THOSE INSURGENT SOCIOLOGISTS, ETERNALLY SEEKING OPPRESSED MASCOTS.

The latest mascots are, predictably, Hamas's constituents. "Sociologists in Solidarity with Gaza and the Palestinian People." William Donohue, a sociologist himself, has reservations about the way the letter opens.

I stopped being embarrassed years ago about my fellow sociologists—I simply gave up on most of them. But I never gave up on sociology. They did. They are nothing but left-wing ideologues disguised as sociologists. Indeed, they don’t even know what sociology is.

“Sociology as a discipline is rooted in a recognition of relationships of power and inequality.” That’s how the letter begins. They are wrong. That is not an accurate definition. What they are describing is social stratification and political sociology, two areas of study within sociology (which happen to be the focus of my own sociological work).

Emile Durkheim, who did more to make sociology a legitimate social science than anyone else, was proud to call sociology the “queen of the social sciences.” In capable hands, it still is. He wrote that “the object of sociology as a whole is to determine the conditions for the conservation of societies.” That is clearly not what motivates these charlatans. As left-wing activists, they are more interested in destroying Western societies than they are in conserving them.

Gary Becker and Paul Samuelson might have something to say about queenship in the social sciences, and that passage about "conditions for the conservation of societies," meaning the continued existence of those societies qua societies raises the possibility that "reality is socially conservative" might have promise as a working hypothesis for sociologists.

It's Hallowe'en season.  I can't promise a tarot reading or an Ouija board session to receive new wisdom from Professor Becker or Professor Samuelson.  That Durkheim passage suggests that the contemporary division of the academy into the laboratory sciences, the social sciences, and the humanities might be counterproductive.  That's material for another day.

Let's turn to the letter.

We join people around the world who are raising their voices in protest of this assault on human life. As educators, it is our duty to stand by the principles of critical inquiry and learning, to hold the university as a space for conversation that foregrounds historical truths, and that contextualizes this past week’s violence in the context of 75 years of settler colonial occupation and European empire. We are also deeply troubled by the lack of concern and care for Palestinian and Muslim students at many of our universities, as well as efforts to clamp down on student organizing and free speech.

We cannot sit back and witness the continuation of this genocidal war. We demand that our governments push for an immediate ceasefire. This stance follows in the tradition of the civil rights movement, anti-war and anti-apartheid protests of decades past. Aligning ourselves with these freedom struggles, we call on all of our colleagues to stand in solidarity with Palestinians and against settler colonialism, imperialism, and genocide.

The cancel mob comes for the Palestinian cheering section at Harvard, and now they develop a conscience. And, again, the contextualization comes with the genesis of the rules-based international order. Luke 2:4? That's mythology, we won't contextualize that.

Take it away, Mr Donohue.

Here’s another great part of the letter. They say that as educators “it is our duty to stand by the principles of critical inquiry and learning.” But as the letter shows, it more accurately reflects a groupthink mindset, one anchored in hate.

If these sociologists read more of Durkheim’s works and less of Marx’s, they might mature intellectually. In the meantime, they should at least learn how to write a coherent sentence.

What is it about academicians and their statements, anyway?  The International Sociological Association releases a statement that suggests we have a while to wait for any intellectual maturity.

The International Sociological Association (ISA) expresses its deep concern about the horrific events of October 2023 in Israel and Palestine as the human carnage there is unfolding in plain view. There have been far too many victims in this and previous cycles of violence. War and violence are never acceptable solutions and are against all the values we uphold. We stand by and respect the UN resolutions concerning this situation and share the call by many of our Palestinian and Israeli colleagues for an immediate release of hostages, exchange of prisoners, and the ending of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

The ISA stands in solidarity with the Israeli and Palestinian social scientists who have defended human rights and raised their voices against the killing and kidnapping of civilians, the bombing of civilian infrastructure, including residential areas, hospitals, and universities, and occupation and war in general. The ISA condemns the massacre of Israeli and Palestinian civilians. We share the repeated denunciation by our colleagues in the Israeli Sociological Society of the violence against Palestinians and the illegal colonies in the Palestinian territories over the past few years.

We also express our deep concern about and condemn the rise of antisemitism, Islamophobia, and xenophobia globally and the everyday acts of violence these entail. We are particularly alarmed by the political backlash within the international academic community. The ISA cannot remain silent as spaces of public and academic debate are shrinking and increasingly policed. Today, more than ever, we require critical interventions by social scientists. Academic freedom needs to be protected and promoted. Well-informed and nuanced debate and a historicized and sociological understanding of the events that have led to the October 2023 atrocities are required to forestall further catastrophic loss of life. As stated by the Department of Historical and Cultural Studies at the University of Toronto, “it is not only permissible, but it is essential for scholars to situate the current war in its broad historical contexts, including those of settler colonialism.” Our duty as sociologists is to maintain spaces of debate and foster discussion during such a critical moment.

Let's leave for another day whether war ended slavery or liberated the death camps.  Let's note, dear reader, the pairing of those invented -isms and -phobias with the "shrinking and increasingly policed" academic space.  It's the illiberal academic left that invented those thoughtcrimes and policed the academic space.  David Ayers, also a sociologist, reads the solidarity letter and concludes that his discipline has hit rock bottom.

I cannot think of any clearer, more visible sign that the discipline of sociology is in serious trouble than this letter. When you can register this many useful idiots this quickly, something is terribly wrong. They would have easily hit 4,000 or more if they had left it open longer. Do I know there are still lots of good folk studying sociology? Yes. Are those who wrote and signed this the norm among sociologists? Probably not, but between those who signed and those who are silent, or even supporting — well, Houston, we have a problem.

So, what to do?

First, any university and academic department that has faculty, especially prominent ones, who signed this open letter should denounce it. If they do not, we should treat these departments as pariahs. We should not recommend them to any aspiring graduate students. We should not invite their “experts” to speak. This is not about denying anyone’s academic freedom. This is about calling out stupidity and hate. This is about using freedom of choice (you know, “pro-choice”) to choose something other than promoting places that harbor anti-Semitic craziness.

They're not going to like the new rules, are they?

Perhaps, though, laughter is the best medicine.  Before the letter-writers closed signatures, the wiseacres had a field day, with inter alia Dr. Hamas McHamasFace and Shitana Pagoda affixing their signatures.  The owners of the letter, after the closure, cleaned the wags out, although Oscar Dirlewanger, whose name is redolent of the authoritarian social scientists, remained after the first cleaning.  So it goes with open-source scholarship.  "Implement a verification process to collect signatures, and be more mindful of internet trolls."