These kids - with their belief structures - are going to be in charge of business, government, and law in about 10-15 years. I don't know what will happen. A lot of people had ideologies in college that they subsequently abandon or refine. I was vaguely libertarian, a principle I've completely abandoned and now look upon as untenable and perhaps even pernicious. But there's a certain vehemence to this ideology that seems to be particularly "sticky" and hard to get away from.
The other thing is that the US is about to head into some really serious financial distress. Most of these graduates - although perhaps not MIT graduates - will be underemployed in the future and really struggling to buy a house or achieve a fraction of wealth equivalent to their parents and grandparents. So as they struggle, they have a very specific set of targets to blame -- and targets fairly easy to identify by skin color/appearance (and I assume they'll start measuring nose length at some point). They've been taught to hate.
Times of financial stress in particular are times when antisemitism peaks. And financial stress there will be as AI begins to shave away job opportunities for educated people, while immigration shaves away job opportunities for uneducated. There's going to be some serious redirection of anger.
I hope there's a university somewhere that appreciates your quest to find students capable of critical thinking. And that it's not as bad elsewhere as it seems to be in the Boston area.
I also hope The University of Austin is ultimately successful and other similar groups follow, as hard as it is to establish a university.
** MIT’s Women’s & Gender Studies department and Coalition Against Apartheid co-hosted Mohammed El-Kurd, a Palestinian poet who has said that Israelis have “an unquenchable thirst for Palestinian blood.” **
Putting aside the Palestinian poet's hatred of Israelis, do the faculty and students have any idea what life is like in "Palestine" for women and gender-y people?
Kudos to Professor Karchmer. I can't imagine how difficult it must be to first, stand alone on principle and secondly after years of hard work, sacrifice and commitment, to walk away from that which one loves.
MIT doesn't deserve Professor Karchmer. He may have chosen to walk away from a "dream job", but the good professor has walked toward keeping his soul which is a far more valuable possession.
DEI boils down to equal outcome vs equal opportunity — giving people things because of their skin color not their qualifications.
Jews (and Asians) have thrived in America because they have stressed the importance of education and hard work to get ahead. BLM and other progressive organizations have turned this on its head, accusing the educated, hard workers who have become the doctors, lawyers, Hollywood producers, Wall Street titans, et.al. as oppressing the dysfunctional inner city black communities where teen pregnancies and single parent uneducated mothers raise undereducated children. But nonetheless, they demand inclusion — equal percentages in college admissions, corporate boardrooms, Academy Awards nominations. And if Jews are in these spots, then they are the oppressors and must be stopped!!
Add to this the toxicity of radical Islam and their embrace of BLM as brothers in arms (intersectionality), where your fight is my fight, and you get to today’s university horror show.
I once believed that ideology swung like a pendulum, favoring one extreme for a short period before the counterbalance of free thought and reason exerted a magnetic balance to allow realignment. I no longer feel this way. The gentle, almost benign radicalism of the sixties which extended into my college years, the seventies, exists no more, having been replaced by a totalitarianism of thought that sweeps young impressionable minds in like an irresistible vortex. The uniformity, conformity and lock-step adherence to what has become Orwellian illogical nouveau-liberalism favors the Hitler youth movement more than classical liberalism I fear for a future where these intellectually bereft automatons seek and assume leadership positions in what used to be the most free and democratic nation in the world.
Mr. Karchmer: Thank you for this sadly revealing essay. Its one shortcoming is your kindness to President Kornbluth. She is by all accounts including yours, a nice person. And you are right to acknowledge that. But to exonerate her and blame the system is wrong. Leadership casts a long shadow. What is needed to fix the system is for Menschs -- like you clearly -- to lead it. Examples need to be set. President Kornbluth has failed at that. She has plenty of company, especially in the academy. Best of luck and I look forward to your next chapter and contributions.
Yet another heartbreaking tale of woe from a once great institution. Yes, having the luxury to vote with one’s feet and the resolve to do that is commendable.
I spent a decade at UPenn. Yesterday I received an email sent to all members of my old department informing everyone of the passing of one of our favorite professors, a man who was my most important mentor. Of course they asked for a donation in his memory to the lectureship established in his honor.
Certainly one of many asks from UPenn. And another one I declined.
I don’t think that my old prof would have approved of what these once fine universities have become.
