But this isn’t just about professors; it’s about all of us. This is the most flagrant attack on higher education in my lifetime. Why are politicians reducing public colleges and universities to vehicles of state propaganda? Why are self-proclaimed proponents of free speech turning around and using state repression to enforce speech codes on our campuses? Why can’t we speak openly about our social world in sociology classes? Why are unqualified appointees from the business world dictating to Ph.D.-holding academics how they should teach and which textbooks they must use?
What we really need are people beyond the university itself — the general public — speaking out about how ludicrous this all is. We are now living through an era of state censorship, politically motivated firings, and state-produced propaganda materials. If this isn’t authoritarianism in higher education, I don’t know what is.
Opinion piece by Zachary Levenson is associate professor of sociology at Florida International University.
EDITED TO ADD (in case some miss my comment)
Imagine the following scenario: You’re teaching Introduction to Sociology at a community college in Florida, and today, you’re trying to explain the well-documented pay gap between men and women in the United States. You check the guidance you just received from your dean, who received instructions via email from the executive vice chancellor of the Florida College System. The instructions state explicitly that explaining “unequal outcomes between men and women” in terms of “institutional sexism” would violate state law.
Outlawing sociology is just outlawing statistics. These people need to be delt with, and quickly. Remove them from every position of authority asap.
For conservatives, statistics mean “repeating the same racist anecdote/news until people think that it happens every day”.
It feels very hard to believe that anything will change. The elite has won.
A healthy and broadly educated population, which feels safe and secure, is incompatible with, and toxic to, conservative and authoritarian ideologies.
They need you to be sick, stupid, and scared.
Only one thing has ever stopped fascists.
No one is going to fight for their country. Americans have been trained since birth to obey their employers and government. they have no idea how to effect change.
there will be a few more completely useless protests, a completely rigged mid-term, most likely another 9/11 on american soil, and none of that will be enough to motivate americans.
we are truly doomed. beaten by a group of pedophiles and Israeli spys.
The myth of the rugged individualist means I don’t give a shit about anyone but myself!
Please stop trusting corporate media (whether social media or otherwise) when they give the impression that nothing is happening and nobody is fighting for their country. Please stop trusting corporate media saying you’re all useless and incompetent and it isn’t worth trying.
The revolution will not be televised. If you’re American, join some of those “useless protests” and talk to people. You’ll be surprised what is getting done.
I was with you until “we.”
If you’re an American and you understand this, absolutely fuck you for doing nothing.
Sigh. Because the Dumbest Common Denominator thinks Sociology leads to Socialism.
Simple fix is to rename your science something dumb. Something like The School of Why We Clump Up Like Dat.
I mean… sociology kinda does lead to socialism. Understanding the mechanisms of society, and factors that drive inequality and injustice, is kind of the entire purpose of the field.
They’re scared because the sociologists are right when they’re screaming that capitalism is going to cause society to collapse under the weight of the sickest, nastiest 1% of our species. They’re scared because sociologists make the argument that socialism is–shock and fucking awe–a logically sound economic system that is fundamentally better than capitalism.
Instead of book burning, it’s book banning that modern fascists do. It’s less ominous and less obvious.
It’s not new either. Iirc certain books were fully banned in Boston (amongst other places) up until the mid-20th century.
A country founded on bass-ackwards puritans hellbent on making others suffer isn’t going to magically lose that DNA. Just remember they got kicked out of England because they were antisocial controlling assholes, not because they were “persecuted.”
Fahrenheit 451
This is sad. There’s not going to be those factory jobs for the uneducated either.
I was wondering how hoping until age verification gets used to block info on slavery and lgbtq but it is not going to be long at all.
I was very confused at first, because I read Scientology
You’re not the only one.
If this isn’t authoritarianism in higher education, I don’t know what is.
A little slow off the mark.
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Become? They always have been. This is just different propaganda than the kind people have grown used to.
The US should’ve become a socialist country in the 1930s during the Great Depression. Seriously!
Maybe we will get the chance during the Make America Great Depression again 2 the pedofile protection depression rebuild.
What?
Schools are already being completely destroyed by AI. Our entire educational system is going to need a ground-up rebuild to deal with this issue and we haven’t even figured out a plan for it yet!
Right now, teachers are essentially stuck fending for themselves against children armed with trillions of dollars in VC funding. It’s one of the most lopsided battles in human history. It’s like this scene from Letters from Iwo Jima:
This is an attack on access to the best understanding of objective reality that humans have ever known.
When you account for occupation and time raising children the gender pay gap is small, and most likely attributable to womens risk aversion to asking for raises.
The bigger problem I’d say is the drive to get women into the work force was deflationary, leading to looser monetary policy and lower interest rates, which ballooned asset values leading to two incomes now being required to afford the average mortgage.
So this means instead of getting more prosperous and having more time we actually have less, as technological deflation and an expanded work force went into higher home prices and stock valuations. The economy grew and many people got very rich, but those without assets had a wall of cheap debt put up in front of them, and its mostly people in their child rearing ages affected by this phenomenon.
