Higher education’s ideological rot has been exposed for Americans to see—but the elites who adhere to such thinking retain control of these institutions.
Thanks for leading the charge, Chris. The 12 elites on the Harvard Corporation are morally bankrupt. They protect Gay because they are just as compromised as she is.
Jeez - my alma mater, Amherst, gets more and more embarrassing every day. We chased Biddy Martin out of office but she's on the board that kept Gay in place, and she put Shirley Tilghman on our Board of Trustees. Oh, and Biddy got to keep her job as a professor, just like UPenn's former president. Money talks (almost as much as the threat of a drawn-out lawsuit...)
Actually, I wonder, thinking about this, if these boards are what REALLY should be scrutinized, these days.
Much like the White House and the Capitol are taking marching orders from K Street, colleges and universities are at least pointed in a direction by their trustees, I bet. These groups were usually filled with wealthy alums and parents, with prominent local leaders sprinkled in, but I was shocked (stupid me) to see Biddy F-in' Martin on the Corporation Board for Harvard!!! Then when I saw Shirley Tilghman from Princeton on the boards of both Harvard and Amherst... What a cabal.
Chris - I have to tell you a totally unbelievable but true story about a prominent nearby women's college up here that was literally run by a coven. No - I'm not a conspiracy nut (okay, given, I did go to Amherst so I may be suspect, but...).
Keep blasting these corrupt to the core scoundrels, the DEI weasels and the cowards who quiver when challenged by merit. They are fundamentally dishonest and must be exposed as the frauds and cheats they are.
The problem is that those individuals actually have been exposed as the frauds and cheats they are, but they remain entrenched. The moral and legal framework that would have immediately evicted them no longer works, though most people do not realize that it is gone, so they infer that the continued entrenchment of those bad people is proof that they have been vindicated.
One of its greatest challenges in my view is countering the idea - so deeply entrenched in our Western politics - that "Left = caring / Right = hard-hearted. This idea of the 'Progressive' as naive but generous-spirited has been the Left's hugely successful gambit ever since its early days and it has always been a fraud. But this fallacy remains the intellectual matrix framing all of Western liberalism’s moral philosophy. Many instinctive conservatives (including politicians) still reflexively allow this fallacy to confuse their thinking." https://grahamcunningham.substack.com/p/invasion-of-the-virtue-signallers
Also to relentlessly attack the bogus idea (also deeply entrenched) that the psychology of your typical Progressive academic is a romantic concern for the 'oppressed'. It is NOT and it never has been. It is a mind-game that a spoilt intelligentsia play with themselves to make them FEEL NICE about themselves on the cheap. At best it's 10% caring and 90% vanity. Conservatives politicians have always fought shy of saying these things out loud, thereby imprisoning themselves in "a political etiquette that is a philosophical stacked deck."
You seem to be in the vanguard of "educating and organizing a counter-elite" so all power to your elbow!
This is also why Hitler and the Nazis are (justifiably deservedly) loathed as the apex of evil but similar bloodthirsty ghouls like Lenin, Stalin and Mao are brushed aside, their multiple massacres shrouded in a fog of war or reduced to a historical footnote—and same goes for people like Castro and Che.
Once you convince people you're doing something "to make the world a better place" or on behalf of the "poor and oppressed" you can literally get away with murder.
In the modern West, egalitarian utopianism excuses all crimes committed in its name, is the ultimate Get Out of Jail Free card.
I agree with your assessment that the fallacy of “Left=caring but Right=hard-hearted” is something that must be fully turned over. Even among people I know whose religious beliefs should fall more to the right, fall into this trap, and get sucked into supporting policies on the Left because they can’t imagine as religious people being seen as “not caring.” But they fail to look beyond one-degree and see how these policies don’t really help, and sometimes are even counter to what they actually believe. But they go along with it because they feel it would undermine their sense of identity as religious caring people to be seen with the Republican “not caring” party. It frustrates me to no end.
A fantastic column on the institutional power dimension of the culture war. An equally important dimension is not addressed: money. These self-proclaimed idealists in academia will squeal loudly if their precious endowments are endangered. As a college professor, believe me, I know.
