Intellegent life in Academia

There is a wonderful link at Kim DuToit pointing to a transcript of a speech at Tech Central Station from an Academic who "gets it". bq. Editor's note: What follows is the Kneller Lecture delivered to the North American Philosophy of Education Society meeting in Toronto, Canada on 27 March 2004. bq. The Professoriate and the Truth When various groups achieve sufficient political clout, they often demonstrate it by forcing the establishment of a new academic department and an instantly invented putative field of study. This is what African-Americans, women, and gays and lesbians, among others, have done. These new departments and fields, however, are not centers of teaching and research, but political action groups aiming at the indoctrination of students with the ideology and grievances of the group. It is a great rarity to find professors in these departments who oppose preferential treatment, have doubts about feminism, or regard homosexuality as a misfortune. The students and professors in departments with a well-established field of study represent a cross-section of the general population, but the overwhelming majority of students and professors in these new and politically motivated departments are members of the very group they claim to be studying. Even a cursory look at many of the courses they offer, the grades they award, and the so-called research they do shows that they have abandoned even the pretence of objectivity. Their interest is not in the pursuit of truth, but in the political transformation of society. There are, of course, honorable exceptions, but they are exceptions, not what happens typically. Sympathy for African-Americans, women, and gays and lesbians on account of past discrimination should not, however, lead to allowing ideological indoctrination to pose as higher education.