Imagine becoming president of Harvard with such minimal achievements. Could anyone still say with a straight face that women of color face 'systemic disadvantage' in the academic world?
Diversity hires seem to be having a difficult time answering relatively straightforward questions.
Had Claudine Gay been unable to answer a much simpler question, such as “What is a woman?,” we could have just immediately appointed her to the Supreme Court. I guess she’ll just have to settle with being the President of Harvard University.
In upside-down world, where race and gender are accomplishments, rather than mere attributes, this all makes perfect sense.
Dec 11, 2023·edited Dec 11, 2023Liked by Janice Fiamengo
Claudine Gay is an affirmative action hire embarrassment. If we lived in a fair world, she would resign immediately and apologize to academia at large for not having enough integrity to admit what she knew deep in her heart when she accepted the position of Harvard president - that she was fundamentally unfit for the job. Then she would get a more fitting position of assistant manager at a local Starbucks. Then academia would apologize to the West for abysmally failing in their job of custodian of the breathtaking intellectual edifice bequeathed to us by the Age of Enlightenment. If we can't get this, I'll gladly settle for Claudine getting canned for the plagiarism allegations now surfacing. That's not too much to ask for Hanukkah.
Wait staff really have to work. I’m not knocking Starbucks managers, or assistant managers, but as long as she stayed a manager of any stripe she could hold on to the hope of continuing to get paid for doing nothing useful.
Excellent analysis. How did it come to this? The obsession with diversity is frankly pathetic. And your illustration of Gay's indifference to questions beyond black advancement ought to be enough for other groups to waken up. Universality is the way. Either every group gets to look out for their own, or none of them do. These blatant double standards are maddening.
I personally think that amidst this glacial climate of anti-white discrimination, whites should look out for themselves more than ever. Europe has already gone to the dogs materially speaking, but at least we still have all the past glories and triumphs preserved in the annals of history. Western culture should be celebrated as much as possible now that its been so desecrated by wokeists. The last thing we need is to have peoples that were not too long ago running around almost naked, living in primitive huts tell us that their culture eclipses ours. For all the "self-love" being promoted, there seems to be ironically enough a pandemic of self hate amongst whites.
Yes, the self-hatred of whites in general is dispiriting and, frankly, mystifying.
A friend of mine told me about a poll conducted about attitudes to racial others. Each person polled was asked to rate their own race on a scale of 10, and then to rate individuals of other races. Most individuals rated their own race fairly highly. Whites rated themselves the lowest and every other group higher. Blacks rated their group highest, and every other group much lower.
One of the disturbing things mentioned in Gay's article about black animosity toward Latinos was black unwillingness to share affirmative action and other benefits with people who weren't black. She didn't make much of this--outside of its potential political effects on blacks themselves--though it seems an enormous barrier to the just society that academics are always touting.
"One of the disturbing things mentioned in Gay's article about black animosity toward Latinos was black unwillingness to share affirmative action and other benefits with people who weren't black. "
Our culture is writ large everywhere and it is what gives them their comfortable life. It is that we must remind them of. Plus the courage to push back. If you are our equals then prove it. You can start by dropping the slavery nonsense. Britain and America didn't start slavery, we ended it. Everywhere.
When Britain abolished slavery in the 19th century it set about eradicating it across the world and was joined by only one other country, the United States.
"Britain and America didn't start slavery, we ended it. Everywhere."
No one ever talks about that. They ONLY focus on the fact that it existed for a time. Today Western culture has startlingly been replaced with black "thug" culture (at least among the youth, I'm not long out of high school and I remember laughing at some white kids of Serb descent ( my school had quite the Balkan population, being from an ex Yugoslav country myself I can attest to our traditionality and anti wokeness) speaking in what we here in Canada call a "Toronto Man" accent (in other words a Jamaican accent). It was firmly ingrained in their speech, they could not utter one word without sounding like they were black. I remember wondering what their parents thought of it haha. They would smoke weed, and were all rapper wannabes who idolized black rappers. It was such a pity to see young white men reducing themselves to the most base and degenerate of characters, instead of the dignified virility possessed by their ancestors who were far more impoverished yet lived infinitely more noble of a life raising a family on a farm than them. Janice writes a lot on how young men are underperforming in school/academia, and I'm almost certain that it's due to the black ghetto ideals of crime, drugs, money, stupidity, and sex pervading Western youth culture like the most noxious of gases.
The black commentator Tommy Sotomayor has spoken in depth of the effects of ghetto culture from within the community; himself the son of a single mother, he explores the consequences of that situation in the black inner city context, which include vulnerability to sexual abuse, rampant vulgar materialism, criminality arising from absent fathers paying child support, lack of discipline or respect for elders (leading to idolisation of gang leaders, confrontations with police etc.), unconscious incest (with the resultant medical issues), transference of various narcissistic character traits... the list goes on.
Whether you take the Jared Taylor line on cause and effect here or a more sociological approach, the veneration and imitation of such a culture is another symptom of the deliberate debasement of Western society, inevitably emphasising the humiliation and deracination of its male members. People like Gay nourish their careers by perpetuating every aspect of this.
Dec 15, 2023·edited Dec 15, 2023Liked by Janice Fiamengo
Writing about black culture in the U.S., Jason Riley notes the role of welfare programs in "slowing the self-development that proved necessary for other groups to advance." Minimum-wage laws have a history of "pricing blacks out of the labor force", affirmative action results in "fewer black college graduates", soft-on-crime laws make black neighborhoods more dangerous etc. Such programs, he claims, "undermine the work ethic and displace fathers" and therefore keep poor people poor. There is little incentive "to study hard in school if you willl be held to lower academic standards, to change antisocial behavior when people are willing to reward it, make excuses for it, or even change the law to accommodate it".
He goes on: "If the rise of other groups is any indication, black social and economic problems are less about politics than they are about culture." Joblessness among blacks is less a problem of discrimination than of unemployability. The black-white learning gap is owed to a "dearth of education choices", not biased tests or a shortage of funding. And instead of a racist criminal justice system, he identifies black behavior, which is "too often celebrated in black culture", as the real culprit.