It must become a plank in the GOP platform: eliminate all government funding at all levels to the indoctrination industry. Money will be spent only on vouchers for K-12 parents, to be used only at schools advertising online their curricula, tuition, graduation rate, and employment rate of their graduates. Not one penny for higher indoctrination. Let the market sort it out.
Thumbs up to the expansion of the voucher system. Rewriting teacher education so it respects parents. Not sure defunding all higher education will fly though. I would prefer new "de-politicalization" legislation that affects the accreditations and funding of universities who do not de-politicize their departments. Couldn't this fly?
The current Marxist teacher training institutes have a monopoly on accreditation. I don't believe they can be saved. Instead, that monopoly must be broken, and new training institutes, vigilant against the poisonous ideology of leftism, must be created, in order to train a new generation of teachers who...actually teach!
Regarding "The current Marxist teacher training institutes have a monopoly on accreditation" - exactly. That monopoly can surgically be removed legislatively.
IMHO, this is well-known. But we also need some ongoing "woke-supressant" therapy so it does not come back. Protecting our education system, from pre-school to Universities is job #1.
I agree Chris but have this thought. Some say Harvard is no longer “elite,” that they have damaged their reputation. I say they are elite and that is the problem. In all their reconstruction of language they have moved the meaning of elite from denotative to connotative, and it is a pejorative connotation. For example, the adjectival “elitist” is never a word of praise. I propose we conservatives take back institutions as you say but do so with our own resonant language. We could replace the word elite with legitimate. In this case, a legitimate university would eschew the mission drift and toxic manifestations of the failed elite institutions. Let’s not reclaim rubble--let’s rebuild.
I agree, elite has now come to mean people who have wealth, and who think (as opposed to are) superior to others.
This ideology of identity, victim hood is toxic.
We have recognized it has spread like a virus in our universities, which has led to instruction to teachers in public schools who teach it to our children. It is important to address the racism in higher education as it does stick from the head down. Just look around at America and the west.
Republicans need to find courage, like some have to fight back against censorship and corruption. We all need to support any leader who opposes it. Most importantly to not remain silent and in fear.
I’m wearing my Darkhorse sweatshirt that states “DO NOT AFFIRM..DO NOT COMPLY “. If the community of the unwoke, the common sense, scales-shed-from-your-eyes Progressives want to hear truly enlightened commentary, consider arching Darkhorse Podcast #203, published on on 3 platforms on the 13th.
I agree with your assessment and recommendations. An interesting editorial in today's Wall Street Journal by Daniel Heninger is also helpful (University Presidents Flunk Out). He mentions the corrosive work of Herbert Marcuse on our universities in the last century. It seems to me that we need to combine the lessons from "Rules for Radicals" (we are now the radicals and can use the best ideas from that book for future strategies and tactics) along with the lessons from "The Book that Made Your World, How the Bible Created the soul of Western Civilization" by Vishal Mangalwadi in order to succeed. And we need the younger generations to be involved, as you mention. Thanks for your work.
Will Harvard grads or former students who have faced or suffered negative consequences for plagiarism or other forms of academic dishonesty file lawsuits?
I am not convinced. Anyone can file a lawsuit (or appeal) for almost any reason in this country. Harvard has stacks of policies and the state governments and the feds have piles of laws about violating policies as an educational institution or providing disparate treatment for substantially the same action.
If a student or a group of students had skillful lawyers who could file in court ( or through an administrative process first if the policy requires it) on their behalf, they might not prevail (although they might), but the case would garner tremendous attention. Students (and perhaps staff) were subject to the rules about plagiarism and experienced negative consequences. If the president does the same thing, and the institution ignores it, then how can a single student from this point forward be held accountable or receive consequences for the act? This circumstance has rendered Harvard’s policy moot while the unequal application of the policy has injured individuals in the past.
And the students in the prior cases suffered real harm. Loss of educational opportunity, future potential income, and so forth. If some of the Wall Street types want to engage, this might be a real action they can take.
To give you a sense of how far we’ve fallen, a little more on Veritas. Did you know that, while it was the original motto, it didn’t even last a decade? By 1650, the Harvard leaders felt it wasn’t clear enough what they meant, so they adopted a new motto: In Christi Gloriam (“For the Glory of Christ”).
