Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
Last week sometime, I noticed that a few of the professionally outraged people I follow on Twitter were calling one of my editors at the Wall Street Journal racist. I know Naomi Schaefer Riley well enough to know that this is laughable. What did she do to warrant such a charge? Why, she criticized the topics of a few dissertations from black studies departments that were highlighted in a recent Chronicle of Higher Education article. Riley, who has long written about higher education, is one of the bloggers at the Chronicle's Brainstorm blog. Here's much of what she wrote in this blog post:
Then there is Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, author of “Race for Profit: Black Housing and the Urban Crisis of the 1970s.” Ms. Taylor believes there was apparently some kind of conspiracy in the federal government’s promotion of single family homes in black neighborhoods after the unrest of the 1960s. Single family homes! The audacity! But Ms. Taylor sees that her issue is still relevant today. (Not much of a surprise since the entirety of black studies today seems to rest on the premise that nothing much has changed in this country in the past half century when it comes to race. Shhhh. Don’t tell them about the black president!) She explains that “The subprime lending crisis, if it did nothing else, highlighted the profitability of racism in the housing market.” The subprime lending crisis was about the profitability of racism? Those millions of white people who went into foreclosure were just collateral damage, I guess.
But topping the list in terms of sheer political partisanship and liberal hackery is La TaSha B. Levy. According to the Chronicle, “Ms. Levy is interested in examining the long tradition of black Republicanism, especially the rightward ideological shift it took in the 1980s after the election of Ronald Reagan. Ms. Levy’s dissertation argues that conservatives like Thomas Sowell, Clarence Thomas, John McWhorter, and others have ‘played one of the most-significant roles in the assault on the civil-rights legacy that benefited them.’” The assault on civil rights? Because they don’t favor affirmative action they are assaulting civil rights? Because they believe there are some fundamental problems in black culture that cannot be blamed on white people they are assaulting civil rights?
Seriously, folks, there are legitimate debates about the problems that plague the black community from high incarceration rates to low graduation rates to high out-of-wedlock birth rates. But it’s clear that they’re not happening in black-studies departments. If these young scholars are the future of the discipline, I think they can just as well leave their calendars at 1963 and let some legitimate scholars find solutions to the problems of blacks in America. Solutions that don’t begin and end with blame the white man.
And how did academia respond to some extremely mild criticism? They flipped out. They kept flipping out. They lost their ever-living minds.
They claimed she was bullying kids (which is, apparently, what we now call people my age who are getting their doctorates). They were super upset that she hadn't read the dissertations for a brief blog post riffing on a sidebar from a Chronicle article. (Really.) Then they thought she couldn't criticize dissertations because she hasn't written one (worse, perhaps, she's written dissertation-length books that people have actually read and enjoyed). Finally, they said she was racist. One comment I read from the Chronicle web site suggested that Riley, who is white, really needed to sleep with a black man. A classy comment, I'm sure you'll agree, even if Riley and her black husband weren't expecting their third child in a few weeks.
Anyway, news comes tonight that Riley has been sacrificed on the altar of political correctness for her crime of pointing out how ridiculous a few black studies dissertations were. An editor announces they've fired her for her blog post.
We can all sleep safely now. Or as a friend wrote, "The liberal mob has spoken. The expiation has occurred. The new gods of diversity are satisfied. The sun will rise tomorrow."
This does confirm for me that academia is far and away the least tolerant, least diverse, least interesting and most petty environment in which to work.
And apparently it's also not very good at preparing students and professors for even the slightest of criticisms. But those folks on Twitter that I mentioned up top? Well, they're celebrating tonight.
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Nov '11
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
Another day, another Fields Medal winner on Ricochet.
Dec '10
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
This news, while tragic and slightly enraging, is also comforting at the same time.
Every time that someone speaks out against the absurdity of the liberal PC mindset and gets canned, the rest of the world gets a little more upset. Every time a story like this breaks, it reminds the rest of us about how out-of-touch and ridiculous the liberals have become.
I may be naive and overly optimistic, but I can't see this continuing for much longer. Eventually people will realize that this PC trash is an affront to common sense and they won't take it any longer.
The left sees their world falling down and is thrashing around in a frenzy because of it. Their Messiah was a false prophet and the Camelot they've worked tirelessly to raise was built on sand.