Abolitionist Frederick Douglass answered the question of "what to do with the Negro?" with "Do nothing with us! ... if the Negro cannot stand on his own legs, let him fall also. All I ask is, give him a chance to stand on his own legs!".
Booker T. Washington concurred: "It is important and right that all privileges of the law be ours, but it is vastly more important that we be prepareed for the exercise of these privileges."
Finally, Riley: "The history of 1960s liberal social policies is largely a history of ignoring this wisdom."
Thank you for including those illuminating and incisive observations from actually black (and not self-hating white liberals) intellectuals. It is always good to be able to assess the shortcomings present in oneself or whatever ethnic or social group one belongs to, without resorting to the blaming of others and in lieu taking accountability for what needs to be done for self/group amelioration. It's one of the most convenient human failings to blame others all the time, but real change only comes of looking at the bigger picture
. Today I read an article in which it was announced that a famous square in Toronto will be renamed from "Yonge and Dundas" to "Sankofa", after some Ghanian term for reconciliation and progress. Apprently the former has some connections to individuals involved in the Trans-Atlantic slave trade. It is precisely this type of pathological obsession with historical injustices that prevent black people from moving on and focusing on the here and now. It's so fatuous to believe that changing the name of a street square will actually help black people edify themselves in any meaningful way that does not include commiserating over slavery and blaming the white race for having damned them to eternal wretchedness.
They have marketed ghetto culture hard. And it worked for a while. But many black commentators have spoken against it, famously Thomas Sowell and Candace Owens. It belittles blacks and reduces them to cariciatures.
But it is not destined to last. It is really an adolescent rebellion.
If youre old enough, you will remember the music industry pushing rap from late disco/Bboy fun party aesthetic towards hard core gangster rap. It was not organic. It was definately a psyop. Or perhaps the crypto-bigotry of liberal record execs
I am not sure it would qualify as a psyop, but it was definitely manufactured. I would argue it is a form of latent racism. It fit the image some have of black culture. It is precisely this Sowell and others push against.
Albanian wiggers in NY is a thing. they got their American success story narrative from MTV (once that channel stopped banning black musicians. yes Im old enough to remember that). A good embodied example is the singer Bebe Rexa, complete with fake nails, hair extensions and the mudras we saw (formerly) in black drag queens, imported now into straight black female culture and youth culture in general.
Yes, and Dua Lipa, as well as Rita Ora, albeit to a lesser extent. My family is Macedonian, so we have experience with Albanians, given that they constitute the largest ethnic populations in the homeland aside from our own. A lot of tension due to the conflicting religions and languages, and Albanian recently became an official language, to the dismay of many. Every time I travel there I always get a sense that being Muslim, Albanians are pretty wild compared to the rest of Orthodox Christians. A lot of girls complain about them making sexual passes at them in the streets at night, and my aunt once told of having been frightened late one night from the sounds of gunshots (apprently her Albanian neighbors, nearing the end of a week long wedding celebration, thought it fit to finish off the festivities with the sound of shots firing.) Aside from my bias, I think there is a genuine reason why Islamic culture has been seen as harmful by the West for so long. It is just far too radical and aggressive at its religious core, and this translates into the behavior of its citizens and adherents, and the reason behind their unwillingness to assimilate to the culture of the Western nations they flee to.
it borders on modern blackface in the adoption of tropes.
Yes thats a lace front wig.
and no the nails and eyelashes arent real.
Ill leave it to the listener to decide if the down low blues sensibility in the vocal is an "authentic" expression of Albanian intergenerational trauma.
Shoter version: Gay is a black female affirmative action hire who was immune from rational, fact-based criticism on account of her status, so rose in the ranks well beyond her level of competence. She appears to be the poster girl (please pardon my sexism/ageism/patriarchical paternalism) for the Dunning-Kruger Effect as well as The Peter Principle. We shall see how thick her Diversity Shield is; I'm betting she survives the effort to defenestrate her.
She has survived for now, but the plagiarism scandal will hurt her standing, and there must be many Harvard academics who resent how she has embarrassed the school.
She may also be part of the kompromat dynamic; elevate poor exemplars and you can make them dance at will. Id guess, her statements on the panel were legally vetted (directed) before she made them.
Very astute observation. Sources report that Gay and McGill were prepped by staff of WilmerHale, a very "connected" law firm. A short google search will give you all you need to know. Some reported they also prepped MIT President Kornbluth as well. You can bet your bottom dollar that none of these three affirmative action figureheads composed their testimonial arglebargle without outside assistance.
So the question remains: is she cannon fodder/human sheild or a true golden child?
Attractive women pushing fat acceptance is a model for the first hypothesis.
I feel like there is a grudge match going on between AWFLs (actually representing their dynastic/marital interests) and "gifted" black women right now. Kimberle Crenshaw's entire ouvre is based on this resentment/turf war.
This is all muddied by performative AWFL guilt and purported "imposter syndrome", where they also get to play savior. When pushed far enough, it does finally come down to competing power interests. Add to the mix, these black females taking white men for husbands. They are storming the castle "by any means necessary".
If black women "on the street" are lamenting "white women taking their men", the AWFLs at the very top are having to compete with black women for THEIR men.
Thank you for this analysis. Christopher Rufo & colleague are exposing significant plagiarism in Gay’s Harvard PhD dissertation. Obvious to me her gender, color, and feminist politics explain her rise to the presidency, not her scholarship. This post by Janice is yet another reason we should support the National Association of Scholars, nas.org, whose mission is restoring reasoned discourse in academia for a civil society. It too calls for Pres Gay to resign.
I would love to see one author an essay ONLY about gender and race because, by the fundamental laws of Postmodernism, one would have to be the oppressor.
I recall a certain black "classicist" whose mission was to destroy the classics. He spent (or spends) his time counting how many blacks are published in journals focused on the classics, rather than just doing the scholarly writing himself. That said, I wonder how many of these "diversity hires" in academia write and "research" anything other than race? Even more egregious is the blatant ingratitude for getting to the top without doing the work. The recently departed, short-lived black president of a NY university claimed on the school's homepage something to the effect that 'only recently has he and his brethren been seen as human." Never mind the degrees from Princeton and NYU or wherever Ivy else. And, while firing useful administrators to save money during the pandemic, he hired his best (black) friend to run the DEI department at a salary more than two times what I earn teaching far too many sections to merely get by.
