Sorry, I found the piece really long although most of the content was excellent; especially your way with language and the brilliantly clever analogies you've used such as comparing it to Ground Zero, etc.
Feb 7·edited Feb 7Liked by Omar Sultan Haque, M.D., Ph.D.
It demonstrates your integrity that you published your essay on a great small platform that, under Adam's tutelage, is chugging its way to the top like the little train engine from children's stories. Niall Ferguson calls this current situation the treason of the intellectuals. In an interview with the Hoover Institute, he likened it to German universities a hundred years ago when academics cleared the path for Hitler. These intellectuals gleefully took over the academic positions when Jewish professors were dismissed. But I don't think it was merely opportunistic. Heidegger was surely a mesmerized true believer that fascism was the answer to Germany's woes in much the same way the philosopher Mussoni believed it for Italy. Years ago on the BBC, Bryan Magee interviewed Peter Singer on Hegel. They discussed how, after Hegel passed, there emerged the new Hegelians and the old Hegelians. The new influenced Stalin and the old Hitler, leading to the ensuing mass murder of millions. Our current hellscape was influenced by members of the Frankfurt School and, in particular, Herbert Marcuse. As James Lindsay opines, we are living his Repressive Tolerance essay. It is twisted that we are to dismiss the ideas of dead old white men, who created the foundation not only for our country but our university system, based on the pontifications of dead white bourgeoise men from Europe. Dr. Peter Kreeft, a philosophy professor from Boston College, opines that if one sees a philosophy professor running for office, run - and do so in the opposite direction. Wise words, indeed.
As to solutions to turn things around for the universities, I agree with Peter Bhogenessian. The universities have been too corrupted. All ships need to be abandoned, and the sane professors plucked into lifeboats that can head to new academic settings that value a true classic education and sound science department that are without the virus of woke ideology.
My apologies for the long comment. I do have two more. I have heard about the grade inflation from Harvard. This is not only a distortion that hurts when kids are competing for coveted spots to top graduate schools, and the Harvard kids always have the top GPA. The true crime is that students fear taking a challenging course where "As" is not guaranteed. Whereas in past decades, undertaking a challenging course where one might get a B or maybe even a C would have been seen as virtuous, it is now seen as just dumb and gullible. Another issue I have observed in Asian students is pushing themselves to achieve at such high levels that I call it the Ubermensch syndrome but one fueled by religiosity where they must flagellate themselves for their sin of achievement. Unfortunately, they also offer sacrifices, but those sacrifices are made up of the scapegoated "others" of society.
Thank you for your comments and insights. Every tyranny starts with a utopian manifesto bereft of trade offs. Also you may enjoy the words of Theodore Dalrymple who said, “It has often been said that anti-Semitism is the socialism of fools; it would be more accurate to say that socialism is the anti-Semitism of intellectuals.”
“Diversity at Harvard is superficial and merely skin and gonads deep, as everyone looks different, but thinks alike. “
Sorry, I found the piece really long although most of the content was excellent; especially your way with language and the brilliantly clever analogies you've used such as comparing it to Ground Zero, etc.
It demonstrates your integrity that you published your essay on a great small platform that, under Adam's tutelage, is chugging its way to the top like the little train engine from children's stories. Niall Ferguson calls this current situation the treason of the intellectuals. In an interview with the Hoover Institute, he likened it to German universities a hundred years ago when academics cleared the path for Hitler. These intellectuals gleefully took over the academic positions when Jewish professors were dismissed. But I don't think it was merely opportunistic. Heidegger was surely a mesmerized true believer that fascism was the answer to Germany's woes in much the same way the philosopher Mussoni believed it for Italy. Years ago on the BBC, Bryan Magee interviewed Peter Singer on Hegel. They discussed how, after Hegel passed, there emerged the new Hegelians and the old Hegelians. The new influenced Stalin and the old Hitler, leading to the ensuing mass murder of millions. Our current hellscape was influenced by members of the Frankfurt School and, in particular, Herbert Marcuse. As James Lindsay opines, we are living his Repressive Tolerance essay. It is twisted that we are to dismiss the ideas of dead old white men, who created the foundation not only for our country but our university system, based on the pontifications of dead white bourgeoise men from Europe. Dr. Peter Kreeft, a philosophy professor from Boston College, opines that if one sees a philosophy professor running for office, run - and do so in the opposite direction. Wise words, indeed.
As to solutions to turn things around for the universities, I agree with Peter Bhogenessian. The universities have been too corrupted. All ships need to be abandoned, and the sane professors plucked into lifeboats that can head to new academic settings that value a true classic education and sound science department that are without the virus of woke ideology.
My apologies for the long comment. I do have two more. I have heard about the grade inflation from Harvard. This is not only a distortion that hurts when kids are competing for coveted spots to top graduate schools, and the Harvard kids always have the top GPA. The true crime is that students fear taking a challenging course where "As" is not guaranteed. Whereas in past decades, undertaking a challenging course where one might get a B or maybe even a C would have been seen as virtuous, it is now seen as just dumb and gullible. Another issue I have observed in Asian students is pushing themselves to achieve at such high levels that I call it the Ubermensch syndrome but one fueled by religiosity where they must flagellate themselves for their sin of achievement. Unfortunately, they also offer sacrifices, but those sacrifices are made up of the scapegoated "others" of society.
Thank you for your comments and insights. Every tyranny starts with a utopian manifesto bereft of trade offs. Also you may enjoy the words of Theodore Dalrymple who said, “It has often been said that anti-Semitism is the socialism of fools; it would be more accurate to say that socialism is the anti-Semitism of intellectuals.”
"Veritas Betrayed" is truth-telling at its best.