"We’ve always had more people on the left than on the right in academia, and I’m not sure the ratio has changed much since I was in college or law school. But what’s happening now is different from what we’ve seen in decades past. We’re seeing a rigid ideology being put into place, subversions of free speech and due process, administrators kowtowing to activists, and illiberal trends that administrators are humoring and placating.... I’ve been in a lot of media cycles through this whole process, from my initial tweet to my suspension to my being shouted down at UC Hastings, and the current one is by far my favorite media cycle. It’s good to finally be driving the narrative. I hope that my 'lived experience,' so to speak, can in some measure advance the ball in exposing and perhaps even fixing the rot at the heart of academia."
Said Ilya Shapiro, interviewed by David Lat in "Constructive Cancellation: An Interview With Ilya Shapiro/What explains Shapiro's abrupt about-face in deciding to leave Georgetown Law?" (Substack).
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14 comments:
It's almost like Ilya Shapiro believes that he won here.
He did not win. He's gone, right?
They have all bought into by any means necessary.
The acquisition and keeping of power justifies everything.
The first and most fertile ground the Frankfurt school found anywhere after its destruction in the old was the United States. The Marshall plan exacerbated the problem...after all there were always far more socialist proclivities in Europe before the war than there ever were in the United States, regardless of the media's red scare.
America was not ready for the ancient, asiatic, khazarian, feminine putch it would face in the late 50s and early 60s.
Houston, we have a problem.
Tell me Again? WHY would/should a person go to college in the 21st century?
I’ve been in a lot of media cycles through this whole process, from my initial tweet to my suspension to my being shouted down at UC Hastings, and the current one is by far my favorite media cycle. It’s good to finally be driving the narrative. I hope that my 'lived experience,' so to speak, can in some measure advance the ball in exposing and perhaps even fixing the rot at the heart of academia."
Does that mean attempts to correct it from the inside are futile?
If anything, it signals how bad it must be.
And that doesn’t even include assistant football coaches.
I'm so old I remember when colleges and universities were the bastion of free speech. How times have changed.
"in exposing and perhaps even fixing the rot at the heart of academia"
How? The left is in charge. Liberal faculty have not resisted. Admins are cowardly. Boards are MIA.
Only when donors object en masse is any change likely. For now, the left will happily claim victims like Shapiro.
Blogger gilbar said...
Tell me Again? WHY would/should a person go to college in the 21st century?
I think more and more are coming to that conclusion. I wonder if it is a coincidence that Jesuit colleges are more leftist even than secular ones?
as presumptive law school professor should he not be able to demonstrate ability to draw up papers with text to guarantee all the freedom he would deserve for the abilities he has?
and monetize that template?
what does cutting and running show you?
"They didn't fire me, I quit!"
Still losing.
administrators kowtowing to activists, and illiberal trends that administrators are humoring and placating
I am a bit more cynical -- I suspect administrators have long been irritated by limitations on their ability to impose their will on faculty (particularly tenured faculty), and are exploiting activists as a means to the end of eroding the privileges of the professors. There may be an ideological component, particularly among the Diversity commissars -- and I expect that ideological component to grow over time thanks to sheer unthinking repetition of the usual slogans and propaganda -- but mostly I think it has started as a power play.
It should be an interesting year at Georgetown ULC, with the Harvard/UNC case along with the sequel to Masterpiece Cakeshop set for argument in the Fall. Under the anti-harassment policy at Georgetown, commentary on both cases will be a bit tricky. The Harvard/UNC cases bit the interests of Asian-Am students against those of Black and Hispanic students, and the fate of race-based affirmative action more generally. Round 2 of the cake wars focuses on the rights of religious believers in the sanctity of man-woman marriage vs. LGBTQLMNOP under public accommodation laws. Only a brave Georgetown academic will say anything publicly criticis\zing the prog position. Harassment, as we've come to learn, is neutral in theory but unidirectional in practice. The progs don't even accept the 'neutral in principle' idea -- white men being, by definition, the fons et origen of all that troubles us.
Shapiro is an extremely elite libertarian all in for open borders That's why they accepted him in the first place. He was their pet pseudo-conservative. He'll land fat and happy at a think tank while we watch our country swirl the drain trying to pay for all the needs of the illegal slaves he's eager to let in and let the working and middle classes support.
Good riddance, CATO slob.
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