Dan-el Pedilla Peralta, no? Amazing story, in which a non-tenured independent scholar, Mary Williams, was blacklisted from the annual conference for suggesting that Padilla Peralta may have got his position because he was black, but she hoped not. In an interview, Pedilla Peralta boasted about his blackness being a qualification.
Much of "academia" is now empty suits (and heads) what is fun is to watch a black woman pushed at her her own behest to stand in the line of fire. KJP is one example, Gay another. They will be taken out as we know, white liberals hate blacks anyway. The agenda is far greater than promoting blackness, but the black leaders think they can ride the tiger.
Wikipedia spins his complaint as one of racial injustice while omitting his less than kosher ideas: "Fryer alleged that he was "unfairly scrutinized ... for his skin color."
I happened to watch a question session that included the interchange with Mz Gay. There appeared to be three other "Presidents" being questioned. Not familiar with the management structures of US Universities I assume these are very senior people. The first thing that struck me was all four were women, in our era of "Diversity" this did raise suspicions that they may be diversity hires, they may not of course but your article suggest one certainly is. The second was the rather inept responses and answers which simply looked like evasion and obfuscation.
So many like her are in positions of authority yet display no authority. Cressida Dick in the UK was Head of the Met Police i London when she should never have got that far.
True, but not difficult with the computer anagram programme. Having said that as his name is so short it is fairly easy to do longhand pencil and paper.
Dec 11, 2023·edited Dec 12, 2023Liked by Janice Fiamengo
Excellent. Gay is a diversity hire, par excellence, obv. I once seriously considered attending the Harvard MBA program in the early 1990s (I had the grades), I am really pleased I chose to do other things, that added more genuine value to my skill set and career. As you point out Janice, the main issue with Gay's flameout in this fiasco is largely self-inflicted. You can't very well police on-campus speech that goes one way, then change course, otherwise your hypocrisy is laid bare.
Fundamentally, Claudine Gay's testimony underscored the looming and persisting insanity of Franz Fanon's twisted view of the universe. Many people in the academic community view "diversity, equity, and inclusion" (DEI), which Dean Claudine Gay has strongly committed to throughout her tenure at Harvard, as a necessary first step toward building a more equitable and representative institution. Supporters view this emphasis on DEI initiatives as being consistent with Harvard's position as a progressive leader in higher education and societal reform.
However, there are voices of concern regarding the potential impact of these initiatives on free speech. Critics point to Harvard's lowered ranking by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression as evidence that the university's climate might be growing less conducive to free and open discourse—a cornerstone of academic freedom.
In response to such criticism, Dean Gay has maintained that her approach to DEI does not infringe upon free speech but rather supports it, even when the ideas expressed are provocative or controversial. In order to prevent those who have traditionally held power from silencing marginalized voices, DEI proponents contend that this balance is necessary. From this angle, it is morally necessary to create spaces where historically oppressed groups can advocate for change without feeling overpowered by dominant narratives.
Concurrently, a substantial number of Harvard faculty members have expressed support for Dean Gay, emphasizing their belief that her leadership embodies Harvard's commitment to academic freedom. They suggest that her policies are a bulwark against political pressures that could undermine the university's scholarly objectives. Nonetheless, some skeptics interpret this support as a means to safeguard personal privileges within the academic structure.
Amidst this complex interplay of opinions, there is an acknowledgement that higher education is facing scrutiny over its adherence to particular world views. Some contend that academic rigour is compromised when ideological positions take precedence over critical inquiry and debate. The suggestion is that resorting to ideological thinking can lead to an oversimplified view of complex issues, where nuanced analysis is replaced by catchphrases and assertive posturing—a departure from the deep thinking traditionally expected in academia.
Bill Ackman, a prominent hedge fund manager, realizes that faculty members who take solid stances on DEI or resist institutional changes may indeed find themselves in the spotlight, much like Ackman does in the financial world. Although it may be dismissed as "neo-liberal encroachment," a reckoning is coming.
Academics who support or oppose particular ideologies or policies might face difficulties akin to those public figures like Ackman have:
1. **Public Scrutiny:** A wide audience can analyze academic leaders' decisions, especially in today's digital age where information spreads quickly, just as the media and the general public closely follow and critique Ackman's investment decisions and comments.
2. Pressure from Stakeholders: Ackman deals with investors, regulators, and the companies he invests in. Similarly, academics must navigate the expectations and demands of students, faculty peers, university administration, and external entities that may include government bodies and the general public.
3. Reputational Risk: As Ackman's reputation can influence his business success, an academic's reputation can affect their career, their standing within the university, and their influence. DEI-based research and careers are going to find themselves under more scrutiny.
In the short period I served on my alma mater's board, I was struck by the aggressive fundraising tactics that seemed primarily focused on extracting substantial donations. This emphasis on financial contributions was quite disheartening. Moreover, it was peculiar to encounter female alumni, who themselves held prominent positions in surgery and healthcare and had significant familial networks that advanced them in this career path, approaching me with the insinuation that my professional success depended on gender. The environment was indeed strange, and it seemed unprepared for the kind of transparency and accountability one would expect in such a setting. I resigned early and ended up spending more time on other useful things. Nevertheless, I suspect Claudine Gay's performance is an indication that it is coming.
Those female surgeons are financially successful and respected in ther field. But they are still oppressed. Because women. Because black, perhaps. Only a misogynist or a racist would formulate such, and so, like the black woke racists, the feminists are themselves misogynist, and they are all projecting their own biases. They and no one else think women or blacks to be lesser, based on sex or race.
When you see the feminists and woke blacks lamenting immutable characteristics you can only conclude that many resent not having male anatomy or white skin, and no amount of money or power will assuage that. Yet they surgically alter their bodies, or wear the wigs of Malaysian hair. They are literal skin walkers. Their jealousy is not political but literally visceral. they want to inhabit the masters house, not dismantle it; they want to be white men and are mad at God that they were denied the ability to "occupy" the very bodies of the object of their jealous desire.
