The Daily Pennsylvanian student newspaper this week ran a story on how some faculty members are panicked at what they consider an existential threat to the safety and future of the institution. No, it is not another pandemic or a wave of terrorism. It is being forced to accept “viewpoint diversity.” The very prospect of hiring faculty with opposing views has led at least one professor to pledge to retire rather than teach in a diverse intellectual environment.
The outrage was triggered by a Dec. 12 email to the Board of Trustees from Marc Rowan, chair of the university’s Wharton business school Board of Advisors and a major donor. Rowan asked about protections for free speech and academic freedom on campus.
Pennsylvania has been regularly criticized as one of the least diverse institutions in the country and one of the most anti-free speech environments. It is ranked at the very bottom of colleges and universities on free speech protection in the annual survey by FIRE.
We have discussed the intolerance at Penn for years. Professors who have even allowed students to discuss issues like transgender status have been attacked for allowing diverse opinions to be heard in class.
Even questioning anti-racism statements is enough to trigger cancel campaigns and calls for termination at the school.
Conversely, it is a school where faculty are lionized for radical statements on the left, even racist language like calling Dr. Ben Carson a “coon.” The same professor, Dr. Anthea Butler, claimed that police held back rescuing children in Uvalde, Texas out of racism and declared that evangelical Christians are white racists who “may end up killing us all.” The MSNBC commentator was given a prestigious academic chair. She is also the chair of the department of Religious Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. If a conservative were to espouse the countervailing views, the reaction on campus would be swift and predictable.
Penn has long maintained such orthodoxy by purging faculties of conservatives and showing little tolerance for dissenting views.
Now faculty are raising the alarm that they could be forced to teach on a campus with conservative faculty. History and sociology Professor Harun Küçük went on to warn that there could be pressure to hire academics with opposing viewpoints. Such diversity, in his view, is nothing short of “a hostile Republican takeover of a distressed institution. He explained that “viewpoint diversity” is “a code word for Republican hires” and that initiatives to protect free speech are nothing other than an effort to “re-engineer the University.”
If “re-engineering” Penn means reintroducing free speech protections and intellectual diversity, it would be a welcomed change. However, political science Professor Robert Vitalis said he plans to retire early to avoid having to teach on a campus with such intellectual diversity.
Cinema and media studies Professor Karen Redrobe even claimed that Rowan’s letter asking about free speech and academic freedom on campus could be unethical: “I think that any advisory board member or trustee who has participated in that kind of use of duress needs to be held accountable for behavior that undermines the educational mission of the University.”
These views are echoed by anti-free speech sites and writers. Sites like Above the Law have spent years ridiculing objections to the barring of conservative faculty. Senior Editor Joe Patrice defended “predominantly liberal faculties” by arguing that hiring a conservative professor is akin to allowing a believer in geocentrism to teach at a university.
What is most striking is the panic over the prospect of introducing a few opposing viewpoints on overwhelmingly liberal faculties. A survey conducted by the Harvard Crimson shows that more than three-quarters of Harvard Arts and Sciences and School of Engineering and Applied Sciences faculty respondents identify as “liberal” or “very liberal.” Only 2.5% identified as “conservative,” and only 0.4% as “very conservative.”
The same is true at other schools. A study found that only nine percent of law school professors identify as conservative at the top 50 law schools. A 2017 study found only 15 percent of faculties overall were conservative. Another survey showed that 33 out of 65 departments lacked a single conservative faculty member.
The last few weeks have awakened donors to the rising intolerance and extremism on our faculties. Some donors have even pulled funding, including $100 million withdrawn from the University of Pennsylvania.
Donors (and state legislatures with state-funded schools) can use their leverage to force greater diversity of thought on our campuses. The problem is not that we have these radical faculty members. The problem is that we have comparably few faculty with opposing views. The diversity of opinion on most faculties runs from the left to the far left. Some faculty members now argue that intellectual diversity is not a core or essential value in academia.
If donors want to open up our campuses, they may need to close their wallets until real reforms are implemented in higher education.
The WSJ has an interesting article about how Americans have lost faith in the value of college.
They cite a Gallup poll showing confidence in higher education fell from 57% to 36%.
Half of parents would not send their children to college, even without financial difficulty.
