How Short-term Thinking on Race Has Caused Long-term Problems in Higher Education

James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal ^ | November 12, 2021 | Gail Heriot

[karpov]

Ladies and gentlemen, if you’re here tonight, it’s because you are concerned that our colleges and universities aren’t doing so well.

I hate to be the one to have to say it, but it’s worse than you probably think.

Remember when we used to fret about grade inflation? At least then nobody was arguing that grading students (or for that matter the whole concept of academic excellence) was racist.

Remember when political correctness was just deeply annoying? On today’s “woke” campuses, it’s not just that someone might wag a finger at you for saying the wrong thing. These days expressing “wrongthink” can (and does) ruin careers. Everyone needs to watch what they say on matters of race or sex. And almost everything is thought to somehow relate to race or sex.

And it’s not just what you can’t say: It’s what you must believe on many campuses that can be most astonishing: Like a man who thinks of himself as a woman actually is a woman and has a legal and constitutional right to play on the women’s volleyball team.

How did all this happen? In particular, how did higher education get so race obsessed?

Colleges and universities have been telling students and faculty that race is the most important thing about them for a long time now. Why should anybody be surprised that after all these years they believe it?

There was a brief moment in the mid-1960s—right after the 1964 Civil Rights Act—where the nation finally got beyond Jim Crow and adopted a policy of equal treatment regardless of race or ethnicity. And polls at the time showed most Americans were fully behind it.

Then quickly discrimination in favor of African Americans became fashionable on campuses.

[ClearCase_guy]

In a lot of ways, we are back to a Jim Crow era. The power balance has completely shifted, though. Of course, the do-gooders and influencers will say that this Power Shift is a very good thing and we need to push harder and get more of it. But I say, Why does race need to be a Power Game at all? I remember the 70s and 80s. People truly were trying to make Race a non-issue. But certain people didn’t like that idea at all. And here we are. Today, the color of your skin is the only thing that matters.

[Scarlett156]

This article gets off to a good start but doesn’t mention Fabian socialism: https://www.conservapedia.com/Fabian_Socialism

There would be no B1ack P4nthers, no BLM, no “Nation of Islam,” etc, if higher education hadn’t caved to communism in the 1920s. Today’s institutions of higher learning are assembly lines cranking out whiny socialists.

Now they want to make college free, too. They might as well because your degree’s not going to be worth anything, anyway.

[euram]

Essentially, the power has shifted to a group that has an average IQ of 85, an inability to think beyond tomorrow, and has strong anti-social and criminal tendencies.

[libertylover]

discrimination in favor of African Americans became fashionable on campuses.

You'll never end discrimination by discriminating.

[nicollo]

This has been long time growing. At my college in 1985, the feminazis ran around campus blowing whistles at “sexists”, i.e. anyone who actually got laid on campus.

Seriously, they did that. I am still laughing, although I shouldn’t since those fools have taken over the university completely.