We have been discussing the largely successful efforts by students and faculty to prevent certain conservative speakers like Milo Yiannopoulos from being able to speak on campuses. The latest such example is University of California at Davis where protesters succeeded in preventing fellow students and faculty from hearing Yiannopoulos. There is one promising element to the story however. Unlike school administrators who have either supported or yielded to the “heckler’s veto,” Interim Chancellor Ralph Hexter denounced the effort to not only silence an opposing voice but to deny the right of others to hear that voice on campus. While the school professes “let there be light” on its seal, the school is now cloaked in a forced silence after the ignoble victory of protesters in curtailing the exercise of free speech.
Category: Academia
I have long been a critic of politician interfering with curricular issues in our schools. Most of us do not look to politicians as paragons of knowledge. Assemblyman Jimmy Gomez personifies the perils of politicians dictating course choices. Gomez is pushing for a course on to teach students who to avoid fake news. It is part of a new trend around the world to rally people against the scourge of “fake news” — a trend that is already been used as a rationale for censorship and the criminalization of speech. Fake news is now the rallying cry for people who disagree with coverage and is used as a way to avoid answering questions. What one person consider fake news and other considers real news can be highly subjective. The most recent controversy reveals the difficult lines to draw. President-elect Donald Trump made headlines yesterday by denounced CNN as “fake news” and refusing to take a question from its reporter. Yet, the report was “news” that was reported by most major outlets. I agree with the Trump staff about the need for BuzzFeed to have looked more closely at specific allegations and I do find the contractions raised by the Trump staff to be very problematic. Indeed, James Clapper appears to have supported Trump in his outrage over the leaks and further distanced the U.S. intelligence community from the merits of the allegations. [Here is Clapper’s statement] Yet, the legitimacy of these stories comes down to the details published in the stories. A former MI6 agent made the allegation and those allegations were forwarded to the FBI by a U.S. Senator. That is news. The specific “dirt” alleged to be in the possession of the Russians is a far more difficult question for editors and most declined to run those details while reporting the lack of independent confirmation.
The Chinese communist regime reminded the world of its unwavering fear of independent thought and analysis for any kind. The latest victim is Deng Xiaochao, 62, an art professor at Shandong Jianzhu University in central China who was fired for a commentary that criticizing Chairman Mao Zedong. Of course, Mao has been dead for 40 years and he was a brutal, moronic dictator. However, this is this 123rd birthday and various people in China still revere a man who killed millions directly in the cultural revolution or indirectly through idiotic policies of centralized planning and controls. One of the best things that ever happened to China was the passing of Mao on September 9, 1976 but many still believe the decades of propaganda on the founder of Communist China,
Continue reading “Better Red Than Dead: Chinese Professor Fired After Criticizing Mao In Commentary”
There is a highly disturbing measure under consideration in Parliament this month. The government has proposed a new ratings system where students would give popularity (or unpopularity) rankings of schools. The Higher Education and Research Bill advocated by Universities Minister Jo Johnson has made it to a legislative committee. The proposed Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) imposes the system on universities which will be awarded gold, silver or bronze medals on the basis of a range of factors including student satisfaction, teaching excellence and preparation for the world of work. It is an effort to move beyond just ranking universities by their research excellence. Many academics have denounced the TEF as an obvious effort to coerce universities into yielding to demands from students on curriculum and other issues. The system would add new pressures on schools to yield to demands of students on curriculum and policies. It is turning over higher education to a type of academic social media where quality is based on your number of “likes.” If students “like” Laurette University more than Oxford, does that make Laurette the better school?
Continue reading “English Government Proposes New Rating System For Universities”
Universities are facing new demands that students be protected from required reading of white authors or that departments take steps to combat white dominance, particularly in English departments. We have previously discussed demands at Yale of English students to eliminate the requirement of reading white authors like Chaucer and Shakespeare. Then there were the Penn students in the English department removing the portrait of Shakespeare and replacing it with a black writer. Now students at the respected University of London are demanding that figures such as Plato, Descartes and Immanuel Kant be removed from philosophy courses in favor of minority writers. Before these students destroy one of the best university systems in the world, they may want to at least consider a Descartes quote: “It is not enough to have a good mind; the main thing is to use it well.”
Continue reading “University of London Students Demand That “White Philosophers” Be Replaced By African and Asian Philosophers”
Drexel University professor George Ciccariello-Maher has caused a firestorm of controversy by tweeting how “All I Want for Christmas is White Genocide.” He then followed up with a taunting clarification that “To clarify: when the whites were massacred during the Haitian revolution, that was a good thing indeed.” Drexel has said that it respects the professor’s right to free speech but has called him into for a meeting. Ciccariello-Maher maintains that he was using satire to taunt white supremacists.