Two-thirds of high schoolers think they can succeed without college.
When looking at the cost, what they are getting for that cost, the mandatory DEI for graduation, would you blame them?
Free markets work.
This article is pointing out that alumini and huge donors that colleges need are presuring woke institutions to change.
You are noting that parents and young adults are increasingly looking at alternatives to woke colleges.
The supposed leaders of the Bud Light boycott have called it off – AHB has purportedly learned its lesson.
Yet, beer drinkers are not listening. AHB’s sales are still way down. They are not recovering anytime soon.
Market forces do not work quickly – it took a long time to F#$K things up as badly as they are today.
It will take a long time to fix them.
But Peter Theil is right – we passed peak woke in 2020.
Personally I think we passed the peak in 2016, and that the past 7 years have been the equivalent to the battle of gettysburg – the last surge of a desparate and failing ideology. Lee nearly succeeded at Gettysburg, but the war had already been won by the north and success at gettysburg would merely have prolonged the inevitable.
We are in the midst of the violent death throes of woke leftist nonsense.
As we see dying beasts are very dangerous. but death is inevitable.
John Say,
I do hope you are right concerning the death of wokeism.
What I do fear is in it’s death throws it will do something very, very dumb.
The example at Penn illustrates just how deep the tentacles of socialism have become embedded in our colleges & universities. But then the Chinese funded the Penn/Biden Center so I guess we shouldn’t be surprised right Jonathan ? Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un must be smiling all the way from his mansion in Pyongyang for his new class of communist-wannabees in Amerika.
But then the Chinese funded the Penn/Biden Center so I guess we shouldn’t be surprised right Jonathan
There were around 100 Confucius centers at universities across this nation. Its down to just a few handfuls, but most that closed just renamed the program of Chinese propaganda, and still operate.
Strange that Standing up for foundational Constitutional tenet like free speech, gets a person labeled a Nazi, but the same College administrators welcome actual Chinese propaganda
This left wing woke nonsense has a fatal flaw.
It does not work. Failure is inevitable.
The only question is how much harm will be done before that.
Post WWII Much of Europe adopted socialism light. As a consequence european standards of living are about 30% lower than the US – this is despite the US having taken in about 50M immigrants in the past 4 decades. Europe has been trying to cast off that socialism lite for 40 years with very slow success.
This stuff does not work.
Standard of living is founded on the value we produce. We must build brings, roads, houses, grow food, produce refrigerators, TV,s all kinds of goods and services – or by defintiion our standard of living declines.
No one cares what the ideology of an engineer is, they care that the bridge holds up.
An ideology that can not deliver the goods and services we want and need will not survive.
The Bud light boycott has been called off – yet AHB is not recovering. It will take a decade for AHB to recover.
Billions have been lost. Disney has likely suffered 150B in damage to shareholder value.
Businesses accross the country have quietly taken note.
The War in Israel has been a disaster for the left. It has provided the oportunity for college students and colleges to show the donors they depend on their total complete lunacy. People are increasingly tired of funding this.
The notoriety of Penn is enough to send student applications and enrollment down quite a lot. I would not advise anyone to go there.
I never thought I would live this long to see my beloved Nation fall to such a low. These Universities and Colleges need a giant enema to cleanse their faculties. No more million dollar Presidents, no more tenured positions and if a member of faculty member is incompetent or fails to perform to their moral standards clause, it’s hit the road!
Trump 2024
I’m not so sure that eliminating tenured positions is a good idea, as any conservative professors could be “cleansed” from campus.
The current backlash isn’t really against Woke, but pushback to critiques of Israeli government policies in Gaza.
The Pushback that Democrats are feeling is against Israel. The Pushback universities are feeling is against the woke.
Both are being hit where it counts – Universities are getting hit by donors,
Democrats are getting hit by young voters.
Trump needs a dementia test.
In his speech last night, he said “By the way, they never report the crowd on January 6. You know Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, you know they -, do you know they destroyed all of the information, all of the evidence, everything, deleted and destroyed all of it. All of it. Because of lots of things, like Nikki Haley is in charge of security. We offered her 10,000 people.”
In the same speech, he said that Putin, Xi, and Kim Jong Un were “very fine people.” They’re dictators! They are not “fine people.” He envies them.