I think much of feminism and wokeism is based on the simple infantile impulse of "I want what you have", "I want to take your stuff", and, of course, only the _good_ stuff. Hence, women want the prestigious, well-paid positions that men have traditionally held, without regard for whether they are qualified. If they have the power do to so, they will grab the "stuff". Much like a child bully would. The principle is even more obvious in Hollywood: non-white and/or female directors and actors have all the freedom to create their own, new characters or even universes. What they do, however, is literally "take the stuff" of traditional culture and race- and gender-swap characters, while re-interpreting everything from Disney classics to superhero movies according to a woke worldview. This fight of theirs is not about equal standing and acknowledgement of different sexes, races, cultures and viewpoints, it's about taking away the other kids' toys and destroying them.
I agree with the inverse plagiarism of traditionally male dominated fields, in particular cinema and the movie industry. There is a recurring trend that even the average non movie buff viewer has noticed, and that is that live action reboots and remakes of Disney stories and other cartoons primarily orientated towards children have become standard fare for Hollywood directors who should mostly be catering to adults. I cannot understand for the life of me why anyone over the age of 10 would want to watch a Disney remake or Barbie film, unless they have children, which a lot of childless wokeists do not have. Peter Pan syndrome is rampant. Only last year I was reading a book (I forget the name but it was written by a rather prominent conservative commentator) on how adults have become increasingly prone to behaving as children (in terms of vocabulary, mannerisms, interests) and how conversely, children have become prematurely exposed to adult matter (sex, money, glamour). Everywhere I look today I see all kinds of testaments to his observations which date back to the 70s. Also meaty dialogue and thematic content of a pround nature which was once a standard of any decent movie, has been completely discarded (unless its woke and worded in the profanity addled, filler word peppered patois of your everyday teen). The bastardization of the human attention span, largely the result of social media, has resulted in movie scenes being very brief and rapid in nature, since apparently directors take general public to possess the mindsets of hyperactive children who have had too much candy after dinner. Just the other day I was watching a movie with my dad, when he pointed out how action in today's films is compressed compared to the action in films from his time, which burned slowly and made the suspense more delicious. Watching thriller flicks from the 60s/70s you feel you're watching something more cerebral than any of the ostensibly didactive "socially enlightening" movies aimed at grown men and women. In the words of Shakespeare: their Oscar honorifics "hangs loose about him, like a giant's robe upon a dwarfish thief".
What an interesting observation. Was it Diana West's book you were reading? The Death of the Grownup?
One obvious thing I've noticed that parallels your observations is how in the 1950s, even quite young men and women looked and presented themselves (in the way they dressed and spoke and held their bodies) as mature adults; now there is someone like Tom Cruz, who must be around 60 years old, still trying to look and act like a boy.
The woke like to blur the line between child and adult. It may not be conscious but they are doing it.
Add in the low level but ubiquitous characteristic of the woke; they have stunted emotional maturity. I credit single parent homes with this. People who otherwise can do a spread sheet, write a PhD thesis, etc. are unable to comport themselves like adults when under pressure. Look for it. Once you see it it is everywhere.
Thank you Janice for your reply, it means a lot. Regarding the book in question, I can tell you that it most definitely was written by a man, although I will certainly check out the book you mentioned. One clue that may lead to the identity of its author lays in the fact that I first heard of him through another book of his that criticized the matrix of technology and the media, and had gained quite a following amongst Reddit users. I will try again sometime to figure it out; it was a very informative and comprehensive book without being too long and garrulous. You are right about people no longer acting their age; I see so many girls barely out of their preteen years wearing heavy makeup and dressing in cheap ways that would once have had them branded girls of loose morals aka hookers. The horribly garish trend of claw like false nails and false eyelashes popularized by the ghetto communities don't help either. I was shocked to find out that Tom Cruise is 61, you would think he never grew out of the roles he had in the 80s!
Of all the insane wokies, I think Fanon is the worst, and thats saying alot. One has to contend with the racism of Marx, towards blacks and his own people no less. Fanons homophobia, a dark mirror image of the lesbian feminist's "political lesbianism" idea, shares in common with it the idea that sexuality is a social constuction, he asserting that it is a pathology, the feminists asserting that it is "liberating".
Harvard (and many other schools like it) went wonky centuries ago, not recently. The very concept of a university (harking back to the Middle Ages) stems from the truth that, in Christ (and in Him alone) there is *true* unity in diversity (not the fake kind so-called universities yammer about nowadays). Since the God-man is the creator and sustainer of everything (John 1:3, Heb 1:2-3), any study of anything must acknowledge cohesion in Him to make any ultimate sense.
As such, I find it ironic that Harvard is stuck with its logo of an open book (the Bible) and the motto, Veritas. (See John 14:6.) One day, folks on every side of this latest Titanic deck-chairs pagan kerfuffle will have to answer to He Who Is Truth as to why they thought they could come up with their own.
Imagine becoming president of Harvard with such minimal achievements. Could anyone still say with a straight face that women of color face 'systemic disadvantage' in the academic world?
Diversity hires seem to be having a difficult time answering relatively straightforward questions.
Had Claudine Gay been unable to answer a much simpler question, such as “What is a woman?,” we could have just immediately appointed her to the Supreme Court. I guess she’ll just have to settle with being the President of Harvard University.
In upside-down world, where race and gender are accomplishments, rather than mere attributes, this all makes perfect sense.
Claudine Gay is an affirmative action hire embarrassment. If we lived in a fair world, she would resign immediately and apologize to academia at large for not having enough integrity to admit what she knew deep in her heart when she accepted the position of Harvard president - that she was fundamentally unfit for the job. Then she would get a more fitting position of assistant manager at a local Starbucks. Then academia would apologize to the West for abysmally failing in their job of custodian of the breathtaking intellectual edifice bequeathed to us by the Age of Enlightenment. If we can't get this, I'll gladly settle for Claudine getting canned for the plagiarism allegations now surfacing. That's not too much to ask for Hanukkah.
Do you mean waitress when you write 'assistant manager'?
'Waitress' is demeaning and misogynistic. I think they prefer 'culinary logistical associate'.
Wait staff really have to work. I’m not knocking Starbucks managers, or assistant managers, but as long as she stayed a manager of any stripe she could hold on to the hope of continuing to get paid for doing nothing useful.