There is a controversy at the University of Oregon that embodies our long debate over the free speech rights of employees over statements and conduct in their private lives. Law professor Nancy Shurtz triggered a firestorm after she wore blackface to a Halloween party. She was dressed as Dr. Damon Tweedy, the author of Black Men In A White Coat. The school launched a formal investigation and found that, while there was no “ill intent”, Shurtz violated the school’s anti-discrimination policies. That has caused a debate over the extension of such rules to the conduct of faculty or students off campus and off hours.
I thought some of the viewers might be interested in this fascinating, if not hypnotic, video of a balloon falling on a bed of nails and explaining why it does not burst.
This year passed a milestone for law schools. For the first time, women make up a majority of law students with just over 50 percent of the seats at accredited law schools in the United States. It is a particularly poignant moment for those of us at George Washington Law School where Belva Ann Bennett Lockwood graduated and ultimately became not only one of the very first female lawyers in the United States but the first woman admitted to practice before the United States Supreme Court. The incoming class owes a debt of gratitude to pioneers like Lockwood who bravely fought entrenched discrimination and ignorance to reach this incredible moment in history.
Continue reading “Women Outnumber Men in Law Schools For The First Time In History”
Democratic leaders have suddenly discovered that the Electoral College is anti-democratic and have called for its elimination. I have long been a critic of the Electoral College, though I understand the concerns of those who fear that the loss of the institution would reduce presidential elections to the choice of states like California and New York. However, the interesting result of this election (where Hillary Clinton won the popular) was a ground swell of calls for the elimination of the Electoral College. The hue and cry for reform gave hope for critics (despite the obvious opportunism and hypocrisy from some quarters) but a recent Gallup poll indicates that an inverse move has also occurred as many have come to appreciate the counter-majoritarian impact of institution in this election. The net results appears to be an increase in support for the Electoral College.
Continue reading “Gallup: Support For Electoral College Surges After 2016 Presidential Election”
We have previously discussed the move to expand the pronouns used at schools and allow students to chose a gender but also a pronoun. Indeed, at George Washington University where I teach, the school is asking faculty to list their preferred pronouns so I recently received an email from a colleague with “Pronouns: he, him, his” after his name. Over the weekend, stories appears in various sites that Oxford University has asked its faculty and students to stop using “he” or “she” entirely in favor of “ze.” It now appears that the story was based on a policy to encourage the use of correct pronouns and not any mandate.
Continue reading “Ze Has Arrived? Oxford Union Denies That It Barred Using “She” or “He”[UPDATED]”
We have previously followed controversies at leading universities where students have objected to reading works by white males (even as part of classic English literature courses). Now, students at the University of Pennsylvania removed a portrait of Shakespeare from a prominent location in the school’s English department because he is a white male. He was replaced by Audre Lorde, a black feminist and author who died in 1992.
Continue reading “Penn Students Remove Portrait of Shakespeare With Black Feminist Author”
We have followed the rapid decline of civil liberties under the authoritarian rule of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in the past few years as well as his empowering of Islamic parties in the once secular state. When Erdogan first ran, he assured Turks that he was committed to the secular traditions and constitution of the country. He then did precisely the opposite in power by chipping away at secular laws, introducing Islamic governing principles, and assuming authoritarian power. After the attempted recent coup, Erdogan has arrested thousands of his opponents. He has suspended civil liberties and shutdown the free media. He has also replaced academics and other professionals with Islamic party stalwarts. Now, we have a chilling story of just how Erdogan’s government has wiped out secular values. Dr. Abuzer Meral, an employee of a private hospital in the Turkish city of Yalova, was fired after merely objecting to mandatory religious studies for children.
We have previously discussed the banning of masterpieces due to contemporary objections to language or content. It is an assault on classic works that threaten the foundation for education in our country. A recent decision from a Virginia school to temporarily remove “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” by Mark Twain and “To Kill A Mockingbird” by Harper Lee is a tragic case in point. The school reportedly pulled the books after a parent said her high school-age son was negatively affected by the inclusion of racial slurs in the books, which deal with racism in those periods.
Hampshire College in Massachusetts caused a national outrage when the Administration ordered the placing of the American flag at half staff after Election Day. It then ordered the the removal of all flags after the flag was found burned on the ground. The flag has now been returned and College President Jonathan Lash is insisting that it was all a positive exercise of free speech. I disagree.
Continue reading “Hampshire College Raises American Flag After Weeks of Controversy”