THE FARCE THAT IS LIBERATING TOLERANCE.

My old "The Burden of Sixties Ideas" alluded to a distinction between reactionary and revolutionary violence, as well as to the concept of liberating tolerance, necessary because pure tolerance gives too much voice to defenders of institutions or traditions the Anointed consider oppressive.  Once upon a time, people with intellectual integrity could address those concepts in a serious way.  "At some point these acts of brazen viciousness [scaling back the public sector, to the less aggravated] are going to lead to a renewed philosophical interest in the question of when acts of political violence are morally justified, an issue that has, oddly, not been widely addressed in political philosophy since Locke."

These days, it's as if people have forgotten the basis for their faith, and they're simply chanting the worship words without grasping their meaning.  Consider the current president of Hamline University, apparently hoping to become the Oberlin of the Twin Cities.  (Yeah, and the Vikings will win a Super Bowl.)

Fueled by commentary not well-informed on the particulars of this situation, we now find ourselves at the heart of a purported stand-off between academic freedom and equity. It has escalated to the point where I, members of my executive staff, other campus staff and, most sadly, one of our students now receive daily threats of violence.

To suggest that the university does not respect academic freedom is absurd on its face. Hamline is a liberal arts institution, the oldest in Minnesota, the first to admit women, and now led by a woman of color. To deny the precepts upon which academic freedom is based would be to undermine our foundational principles.

Prioritizing the well-being of our students does not in any way negate or minimize the rights and privileges assured by academic freedom. But the concepts do intersect. Faculty have the right to teach and research subjects of importance to them, and to publish their work under the purview of their peers.

At the same time, academic freedom does not operate in a vacuum. It is subject to the dictates of society and the laws governing certain types of behavior. Imara Scott, in an April 2022 article published in Inside Higher Ed, noted that “academic freedom, like so many ideological principles, can be manipulated, misunderstood, and misrepresented…academic freedom can become a weapon to be used against vulnerable populations. Why? Because on the other end of a professor claiming academic freedom may be a student — a student who lacks tenure, who must rely on that professor for a grade and who may be emotionally, intellectually, or professionally harmed by the professor’s exercise of the power they hold.”

The "woman of color" is the very president of Hamline who wrote those paragraphs, and that "first to admit women" might be her fall-back because Oberlin was first to integrate, or something, and that "At the same time" paragraph is straight out of Critique of Pure Tolerance, with today's therapeutic justifications larded on.  Those "dictates of society"?  In the instant situtation, the society is a cohort within Islam that objects to making graven images of Allah's Prophet.  Hamline was founded as a Methodist institution: as far as I know, there have been no objections to portraits of Jesus or the Holy Family in chapel, although there is a cohort within Christianity that could interpret the Second Commandment in that way.  As far as I know, no such believers came forth to agree with the student complaint that led to the controversy, over an art history instructor showing (after issuing a content warning) a photograph of a Persian graven image of Allah's Prophet, being advised by no less than the Archangel Gabriel, who earned his wings in the beginning.

The farce that is liberating tolerance is precisely that it gives to some members of society the moral standing to have course content circumscribed or faculty discharged, whilst the complaints of other members of society can be dismissed as benighted foolishness.  Consider, dear reader, whether a reluctant Trump voter enrolled at Hamline would risk filing a bias complaint with the diversity office.  I might be thinking about unicorns, does anyone with a conservative populist temperament even apply to Hamline or Oberlin or Bowdoin these days: but one way to make university administrators aware that there are diverse interpretations of "dictates of society" might be to overwhelm the diversity office with bias complaints, using the most generous interpretations of "bias" and "microaggression".  The way to demonstrate the folly of a rule is to comply with it.

Let Adam Steinbaugh explain the deeper flaws in that president's reasoning.

A statement laying out such a deeply flawed understanding of academic freedom would be confounding if it came from the president of any college or university, but it is all the more so when it comes from a leader weeks into a controversy over academic freedom.

Where to begin?

First, far from being subordinate to “the dictates of society,” academic freedom is a bulwark against society’s “dictates.” It is intended to give faculty breathing room to explore ideas and materials others think should not be aired. Those pressures may come from administrators, lawmakers, donors, community leaders, parents, or students whose “traditions, beliefs, [or] views” animate their objections to the discussion or material.

If a professor’s expression is popular with society, she wouldn’t need the shield of academic freedom. The “dictates of society” are the pressure to be resisted — not implemented — by a university’s leaders.

The "students" category in that listing applies to whoever's Islamic sensibilities were bruised, and that paragraph applies to the Diversity Weenies protected classes (who ought be protected against abusive behavior) as well as to the Deplorable Classes, who merit precisely the same protection.  Maybe bourgeois convention isn't such a bad idea after all.  Hamline?  See the Stalinism inherent in the inclusion.  "Universities cannot claim to foster a culture of free expression when they’re sanitizing their social media feeds and shutting down discussion on important campus issues. What message does it send to students and faculty about tolerance for dissent if the university is busily scrubbing criticism from public view?"

Our universities are being run by terminally stupid people.