It wasn’t til much, much later that Harvard went back to Veritas - not out of a love for truth, but as a way to get itself away from any icky religion. We all see where this has led…
Excellent summary of the road ahead - keep exposing and calling out the corrupt DEI systems, while building a counter-elite. I would expand the coalition to include non-conservatives. There is a large number of educated liberals who are aghast at the subversion of classically liberal ideals of free speech, objectivism, truth. To be successful in providing an alternative culture, media and educational system, the counter-elite must (and already does) include them.
And speaking about Gramsci, you know who was a big fan of him, translated his writings into English, and started an academic society in his name? He was a professor at Notre Dame by the name of Joseph Buttigieg. Yes, his son is Peter Buttigieg, the Secretary of Transportation.
Jordan Peterson’s Alliance For Responsible Citzenship (ARC) has the potential to be such a “counter-elite” intellectual institution that also invites participation by non-elites, forming a much stronger foundation for lasting change.
The war of position will require all of us self-respecting patriots to invest more heavily in parallel economies inasmuch as buying/using any mainstream crap keeps feeding the Ivy League alumni network. Easier said than done of course, as I write this from a device made by Apple, a corporation that no doubt prioritizes Harfraud-DEI hires and other such elite shams.
As for rescuing Harfraud from left-wing hegemony, I yet again quote Bret Weinstein: when your dog has rabies, you put it down and find a new dog. Likewise these institutions are also "incurable" – to borrow a term Socrates uses to describe the *shameless* sophists amongst him in the dialogue with Gorgias.
I forgot if it's actually in Gorgias or elsewhere, but we know how Plato punctuates this point: those who prioritize "care of the body" (i.e. sophists, materialists, marxists, influencers, corporate careerists, etc) and those who understand the imperative of caring for one's soul (i.e. philosophers, patriots, saints, hippocratic physicians, artists) – these two kinds of people will necessarily "despise each other"; this is one way to comprehensively map the culture war as we know it today. Harfraud is no place to care for one's soul, to say the least.
As one final note, it seems to me that only a small fraction of my Harfraud alumni cohort has "red-pilled" in any capacity these past few years. I have just 3 friends who are openly critical of the covid shamdemic, DEI, Hamas, and other such evil things. Everyone else I know has "blue-pilled" up the ass however, hunkered down with their digital PMC laptop WFH gigs and pretend that "THIS IS FINE." as they do whatever it takes to make money and other such meaningless pursuits. Alas.
"It would be better for me that multitudes of men should disagree with me rather than that I, being one, should be out of harmony with myself." – Socrates, telling Gorgias why he must red-pill.
The best counteroffensive may be alternative schools that have not sold out; your work at Hillsdale College, a case in point, along with a number of solid religious institutions and new schools popping up across the country. Harvard may be beyond redemption, as indicated by its selection of an atheist chaplain. Long gone are the days of preparing men to preach the Gospel. DEI is their new religion, though it be nothing more than an old Pharisaism, cloaked in "antiracism" with its many microaggressions--yet the same, self-righteous Law, only coming down now from the ivory towers above. enteringstageright.substack.com
Thanks for leading the charge, Chris. The 12 elites on the Harvard Corporation are morally bankrupt. They protect Gay because they are just as compromised as she is.
Here is a closer look at who they are and the tangled webs they weave: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-get-into-harvard-gay-bobo-corporation
Jeez - my alma mater, Amherst, gets more and more embarrassing every day. We chased Biddy Martin out of office but she's on the board that kept Gay in place, and she put Shirley Tilghman on our Board of Trustees. Oh, and Biddy got to keep her job as a professor, just like UPenn's former president. Money talks (almost as much as the threat of a drawn-out lawsuit...)
Most of the small liberal arts colleges have drank the poison.
Actually, I wonder, thinking about this, if these boards are what REALLY should be scrutinized, these days.
Much like the White House and the Capitol are taking marching orders from K Street, colleges and universities are at least pointed in a direction by their trustees, I bet. These groups were usually filled with wealthy alums and parents, with prominent local leaders sprinkled in, but I was shocked (stupid me) to see Biddy F-in' Martin on the Corporation Board for Harvard!!! Then when I saw Shirley Tilghman from Princeton on the boards of both Harvard and Amherst... What a cabal.