She's "doing her job"; dismantling the masters house with his tools. They said they couldnt dismantle it with the masters tools. This was a lie.
Excellent analysis. How did it come to this? The obsession with diversity is frankly pathetic. And your illustration of Gay's indifference to questions beyond black advancement ought to be enough for other groups to waken up. Universality is the way. Either every group gets to look out for their own, or none of them do. These blatant double standards are maddening.
I personally think that amidst this glacial climate of anti-white discrimination, whites should look out for themselves more than ever. Europe has already gone to the dogs materially speaking, but at least we still have all the past glories and triumphs preserved in the annals of history. Western culture should be celebrated as much as possible now that its been so desecrated by wokeists. The last thing we need is to have peoples that were not too long ago running around almost naked, living in primitive huts tell us that their culture eclipses ours. For all the "self-love" being promoted, there seems to be ironically enough a pandemic of self hate amongst whites.
Yes, the self-hatred of whites in general is dispiriting and, frankly, mystifying.
A friend of mine told me about a poll conducted about attitudes to racial others. Each person polled was asked to rate their own race on a scale of 10, and then to rate individuals of other races. Most individuals rated their own race fairly highly. Whites rated themselves the lowest and every other group higher. Blacks rated their group highest, and every other group much lower.
One of the disturbing things mentioned in Gay's article about black animosity toward Latinos was black unwillingness to share affirmative action and other benefits with people who weren't black. She didn't make much of this--outside of its potential political effects on blacks themselves--though it seems an enormous barrier to the just society that academics are always touting.
"One of the disturbing things mentioned in Gay's article about black animosity toward Latinos was black unwillingness to share affirmative action and other benefits with people who weren't black. "
It's a turf war, plain and simple for "gimmes"
When a rich kid is a midwit, there is much guilt about material success.
Our culture is writ large everywhere and it is what gives them their comfortable life. It is that we must remind them of. Plus the courage to push back. If you are our equals then prove it. You can start by dropping the slavery nonsense. Britain and America didn't start slavery, we ended it. Everywhere.
When Britain abolished slavery in the 19th century it set about eradicating it across the world and was joined by only one other country, the United States.
"Britain and America didn't start slavery, we ended it. Everywhere."
No one ever talks about that. They ONLY focus on the fact that it existed for a time. Today Western culture has startlingly been replaced with black "thug" culture (at least among the youth, I'm not long out of high school and I remember laughing at some white kids of Serb descent ( my school had quite the Balkan population, being from an ex Yugoslav country myself I can attest to our traditionality and anti wokeness) speaking in what we here in Canada call a "Toronto Man" accent (in other words a Jamaican accent). It was firmly ingrained in their speech, they could not utter one word without sounding like they were black. I remember wondering what their parents thought of it haha. They would smoke weed, and were all rapper wannabes who idolized black rappers. It was such a pity to see young white men reducing themselves to the most base and degenerate of characters, instead of the dignified virility possessed by their ancestors who were far more impoverished yet lived infinitely more noble of a life raising a family on a farm than them. Janice writes a lot on how young men are underperforming in school/academia, and I'm almost certain that it's due to the black ghetto ideals of crime, drugs, money, stupidity, and sex pervading Western youth culture like the most noxious of gases.
The black commentator Tommy Sotomayor has spoken in depth of the effects of ghetto culture from within the community; himself the son of a single mother, he explores the consequences of that situation in the black inner city context, which include vulnerability to sexual abuse, rampant vulgar materialism, criminality arising from absent fathers paying child support, lack of discipline or respect for elders (leading to idolisation of gang leaders, confrontations with police etc.), unconscious incest (with the resultant medical issues), transference of various narcissistic character traits... the list goes on.
Whether you take the Jared Taylor line on cause and effect here or a more sociological approach, the veneration and imitation of such a culture is another symptom of the deliberate debasement of Western society, inevitably emphasising the humiliation and deracination of its male members. People like Gay nourish their careers by perpetuating every aspect of this.
Writing about black culture in the U.S., Jason Riley notes the role of welfare programs in "slowing the self-development that proved necessary for other groups to advance." Minimum-wage laws have a history of "pricing blacks out of the labor force", affirmative action results in "fewer black college graduates", soft-on-crime laws make black neighborhoods more dangerous etc. Such programs, he claims, "undermine the work ethic and displace fathers" and therefore keep poor people poor. There is little incentive "to study hard in school if you willl be held to lower academic standards, to change antisocial behavior when people are willing to reward it, make excuses for it, or even change the law to accommodate it".
He goes on: "If the rise of other groups is any indication, black social and economic problems are less about politics than they are about culture." Joblessness among blacks is less a problem of discrimination than of unemployability. The black-white learning gap is owed to a "dearth of education choices", not biased tests or a shortage of funding. And instead of a racist criminal justice system, he identifies black behavior, which is "too often celebrated in black culture", as the real culprit.
Abolitionist Frederick Douglass answered the question of "what to do with the Negro?" with "Do nothing with us! ... if the Negro cannot stand on his own legs, let him fall also. All I ask is, give him a chance to stand on his own legs!".
Booker T. Washington concurred: "It is important and right that all privileges of the law be ours, but it is vastly more important that we be prepareed for the exercise of these privileges."
Finally, Riley: "The history of 1960s liberal social policies is largely a history of ignoring this wisdom."
Thank you for including those illuminating and incisive observations from actually black (and not self-hating white liberals) intellectuals. It is always good to be able to assess the shortcomings present in oneself or whatever ethnic or social group one belongs to, without resorting to the blaming of others and in lieu taking accountability for what needs to be done for self/group amelioration. It's one of the most convenient human failings to blame others all the time, but real change only comes of looking at the bigger picture
. Today I read an article in which it was announced that a famous square in Toronto will be renamed from "Yonge and Dundas" to "Sankofa", after some Ghanian term for reconciliation and progress. Apprently the former has some connections to individuals involved in the Trans-Atlantic slave trade. It is precisely this type of pathological obsession with historical injustices that prevent black people from moving on and focusing on the here and now. It's so fatuous to believe that changing the name of a street square will actually help black people edify themselves in any meaningful way that does not include commiserating over slavery and blaming the white race for having damned them to eternal wretchedness.