If Biden said anything like this, Fox would have a meltdown.
And President Volodymyr Zelensky has extended an invitation to Donald Trump to visit Kyiv, with a specific condition attached: Trump must demonstrate his ability to bring an end to the war with Russia within 24 hours, as he’d claimed he could.
Not only can Trump end the War in Ukraine – Biden can too, and frankly it is going to end.
Is it really that difficult for you to understand this ?
Can trump end it in 24hrs ? No. But as Salena Zito observed.
Trump supporters take him seriously but not litterally.
The left takes Trump literally but not seriously.
Russia needs the US to lift sanctions, fix the norde stream II pipeline, help bring the Russian oil and gas fields that have dropped off back on line. These are all things Russia can not do itself, not in a year, not in a decade.
Russia needs to get enough out of this war that it is not perceived as the loser – and it has the wherewithal to assure that does not happen.
Russia wants to make sure that NATO does not encroach directly on Russia’s borders.
Ukraine needs to be able to survive as a sovereign country.
The world needs russian oil and gas online.
It needs both Russian and Ulkrainian fertilizer.
It needs Ukrainian grain.
While the details may vary based on the state of the conflict at the moment
It is not all that difficult to come to a resolution that all parties will agree to.
There was a better one on the table 2 years ago that Ukraine will get today.
Ultimately Ukraine will do whatever the west tells is, because it is not capable to taking on Russia without western support.
I do not wish to pretend that getting a peace deal will be painless.
Russia is likely to insist on Ukraine not merely renouncing NATO membership permanently,
But also completely severing military ties with the west.
It is also going to insist on keeping crimea and a land bridge to Crimea.
Are you so daft that you can not figure out how to make a deal with that ?
Biden can not resolve any foreign policy issues – not with Russia, not in the mideast, because he has F$%Ked up so much any deal would be a huge admission of the failure of his policies.
Trump does not have the burden of losing face, because he is not the stupid person behind all these incredibly bad policies.
The left takes Trump quite seriously. He’s a danger to the country.
And he’s showing signs of senility, as with his comment that “By the way, they never report the crowd on January 6. You know Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, you know they -, do you know they destroyed all of the information, all of the evidence, everything, deleted and destroyed all of it. All of it. Because of lots of things, like Nikki Haley is in charge of security. We offered her 10,000 people.”
“It is not all that difficult to come to a resolution that all parties will agree to. ”
If it weren’t that difficult, the war would already be over. And if Trump thinks he can end it, he should share his proposal instead of keeping it secret while people are dying.
Trump has had a dementia test. I am pretty sure he takes one every year and trumpets the results.
Those of you idiots on the left focus on disecting Trump’s words – and you have been caught lying about them or selectively editing so often that no one outside your bubble is paying attention to you. Trumps supporters and the rest of the country increasingly care what Trump DOES, What Biden DOES.
Trump and Biden are going to say stupid things from now until november. It will not matter.
You fixate on what Trump allegedly says about Xi or Putin or …
Putin has invaded a neighbor in every single presidency since he has taken power EXCEPT Trump.
During the Trump administration the US shfted to an asia facing foreign policy – because as should be clear even with the war in Ukraine – Russia is a paper tiger and Europe is capable of taking care of itself.
During the Trump administration US relations with india, vietnam, Philipines, Japan, Australia, New Zealand.
Taiwan Malasia all improved. The nations of asia quietly have aligned to contain china.
This is one of very few accomplishments of Trump that Biden has not burned to the ground.
China is in economic trouble and will be for another generation – that is very dangerous. There is significant risk of China militarily threatening a neighbor.
As the Trump administration progresses the Mid East became increasingly peaceful. Now we are seeing the same kind of chaos and conflict we saw at the start of the Obama administration.
It is not Trump that talked about locking up americans that disagreed with him in “re-education camps” – it is Democrats.
It is not Trump or Republicans that live in the idiotic fear that their neighbor is a white supremecist preparing to slay them – it is democrats.
It is not Trump that weaponized the federal govenrment to go after parents of school children, catholics, pro life protestors, people who shop at Cabella’s or Dicks.
It is not Trump that drove inflation up to near 10% and has left it at 3 times the norm of the past 40 years.
