Over 1,000 U.S. Profs Sign the “Stanford Academic Freedom Declaration”
“Freedom is a culture, not merely a set of rules, and a culture must be nurtured.”
Higher education needs more of this, not less.
The College Fix reports:
More than 1,000 professors sign on to ‘Stanford Academic Freedom Declaration’
More than 1,000 professors across the country have signed the “Stanford Academic Freedom Declaration” that calls on universities to restore free speech, academic freedom and institutional neutrality.
The open letter calls on universities and professors to adopt and implement the “Chicago Trifecta” — the Chicago Principles on unilateral free speech, the Kalven report that requires institutional neutrality on political and social topics, and the Shils report, making “academic contribution the sole basis for hiring and promotion.”
As of Thursday the letter had 1,095 signatures, and it increases daily.
“The larger hope is to bring back academic freedom on campus and in the academic enterprise more generally,” Stanford economist and co-author John Cochrane said in an email to The College Fix. “Only with robust academic freedom, the ability to investigate ideas and bring out uncomfortable facts, does scholarship bring about new and reliable knowledge, especially on crucial issues to our society.”
The loss of academic freedom, the letter states, is tied to a leadership crisis.
Many university leaders want to uphold free speech yet “punish those who express views deemed to be incorrect and enforce ideological conformity in hiring and promotions,” it states.
Underscoring the problem is the fact that purse strings — funding resources — are tied to following the accepted narrative instead of a free exchange of ideas, Cochrane said.
“[A]cademic freedom, free speech, and the pursuit of scholarly excellence are under siege at universities, in professional societies, and in government agencies, including those that give grants,” Cochrane said. “Simple facts cannot be spoken out loud. Research that comes to conclusions that counter political narratives can’t be conducted, published, or popularized.”
The declaration signers call on their universities to implement the “Chicago Trifecta” to help resolve that problem: “Freedom is a culture, not merely a set of rules, and a culture must be nurtured.”
Professor Jacobson is one of the signatories.
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Comments
The universities cave because 1) the admins are now all lefties, and 2) the left considers screaming/cancelling and censoring to be the most useful alternatives to logical debate/conversation.
I saw this at my schools, starting with “political correctness” and now peaking with mandatory pronoun rules, politically and philosophically closed departments and faculty, approved racism in the form of CRT and preferred acceptance of “the correct” racial makeup (real or “identified), rampant transgenderism (the bigger part of the pronoun problem) and outright and enabled infantilism in the student body, and to some degree (although increasing) the faculty.
The Chinese wouldn’t send their kids/spies here if it wasn’t worth it. Watch them, and when the number of Chinese students drop, the colleges will effectively be dead, turned into nurseries for adult children rather than a place for minds to mature.
If I had to do it today, I would select a trade rather than a Ph.D.
The question that people are avoiding is to what extent has CCP funding become indispensable to particular colleges or departments?
The problem named “academic freedom” is so multi-factorial I’m reminded of the Hydra. The causes are more numerous than the number of signatories to the letter and have been allowed to invade/infest the campus without restraint (that I personally have been aware of) since at least ’60.
They don’t want to get along with you. It really is as simple as that.
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If a man from mars landed in America and took a look around, he’d see it.
They. Do. Not. Want. To. Get. Along. With. You.
It is their intent to fundamentally transform America, eliminate “racist” “whiteness” ideas of fair play and patriotism — and they intend to make you pay for it.
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This statement about academic freedom , and its signatures, means nothing to those administering the American education system.
If these signatories really want what they say they want, then they’re going to have to pool their resources, leave the United States, and find a country somewhere that will welcome a small “AmericaTown” where they can resume their life-goal of academic excellence.
A visitor from mars would be able to see this.
Sadly, this used to be that place.
Maybe we just need a renaissance of Hillsdale Colleges as “historically conservative universities.”
Unfortunately , non-woke colleges — if they grow in popularity or influence — will surely be decertified.
Just like , for example, what they’ve done to non-woke soldiers, sailors, and marines. And their officers.
Just like what they’ve done to non-woke doctors.
And so , unfortunately, they will make non-woke college’s degrees insufficient for admission to law schools etc. And they’ll make a non-woke degree inadequate for state licensure — e.g., nursing, teaching, etc.
It’s hard to accept that there is no longer equality under the law. But even if there is equality under the written laws … once they appoint most-all the judges, effectively it doesn’t matter what the law says. (
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They do not want to get along with you.
They don’t intend to get along with you.
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If a country somewhere had the vision to recruit really talented academics and engineers from the U..S. the results could be breath-taking. Not to mention lucrative.