I’m interested here in the politicization of our institutions. It is interesting that not everyone is on board this project, even in the UC system. There are still Jerry Coynes and Abigail Thompsons at major universities. Much of the project is to force political conformity and silence their dissent within the institution.
I recommend the whole post, which covers the controversy over the requirement of the UC system for faculty to submit “diversity statements.”
One more excerpt:
The game is no longer to advance candidates who are themselves “diverse.” The game is to stock the faculty with people of a certified ideological stripe, who are committed to advancing this cause. Tom Sowell need not apply. In case the litmus test is not perfectly clear:
Sowell, of course, is a distinguished economic conservative who happens to be black.
If you don’t say the right things in your diversity statement, you can be denied a promotion, a raise, or even a job. I think it is fair to say that this is a religion that persecutes non-believers.
How is this going to play out? For 250 years, Americans resisted religious persecution. It seems to me that either universities have to change, or America has to change. Which will it be?
Here is a clue: many liberal arts colleges are in financial trouble, and the lib arts departments of major universities are witnessing a drop in students. Maybe, the focus on ideology and “diversity” has created departments that are not stocked with the best professors, but with ideologically acceptable ones. The students are slowly getting tired of propaganda and want some substance for the high prices they are paying for an education.
I hope you are correct.
America has already changed, the universities won, and they will keep winning until the fact that there is no countervailing force to prevent them from succumbing to their own vices allows them to drive themselves so far off the cliff that they make a punitive reaction politically profitable.
Indeed, these policies are hardly new: I’ve been reading about “what have you done for / contributed to Diversity lately?” statement requirements for more than a decade – in academia (both students and faculty) and hiring and promotions in the public and private sectors, even for applying for publicly-funded research grants.
There is a whole “test-prep / admissions help” industry that will help you draft your statement. Or, if you have the ‘privilege’ of having especially savvy parents or mentors, they can coach you for free. Whole government agencies are required to have the equivalent of such statements (See the NIH’s, which amusingly gets revised every year or so). In Virginia, kids as young as 13 asking for teacher’s recommendations are given “request support forms” (shared with the program) and those forms ask the student to list out their past contributions to diversity and how they think they will contribute to the diversity of whatever program they are applying to, and then the teacher writing the recommendation is also asked how the student will so contribute to diversity.
I’ve had to go through this as a parent, and then go through the humiliating process of coaching offspring to put magic talismanic buzzwords in the right sequence, and to recite the open-secret creed in the right ways that I know the targets want to see, while swallowing down bitter bile all the while, and feeling a deep sense of shame at having to submit to the severe phoniness of it all, and introducing a child to a world built on mandatory, reciprocal frauds.
Wwhat exactly are they supposed to say at 13 except emphasize their membership in identity groups or the fact they have those members as friends? Ah, that’s just one chess move deep – so just like the Fake ‘Community Service’ / Charity projects which emerged in the late 80’s, savvy parents (especially of non-diverse kids) also have to be strategic and plan ahead for 12, 11, 10, earlier so they can have the series of phony hoop-jumping experiences on the resume that back up the diversity contribution statements.
It’s a completely, authentically Soviet experience. You look at your kid, “I teach you to be honest with me and that integrity is a virtue for which you should stand on principle even at some personal cost and sacrifice. But, sorry, that’s just for trusted friends, because you live in a system such that these are the lies you have to repeat all the time to have a normal, successful life. ‘Live not by lies!’, but …”
Dreher is writing a book on lessons and warning from those that suffered under Communism for dissenters and heretics from what our own system has been evolving toward, and the idea of the terrifyingly accurate analogy hits the nail right on the head.
Oh, two more things.
1. Related to that possible punitive political reaction is Arthur Milikh’s article in the current issue of National Affairs, “Preventing Suicide by Higher Education.” Read the whole thing. “If the universities are going to be rebuilt, only external force, rather than pleading or slight policy modifications, will work.” The apt historical analogy is to Henry VIII’s dissolution of the monasteries , begun in 1535. The paradox is that it takes illiberal state acts to prevent degeneration into even more illeberalism, and to preserve the genuine liberalness of non-state institutions once they start abusing their discretion and have gone completely off the rails. But you fight fire with fire, or you burn.
2. There’s a lot of talk about rising “affective polarization”, and dismissive diagnosis in terms “tribalization” and so forth around this corner of the blogosphere, and I’ve been repeatedly trying to object and argue against that “dispositive psychologizing” framework.
One thing I’ve tried to do is pointing out that, no, in fact, many people have strong, important, rational reasons based in core personal interests to really despise certain ideological requirements imposed on them by progressive elites, and to be truly terrified of what more will come in the Wokepocalypse should they achieve One-Party-State levels of power as in California, and thus motivated to resist that by all available, peaceful political means. If you survey such a person, all the indicators for “affective polarization” are there, “Would vote for a doorknob before [any member of the other party]” (Taken from a recent top “NYT pick” comment by a Democrat).
Now it’s worth asking whether someone who is affectively polarized in part because of the humiliation of the “diversity contribution statement” creed-loyalty-recital requirement is just acting out tribal, group-mentality social psychology, or manifesting a sincere and rational expression of his objections and concerns.
