Universities used to defend academic freedom, and tenure protected professors from termination for anything short of criminal behavior. The rise of “wokeness” has changed all of that. Faculty members aren’t allowed to say certain things that offend the “progressives.” Do so and you’ll lose your job, with or without tenure.
In a case that reveals the ugly truth about academia in 2022, Princeton has just fired Professor Josh Katz. In this American Greatness article, Mark Bauerlein covers the details and explains what is at stake.
Here is Bauerlein’s conclusion: “Our major institutions are led by people who don’t understand that the protective politically correct actions they take only harm the institutions they lead. They can’t do otherwise, of course, or they would lose their jobs. One wonders, though, if any of those well-paid executives ever look in the mirror and feel a sore temptation to hit the office and do exactly what Katz did, pronounce a great big “no” to the forces of political correctness. If they did, they’d end up in early retirement but perhaps much happier. The spiritual improvement that comes with honesty may be worth a lot more than the material cost.”
Read the whole thing.
The academic mobs will only grow bolder, looking for any excuse to torment and terminate professors who say things that they dislike. For now, at least, there are still quite a few institutions that would be happy to have a scholar like Josh Katz, even though he’s been branded a heretic.