Go listen to Jamie Diamond – not a republican or conservative by any measure. Who recently took the media to task by noting that on policy after policy Trump was right. Trump’s presidency worked. Biden’s does not.
I do not give a schiff what Trump says about Xi – and I certainly do not expect YOU to report it correctly.
I really do not care much about What Trump says. I also do not care much about What Biden says – though the fact that he can not seem to ever figure out how to get off a stage is distrubing. The WH is not a senior living center.
Regardless, I do care what Biden has done.
Biden cares more about going after his enemies as well as ordinary people that disagree with him than he does about the people of this country.
Nikki Haley wasn’t involved in J6, nor was/is she “in charge of security.”
Despite Trump repeatedly invoking her name and saying that she’s in charge of security: “By the way, they never report the crowd on January 6. You know Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, you know they -, do you know they destroyed all of the information, all of the evidence, everything, deleted and destroyed all of it. All of it. Because of lots of things, like Nikki Haley is in charge of security. We offered her 10,000 people.”
Trump lies a lot, including about the things he trumpets.
Nikki Haley is now publicly questioning Trump’s mental fitness:
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/nikki-haley-trump-mentally-fit-nancy-pelosi-rcna134887
Haley: “He got confused. He said he was running against Obama — he never ran against Obama! Don’t put our country at risk.”
Not all Republicans, but the Trump wing is an anti-American constitutionally-subversive movement.
Trump’s wing is anti-conservative, supporting the ideals of Mussolini and Hitler. Trump recited Hitler almost verbatim. Trump favors communist dictators over his own American intelligence community (sworn to uphold the U.S. Constitution). Trump opposes strengthening NATO but supports leaders like Putin – opposite view of Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan.
Trump in 2024 still supports insurrection and coup attempts, instead of the American system.
The question is should colleges allow “constitutional-subversives” to speak promoting foreign models of government? At one time most voters opposed communist-sympathizers promoting subversive ideals.
Do you actually listen to yourself ?
Was China threatening to take over Taiwan when Trump was president ?
Was Russia at war with Ukraine when Trump was president ?
Was Iran fomenting terrorism and war throughout the persian gulf when Trump was president ?
All those dictators and bad actors you seem to think Trump fawns over were peaceful and contained and slowly failing on their own.
It should be self evident from the War in Ukraine that While Russia can likely defeat Ukraine without western assistance,
That Russia is a paper tiger, that it is incapable of defeating any two NATO countries.
That but for Nukes Russia is barely a regional power anymore.
The US is not exiting NATO – not under Trump or any democrat.
But US involvement in NATO is with certainty going to diminish.
NATO does not really need us anymore, and is better off in most every way dealing with its own defense and not relying on the US.
I would further note that as the US is an oil exported, as the northern hemisphere is more than energy self sufficient. US interest int he mideast is waning too.
Again part of the global realignment that you are obviously oblivious to is that the US is backing away from its military role in the Mideast.
Increasingly the US is NOT in US national security interests, and increasingly we are not able to handle mideast conflcits AND contain China AND serve as NATO’s primary defensive force.
Read the Tea Leaves, The US is moving from its dominant leadership of NATO and letting Europeans take the lead in dealing with what are essentially European problems.
Containing Russia is a NATO/EU probelm – within the capability of NATO/EU with minimal assistance from the US.
Further peace and security in the mideast is increasingly a EU matter – the US does not need oil from the mideast.
The EU does.
Conversely US trade and other interests are first in the western hemisphere and 2nd in the pacific, and thrid in the anglosphere.
All of the above are going to happen one way or the other – because despite the massive US defense budget the US is no longer capable of securing all the seas in the world and fighting major conflicts in two theaters concurrently.
And it is increasingly not in our interests to do so.
You can allow things to continue as they did under Biden and Obama (and Bush) with the US increasingly unable to carry the world on its own,
Or you can accept the changes and work towards the EU/NATO taking the lead in both European national security and maintaining peace in the mideast.
Regardless oblivious to left wing nuts, the US military is no longer capable of protecting the seas for global free trade.
We are also no longer able to fight two wars on two theaters any more.
The current real threat to global stability is China and the real international military aliance that the US must be part of is that alliance to contain China.
