you don’t develop local signatures and just follow the market. You’d distribute those positions approximately thus:
18% Biology
12% Psychology (academic wing)
9%: Political Science
8%: English and world literature
7%: Social relations
6%: History
5%: Economics
5%: Communications (academic wing)
5%: writing and rhetoric
4%: computer and information science (academic wing)
3%: mathematics and statistics
3%: chemistry
3%: studio art
3%: music
2%: theatre and dance
2%: anthopology
2%: comparative religion
1%: Spanish language and literature
1%: Philosophy
If you have 6 specialists in American history, 8 in American literature, 9 music faculty, and 20 sociologists, developing even a concentration in black studies (as opposed to a few courses) is going to require a quarter to a third of your faculty to the study of American blacks in three of these four disciplines. You only have the room in the sociology department.
Any university offering a course entitled “Black Hair” has confused scholarship with sheer idiocy.
Darren: you are correct on this. We do not need “minority” studies. It puts the graduates into a bundle or dumbdowns. Where are they going to go teach? We need courses on American Indians and German Americans. Right? Majors. Minors for coal minors daughters and whatnot.
Excellent. Universities exist to prepare young people for their lives both economically and intellectually.
Academia needs to funciton in free markets.
Academia needs to remove the artifices of:
– Unconstitutional affirmative action
– Unconstitutional anti-striker replacement hiring laws
– Usurious student lending as a Ponzi scheme on the American education industry,
employed for the sole purpose of creating teachers union jobs and members.
Academia needs to have an honest reexamination of the utility and effect of having minority and women’s studies departments.
They should close such programs tout court. That’s not the issue here. His berth is in the sociology department.