In recent weeks we’ve spoken about the three college presidents from perceived prestigious universities who took part in an incredibly poor congressional hearing. (Note: I am being kind.) As has been documented here, the presidents of Harvard, Penn and MIT spent hours dodging the question of whether or not calls for the genocide of Jews and/or the elimination of Israel were against their respective university’s code of conduct. Remember that none of the three would directly answer the question, suggesting free speech and context mattered most. None would offer either a “yes” or “no.”
The fallout was swift, strong, and across all party lines. Not only was it a disastrous public relations appearance, it was an even worse ethical interaction, noting that those who are directing the education of our country’s kids could not acknowledge that such calls are “antithetical to everything we represent as a country.”
All three presidents have faced plentiful pressure to resign, with the UPenn president following through. The other two currently remain in their leadership post; however, ample questions and calls for their removal also ardently remain.
Regardless, as alluded to here previously, the bigger question is not with individual leadership; their continued tenure or lack of it doesn’t change the perspicuously fragile foundation underneath. The glaring challenge, therefore, lies in the following: what are the guiding principles these institutions are attempting to instill in those who are on their campus, preparing for professional adulthood?
Interestingly, while the presidents couldn’t be black and white in their public behavioral analysis, as to what the appropriate consequence of a given situation should be, note where they’ve been more decisive. Allow us a mere two examples from Harvard, although indeed, there are far more…
Harvard biology professor Carole Hooven, during the promotion of her book on testosterone and sex differences, explained that sex is binary and biological. As she shared, “In response, the director of my department’s Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging task force (a graduate student) accused me of Twitter of transphobia and harming undergraduates, and I responded. The tweets went viral, receiving international news coverage. The public attack by the task force director runs contrary to Harvard’s stated academic freedom principles, yet no disciplinary action was taken, nor did any university administrators publicly support my right to express my views in an environment free of harassment.” Hooven currently remains on leave.
Or the case with Ron Sullivan, Harvard’s first black faculty dean…
Sullivan was well credentialed and respected. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa and began his teaching career at Yale where he won the law school’s prestigious award for Outstanding Teaching. Then dean — and future Supreme Court Justice — Elena Kagan recruited him to Harvard. But he was fired four years ago. Why? Sullivan joined the defense team of Harvey Weinstein, the former film producer then facing multiple rape and sexual abuse allegations. Apparently, in a country which constitutionally proclaims that everyone is afforded the right to a fair trial, Weinstein was not worthy of a defense.
Harvard’s campus promotes the concept of “veritas” — in other words, truth. It was was more than 30 years ago when the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences adopted “Free Speech Guidelines” declaring that “free speech is uniquely important to the University because we are a community committed to reason and rational discourse.”
And yet, based on the above, it would seem they indeed struggle with truth when it surrounds academic freedom.
Are students allowed to come to their own decisions?
Perhaps that’s another ‘yes’ or ‘no.’
As a young parent, I used to tell my sons that my job wasn’t to teach them what to think, but rather how to think. My concern now with the institutions of higher learning is that they are most focused on the what, dismissing angles and opinions which conflict from their chosen agenda. There is no veritas nor freedom.
Here is where the evolution of “wokeism” needs to be acknowledged and addressed. We speak not of “woke’s” original definition in the African-American community referring to an increased awareness of racial injustice. Rightly or wrongly, “woke” has morphed into more of an umbrella term, continually changing, now including a mass variety of perceived social injustice by whoever says so loudest. It thus, also rightly or wrongly, has become associated with political correctness, cancel culture and blinded bias.
All that to say, wokeism comes into play if this is the agenda of the university — that free speech only exists when the school is the determiner of the discourse. Wokeism comes into play if they are canceling unlike angles. Something other than being “over-lawyered” made those college presidents unable to say calls for genocide were wrong. And something made those presidents and administrations un-okay with proclamations of sex being binary. That’s where wokeism may be a problem. What is driving these administrations?
Asked once more: what are they teaching our kids?
Respectfully…
AR