Let’s say you agree, “Ok, widely-shared opinions and sentiments and political-coalition collective behaviors regarding that particular issue aren’t merely ‘tribal’ and have a rational basis,” but then ask how such an affectively polarized individual reacts when he hears that it’s all really just groupthink. It doesn’t seem like a clever diagnosis; it seems like an oblivious insult.
I’ve had to go through this as a parent, and then go through the humiliating process of coaching offspring to put magic talismanic buzzwords in the right sequence, and to recite the open-secret creed in the right ways that I know the targets want to see, while swallowing down bitter bile all the while, and feeling a deep sense of shame at having to submit to the severe phoniness of it all, and introducing a child to a world built on mandatory, reciprocal frauds.—-Handle
That is really good writing. Personally, I will vote for the first presidential candidate who says, “I eschew, revile, loathe and detest identity politics.”
Bernie Sanders. Thats his whole thing.
It’s hardly Bernie’s whole thing! He hardly talk about it. It’s something attributed to him by people who are sick of it however. That gives it a kernel of truth.
There’s a predictable, justified, and growing reaction to this. Google “Why have conservatives lost faith in academia?”.
Roger Scruton, in 2019, said, “‘Get Rid of Universities Altogether'”. Some variation of that viewpoint is surprisingly common. Clearly, Scruton is an academic who takes the classic purposes of academia very seriously, but opposes the politically weaponized aspects of today’s academia.
Separation of school and state?
So far, universities have survived, without major revolt or reforms, but the pressure is building, and major reforms seem inevitable. I can’t predict exactly when or how they will happen, but pressure, momentum, and justification is building for major reforms.
“Separation of school and state?”
Milikh goes through some proposals and possibilities in his National Affairs article.
The choices seem to be:
1. Status Quo “Crazy Train”
2. “Dissolve the Monasteries” (more like Social Justice Madrassas) and drop dead to the bottom 90% of the system, implode the Department of Education budget, stop sending any federal taxmoney to loans, grants, or subsidies of any type, and eliminate all higher education visas for students and faculty alike, so they can’t compensate with making more money from rich foreign students or spending less money on cheap foreign labor.
3. Police the craziness one college case at a time, by threatening #2 , and also prosecutions under 42 USC 1985, among other provisions. Indeed, make it a major function of the Department of Education to be a Counter-Woketionary inquisitor and enforcer, and have the 101st Airborne physically escort conservative students and professors to classes, presentations, and debates.
We’ll probably get #1. I think you could get Democrats and establishment GOP types to agree to #3, because they know how temporary and ineffectual it would be, controversial and tied up permanently by the courts.
So #2 is the way to go, “creative destruction”, burn it down and start over (not a very Brooks-Levin attitude) as the only way to create fertile land for all kinds of different approaches that can’t get the light of day in the dark forest when overshadowed by the old growth regime of ancient incumbents. “Let a hundred weeds wither to let a hundred flowers bloom.”
The mild mannered blog commenter throws aside his glasses and rips open shirt exposing the superhero fighting suit of the Dark Nihilist. His utility belt full of legal weapons. A remote trigger in his hand ready to annihilate The System with his Mass Weapon of Creative-Destruction.
Remember the Obama-Hillary Clinton “Russian Reset” button stunt? Our own system is having a Kernel Panic and either we suffer through the full national nervous breakdown, or we entertain the possibility of pressing the reset button on ourselves.
The tension running through the right at the moment regards how radical one must now be to be willing and able to ditch that to which one was formerly and justifiably loyal, but which is now totally rotten and dangerous.
Just a little more radical stubbornness and adversarialism in the past would have paid huge dividends today in making unnecessary what is now the tremendous degree of radicalism necessary to head off a cultural crisis.
The compound interest on squandered opportunities is crushing.
This is exactly how progressives react to instances of corporate malfeasance; rally and rip-apart the broken capitalist system. Perhaps the only problem is overblown outrage.
Some people here have called for increased military service. The one thing military service gives people is a keen understanding of the terms FUBAR and SNAFU. Programmers use the variable “foo” (from fubar). Everyone who has worked at a large corporations has stories of FUBAR and SNAFUs.
Perhaps being able to distinguish between a failed institution and a large institution filled SNAFUs and FUBAR events.
My personal fantasy idea is to take the amazing STEM content in universities and unbundle that from the rest of the university and allow people to buy coaching (teaching) + testing/vertification/ranking services without the university system. This would completely resolve the political issues as a secondary concern. The main goal is to give the masses top quality access to high quality education and practical job skill growth that they have full control over.
– Testing is separate from coaching (teaching).
– It matters much less what city you are in. From any suburb, you can take the same tests and compete on the same playing field.
– No admission. Anyone can buy classes + testing services and work on growing their skill credentials. Students aren’t owed good test scores or good rankings, but they are owed basic access to try whatever subjects they are interested in.
– Low performing students don’t fail; they simply don’t advance and are free to work on growing their skills as much or as little as they want. Think of how fitness coaching works in this sense; adults can train as much as they want even if they will never be highly ranked athletes.
– It probably wouldn’t be strictly online, there would probably be a human coaching element.