Chris - I have to tell you a totally unbelievable but true story about a prominent nearby women's college up here that was literally run by a coven. No - I'm not a conspiracy nut (okay, given, I did go to Amherst so I may be suspect, but...).
Anyway - this is great - keep up the great work.
You referring to Mount Holyoke?
> colleges and universities are at least pointed in a direction by their trustees, I bet.
Frankly, that sounds like it would work much better than what we currently have.
Thanks, Yuri.
Fantastic and hilarious piece Yuri, I can't wait to peruse it more later today.
Keep blasting these corrupt to the core scoundrels, the DEI weasels and the cowards who quiver when challenged by merit. They are fundamentally dishonest and must be exposed as the frauds and cheats they are.
The problem is that those individuals actually have been exposed as the frauds and cheats they are, but they remain entrenched. The moral and legal framework that would have immediately evicted them no longer works, though most people do not realize that it is gone, so they infer that the continued entrenchment of those bad people is proof that they have been vindicated.
One of its greatest challenges in my view is countering the idea - so deeply entrenched in our Western politics - that "Left = caring / Right = hard-hearted. This idea of the 'Progressive' as naive but generous-spirited has been the Left's hugely successful gambit ever since its early days and it has always been a fraud. But this fallacy remains the intellectual matrix framing all of Western liberalism’s moral philosophy. Many instinctive conservatives (including politicians) still reflexively allow this fallacy to confuse their thinking." https://grahamcunningham.substack.com/p/invasion-of-the-virtue-signallers
Also to relentlessly attack the bogus idea (also deeply entrenched) that the psychology of your typical Progressive academic is a romantic concern for the 'oppressed'. It is NOT and it never has been. It is a mind-game that a spoilt intelligentsia play with themselves to make them FEEL NICE about themselves on the cheap. At best it's 10% caring and 90% vanity. Conservatives politicians have always fought shy of saying these things out loud, thereby imprisoning themselves in "a political etiquette that is a philosophical stacked deck."
You seem to be in the vanguard of "educating and organizing a counter-elite" so all power to your elbow!
This is also why Hitler and the Nazis are (justifiably deservedly) loathed as the apex of evil but similar bloodthirsty ghouls like Lenin, Stalin and Mao are brushed aside, their multiple massacres shrouded in a fog of war or reduced to a historical footnote—and same goes for people like Castro and Che.
Once you convince people you're doing something "to make the world a better place" or on behalf of the "poor and oppressed" you can literally get away with murder.
In the modern West, egalitarian utopianism excuses all crimes committed in its name, is the ultimate Get Out of Jail Free card.
I agree with your assessment that the fallacy of “Left=caring but Right=hard-hearted” is something that must be fully turned over. Even among people I know whose religious beliefs should fall more to the right, fall into this trap, and get sucked into supporting policies on the Left because they can’t imagine as religious people being seen as “not caring.” But they fail to look beyond one-degree and see how these policies don’t really help, and sometimes are even counter to what they actually believe. But they go along with it because they feel it would undermine their sense of identity as religious caring people to be seen with the Republican “not caring” party. It frustrates me to no end.
Religious people should care more about lies.
and the possibility of The Prince of Lies...
I agree. And they should care more about lies than how they are viewed by others.
Nice article GC. You outline some actions we can take. These should be high on all conservative's agendas.
"Well-intentioned but..." embodies this error. "Weaponized" empathy, etc. is the reality. This is all tactics.
A fantastic column on the institutional power dimension of the culture war. An equally important dimension is not addressed: money. These self-proclaimed idealists in academia will squeal loudly if their precious endowments are endangered. As a college professor, believe me, I know.
It must become a plank in the GOP platform: eliminate all government funding at all levels to the indoctrination industry. Money will be spent only on vouchers for K-12 parents, to be used only at schools advertising online their curricula, tuition, graduation rate, and employment rate of their graduates. Not one penny for higher indoctrination. Let the market sort it out.
Thumbs up to the expansion of the voucher system. Rewriting teacher education so it respects parents. Not sure defunding all higher education will fly though. I would prefer new "de-politicalization" legislation that affects the accreditations and funding of universities who do not de-politicize their departments. Couldn't this fly?
