September 14, 2007
P.C. kills the academy -- and the academician, too
Check out this tale of political correctness run amuck, and how well-meaning professors dumb-down their lectures to avoid a fate like that of their late, lamented colleague, a liberal driven to the brink, despite his lefty credentials, because he offended the thin-skinned morons otherwise known as "students."
I had a distinguished colleague - Stuart Nagel - whose tale is worth telling. He taught public policy and one day explained that black businesses in Kenya were uncompetitive against Indian-run enterprises since blacks where too generous in granting credit to friends and family. He had been invited by the government of Kenya to study the situation and suggested better business training for black Kenyans. The topic was indisputably part of the course and thus totally protected by AAUP academic speech guidelines. Stuart was also extremely liberal on all racial issues.
Nevertheless, to condense a long story, an anonymous letter from irritated black students complained of Nagel's "racism" and included the preposterous change of "workplace violence." After a protracted and bungled internal university investigation, two federal trials (I testified at one), he was stripped of his teaching responsibilities and coerced into retirement.
Interestingly, having been charged as "racist," his departmental colleagues, save two conservatives, abandoned him. A few years later, partially as a result of this emotionally and financially draining incident ($100,000 out-of-pocket for legal fees), he committed suicide.
I can only speculate that he believed that years spent being a "good liberal" (including service in the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division) would insulate him from being denounced as a "racist." Nor would he have anticipated that the university would spend the hundreds of thousands in legal fees to punish a famous tenured faculty member who "offended" two students.
Nagel's sad saga undoubtedly provided useful lessons to many others: stupidity can really be dangerous, even in a university. Better keep quiet.
It reminds me of the Washington, D.C., official, fired because he used the term, "niggardly," denounced by race pimps as an outrageous manifestation of hatred for blacks.
Unfortunately, their spittle-flecked howls of outrage were undeterred by the explanation that "niggardly" is an adjective for one who is miserly, meaning that the ignorant idiots were allowed to redefine the meaning of words they don't even understand.
Talk about dumbing-down society.
I'm not surprised that university classrooms -- despite the guarantees of academic freedom -- aren't immune from the perils of political correctness and McCarthy-style prosecutions for thought crimes.
Pity about Prof. Nagel; I guess he foolishly thought he was teaching open-minded, free-thinking "progressives." Too bad he didn't play it safe and self-censor, delivering an unambiguous, innocuous, elementary-school level lecture. And it's also a shame his university and fellow faculty members threw him to the wolves.
What exactly is to be gained from higher education? Precious little, it seems.
Posted by Mike Lief at September 14, 2007 02:07 PM
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