If the moral rot and septic, woke ideology cannot be purged from these places it is time for clear thinkers to go elsewhere and re-establish themselves in an environment that fosters clear thinking and intellectual freedom.
Hence the reason I now not only do not give extra credence to an Ivy League degree but will actually DISCOUNT it when I am reviewing resumes of people to hire.
If you come out of the Ivy League, you are probably not educated but are indoctrinated, and that means lack of performance and issues at work.
I now look very very differently at the types of kids I hire. One thing I do look at is how much time they spent working in HS and college. If they were out working in the real world they were too busy to get caught up in the psychobabble on campus and had exposure to the real world and real people.
Academics have their uses, but allowing them to set social policy or allowing their mental masturbations to rule the world is not one of them.
MIT professor: “Israel doesn’t have a right to exist, it’s an illegitimate settler-colony like the US.” But yet, there is the professor, happily employed by MIT, residing in our " illegitimate settler-colony" and no doubt enjoying all the benefits thereof. The hypocrisy, which is characteristic of the left, is astounding.
Many thanks to Professor Karchmer for exposing the rot in Americas campuses. We have allowed a cadre of hardcore, America-hating leftists to burrow into our institutions - not only universities but our corporations, think tanks and professional organizations. This poisonous vine must be ripped out at its roots and destroyed. Anyone in America who says or believes that “Israel doesn’t have a right to exist, it’s an illegitimate settler-colony like the US” has no place in OUR country. Period. As I've said before - they hate you, your children and your grandchildren and shriek for your destruction. They are your enemy and if you don't wake up soon, you will deeply regret it. For you are cowards and fools if you think otherwise.
Leadership matters. But at universities there is none. The rank and file faculty members rule hiding behind tenure without facing any consequences for their decisions. Mob rule squashes all dissent. University presidents govern accordingly. The only cure to this disease is cut off funding. Donors must hold universities accountable. DEI must be dismantled.
These kids - with their belief structures - are going to be in charge of business, government, and law in about 10-15 years. I don't know what will happen. A lot of people had ideologies in college that they subsequently abandon or refine. I was vaguely libertarian, a principle I've completely abandoned and now look upon as untenable and perhaps even pernicious. But there's a certain vehemence to this ideology that seems to be particularly "sticky" and hard to get away from.
The other thing is that the US is about to head into some really serious financial distress. Most of these graduates - although perhaps not MIT graduates - will be underemployed in the future and really struggling to buy a house or achieve a fraction of wealth equivalent to their parents and grandparents. So as they struggle, they have a very specific set of targets to blame -- and targets fairly easy to identify by skin color/appearance (and I assume they'll start measuring nose length at some point). They've been taught to hate.
Times of financial stress in particular are times when antisemitism peaks. And financial stress there will be as AI begins to shave away job opportunities for educated people, while immigration shaves away job opportunities for uneducated. There's going to be some serious redirection of anger.
I hope there's a university somewhere that appreciates your quest to find students capable of critical thinking. And that it's not as bad elsewhere as it seems to be in the Boston area.
I also hope The University of Austin is ultimately successful and other similar groups follow, as hard as it is to establish a university.
** MIT’s Women’s & Gender Studies department and Coalition Against Apartheid co-hosted Mohammed El-Kurd, a Palestinian poet who has said that Israelis have “an unquenchable thirst for Palestinian blood.” **
Putting aside the Palestinian poet's hatred of Israelis, do the faculty and students have any idea what life is like in "Palestine" for women and gender-y people?
Kudos to Professor Karchmer. I can't imagine how difficult it must be to first, stand alone on principle and secondly after years of hard work, sacrifice and commitment, to walk away from that which one loves.
MIT doesn't deserve Professor Karchmer. He may have chosen to walk away from a "dream job", but the good professor has walked toward keeping his soul which is a far more valuable possession.
I wish him well. It will pay off in the end.
MIT has a women's and gender studies department? Yikes. I thought it was all about STEM.
Professor Karchmer, you were MIT’s dream hire, not the other way around.
DEI boils down to equal outcome vs equal opportunity — giving people things because of their skin color not their qualifications.