The current Marxist teacher training institutes have a monopoly on accreditation. I don't believe they can be saved. Instead, that monopoly must be broken, and new training institutes, vigilant against the poisonous ideology of leftism, must be created, in order to train a new generation of teachers who...actually teach!
Regarding "The current Marxist teacher training institutes have a monopoly on accreditation" - exactly. That monopoly can surgically be removed legislatively.
IMHO, this is well-known. But we also need some ongoing "woke-supressant" therapy so it does not come back. Protecting our education system, from pre-school to Universities is job #1.
I agree Chris but have this thought. Some say Harvard is no longer “elite,” that they have damaged their reputation. I say they are elite and that is the problem. In all their reconstruction of language they have moved the meaning of elite from denotative to connotative, and it is a pejorative connotation. For example, the adjectival “elitist” is never a word of praise. I propose we conservatives take back institutions as you say but do so with our own resonant language. We could replace the word elite with legitimate. In this case, a legitimate university would eschew the mission drift and toxic manifestations of the failed elite institutions. Let’s not reclaim rubble--let’s rebuild.
Exactly! I will change from elite to legitimate. Maybe even put it on a sweatshirt to prompt questions.
I agree, elite has now come to mean people who have wealth, and who think (as opposed to are) superior to others.
This ideology of identity, victim hood is toxic.
We have recognized it has spread like a virus in our universities, which has led to instruction to teachers in public schools who teach it to our children. It is important to address the racism in higher education as it does stick from the head down. Just look around at America and the west.
Republicans need to find courage, like some have to fight back against censorship and corruption. We all need to support any leader who opposes it. Most importantly to not remain silent and in fear.
I’m wearing my Darkhorse sweatshirt that states “DO NOT AFFIRM..DO NOT COMPLY “. If the community of the unwoke, the common sense, scales-shed-from-your-eyes Progressives want to hear truly enlightened commentary, consider arching Darkhorse Podcast #203, published on on 3 platforms on the 13th.
> scales-shed-from-your-eyes Progressives
Someone who truly had the scale shed from their eyes would not remain a Progressive.
Agreed.
So what is it about my comment that seemingly displeases you Chris?
Simple thought but great idea Tim. It's about defining the definitions based on logic not ambiguous feelings.
Here is a great quote by one of Harvard's greatest living graduates:
"The principal benefit of a Harvard degree is never again having to be impressed by anyone with a Harvard degree." -Thomas Sowell.
Sowell is a gem.
I agree with your assessment and recommendations. An interesting editorial in today's Wall Street Journal by Daniel Heninger is also helpful (University Presidents Flunk Out). He mentions the corrosive work of Herbert Marcuse on our universities in the last century. It seems to me that we need to combine the lessons from "Rules for Radicals" (we are now the radicals and can use the best ideas from that book for future strategies and tactics) along with the lessons from "The Book that Made Your World, How the Bible Created the soul of Western Civilization" by Vishal Mangalwadi in order to succeed. And we need the younger generations to be involved, as you mention. Thanks for your work.
Thanks, Russell.
Will Harvard grads or former students who have faced or suffered negative consequences for plagiarism or other forms of academic dishonesty file lawsuits?
No. No basis for a lawsuit.
I am not convinced. Anyone can file a lawsuit (or appeal) for almost any reason in this country. Harvard has stacks of policies and the state governments and the feds have piles of laws about violating policies as an educational institution or providing disparate treatment for substantially the same action.
If a student or a group of students had skillful lawyers who could file in court ( or through an administrative process first if the policy requires it) on their behalf, they might not prevail (although they might), but the case would garner tremendous attention. Students (and perhaps staff) were subject to the rules about plagiarism and experienced negative consequences. If the president does the same thing, and the institution ignores it, then how can a single student from this point forward be held accountable or receive consequences for the act? This circumstance has rendered Harvard’s policy moot while the unequal application of the policy has injured individuals in the past.
And the students in the prior cases suffered real harm. Loss of educational opportunity, future potential income, and so forth. If some of the Wall Street types want to engage, this might be a real action they can take.
