This professor is raising important issues in his mad rant here....
Although he clearly think he is making fun his examples smack of elitism.
17 sept 07
What is Wrong with Quotas? Equality, Democracy, Bias, and Balance in American Society
By Jules R. Benjamin
Mr. Benjamin, PhD University of Pennsylvania, is a retired professor of history (Foreign Policy and International Relations). He is the author of A Student's Guide to History.
I was thinking the other day about the issue of academic freedom. Conservative scholars have discovered the secret control of liberal arts departments by, of all people, liberals. The remedy suggested is balance, achieved by ending the liberal bias of current hiring and tenure decisions. Who can oppose balance or support bias? It seems true that if the controlling liberals say, in a department of English or of Sociology, would eliminate the bias that has kept their departments lilly-left, they would take a significant step toward the multicultural institution they say they admire. Surely this is a reasonable request. (After all, this is such a thing as right-wing culture.)
Since it is true that bias clearly favors continued imbalance, the effort to achieve balance require a “surge” in the number of conservatives in, say, departments of anthropology. Due respect for the fossil evidence supporting intelligent design would remove a major roadblock to hiring someone with a dissertation on “Darwinism: The Problem from Hell,” or on “The Devil is the One and Only Other.”
Departments of Physics would greatly benefit by replacement of the terribly warped theory of space-time derived from the work of a mere clerk in the Swiss Patent Office. (And for this phlogiston was sacrificed!) Proponents of stringy theory deserve to be heard. (See: Pasta Studies “Is Nano Still Too Long?”) Despite the fact that everyone knows that Existentialism is a dead end, departments of Philosophy refuse to allow the kind of balance that would derive from new faculty in the “Life is Great” school. A rampant pessimism blocks their acceptance by hiding behind a disgusting relativism. (All of this is exposed in the latest issue of the Journal of Paradigm Studies, “It All Depends on How You Look at it.”)
Removing bias would draw many bright flat-earth natural scientists to departments of Geology. Plate Tectonics would finally face a serious challenge opening the way for the new Tsunami theory based on path breaking bathtub studies based on recent work by Archimedes. Moreover, under the new dispensation, courses in Environmentalism could be taught by characters from Dickens who would hold such prestigious appointments as the Dark, Satanic Mills Chair of Pollution Studies. Psychology departments would now be free to hire specialists in Intelligence, such as the author of the fine study “If You’re So Smart Why Isn’t Your IQ higher?” Opportunities to teach courses in Feminist/Queer studies would, finally, be open to talented jocks.
In the course of my research, I found it shocking to discover that a job candidate for a position in Economics was passed over wholly on the basis of negative responses to his dissertation: “Market Forces as a Cure for Community.” Nevertheless, a quick survey of hiring data made it clear that, in the discipline of Economics, liberal bias has taken a Philip’s curve. The data are quite clear, all of the Chairs in Entrepreneurialism are held by neo-classical economists! Can this be no more than coincidence? In fact, there is not a single holder of such a chair who is a Marxist. Talk about lack of balance!
To be fair, aspects of the lack of balance in the dismal science may be merely the result of communist conspiracy. It would appear that a powerful force behind the growth of faculty positions in schools of neo-classical economics is the not well hidden fact that the Chinese Communist Party has started to place job notices in the Wall St. Journal. To underscore the strength of this assault on balance, ads in the far left New York Times by the Cuban Communist Party have had little success. (Data based on a study by A. Rand, “Ideological Supply and Demand,” Hayek Press.)
While on the subject of conservative bias, surely there can be no objection to adding a healthy infusion of anarchists to departments of Government now woefully weighted on the side of republican (as well as Republican) theorists. The shocking under-representation of atheists in schools of theology clearly needs to be addressed. What other than bias can explain the complete absence of astrologers and alchemists from fields they dominated as recently as the sixteenth century? The data on Phrenologists only makes the case stronger. Nor could my research discover a single professor of mathematics whose work challenged the Pythagorean Theorem.