Jews (and Asians) have thrived in America because they have stressed the importance of education and hard work to get ahead. BLM and other progressive organizations have turned this on its head, accusing the educated, hard workers who have become the doctors, lawyers, Hollywood producers, Wall Street titans, et.al. as oppressing the dysfunctional inner city black communities where teen pregnancies and single parent uneducated mothers raise undereducated children. But nonetheless, they demand inclusion — equal percentages in college admissions, corporate boardrooms, Academy Awards nominations. And if Jews are in these spots, then they are the oppressors and must be stopped!!
Add to this the toxicity of radical Islam and their embrace of BLM as brothers in arms (intersectionality), where your fight is my fight, and you get to today’s university horror show.
DEI must DIE!
I once believed that ideology swung like a pendulum, favoring one extreme for a short period before the counterbalance of free thought and reason exerted a magnetic balance to allow realignment. I no longer feel this way. The gentle, almost benign radicalism of the sixties which extended into my college years, the seventies, exists no more, having been replaced by a totalitarianism of thought that sweeps young impressionable minds in like an irresistible vortex. The uniformity, conformity and lock-step adherence to what has become Orwellian illogical nouveau-liberalism favors the Hitler youth movement more than classical liberalism I fear for a future where these intellectually bereft automatons seek and assume leadership positions in what used to be the most free and democratic nation in the world.
This made me want to weep, except weeping is useless. What a disgusting world we have permitted to be created through this vile ideology.
Mr. Karchmer: Thank you for this sadly revealing essay. Its one shortcoming is your kindness to President Kornbluth. She is by all accounts including yours, a nice person. And you are right to acknowledge that. But to exonerate her and blame the system is wrong. Leadership casts a long shadow. What is needed to fix the system is for Menschs -- like you clearly -- to lead it. Examples need to be set. President Kornbluth has failed at that. She has plenty of company, especially in the academy. Best of luck and I look forward to your next chapter and contributions.
Yet another heartbreaking tale of woe from a once great institution. Yes, having the luxury to vote with one’s feet and the resolve to do that is commendable.
I spent a decade at UPenn. Yesterday I received an email sent to all members of my old department informing everyone of the passing of one of our favorite professors, a man who was my most important mentor. Of course they asked for a donation in his memory to the lectureship established in his honor.
Certainly one of many asks from UPenn. And another one I declined.
I don’t think that my old prof would have approved of what these once fine universities have become.
If the moral rot and septic, woke ideology cannot be purged from these places it is time for clear thinkers to go elsewhere and re-establish themselves in an environment that fosters clear thinking and intellectual freedom.
Hence the reason I now not only do not give extra credence to an Ivy League degree but will actually DISCOUNT it when I am reviewing resumes of people to hire.
If you come out of the Ivy League, you are probably not educated but are indoctrinated, and that means lack of performance and issues at work.
I now look very very differently at the types of kids I hire. One thing I do look at is how much time they spent working in HS and college. If they were out working in the real world they were too busy to get caught up in the psychobabble on campus and had exposure to the real world and real people.
Academics have their uses, but allowing them to set social policy or allowing their mental masturbations to rule the world is not one of them.
I am full of admiration. Sadly, we need more of this clear-eyed courage in academia and elsewhere.
MIT professor: “Israel doesn’t have a right to exist, it’s an illegitimate settler-colony like the US.” But yet, there is the professor, happily employed by MIT, residing in our " illegitimate settler-colony" and no doubt enjoying all the benefits thereof. The hypocrisy, which is characteristic of the left, is astounding.
Many thanks to Professor Karchmer for exposing the rot in Americas campuses. We have allowed a cadre of hardcore, America-hating leftists to burrow into our institutions - not only universities but our corporations, think tanks and professional organizations. This poisonous vine must be ripped out at its roots and destroyed. Anyone in America who says or believes that “Israel doesn’t have a right to exist, it’s an illegitimate settler-colony like the US” has no place in OUR country. Period. As I've said before - they hate you, your children and your grandchildren and shriek for your destruction. They are your enemy and if you don't wake up soon, you will deeply regret it. For you are cowards and fools if you think otherwise.
Leadership matters. But at universities there is none. The rank and file faculty members rule hiding behind tenure without facing any consequences for their decisions. Mob rule squashes all dissent. University presidents govern accordingly. The only cure to this disease is cut off funding. Donors must hold universities accountable. DEI must be dismantled.