Roland Fryer is a victim of Harvard and Christine Gay. Gay should be canned for this alone.
https://youtu.be/m8xWOlk3WIw
Many such reasons!
Mr Rufo, what a week - amazing work, sir!
*Different world alert*
To give you a sense of how far we’ve fallen, a little more on Veritas. Did you know that, while it was the original motto, it didn’t even last a decade? By 1650, the Harvard leaders felt it wasn’t clear enough what they meant, so they adopted a new motto: In Christi Gloriam (“For the Glory of Christ”).
It wasn’t til much, much later that Harvard went back to Veritas - not out of a love for truth, but as a way to get itself away from any icky religion. We all see where this has led…
More here:
https://gaty.substack.com/p/mcculloughs-mistake-and-ours
Anyway, when I was a student there, president Summers got booted… imagine how he feels this week with the board going all in to support Gay!
Thank you for all you do!
Thank you!
Excellent summary of the road ahead - keep exposing and calling out the corrupt DEI systems, while building a counter-elite. I would expand the coalition to include non-conservatives. There is a large number of educated liberals who are aghast at the subversion of classically liberal ideals of free speech, objectivism, truth. To be successful in providing an alternative culture, media and educational system, the counter-elite must (and already does) include them.
And speaking about Gramsci, you know who was a big fan of him, translated his writings into English, and started an academic society in his name? He was a professor at Notre Dame by the name of Joseph Buttigieg. Yes, his son is Peter Buttigieg, the Secretary of Transportation.
Of course, yes.
That did not go well. Lol
Jordan Peterson’s Alliance For Responsible Citzenship (ARC) has the potential to be such a “counter-elite” intellectual institution that also invites participation by non-elites, forming a much stronger foundation for lasting change.
I'm skeptical. I don't think an international NGO modeled after WEF has much of a chance at influencing deep culture in the US.
The war of position will require all of us self-respecting patriots to invest more heavily in parallel economies inasmuch as buying/using any mainstream crap keeps feeding the Ivy League alumni network. Easier said than done of course, as I write this from a device made by Apple, a corporation that no doubt prioritizes Harfraud-DEI hires and other such elite shams.
As for rescuing Harfraud from left-wing hegemony, I yet again quote Bret Weinstein: when your dog has rabies, you put it down and find a new dog. Likewise these institutions are also "incurable" – to borrow a term Socrates uses to describe the *shameless* sophists amongst him in the dialogue with Gorgias.
I forgot if it's actually in Gorgias or elsewhere, but we know how Plato punctuates this point: those who prioritize "care of the body" (i.e. sophists, materialists, marxists, influencers, corporate careerists, etc) and those who understand the imperative of caring for one's soul (i.e. philosophers, patriots, saints, hippocratic physicians, artists) – these two kinds of people will necessarily "despise each other"; this is one way to comprehensively map the culture war as we know it today. Harfraud is no place to care for one's soul, to say the least.
As one final note, it seems to me that only a small fraction of my Harfraud alumni cohort has "red-pilled" in any capacity these past few years. I have just 3 friends who are openly critical of the covid shamdemic, DEI, Hamas, and other such evil things. Everyone else I know has "blue-pilled" up the ass however, hunkered down with their digital PMC laptop WFH gigs and pretend that "THIS IS FINE." as they do whatever it takes to make money and other such meaningless pursuits. Alas.
"It would be better for me that multitudes of men should disagree with me rather than that I, being one, should be out of harmony with myself." – Socrates, telling Gorgias why he must red-pill.
σωφροσύνη
The best counteroffensive may be alternative schools that have not sold out; your work at Hillsdale College, a case in point, along with a number of solid religious institutions and new schools popping up across the country. Harvard may be beyond redemption, as indicated by its selection of an atheist chaplain. Long gone are the days of preparing men to preach the Gospel. DEI is their new religion, though it be nothing more than an old Pharisaism, cloaked in "antiracism" with its many microaggressions--yet the same, self-righteous Law, only coming down now from the ivory towers above. enteringstageright.substack.com
Yes, we need all methods.
The exposure of her lack of competence academically and administratively does not matter.
She is the embodiment of the DEI goals and philosophy. They will not let her fall since that would expose the falsehood of DEI.
This is the Woke war to die for.
Let's help them.....