(These examples are taken from J. Swift, The Path to Ignorance, Psychlite Press.) Somewhat less surprising is the absence of witches or monsters teaching in departments of folklore. (A colleague involved in hiring in the field relates that monster’s vita do not make pleasant reading.)
Outside of the academy, signs of bias abound as well. Liberal bias is most shocking when one examines so-called “civil rights” organizations. A poll of the members of the ACLU found only three percent (3%) who opposed free speech. This in an organization that prides itself on support for minority opinion! Gay/Lesbian organizations apparently have a policy (stated or otherwise) that bars admittance to homophobes. Well known is the prejudice against short people in the NBA; or against non-skaters in the NHL. Other outrages of this kind are treated in: The Bias that Dare not Speak its Name (Simplicity Press).
Conservatives may have alerted us to this kind of problem but what evidence of balance can one find in right-wing organizations? You don’t have to be a conspiracy theorist to suspect that the NRA regularly turns down applications by pacifists. Is this justified? What of the obvious prejudice against people of color by the Klan? Do they expect us to buy their argument about sampling error?
As the obvious solution to bias is a policy of strict balance, what objection could there be to adding liberals to conservative bodies. The current absence of a Supreme Court Justice who clerked for Felix Frankfurter (or even William O. Douglas) should be addressed. Why has there never been, I ask, a militant Muslim on the Joint Chiefs of Staff? (If, in the 1950’s, we could have communists in the State Department, national security can surely survive a few mad bombers in, say, the Strategic Air Command.) The Heritage Foundation, cleverly stacked with covert pro-American types, should, in the name of balance, bring Noam Chomsky on board, perhaps to fill a new position in “American Self-Hatred Studies.”
The media should contribute its share to the jihad against imbalance. Fox News should hire John Stewart, who would (finally) bring a serious perspective to the news. As a result, there would be fewer slots for the pre-emptive pundits with their geopolitical game diagrams. (Such types could now be renditioned -- however extraordinary that might seem -- to a land where, in a variety of stressful positions, they would be made to listen to a tape loop of Albert Schweitzer playing Bach mixed with crowd sounds from Woodstock I.) Free download available from Masta Rasta at “Fire-Next-Time Studios.”
Some may argue that balance is oxymoronic in the following cases but it still strikes me as odd that I am the first to raise the question. For example, one can find no children on the board of the AARP; no one with diagnosed emphysema among the 8,461 scientists working for tobacco companies; or, to look at the other side for a moment, no executive of a tobacco company has ever led the American Lung Association.
Politics is a place where one might expect to find balance. However, our richly diverse electorate is not reflected in our governmental institutions. The House Democratic Caucus bars Republicans. (I suspect the Republicans have a similar unjustified policy.) In fact, the chairmanships of every committee in Congress are held by members of just one political party! The same is true, sadly, of the presidency. (Why the millions of voters who favor someone else for president allow this brazen assault on our revered two-party system, I cannot imagine. In a similar vein, what excuse can there be for the undeniable fact that no sitting Federal Court judge is a convicted felon? (See, “Longitudinal Survey of Federal Court System,” Association of Incarceration Graduates, Lock Down Press.)
As there are no class divisions in our society, you may be brought up short by a survey of billionaires (who represent only .05% of the U.S population), indicating that they occupy a whopping 82% of the homes in upscale gated communities. While some might say that diversity, in this instance, would contradict the whole purpose of such communities, I still find it scandalous that, after extensive research, I could not find a single homeless person living in one.
Another unaccountable instance of what would appear to be economic bias concerns the fact that racially segregated communities are overwhelmingly composed by people of color. Given the well known fact that spending quality time with white folks is uplifting, one is hard put to explain this strange choice of environment. Unless, of course, this is a case of self-selection. (See: “Resistant Aspects of the Ghetto Mindset,” Journal of Urban Renewal, Vol. 3, #3.)
