The hearings in Congress from presidents Liz Magill of The University of Pennsylvania, Claudine Gay of Harvard and Sally Kornbluth of MIT have gone viral and are so detrimental to the reputation of their schools that Magill has already resigned. It is shameful that it took blatant antisemitism to expose a problem that has developed over decades.
These three women making over seven figures each to run our leading universities acted like puppets of their legal and HR departments and were incapable of comprehending their blatant hypocrisy and the lunacy of their positions. Even MSNBC and Al Sharpton were critical of their performance. To think that merely replacing them will come close to solving the underlying problem, however, is incredibly short sighted.
These leaders are only the tip of the iceberg. They should be held accountable but don’t stop there. They represent institutions that are deeply flawed. It is about much more than just antisemitism. There are three fundament problems.
The universities have abandoned any requirements for civil decency from their students. Screaming at professors, shouting down invited speakers, vandalism, and threatening students and professors has been tolerated as free speech. Such behavior should lead to expulsion. Entering students should sign a code of conduct and be held accountable to it.
With all of the claims for diversity the one they need the most is intellectual diversity. It is fine to discuss critical theory and Marxism but not without the balance of constitutional democracy and free markets. It is shameful when graduates have studied Howard Zinn, Karl Marx, or Ibram Kindi but have never heard of Gordon Wood, Friedrich Hayek, or Thomas Sowell. Hiring practices should seek a far more balanced faculty.
And finally, end DEI. The amount of money wasted on this is absurd. That so much antisemitism is tolerated on campuses bloated with DEI hires makes this the Orwellian acronym of the century.
Withholding big donations certainly got their attention, but it needs to go much further. Stop preferential hiring from these schools. The boards that have upheld these dysfunctional institutions also need to be replaced.
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