Few colleges and universities seem able to operate without at
least one Vice President for Diversity and Equity whose
responsibility is to ensure diversification in every facet of
college life save opinions. Not only are conservative and Christian
religious beliefs exempted, they are often targets of disdain in
the intellectual equivalent of open season. This began to change
when social work major Emily Brooker sued Missouri State University
after she was pressed before an ethics committee accused of
violating “diversity standards.”
Her offense: Ms. Brooker had declined to participate in a
classroom writing assignment asking legislators to support the
right of gay couples to be foster parents. During her hearing
before the ethics panel Ms. Brooker was asked: “Do you think gays
and lesbians are sinners? Do you think I am a sinner?”
Missouri State University is located in Springfield, Missouri,
the proverbial buckle of the Bible Belt. As headquarters of the
Assemblies of God Church, one would expect the local campus to be
overwhelmingly pro-Christian. But even here there is disdain for
evangelical beliefs.
Indeed, the feeling is widespread. A San Francisco-based
Institute for Jewish and Community Research survey found that 53
percent of its sample of 1,200 college and university faculty
members said they have “unfavorable” feelings toward evangelical
Christians. The institute had been gauging for anti-Semitic
attitudes among faculty; instead, it found pro-Jewish sentiment and
anti-evangelical attitudes. Mormons also came in for negative
sentiments. And this number reflects only the professors willing to
reveal their prejudice to pollsters — professors who routinely
denounce stereotyping, prejudice and hypocrisy — so presumably the
real figure could be much higher. The institute’s director and
chief pollster Gary A. Tobin told the Washington Post, “There is no
question this is revealing bias and prejudice.”
Much to the university’s chagrin, Tobin went on to add: “If a
majority of faculty said they did not feel warmly about Muslims or
Jews or Latinos or African Americans, there would be an outcry. No
one would attempt to justify or explain those feelings. No one
would say, ‘The reason they feel this way is because they don’t
like the politics of blacks or the politics of Jews.’ That would be
unthinkable.”
An independent report, undertaken as part of the settlement of
Brooker’s lawsuit, found many social work majors fearful of
expressing views that differed from their professors, especially on
spiritual and religious matters. In fact “bullying” was used by
both students and faculty to characterize specific faculty. It
appears that faculty have no history of intellectual
discussion/debate. Rather, differing opinions are taken personally
and often result in inappropriate discourse.
Investigators concluded their report with a recommendation to
temporarily shut down the School of Social Work, rid the school of
“toxic faculty” and hire new staff.
But don’t expect the professoriate to accept the report’s
conclusion. Instead, many academics justified the evidence of bias
as a form of “political and cultural resistance,” which is what
southern rednecks would have called lynching had they gone in for
euphemism.
THIS PERSISTENT BIAS HAS led to a campaign organized by conservative activist David
Horowitz to promote intellectual diversity on campuses. The
Missouri House is the first body to pass such legislation.
Missouri’s “Emily Brooker Intellectual Diversity Act” mandates
requirements for balance in the curriculum and respect for
intellectual diversity, in hiring, and in public speeches on the
campus — coupled with reporting requirements. Momentum is
building. An Arizona Senate Bill would forbid school district
employees from advocating “one side of a social, political, or
cultural issue that is a matter of partisan controversy,” or face a
fine of up to $500. Some academics — particularly science faculty
— worry that if they do not give equal time to creationism or
intelligent design, they could face disciplinary action or
worse.
Certainly one is tempted to say, what comes around goes around.
If academics hadn’t been so blatantly biased against Christians in
the first place the issue never would have arisen. And if
universities had allowed a multiplicity of viewpoints — left and
right — to battle it out in the marketplace of ideas, the faculty
at MSU School of Social Work would still have their cushy teaching
posts. Apparently religious intolerance cometh before a fall.
Most of us, I suspect, have been there before. In college, I was
sometimes reluctant to express my true opinions — libertarian or
conservative — for fear of offending my ultraliberal professor who
might then lower his or her opinion of me as well as my grade. Had
there been conservative professors, I’m sure my liberal classmates
would have felt the same, but of course there weren’t any. When I
would ask my right-wing elders why there were no conservative
professors, inevitably I would be told, “Those who can, do. Those
who can’t, teach,” or words to that effect. According to Horowitz,
the real reason is far more sinister: liberal academics have
conspired to keep conservatives and conservative voices out of the
academy through discriminatory hiring practices.
Horowitz et al. are right to draw attention to the one-party
system present on many of our campuses, but there is reason for
optimism. Indeed, as universities and colleges increasingly operate
like bottom-line oriented big businesses and less like elite
pedagogic institutions with a mandate to develop the best young
minds (in my opinion a far more serious problem confronting
colleges) free market policies will inevitably come into play and a
lot of liberal professors will find themselves back in the homeless
shelters where they belong. I am all for the establishment taking
back the universities, but don’t let’s do it by creating more laws
and giving more power and money to college administrators and
bureaucrats. That solution will only create more problems.
Christopher Orlet writes the Existential Journalist blog.