The present administration (May Allah protect us!) is itself a source of imbalance. Ninety-four percent of arms contracts to only three firms; no Marines under 5’10” (which clearly would have prevented Napoleon from entering the Halls of Montezuma.); no illegal immigrants in (what is clearly misnamed) the “Justice” Department Why Alberto Gonzales failed to notice this one is beyond me. And while I am at it, what justification is there for denying jobs as air traffic controllers to the partially-sighted?
Opponents of torture, as far as I have been able to determine, make up only 14% of the thousands of employees at CIA. And what of this one for narrow mindedness: all “renditions” have been carried out by people wearing ski masks! Why no Batman masks; baseball caps; dew rags; or veils? As there is a policy of deeply embedded denial on this matter there are likely other, as yet undisclosed, “un-American” acts that have been hidden from voters. (This would be especially true for would-be voters advised that their polling station had been moved to Kazakhstan.)
Some of this data was provided by anonymous whistle-blowers peeking in the windows of the School of Stress Management where a bulletin board announced meetings of the “Light Footprint brigade;” Guantanamo vacation packages; the “How to avoid Habeus Corpus” advisory board and a meeting of the local Star Chamber Society.
By the way, there is no justification for confining the “people of book” to one holy text. Madrassa classes should include Torah readings; students in Schools of Divinity could be required to pray at least three (if not five) times a day.
One final balancing act should be mentioned. Here the subject is academic scholarship. Replace the vacuous debate over the existence of the Holocaust by a compromise between semitic and anti-semitic authors. In the name of balance, they might settle their differences by agreeing that three instead of six million Jews were killed. A similar bargain could be struck between materialists and people of faith by declaring that evolution is the cause of 50% of the nature of human beings while the other 50% is the work of god. Obviously, the nature vs. nurture debate could be resolved in the same manner.
It is amazing how many seemingly intractable problems can be resolved in this way.http://hnn.us/articles/42731.html
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After such madness you may well like to read something sane:
Iqbal Jassat: The Road Map to Nowhere - Book Review
Tanya Reinhart’s book is a significant contribution to understanding the wide gap between myth and reality. Its exposition is accurate, sharp and as urged by Chomsky, must be taken very seriously.
The Road Map to Nowhere: Israel/Palestine Since 2003 by Tanya Reinhart
In her book “The Road Map to Nowhere”, late Professor Tanya Reinhart recounts a poignant observation made by an Israeli philosopher almost 40 years ago.
Yeshayahu Leibovitz anticipated that in the occupied territories “Concentration camps would be erected by the Israeli rulers……….Israel would be a state that would not deserve to exist, and it will not be worthwhile to preserve it.”
Such bold critique is reflective of views shared by many Israelis who have regularly warned about the consequences of dehumanizing Palestinians who, under occupation, remain helpless victims of state terrorism.
Reinhart, a highly respected academic, author and political commentator – contributed insightful analysis as a regular columnist for the largest Israeli daily, Yediot Aharonot, produced this powerful and devastating book providing a scathing account of contemporary Israeli politics.
Her eloquence as a writer which earned her much respect from luminaries such as the late Edward Said and Noam Chomsky when her “Israel/Palestine: How to End the War of 1948” was published, remains a pleasant trait in “Road Map to Nowhere”.
That she was able to package vital analysis dealing with a crucial period from the spring of 2003 [the Road Map Era] to the winter of 2007 [the Palestinian Elections] within 200 pages, attests to her remarkable scholarship which, even with her passing, will remain an impeccable source of credible commentary.
Reinhart’s major source of information in constructing the history of this period has been the Israeli media. This does not mean it is more liberal and critical of state policies than other Western media. As she explains, with the notable exception of courageous and conscientious journalists like Amira Hass and Gideon Levy, the Israeli press is “as compliant as elsewhere, and it faithfully recycles military and governmental messages.”
