Q&A: Ethics and Academia
Ethics and Academia
Question
Good evening!
How is it possible that the most highly regarded academies in the world did not condemn the massacre at all, not even on Simchat Torah itself? And beyond that, they are not supporting their Jewish students there at all. Political bodies, fine, maybe that can be understood, but ostensibly these universities are supposed to be the ethical beacon—doesn’t this indicate the bankruptcy of the West?
Answer
Why did you decide that they are the ethical beacon?
Discussion on Answer
First, I don’t think this is a function of more or less thinking. On the contrary, sometimes overthinking leads to error. There’s that well-known saying that there are stupidities so enormous that only intellectuals can believe them. That’s not a joke. From people on the street you hear nonsense and mistakes right and left, but colossal errors are found mainly among intellectuals.
Second, there are sectors of academia that are not engaged in thinking but in advancing an agenda. This is mainly in fields that also don’t require all that much thinking, such as gender studies, international relations, and the rest of the various nonsense fields (much of the humanities and social sciences). I think most of the nonsense you hear comes from there (though of course not only from there).
Third, one should remember that academia is a cosmopolitan world that comes into contact with the rest of the world more strongly than other people and groups do. There is something in cosmopolitanism that rejects nationalism and chauvinism. And more broadly, the distorted postmodern idea goes against anyone who claims any kind of right at someone else’s expense. Whoever suffers is right. There are no weak people, only weakened people. For some reason this stupid idea has gained a very strong foothold in academia.
Fourth, there is a lot of fake information, and when you are exposed to information that presents Israel as a great, strong, cruel occupier—and it is quite easy to present it that way—you immediately line up on the side of the weak. Especially against the background of post-colonial guilt.
And behind it all there is blatant antisemitism, of course, though it is true that this was not supposed to show up דווקא in academia.
But it seems to me that the one-sided picture sometimes presented to us is also fake. Academia is not entirely against us either. True, there are vicious demonstrations there and blatant biases against Israel, but we focus on them when there are also many other phenomena. It is infuriating and outrageous, so people focus on it, but that is really not the whole picture, certainly not these days after Hamas’s mega-terror attack.
One should remember that not every expression of support for Palestinians is support for terrorism. These days anyone who says “free Palestine” is perceived as supporting terrorism, and a witch hunt is being conducted against “traitors” and “antisemites,” both in Israel and around the world. There’s no need to exaggerate in the other direction either.
Sorry for butting in.
In any case, what might it indicate?
You could almost say that “academia” in the world is antisemitic to an unusual degree. I would דווקא have expected the bias toward the underdog to affect thinking people less (well… not everyone in academia thinks, but still, less than taco sellers?)