Those Who Can Indoctrinate, Teach

I read this article today by an anonymous European university professor, decrying the totalitarianism exercised by the Left in academia. His testimony is part of a rising movement among conservatives that involves many professors and students speaking out about the overwhelming liberal bias in higher education. David Horowitz and crew are leading the way by lobbying for the Academic Bill of Rights.

This conservative movement for academic “diversity” (funny how liberals cringe at their own buzz word when it comes to diversity of thought) is not insignificant or marginal, as evidenced by the number of professors (maybe twenty-five or more out of a crowd of forty) who attended a lecture here at Georgetown two weeks ago by Yale Law professor Robert Post. Post’s talk, entitled “The Structure of Academic Freedom,” denounced the Academic Bill of Rights and proclaimed the benefits of self-regulating ethics among university faculty. Post pointed out the moral hazard created by such systems of self-regulation in other fields such as medicine, accounting, and architecture, but somehow maintained that university professors would be immune to the traps that those lesser mortals have fallen into.

Okay, he didn’t say “lesser mortals,” but that was the basic idea conveyed. I guess when you spend so much time looking out from the ivory tower, the reality of your own moral vulnerability escapes you. It must be that allegory-of-the-cave-induced blindness from seeing the scorching light of your own brilliance.

With names like Ward Churchill and Lawrence Summers making recent headlines for their provocative statements, the Academy is circling the wagons, scurrying to be the first and fiercest defenders of “free speech.” Yet, these same academics are working hard to stifle any dissent in their ranks.

[A] conservative faculty member – junior professor, still far from going up for tenure – was harassed for his political beliefs on an almost daily basis. The harassment was executed by tenured, senior members of his department and took such extreme measures that he simply packed up and left his position at the school.

This isn’t late-breaking news or anything, especially for anyone who has spent time as a conservative on a university campus, but it is more than just a nuisance for those of us who have to tolerate having our views belittled on a regular basis. As the anonymous professor points out, liberal professors who use their classrooms to present their ideologies as truth breed liberal college graduates who vote for liberal politicians.

I started this post with a point in mind, so here’s the part where I actually get to it: I think the more serious problem than the fact that a majority of college graduates vote for liberals is the fact that college graduates become teachers in elementary and high schools. Thus the liberal indoctrination that infiltrates college campuses is more than just an abstract problem for conservatives who dislike the one-party state that is academia. This is something that Americans need to take seriously for the long-term good of our children and our culture.