Yes, the woke spirits that are today filling the air move these important insights even further away from the grasp of those who should heed them...
They have marketed ghetto culture hard. And it worked for a while. But many black commentators have spoken against it, famously Thomas Sowell and Candace Owens. It belittles blacks and reduces them to cariciatures.
But it is not destined to last. It is really an adolescent rebellion.
If youre old enough, you will remember the music industry pushing rap from late disco/Bboy fun party aesthetic towards hard core gangster rap. It was not organic. It was definately a psyop. Or perhaps the crypto-bigotry of liberal record execs
I am not sure it would qualify as a psyop, but it was definitely manufactured. I would argue it is a form of latent racism. It fit the image some have of black culture. It is precisely this Sowell and others push against.
Albanian wiggers in NY is a thing. they got their American success story narrative from MTV (once that channel stopped banning black musicians. yes Im old enough to remember that). A good embodied example is the singer Bebe Rexa, complete with fake nails, hair extensions and the mudras we saw (formerly) in black drag queens, imported now into straight black female culture and youth culture in general.
Yes, and Dua Lipa, as well as Rita Ora, albeit to a lesser extent. My family is Macedonian, so we have experience with Albanians, given that they constitute the largest ethnic populations in the homeland aside from our own. A lot of tension due to the conflicting religions and languages, and Albanian recently became an official language, to the dismay of many. Every time I travel there I always get a sense that being Muslim, Albanians are pretty wild compared to the rest of Orthodox Christians. A lot of girls complain about them making sexual passes at them in the streets at night, and my aunt once told of having been frightened late one night from the sounds of gunshots (apprently her Albanian neighbors, nearing the end of a week long wedding celebration, thought it fit to finish off the festivities with the sound of shots firing.) Aside from my bias, I think there is a genuine reason why Islamic culture has been seen as harmful by the West for so long. It is just far too radical and aggressive at its religious core, and this translates into the behavior of its citizens and adherents, and the reason behind their unwillingness to assimilate to the culture of the Western nations they flee to.
Perfomative blackness by an Albanian girl.
This anthem to narcissism veering into solipsism, was blasted during COVID on YT, whether I wanted to watch it or not via paid ad placement.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTiu-K1YSr0&t=1s
it borders on modern blackface in the adoption of tropes.
Yes thats a lace front wig.
and no the nails and eyelashes arent real.
Ill leave it to the listener to decide if the down low blues sensibility in the vocal is an "authentic" expression of Albanian intergenerational trauma.
I have a story about a tennant who was spared a bullet because the landlord (mistakenly) thought he was Albanian.
But I digress.
They have embraced gangster culture in NYC and took over the music scene.
Words are violence ONLY when I say they are.
Shoter version: Gay is a black female affirmative action hire who was immune from rational, fact-based criticism on account of her status, so rose in the ranks well beyond her level of competence. She appears to be the poster girl (please pardon my sexism/ageism/patriarchical paternalism) for the Dunning-Kruger Effect as well as The Peter Principle. We shall see how thick her Diversity Shield is; I'm betting she survives the effort to defenestrate her.
She has survived for now, but the plagiarism scandal will hurt her standing, and there must be many Harvard academics who resent how she has embarrassed the school.
You forgot 'Murphy's Law' and, possibly, 'Poe's Law'. This story could easily have been an invention of the Babylon Bee.
She may also be part of the kompromat dynamic; elevate poor exemplars and you can make them dance at will. Id guess, her statements on the panel were legally vetted (directed) before she made them.
Very astute observation. Sources report that Gay and McGill were prepped by staff of WilmerHale, a very "connected" law firm. A short google search will give you all you need to know. Some reported they also prepped MIT President Kornbluth as well. You can bet your bottom dollar that none of these three affirmative action figureheads composed their testimonial arglebargle without outside assistance.
So the question remains: is she cannon fodder/human sheild or a true golden child?
Attractive women pushing fat acceptance is a model for the first hypothesis.
I feel like there is a grudge match going on between AWFLs (actually representing their dynastic/marital interests) and "gifted" black women right now. Kimberle Crenshaw's entire ouvre is based on this resentment/turf war.
This is all muddied by performative AWFL guilt and purported "imposter syndrome", where they also get to play savior. When pushed far enough, it does finally come down to competing power interests. Add to the mix, these black females taking white men for husbands. They are storming the castle "by any means necessary".
If black women "on the street" are lamenting "white women taking their men", the AWFLs at the very top are having to compete with black women for THEIR men.
Another brilliant piece. Your closing sentence captures so much that is happening in higher ed. right now.
Thank you for this analysis. Christopher Rufo & colleague are exposing significant plagiarism in Gay’s Harvard PhD dissertation. Obvious to me her gender, color, and feminist politics explain her rise to the presidency, not her scholarship. This post by Janice is yet another reason we should support the National Association of Scholars, nas.org, whose mission is restoring reasoned discourse in academia for a civil society. It too calls for Pres Gay to resign.
Here’s the link to Rufo’s allegations of plagiarism if anyone else is curious: https://open.substack.com/pub/rufo/p/is-claudine-gay-a-plagiarist
I would love to see these academics author an essay that was NOT about gender and/or race.
I would love to see one author an essay ONLY about gender and race because, by the fundamental laws of Postmodernism, one would have to be the oppressor.
Wouldn’t that be painful to read?
I recall a certain black "classicist" whose mission was to destroy the classics. He spent (or spends) his time counting how many blacks are published in journals focused on the classics, rather than just doing the scholarly writing himself. That said, I wonder how many of these "diversity hires" in academia write and "research" anything other than race? Even more egregious is the blatant ingratitude for getting to the top without doing the work. The recently departed, short-lived black president of a NY university claimed on the school's homepage something to the effect that 'only recently has he and his brethren been seen as human." Never mind the degrees from Princeton and NYU or wherever Ivy else. And, while firing useful administrators to save money during the pandemic, he hired his best (black) friend to run the DEI department at a salary more than two times what I earn teaching far too many sections to merely get by.