Biden has fortunately not Flushed Trump’s efforts to reface US national security policy towards China.
I would note this is also the source of the “deep state” holy war with Trump. That is mostly NOT about right/left politics.
It is mostly about the most powerful cabals in the US defence/inteligence and foreign affairs ceding power to the hitherto far less significant Asia Pacific desks.
This is not about Republicans or Trump supporters not being conservative anymore.
It is about Getting past the cold war global power structure that significant portions of the U State/intelligence and defense communites are heavily invested in that are no longer relevant today.
The US reducing its committment to NATO and the mideast does not mean the end of NATO or war and chaos in the mideast.
It does not mean Russian Hedgemony.
It means Europe steping up to take more responsibility for the defense of Europe and the stability of the mideast.
Both Tasks that Europeans are capable of on their own.
Both Tasks that the US can no longer do AND maintain the more critical commitments to pacific rim interests.
The War in Ukraine is going badly for Ukraine. But it has also exposed that Russia is far weaker than many supposed.
The cold war US committment to NATO and to the Mideast are no longer necescary for global stability.
But Europe must step up and deal with security issues that are more critical to it than to the US.
And members of the US “deep state” whose lives revolve entirely arround Russia and the mideast better grasp that they are no longer on the most important front with respect to US global interests.
None of this is conservative/progressive. None of it is republican/democrat.
It is the reality of Post cold war global political shifts.
Grow up and face reality and quit trying to pretend that the Cold War is still ongoing.
Why the panic?
Why the fear?
Why threaten to retire early rather than have a co-worker whom just might have a differing opinion?
Could it be the idea of differing opinions that just might challenge their own is a threat? That their opinions may not stand up to an opposing opinion or viewpoint?
Could it be some students might listen and even consider a differing opinion or viewpoint based on its merits?
As long as we have these professors who are intolerant of any other opinion or viewpoint other than their own, these institutions of higher learning are no such thing.
Create a parallel education system that focuses on education and not indoctrination.
Professor, what you write about Penn could easily have been written about my alma mater, Cornell. It is a sinking ship. I have abandoned it.
As is America. We are living in the 1930s in so many ways.
I would disagree with this statement: “The problem is not that we have these radical faculty members.” It’s not their opinions that are the problem, it’s that they are unwilling to tolerate any opinion other than their own. Increasingly I see conservatives as willing to engage in debate, and liberals as willing to cancel their opponents without debate. Adding conservative faculty will not solve the problem until all are respectfully willing to allow each side to have their own viewpoints.
Conservative viewpoints follow leaders like Ronald Reagan, Barry Goldwater, John McCain, etc. There are virtually no Conservatives in Congress or in academia today.
Divisiveness, racism and tribalism is not a “Conservative” viewpoint from Abraham Lincoln’s political party. Denying election results is not a Conservative value.
The premise of the article is false, there are virtually no Conservatives in America in 2024.
Cruz isn’t conservative? Chip Jones? Mike Johnson?
Conservative viewpoints follow leaders like
It’s always to entertaining when raging extreme leftist are in charge of defining “conservatives”
But really? claiming conservatives are responsible for tribalism? The lefts lack of self awareness is epic.
Lots of assertions, but nothing to back up your claims.
What is it that you mean by “there are no conservatives” – your going to have to provide a defintion of conservative.
When you say things like “denying election results …” you undercut your credibility.
Are you saying that to be conservative fraudulent results must be accepted ?
Regardless “denier” is the lingo of left wing nuts, it is a left wing nut “dog whistle”.
Conservatism is NOT an ideology. It can coexist with other ideologies.
Conservatism inherently means proceeding calmly and presuming that institutions and norms established for decades or even centuries – even if imperfect, will likely get us through whatever we encounter.
That means that you do not panic over things like Covid and rush out and change everything. Change business, change home life, change elections.
Conservatism is FACTUALLY rooted. The FACT is most change is error. Most change causes more harm than good. Even good change often takes many iterations before it is better than what preceded it.
Conservatism does NOT mean that there should be no change ever. Only that we should proceed carefully. That we should ALWAYS be suspicious that change will make things worse not better – which is true MOST of the time.
