My maternal grandmother had a phrase we could apply to Claudine Gay and Sally Kornbluth, the presidents of Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) respectively, and M. Elizabeth Magill, the now-resigned president of the University of Pennsylvania — “book-smart and life-dumb.”
How else can you explain the mind-boggling situation in which the trio haa been denounced by the right ant the left after a gutless performance on the subject of anti-Semitism that found them steamrolled, ironically so, by Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-New York), a disciple of former President Donald J. Trump, the man who put the “ate” in hate speech.
All the three had to do when called on the Congressional carpet to explain the anti-Semitic protests roiling their campuses was to denounce anti-Semitic, anit-Muslim, anti-everyone hate speech. That’s all. The door was open. All they had to do was walk through it. Instead, they not only shut the door in front of them; they then smashed into it, shattering its glass.
It’s beyond comprehension how three women with an alphabet soup of degrees could fail the simplest rhetorical challenge. Not only have they set the cause of the left and of women leaders back, but they’ve played into the hands of those who have allied themselves with the king of the hate speechmakers. Let’s be clear here: Stefanik does not have the moral high ground. And maybe the University Three — Wynken, Blynken and Nod there — couldn’t voice that. But they could’ve been clever enough to shut her down. Instead they served themselves up for a meal.
Perhaps it’s all for the best. Perhaps it’s high time that we have a frank discussion about the failure of leadership and education in this country and what that is going to mean for a democracy in crisis. Because it’s not just the right with its endless denouncing of critical race theory, which I’d bet no right-winger could define, and books about kids who have two mommies and courses exploring gender fluidity. It’s also the left with its unending virtue signaling and hand-wringing over pronouns and bending over backward to be fair while at the same time offering justice to no one.
If you didn’t know it before, let me spell it out: This is the consequence of years of neglecting the humanities, including but not limited to history, civics and philosophy — subjects that teach you to think critically and apply uncommon common sense. What you have here are students and administrators alike with no actual knowledge of the First Amendment. That amendment protects your right to free speech from government oppression and suppression.
It does not, however, allow you to say or do anything you want without consequences. A business or a university could expel you for behavior not in keeping with its policies. Just ask Colin Kaepernick, who’s not on his way to a Hall of Fame career with the San Francisco 49ers. His political gesture of kneeling during the National Anthem — in no way constituting hate speech — nonetheless cost him his career in the NFL. That was his choice — and that of the team owners.
In 2017, Harvard University rescinded admission to 10 students who had made racist and sexist comments online. What’s different now? Is it anti-Semitism or is it also fear of being sued, of being unpopular and uncool? Is it about offending tuition-paying parents or donors, because I’ve got to tell you plenty of them are offended now and are using money — or the withholding of it — as the currency of love.
I think part of what this is about is the postmodern idea that authority figures — administrators, teachers, coaches, leaders of houses of worship, politicians of all stripes — are somehow friends to kids. You are not their friends. You are not their peers. You are in authority over them and that means protecting them, sometimes even from themselves.
Here’s what the policy should be: You engage in hate speech and action, you engage in violence, you engage in bullying, keep walking, because you’re out.
You can’t yell “fire” in a crowded movie theater, where there is no evidence of fire, simply to get your kicks watching a stampede.
The University Three probably were just trying to save their jobs. Now those jobs are in jeopardy and, in one case, a thing of the past.
But then, stupid is as stupid does.