Nov '11
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
Mollie, any serious thinking about the daftness and racism found in most black studies departments must be avoided at all costs. It is akin to discussing Margaret Sanger's writings, or VENONA. Thus, the response to asking questions like "What are the students really learning about in a class with a description such as
?" is "Racist! Homophobe!" The corresponding responses to my other examples are "Misogynist!" and "McCarthyite!"
Such is the level of reasoned discourse with the civility police. As DocJay notes, debating with liberals is a waste of time - unless it's in public, where non-liberals can see what fools they are.
May '10
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
Welcome to my world...this is the most important profession run by some of the most ridiculous and fad-obsessive mob-mindset fanatics on the planet.
I fear for our children.
Aug '11
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
She shouldn't have been fired for that. It was wrong that she was fired. I don't think she said anything that was offensive or even wrong. We should be able to have fun with the people who write the things she cited.
Jun '10
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
Please don't get me going on the whole "gender studies" thing. A few years ago Christina Hoff Sommers wrote Who Stole Feminism? Among other things, she took the whole "gender/women's studies" racket head on.
In the spirit of proper warning labels, she suggested that every "women's studies" program send this warning to the parents of a daughter thinking of entering such a program (edited for length):
In an asylum, the inmates think the sane (Riley) are insane.
Edited on May 8, 2012 at 5:50pmSep '10
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
"Black studies" and "gender studies" departments and their ilk are, of course, just left-wing propaganda outfits dressed up in academic robes. There are two salient characteristics to keep in mind:
It's no surprise that they will fight any criticism of their laughable "scholarship", no matter how mild. When your job depends on everyone keeping quiet about the emperor's lack of raiment, dissenting voices must be silenced.
Oct '10
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
And you just know that some of those wonderful, caring black studies scholars are secretly disgusted by interracial marriage, and dislike Riley for that reason alone.
Oct '10
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
Mothership_Greg: Mollie, any serious thinking about the daftness and racism found in most black studies departments must be avoided at all costs. It is akin to discussing Margaret Sanger's writings, or VENONA. Thus, the response to asking questions like "What are the students really learning about in a class with a description such as
?" is "Racist! Homophobe!" The corresponding responses to my other examples are "Misogynist!" and "McCarthyite!"
Such is the level of reasoned discourse with the civility police. As DocJay notes, debating with liberals is a waste of time - unless it's in public, where non-liberals can see what fools they are. · 6 hours ago
Honestly, I think the greatest indictment of these classes is that they are against the spirit of a liberal arts education. They are ideological indoctrination, which goes against the kind of well-rounded open-thinking ideal of liberal arts education.
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
In the academy, there is one crime for which there is no expiation, pointing out that the emperor has no clothes.
Dec '11
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
Courtesy of a commenter over at reason:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Lefkowitz
Mar '12
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
Very well put. In the story, the emperor was revealed and put to shame by the simple utterance of a peasant boy (or something like that). What's different in our present situation? Why can they withstand simple, plainspoken observation that the emperor could not? I suppose the answer is that there is a well-entrenched bureaucracy and infrastructure dependent upon the emperor's clothes remaining un-criticized -- and ready to attack anyone who does. The emperor had no such soldiers at his disposal, I guess.
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
Brasidas
Very well put. In the story, the emperor was revealed and put to shame by the simple utterance of a peasant boy (or something like that). What's different in our present situation? Why can they withstand simple, plainspoken observation that the emperor could not? I suppose the answer is that there is a well-entrenched bureaucracy and infrastructure dependent upon the emperor's clothes remaining un-criticized -- and ready to attack anyone who does. The emperor had no such soldiers at his disposal, I guess. · 4 hours ago
Naomi's crime was that she refused to patronize.
Apr '11
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
Her real offense was spelling out the authors' names: "Keeanga-Yamahtta" and "La TaSha B.".
Feb '12
Re: Tolerance And Diversity At The Academy
(1) What was wrong with firing Grenell? In any case, his appointment and his firing were both signals sent by a political campaign. Campaign operatives ideally are identical to their boss in views and superior in their morality. Bloggers are not.
(2) I was surprised by the outrage that resulted a year or two ago when I expressed astonishment at how many MFA's (Masters of Fine Arts) were being hired as professors by the English Dept. when so many PhDs are begging for jobs. I think the reason was similar: justified lack of self-confidence combined with a tacit understanding that nobody's supposed to mention the problem.