An interesting detail which emerges in her examination of Mahmoud Abbas’ emergence as Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority is his relationship with Israeli leaders. In spite of his disavowal of “terror” and presenting his political vision as “moderate”, the demand posed by Israel as a condition for accepting the Road Map, was that he completes the “dismantling of terrorist organizations [Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front, the Democratic Front, Al-Aqsa Brigades and other apparatuses] and their infrastructure.”
This demand meant a confrontational showdown between Abu Mazen [Abbas] and Mohammed Dahlan on the one hand and Hamas, Jihad and the Al-Aqsa Brigades on the other. It also demanded that not only their military wings be dismantled, but their “infrastructure” – which according to Reinhart meant the political and social organizations that support them and provide welfare and education.
The political landscape in Gaza and the West Bank today, suggests that four years later, Abbas has finally surrendered to these demands. Dahlan’s failed coup and provocation of a civil war within Palestinian society alongside Abbas’ illegal wresting of power from Hamas and the equally tyrannical shut down of over a hundred NGO’s and other civil society formations attests to this.
Another uncomfortable fact for many in the Fatah hierarchy of Abu Mazen: Reinhart confirms that while “the political branches of the Fatah-led PA may have been just passive in the Palestinian struggle for freedom, some of its security forces have been active collaborators with the Israeli occupation, most notably the Preventive Security apparatus, headed by Mohammed Dahlan in the Gaza Strip and Jibril Rajoub in the West Bank.
“These forces, trained by the CIA, have worked during all years of the Oslo Agreements in tight collaboration with the Israeli security forces, including collaborations in assassinations of Hamas militants.”
Reinhart’s excellent treatise provides a keen understanding of patterns of political conduct on the part of Israeli leaders. While on the surface appearing to be complex, Israeli politics is in effect inconsistent with international laws and built on a platform of defiance. Yet in its vulnerability, commits excessive atrocities knowing that US support will render it immune from UN censure.
Her exposition of the apartheid wall’s real purpose is equally compelling. She devotes an entire chapter titled “A System of Prisons: the Plans Behind the West Bank Wall”. In this section she unpacks Ariel Sharon’s vision of Israeli control of the West Bank, which is shared by Ehud Olmert together with most of the political and military elite today. It is motivated by a preoccupation to retain as much of the occupied land as possible.
The solution to retaining a long-term method of control over the occupied people was to develop [under Sharon] a complex system of prisons wherein the Palestinians are pushed into locked and sealed enclaves, fully controlled by the Israeli army. Reinhart confesses that as far as she is aware “this imprisonment of a whole people is an unprecedented model of occupation – and it is being executed with frightening speed and efficiency”.
Unconvinced by Israeli propaganda that the wall is vital for security, she dismisses this argument and explains that it is no less than a massive project of land grab on Israel’s part. Ethnic cleansing is another aim. In response to her own question about the likely fate of Palestinians cut off from their land and livelihood and imprisoned in isolated enclaves, Reinhart spells out the answer: “With no means of subsistence, they will eventually be forced to leave the enclaves ………….In this way, sections of the West Bank that border Israel will be ‘cleansed’ of Palestinians”.
Tanya Reinhart’s book is a significant contribution to understanding the wide gap between myth and reality. Its exposition is accurate, sharp and as urged by Chomsky, must be taken very seriously.
Reinhart’s study becomes all the more imperative given the current hype being generated by the Bush administration regarding their so-called “peace conference” being planned for year-end. Since he is determined to claim some fictitious “victory” in the midst of humiliating reversals in Iraq, Bush’s desperation coupled with Abbas’ collaboration is likely to allow Israel to yet again point its middle finger at international conventions!
-Iqbal Jassat is a regular contributor to PalestineChronicle.com; he serves as the Chairman for the Media Review Network - www.mediareviewnet.com
soure: http://www.palestinechronicle.com/story-09120793606.htm
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