The Fora: A Higher Education Community

I went to my 45th Reunion and had a good time.  I'm introverted but made an effort to talk to people that I knew and also introduce myself to people I didn't know.  I think 🧐 general rules like staying away from hot topics (politics) in conversations,  watching your alcohol intake, and not expecting too much in regards to emotional connections apply. 

Quote from: Parasaurolophus on Today at 10:59:52 AMMore on T1, will finish reading for my referee report.

Did a good chunk of the first, managed the second by the skin of my teeth.

The issue is never the issue. The issue is always the revolution.

Quote from: jimbogumbo on Today at 12:10:29 PMDid I mention the snipers? Yes, State Police head Carter has confirmed that over the two days this "action" was undertaken there were in fact police snipers on rooftops. All to combat a protest which featured no violence, no destruction and in fact little (if any) disruption of campus activities.

Holy shit. What the ever-living fuck?! Talk about making 'some' students feel unsafe on campus.

Different topic, but an interthread connection (first two paragraphs): https://prospect.org/education/2024-05-02-many-faces-of-campus-activism/

It is simler in this way also. Administrators always overreact, contrary to Fox News headlines.


I asked someone once about a student I suspected of lying about an instructor. All I to my source was I'm going to say a name, tell me what you think. Her response: " He lies, he lies all the time. He can't help himself. He lies even when the truth would be better for him."


That was definitely the case at IU, and AZ, and WI etc etc. The response simply makes things worse for the campus. In the IU case, yes they could ask the police in (albeit under a shady pretext), but it wasn't in the administration's best interest. They did it anyway.


Even if justified to have police get students to disperse, batons, let alone snipers, rubber bullets or chemical gas is unjustified for peaceful gatherings. Almost all of these were peaceful UNTIL cops started busting.


No matter whether the students are justified, ill-informed or pawns, the institutional response is often counter productive.


And in case you think I'm over reacting, in two days it will be May 4, followed soon by May 15. We've done it before, and learned nothing.

In some ways the situation is much simpler than any of that.

The students are occupying government property designated for a specific activity, not camping, or private property that is designated for whatever, but not camping.

If administration tells students they have to go, it is a lawful command.  Same with the cops.  If the students do not leave, the cops can lawfully use reasonable force (and before we vilify them too much, police are not breaking heads or using chokeholds, they are wrestling students and sometimes a professor into handcuffs and then escorting them off campus----hardly the treatment Palestinians are subject to).

Should police not enforce lawful orders simply because the complaints against Israel are justifiable? 

Also "duplicative language without appropriate attribution": As a society, we're like the Marlon Brando character Johnny Strabler in The Wild One. "Hey Johnny," a woman asks him, "what are you rebelling against?" His laconic, iconic response: "Whaddya got?"

Loved Oppenheimer.  Fell asleep half way through Barbie.  Don't think I'm it's demographic.

Quote from: dismalist on Today at 12:52:02 PMI don't give a shit about which higher education institutions will survive in the eternal struggle for resources. There are enough that some good ones will surely survive. I see the current fracas on campuses as a failure of governance in some places. Those with good governance will succeed.

But, to not put too dismal an edge on this, there is [Robert] Conquest's Third Law of Politics: The simplest way to explain the behaviour of any bureaucratic organisation is to assume that it is controlled by a cabal of its enemies. :-)

Somebody explains ["duplicative language without appropriate attribution" follows]: What makes this paradox so insightful? I take it to mean that any organisation that survives long enough ends up being run in such a way as to contradict its founding purpose. As an organisation grows and becomes more complex, it ends up acting primarily to ensure its own perpetuation. The purpose for which it was founded becomes secondary to its own survival. In fact, for many in the organisation, possibly the vast majority, its continued survival becomes confused with the purpose it was originally founded to deliver. This can lead to behaviours that seem rational when viewed from the perspective of perpetuating the organisation but look counter-intuitive when considered from the perspective of what the organisation ostensibly exists to do.

This is descriptively good stuff. I'm just predicting that those protesting got the details wrong. To hell with psychologizing -- they're being instrumentalized, useful idiots.

Pretty much what Ivan Illich wrote in the 1970's. Eventually, any organization evolves to become the cause of the problems it was designed to solve.  Healthcare, education etc.  Healthcare was designed to reduce suffering but causes a fair bit of harm and suffering along the way.  Teaching students about structural racism and violence - and they take it far too seriously and start to engage in their own separation into in/out groups and maybe tearing up the quad.