It means that we should resist large scale change imposed by force aka Government – because that is the type of change that will have the largest and likely the worst negative impact.
So conservatism would inherently mean – we should resist panicking over COVID and locking the country down, forcing people to mask, social distance and granting vast unchecked powers to those in government and public health – and that we should accept that if we do so the consequences will be worse than the problem we are trying to solve.
And that is precisely what happened.
Everything from masks, to mailin voting undermined society, institutions and pretty much universally did not work.
And as many correctly argued at the time – even if these measures had worked – the unintended consequences would be worse that the problem they attempted to correct.
Conservatism does NOT say that all change is bad. The World, the west, the US particularly are “great” – better off than they were 500 years ago because of dramatic changes that have occured. Proceed cautiously and thoughtfully, test new ideas before applying them to society wholesale by force, is not the same as do not change.
Regardless, this country is split between those who think we have gone too far too fast – which while substantially larger a groups, is best reflected by MAGA – Make America Great Again, which is at is core pure conservatism. All it means is reverse many of the recent changes that have been disruptive and destructive.
Distrust of government – especially when govenrment is being used as to force change is inherently conservative, and also inherently correct.
Distrust of rapid change – as we have done with covid is inherently conservative – and also has proved inherently correct.
Distrust of massive lawless changes to our elections is inherently conservative – and has also proved inherently correct.
It is conservative to trust elections that are conducted in the same way as in the past.
It is conservative to distrust elections when election laws that we have spent centuries trying to get right are all tossed out and some excuse is used to conduct elections significantly differently.
I would note, it is not only conservative, it is also logical.
Those on the left constantly deny this – but people are very close to exclusively motivated by their own self interest.
Those on the left are incorrect in claiming that conservatives efforts to require voter ID in elections is racist. But they are absolutely correct in beleiving that conservative think that voter ID will benefit conservatives.
Conversely the rest of us are correct in beleiving that the whole scale mangling of election laws in 2020 was about much more than covid.
It was about gaining both short and long term political advantage for those on the left.
John McCain was a conservative? On what planet?
Earth.
Isn’t the real fear of these faculty members is that if conservative views are espoused, students and some faculty members will see the truth of these views? It is The Lie that is being protected.
Edward, that is a lofty goal
I think the problem is the students exposed to new ideas will start asking very simple questions.
Like free speech. The left says some ideas are so wrong, those topic do not deserve 1st amendment protections. A conservative Prof might agree and then ask, who should have to power to make such a decision.
Its the questions these extremely educated professors fear. With their degrees and years of teaching experience, they have no clue how to answer simple questions.
I guess we ironically have to thank Hamas for opening up this window into the soul of our universities.
The ripple effect of the pebble (actually a boulder) thrown into the pond of our culture of seeing the pro-Hamas (yes, they are pro Hamas and you all know it) “students” protesting ISRAEL on October 8th prior to Israel doing anything except having their citizens killed, their women raped and babies kidnapped.
Those of us who follow what has been going on with our universities were somewhat shocked by the radical response to the massacre, but other folks that were oblivious to what was happening on campus were blown away but what they saw. ESPECIALLY JEWISH LIBERALS.
The schools were taken over by the Nazis in this same manner. The communists in the USSR and China also took over their schools the way the left has taken over ours. This has been a 40 year program that has been more successful than any of us ever thought possible.
We need to end this here and now and the only one that seems to be doing something about it is DeSantis in Florida. DEI needs to be expunged as the cancer that it is. Michigan has over 100 diversity officers in their college administration and they spend over 18 million dollars on it. These 142 “officers” have one goal and that is to find trouble even where there is no trouble. Imagine spending 18 million dollars to not only zero effect but in fact to actually have a negative impact on the school.
END DEI NOW!
Great comment. Two things especially caught my eye:
1) “…pro-Hamas (yes, they are pro Hamas and you all know it) “students”…”
YES! They are pro-Hamas. This is not an innocent population. They voted for Hamas and they support Hamas even now, particularly with harboring the hostages. When the transfers were ongoing, Red Cross ambulances were rocked and hostages being paraded to the ambulances were jeered by citizens.
2) “The schools were taken over by the Nazis in this same manner. The communists in the USSR and China also took over their schools the way the left has taken over ours. This has been a 40 year program that has been more successful than any of us ever thought possible.”
