But in determining the process for vetting the finalists, a couple of tenacious notions encroached upon our proceedings: angst over any semblance of an exclusionary or elitist process and a quest for so-called enfranchisement. In the past, an unspecified practice of “self-selection,” as senior colleagues used to put it to me, was thought to be sufficient for assuring that the appropriate professionals were involved in the hiring process. But this time, a non-tenure-track faculty member with friends of all ranks was one of the candidates for the position, and the department’s non-tenure-track faculty—which in recent years had grown steadily in size—wished to self-select into the hiring process.

At that point, a general antipathy toward hierarchical structure made it practically impossible for otherwise rational colleagues of all ranks to acknowledge differences in professional roles and responsibilities among the various types of faculty members. As a result, the conversation was dominated by a demand for equal “rights”—not about better pay and benefits for poorly compensated adjuncts, but about professional, institutional decision-making power.

(source: Who Gets a Vote in Departmental Decisions? – Advice – The Chronicle of Higher Education)

when all things are carried by a democracy, although it be just and moderate, its very equality is a culpable levelling, since it allows no gradations of dignity

(source: The Political Works of Marcus Tullius Cicero, vol. 1 (Treatise on the Commonwealth) – Online Library of Liberty)

This Chronicle column is fascinating because, although I radically disagree with some of her presuppositions and conclusions, it seems obvious that we should all be able to come to a more sensible decision about where to draw the lines–and how far to imagine ourselves deterministic puppets in the hands of the nominally powerful:

There was more, but my eye was struck by the word “survivor,” which was repeated several times. Wouldn’t the proper term be “accuser”? How can someone be referred to as a survivor before a finding on the accusation—assuming we don’t want to predetermine the guilt of the accused, that is. At the risk of sounding like some bow-tied neocon columnist, this is also a horrifying perversion of the language by people who should know better. Are you seriously telling me, I wanted to ask the Title IX Committee, that the same term now encompasses both someone allegedly groped by a professor and my great-aunt, who lived through the Nazi death camps? I emailed an inquiry to this effect to the university’s general counsel, one of the email’s signatories, but got no reply.

For the record, I strongly believe that bona fide harassers should be chemically castrated, stripped of their property, and hung up by their thumbs in the nearest public square. Let no one think I’m soft on harassment. But I also believe that the myths and fantasies about power perpetuated in these new codes are leaving our students disabled when it comes to the ordinary interpersonal tangles and erotic confusions that pretty much everyone has to deal with at some point in life, because that’s simply part of the human condition.

(source: Sexual Paranoia Strikes Academe – The Chronicle Review – The Chronicle of Higher Education)

Continue reading →

(source: Ian Carmichael – Telegraph)

(source: What Type of Conservative Is Jeb Bush? – The New Yorker)

It means nothing.  It made me laugh.

A man, not a character, is gone; but a man who gave us thoughtful entertainment–the silly with the serious–without becoming a buffoon or giving scandal.  A very human alien; a human who relieved our alienation, at least a little.

A funny man, too.

John Fund, on the passing of Leonard Nimoy:

Shortly after Star Trek: The Motion Picture premiered in 1979, I decided to go back to college, but the experience had changed my life. At one of the last conventions I did, Leonard Nimoy remarked to me on how he had observed my growth from the first time we had met: “You seem to enjoy turning plans into reality, and that is the essence of becoming an adult.”

His comment meant a lot to me, and he was right. I had been handed responsibility at a young age and succeeded with it. I was no longer shy, I had developed some self-confidence and social skills. I had learned to interact with adults and gained their respect.

And I had helped build support for the goal of reviving a series that had entertained and inspired millions and that didn’t deserve to die. Neither did Leonard Nimoy, a gracious and good man, but he accepted the inevitable. His final tweet last week was incredibly poignant:

A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory. LLAP

(source: Star Trek Loses Its Muse, Spock)

And Kevin Williamson, whose attraction to the character I definitely echo:

But there was something else to Spock, one that spoke to seven- or eight-year-old me (Star Trek was in syndication by that point) the way I am sure it did to many others. Half human and half Vulcan, the young Spock made a conscious decision to retreat from sentimental human entanglements into logic. When another character tries to get under his skin, he observes: “I have no ego to bruise.” In a chaotic and threatening world, to be able to set aside, even if imperfectly, the aspect of one’s self that is vulnerable to the chaos is an alluring prospect: There is no threat if there is nothing there to be threatened. Twenty years later, I’d discover that this was the juvenile (a word that in this context is not pejorative) version of Stoicism, which makes substantially the same promises as Spock’s kolinahr discipline (possibly the nerdiest clause I have ever written), offering the same state of resolute tranquility that is, for the more than half-human, equally elusive. It is science fiction — and it is camp — but there is something in that that leaves me still convinced that a more Spockian approach to life would be eminently desirable, that water becomes transparent only when it is clean and still.

(source: Live Long and Prosper)

And I certainly cannot possibly resist being one of the many who think of this video immediately:

Though in fact, “Amazing Grace” may not be the obvious choice– Continue reading →

Russ Saltzman has a good column for the season, and neither the lede nor this excerpt give you the full flavor.  You’ll just have to Read It Yourself.

Tell you what: As part of your Lenten discipline, pray for your least favorite public office holder. Just a couple times, perhaps, until you get the hang of it, then with more regularity. It may do him or her some good, but I think it might be of more benefit to the rest of us.

(source: Pity the Politician | Russell E. Saltzman | First Things)