I have read with great interest two opinion pieces by Steven B. Gerrard in Bloomberg, both of which attack Williams College for failing in its mission to promote excellence, truth and scholarship.
The Rise of the Comfort College: At American universities, personal grievances are what everyone's talking about.
How Comfort Conquered College: The far right has already abandoned its respect for science. But the left has shown that it values dogma more than knowledge.
I've watched Steven on a video tape where he expresses his intense hatred of Donald Trump and then flips on his leftist student audience by advocating that we should hear out our enemies. On video, at least, he comes across as a manipulative, pedantic, overwrought drama queen. Nevertheless, I have to admire him for sticking up for freedom of speech even if listening to or reading him feels like nailing my hand to the coffee table.
In the end, I'm grateful I have this opportunity to remind Steven and the other white men of my academic generation that affirmative action was always pure evil and that it was easy to predict it would end badly for all of us, even sell-outs cucks like Steven B. Gerrard. I get some cold comfort now in adding: "I warned."
As I review Steven's efforts it always looks to me like he is trying to do two things at once: 1) Stand firm behind the principle of freedom of speech, the pursuit of truth, and the American Way, 2) Say what ever it takes to keep his job in an out-of-control leftist mad house.
Gerrard once said: “At the end of the day, we have to believe in Truth and we have to believe in the Good, and we have to fight for what we believe in. We have to ask these questions concerning virtue and what is right. And this is our job as teachers.” Given these views, it apparently hurt him bad last year when he found his defense of freedom of speech got him labeled as an "Enemy of the People."
I understand where he is coming from. Steven and I got our degrees at about the same time and at about the same pace. He took a B.A. Amherst College (1978), M.A. University of Chicago, Philosophy (1982) and Ph.D. University of Chicago, Philosophy (1987). He has taught philosophy at Williams College since 1992 or about three years after I resigned in disgust from the political science department. I checked him out on Rate My Professor. Based on his writing, I have to agree with the reviewer who said, "He is great at explaining all the detailed logic." According to the eight student reviewers, his class isn't very difficult and he receives a difficulty rating of 3.1. Good for him. I remember I was a highly rated teacher too. I thought being difficult was a sign you were a bad teacher.
Unlike me, however, Steven figured out how to survive and thrive in the left-wing politics of the academic world. For example, he plays up his victimization card by stressing his Jewish identity, and even brags that he was woke enough to serve as the chair of the Williams faculty’s Diversity and Community Committee two decades ago. Steven seems upset that leftist students now are apparently going after him and threatening his employment after he has spent decades twisting himself in little knots. Shouldn't he get a free pass after all the years he did whatever it took to survive as a white, male professor who believes in objectivity and truth. Shouldn't he get credit for all the years he has advocated policies to discriminate against better qualified white male graduate students looking for teaching jobs at Williams College? What about all the young white professors he helped screw out of tenure? Doesn't that count for anything any more?
In these two articles, Steven B. Gerrard is expressing the same shock you see at Evergreen College among the liberal, leftist frequently Jewish professors who suddenly realize they are the new enemies of the black students and faculty members.
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