Dan-el Pedilla Peralta, no? Amazing story, in which a non-tenured independent scholar, Mary Williams, was blacklisted from the annual conference for suggesting that Padilla Peralta may have got his position because he was black, but she hoped not. In an interview, Pedilla Peralta boasted about his blackness being a qualification.
I made a video about it long ago, called "The Unbearable Pettiness of Academic Race and Gender Politics." https://odysee.com/@StudioBruleArchive:e/the-unbearable-pettiness-of-academic:9
Much of "academia" is now empty suits (and heads) what is fun is to watch a black woman pushed at her her own behest to stand in the line of fire. KJP is one example, Gay another. They will be taken out as we know, white liberals hate blacks anyway. The agenda is far greater than promoting blackness, but the black leaders think they can ride the tiger.
Add into the mix based black scholars who are booted:
https://glennloury.substack.com/p/the-truth-about-roland-fryer
Wikipedia spins his complaint as one of racial injustice while omitting his less than kosher ideas: "Fryer alleged that he was "unfairly scrutinized ... for his skin color."
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/10/business/economy/roland-fryer-harvard.html
yes, and.........no. He was targeted for being black AND not going along with the narrative, under a veil of sexual inpropriety. https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/fryer/files/affirmative_action_and_its_mythology.pdf
In 2024 everyone is going to be accused of rape.
I happened to watch a question session that included the interchange with Mz Gay. There appeared to be three other "Presidents" being questioned. Not familiar with the management structures of US Universities I assume these are very senior people. The first thing that struck me was all four were women, in our era of "Diversity" this did raise suspicions that they may be diversity hires, they may not of course but your article suggest one certainly is. The second was the rather inept responses and answers which simply looked like evasion and obfuscation.
Your criticism is right on target, as always. Brava!
So many like her are in positions of authority yet display no authority. Cressida Dick in the UK was Head of the Met Police i London when she should never have got that far.
She should never have gotten past her role in murdering Jean Charles de Menezes.
Female cops are more likely to shoot, as they "have to" to physically control situations
Agreed.
https://alphaandomegacloud.wordpress.com/2021/03/28/cressida-dick/
Liz Truss was another example of someone incapable of tackling the job she was handed. She at least had the good sense to resign after a month or so.
True and as an accountant she was never broad enough but then we got the 'Hi risk anus' instead.
https://alphaandomegacloud.wordpress.com/2022/11/09/rishi-sunak-memes/
https://alphaandomegacloud.wordpress.com/2022/08/25/a-new-pm-for-uk-conservative-party-candidates-rishi-sunak-and-liz-truss/
That's quite an ingenious anagram.
True, but not difficult with the computer anagram programme. Having said that as his name is so short it is fairly easy to do longhand pencil and paper.
It took me a minute. ‘Hi risk anus’?
Excellent. Gay is a diversity hire, par excellence, obv. I once seriously considered attending the Harvard MBA program in the early 1990s (I had the grades), I am really pleased I chose to do other things, that added more genuine value to my skill set and career. As you point out Janice, the main issue with Gay's flameout in this fiasco is largely self-inflicted. You can't very well police on-campus speech that goes one way, then change course, otherwise your hypocrisy is laid bare.
Its not about hypocrisy, per se, although that is part of it; it is about flexing the arbitrary exercise of power.
agree. Also, take a look at the John Ivison article in the National Post, makes some good points.
Fundamentally, Claudine Gay's testimony underscored the looming and persisting insanity of Franz Fanon's twisted view of the universe. Many people in the academic community view "diversity, equity, and inclusion" (DEI), which Dean Claudine Gay has strongly committed to throughout her tenure at Harvard, as a necessary first step toward building a more equitable and representative institution. Supporters view this emphasis on DEI initiatives as being consistent with Harvard's position as a progressive leader in higher education and societal reform.
However, there are voices of concern regarding the potential impact of these initiatives on free speech. Critics point to Harvard's lowered ranking by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression as evidence that the university's climate might be growing less conducive to free and open discourse—a cornerstone of academic freedom.
In response to such criticism, Dean Gay has maintained that her approach to DEI does not infringe upon free speech but rather supports it, even when the ideas expressed are provocative or controversial. In order to prevent those who have traditionally held power from silencing marginalized voices, DEI proponents contend that this balance is necessary. From this angle, it is morally necessary to create spaces where historically oppressed groups can advocate for change without feeling overpowered by dominant narratives.
Concurrently, a substantial number of Harvard faculty members have expressed support for Dean Gay, emphasizing their belief that her leadership embodies Harvard's commitment to academic freedom. They suggest that her policies are a bulwark against political pressures that could undermine the university's scholarly objectives. Nonetheless, some skeptics interpret this support as a means to safeguard personal privileges within the academic structure.
Amidst this complex interplay of opinions, there is an acknowledgement that higher education is facing scrutiny over its adherence to particular world views. Some contend that academic rigour is compromised when ideological positions take precedence over critical inquiry and debate. The suggestion is that resorting to ideological thinking can lead to an oversimplified view of complex issues, where nuanced analysis is replaced by catchphrases and assertive posturing—a departure from the deep thinking traditionally expected in academia.
Bill Ackman, a prominent hedge fund manager, realizes that faculty members who take solid stances on DEI or resist institutional changes may indeed find themselves in the spotlight, much like Ackman does in the financial world. Although it may be dismissed as "neo-liberal encroachment," a reckoning is coming.
Academics who support or oppose particular ideologies or policies might face difficulties akin to those public figures like Ackman have:
1. **Public Scrutiny:** A wide audience can analyze academic leaders' decisions, especially in today's digital age where information spreads quickly, just as the media and the general public closely follow and critique Ackman's investment decisions and comments.
2. Pressure from Stakeholders: Ackman deals with investors, regulators, and the companies he invests in. Similarly, academics must navigate the expectations and demands of students, faculty peers, university administration, and external entities that may include government bodies and the general public.
3. Reputational Risk: As Ackman's reputation can influence his business success, an academic's reputation can affect their career, their standing within the university, and their influence. DEI-based research and careers are going to find themselves under more scrutiny.