Exactly! No Trump fan here, but people who call him the 1933 chancellor of Germany forget one thing. He needed a violent group and a complicit populace to spread his terror. The clowns of J6 don’t come close to the SA and Brown Shirts. One need only read “Life and Death in Shanghai” to see the same tactics being used here. And lest we who were adults in the late 1970s forget, Iranian university students helped clear the way for Ayatollah Khomeini and were complicit in the Embassy hostage taking.
Just one more thing, Jewish liberals may have been shocked, but the ones I know have not opened their eyes to the root cause of these extremist views.
America is going the path of Nazi Germany, Mao’s China, and Lenin’s Russia.
I guess we ironically have to thank Hamas for opening up this window into the soul of our universities.
Excellent observation.
We want to reestablish a healthy diversity of ideas, not roiling factional tribalism in our universities. That means bringing back intellectual modesty and respectful candor. It means weeding out strident, militant forms of expression. Yes, Jonathan, free speech is maximized when local cultures backed by authority rope off intimidation, deception and urging others to break norms and laws.
Norms of civility and goodwill (and their diligent upholding) are essential to productive diversity in public speech.
University Presidents are in a decent position to lead in defining their institutional norms, and must have the courage to enforce them. The most intolerant, self-righteous among the faculty may have to be pushed out. I believe the others will adapt.
The intolerance is not exclusively among the faculty but among the administrators and their staff, and, worse yet, the governing boards, too. Plenty of intolerance and self-righteousness to go around. It is a situation where the problems will simply arise again because the raw material is ubiquitous.
the governing boards, too. Plenty of intolerance and self-righteousness to go around.
Harvard discovered when the natural trajectory of their “education” collides with reality, the mega donors perk up their ears and ask whats going on.
The answer rests with the donor Alums. All the rest are already corrupted
Hard to believe or accept that my alma mater has sunk this low and that smug elitists like Kucuk are running the show. Time to close the checkbook and encourage other alums to do the same.
Such diversity, in his view, is nothing short of “a hostile Republican takeover of a distressed institution.
If you gathered a bunch of Phd’s in a room and asked exactly why their institution was distressed, they would be too stupid the see the literal writing on wall.
They could begin by asking why large corporations no longer require a college degree. No longer see a need to buy the product the institutions are delivering.
“Cinema and media studies Professor Karen Redrobe even claimed [. . . ] ‘needs to be held accountable for behavior that undermines the educational mission of the University.’”
Which “mission” is to provide a bully pulpit for anti-Western, anti-American, tribalistic propagandists.
Our universities are beyond repair. I only hope some of the students are smarter than their professors.
pudnhead, you giving up?….you a quitter? DEI took it in the chops at Harvard. Independent thinking is making a comeback. Stick around for it.
Love your optimism, but I believe it’s too late.
““The kinds of things that he suggests will turn this place into a vocational school. It will turn into something like the University of Phoenix,” Küçük said. “So I hope there are enough people out there with decision-making power who would see that.””
Professor Harun Küçük clearly believes Republicans are lacking in intelligence, incapable of actually attaining degrees of higher learning. He has clearly been sheltered from the big, bad scary world of deplorable Americans who, instead of availing themselves of his superior intellect and ability, bitterly cling to their guns and Bibles.
It seems to me, judging by the rhetoric of many in media, government and education, there is a significant mass delusion happening. Unfortunately, they hold sway over virtually all levers of power and have shown no compunction in using it in ways antithetical to the principles of our Constitutional Republic.
Americans need to speak out against this nonsense at every turn.
These left-wing apparatchiks could not survive outside the walls of the universities..
King Arthur flour baking contest: Whites need not apply
“Pitchfest 2024 [the contest] is a testament to our commitment to fostering a more inclusive baking community and empowering creative POC leaders in the industry.” (Molly Lawrence, social responsibility manager at King Arthur)
Yet again, why does “inclusive” always mean its opposite?
Time to “Bud Light” King Arthur
Thanks for the heads up. I already stopped using their flour. Costco Organic AP better for bread.
and your kids can get all of this for 66K per year. What a bargain!
Sorry Mr. Franklin, it’s time for this one to close.