In the short period I served on my alma mater's board, I was struck by the aggressive fundraising tactics that seemed primarily focused on extracting substantial donations. This emphasis on financial contributions was quite disheartening. Moreover, it was peculiar to encounter female alumni, who themselves held prominent positions in surgery and healthcare and had significant familial networks that advanced them in this career path, approaching me with the insinuation that my professional success depended on gender. The environment was indeed strange, and it seemed unprepared for the kind of transparency and accountability one would expect in such a setting. I resigned early and ended up spending more time on other useful things. Nevertheless, I suspect Claudine Gay's performance is an indication that it is coming.
Thanks for this--very astute.
Those female surgeons are financially successful and respected in ther field. But they are still oppressed. Because women. Because black, perhaps. Only a misogynist or a racist would formulate such, and so, like the black woke racists, the feminists are themselves misogynist, and they are all projecting their own biases. They and no one else think women or blacks to be lesser, based on sex or race.
When you see the feminists and woke blacks lamenting immutable characteristics you can only conclude that many resent not having male anatomy or white skin, and no amount of money or power will assuage that. Yet they surgically alter their bodies, or wear the wigs of Malaysian hair. They are literal skin walkers. Their jealousy is not political but literally visceral. they want to inhabit the masters house, not dismantle it; they want to be white men and are mad at God that they were denied the ability to "occupy" the very bodies of the object of their jealous desire.
I think much of feminism and wokeism is based on the simple infantile impulse of "I want what you have", "I want to take your stuff", and, of course, only the _good_ stuff. Hence, women want the prestigious, well-paid positions that men have traditionally held, without regard for whether they are qualified. If they have the power do to so, they will grab the "stuff". Much like a child bully would. The principle is even more obvious in Hollywood: non-white and/or female directors and actors have all the freedom to create their own, new characters or even universes. What they do, however, is literally "take the stuff" of traditional culture and race- and gender-swap characters, while re-interpreting everything from Disney classics to superhero movies according to a woke worldview. This fight of theirs is not about equal standing and acknowledgement of different sexes, races, cultures and viewpoints, it's about taking away the other kids' toys and destroying them.
I agree with the inverse plagiarism of traditionally male dominated fields, in particular cinema and the movie industry. There is a recurring trend that even the average non movie buff viewer has noticed, and that is that live action reboots and remakes of Disney stories and other cartoons primarily orientated towards children have become standard fare for Hollywood directors who should mostly be catering to adults. I cannot understand for the life of me why anyone over the age of 10 would want to watch a Disney remake or Barbie film, unless they have children, which a lot of childless wokeists do not have. Peter Pan syndrome is rampant. Only last year I was reading a book (I forget the name but it was written by a rather prominent conservative commentator) on how adults have become increasingly prone to behaving as children (in terms of vocabulary, mannerisms, interests) and how conversely, children have become prematurely exposed to adult matter (sex, money, glamour). Everywhere I look today I see all kinds of testaments to his observations which date back to the 70s. Also meaty dialogue and thematic content of a pround nature which was once a standard of any decent movie, has been completely discarded (unless its woke and worded in the profanity addled, filler word peppered patois of your everyday teen). The bastardization of the human attention span, largely the result of social media, has resulted in movie scenes being very brief and rapid in nature, since apparently directors take general public to possess the mindsets of hyperactive children who have had too much candy after dinner. Just the other day I was watching a movie with my dad, when he pointed out how action in today's films is compressed compared to the action in films from his time, which burned slowly and made the suspense more delicious. Watching thriller flicks from the 60s/70s you feel you're watching something more cerebral than any of the ostensibly didactive "socially enlightening" movies aimed at grown men and women. In the words of Shakespeare: their Oscar honorifics "hangs loose about him, like a giant's robe upon a dwarfish thief".
What an interesting observation. Was it Diana West's book you were reading? The Death of the Grownup?
One obvious thing I've noticed that parallels your observations is how in the 1950s, even quite young men and women looked and presented themselves (in the way they dressed and spoke and held their bodies) as mature adults; now there is someone like Tom Cruz, who must be around 60 years old, still trying to look and act like a boy.
The woke like to blur the line between child and adult. It may not be conscious but they are doing it.
Add in the low level but ubiquitous characteristic of the woke; they have stunted emotional maturity. I credit single parent homes with this. People who otherwise can do a spread sheet, write a PhD thesis, etc. are unable to comport themselves like adults when under pressure. Look for it. Once you see it it is everywhere.
Thank you Janice for your reply, it means a lot. Regarding the book in question, I can tell you that it most definitely was written by a man, although I will certainly check out the book you mentioned. One clue that may lead to the identity of its author lays in the fact that I first heard of him through another book of his that criticized the matrix of technology and the media, and had gained quite a following amongst Reddit users. I will try again sometime to figure it out; it was a very informative and comprehensive book without being too long and garrulous. You are right about people no longer acting their age; I see so many girls barely out of their preteen years wearing heavy makeup and dressing in cheap ways that would once have had them branded girls of loose morals aka hookers. The horribly garish trend of claw like false nails and false eyelashes popularized by the ghetto communities don't help either. I was shocked to find out that Tom Cruise is 61, you would think he never grew out of the roles he had in the 80s!
There's an undercurrent of simple laziness here with Gay as exemplar
Of all the insane wokies, I think Fanon is the worst, and thats saying alot. One has to contend with the racism of Marx, towards blacks and his own people no less. Fanons homophobia, a dark mirror image of the lesbian feminist's "political lesbianism" idea, shares in common with it the idea that sexuality is a social constuction, he asserting that it is a pathology, the feminists asserting that it is "liberating".
Harvard (and many other schools like it) went wonky centuries ago, not recently. The very concept of a university (harking back to the Middle Ages) stems from the truth that, in Christ (and in Him alone) there is *true* unity in diversity (not the fake kind so-called universities yammer about nowadays). Since the God-man is the creator and sustainer of everything (John 1:3, Heb 1:2-3), any study of anything must acknowledge cohesion in Him to make any ultimate sense.
As such, I find it ironic that Harvard is stuck with its logo of an open book (the Bible) and the motto, Veritas. (See John 14:6.) One day, folks on every side of this latest Titanic deck-chairs pagan kerfuffle will have to answer to He Who Is Truth as to why they thought they could come up with their own.