I guess that Harvard probably does not need the Feds as much as the Feds need Harvard but I'm glad they are standing up to the Fascists. I'm going to have to see what NYU is doing now.
I assume Harvard has a plan for dealing with this dynamic. They have some extremely smart people there, so I don't doubt they've found a way.
Lawyers? Doctors? Medical research? Thousands of highly educated graduates annually? 161 Nobel prize winners?
This is compared to a direct payment to sustain operations which the government is saying they may not be in favor of. But its not like Harvard would say ”it may not be in our interest to produce successful people anymore.”
The American university system is undeniably impactful on American success over the last century. It would be tough to put any sort of exact number on it, but we can absolutely say "a shitload".
Merit based reforms would only help. What kind of DEI programs did Harvard have 100 years ago?
I look forward to some.
This ain't it.
Amongst others, legacy admissions and discrimination against Jews, Catholics and non-whites. Let’s not pretend that Harvard’s admissions process, or American society more generally, was some kind of perfect meritocracy in 1925.
Medical research depends heavily on faculty and postgraduate folks.
Only some of their thousands of annual graduates are undergrads - about 1/3 of them, per Wiki.
Include postgraduate folks and they're still doing a lot more than just teaching and credentialing. Places like Harvard output research, too.
I don't think the GOP & Trump thinks they need anything from Harvard other than agreeing to impose first amendment violations on others on behalf of the GOP and Trump.
Today I learned that demanding an end to racial discrimination makes you a fascist. I swear this word becomes more meaningless by the day.
Is the government asking a university to shift their bias away from skin color diversity to viewpoint diversity fascist?
Is there a historical parallel?
Or is it just the fact that the government is asking for reform, and any reform request would be considered fascist? If so, do you also consider the DEI reform requests fascist?
> the University shall commission an external party, which shall satisfy the federal government as to its competence and good faith, to audit the student body, faculty, staff, and leadership for viewpoint diversity, such that each department, field, or teaching unit must be individually viewpoint diverse.
Do you feel this is ok for the government to demand of an educational institution? This isn't about specific political ideologies. If the Biden administration had threatened to withhold funding from a university because, for example, their hiring policies weren't left-leaning enough or something, it would be equally outrageous.
Let me start by saying that I am not American and I am not your enemy. Also, I am genuinely trying to understand the truth about these matters, with an open mind to the possibility that it's messy and complicated and I might not be capable of understanding it. I hope that provides context for what follows.
Honestly, I am not sure if it's okay. It reminds me of the anti-racist movement, in that the action almost feels like it's anti-fascist. It's using a fascist action (use of state power to enforce conformity), to undo a fascist policy (suppression of political opposition and dissent). This reminds me of anti-racism, which uses one type of racism to compensate for a different type of past-racism.
What I find interesting is the very last statement in your post. I am not aware of anything Biden did, but it does seem like Obama did something very similar with the DEI policies forced on universities which came with funding implications for non-compliance. It was a different time, everyone was upset about the great financial crisis of 2008, and on their surface I am sure these policies sounded like a good thing. In the end though these policies were very much a form of facism in that it was a state sponsored effort to suppress political opposition. This probably sounds like I am defending the political views of racists, but really I am defending the political views of people who believe leadership roles should be filled based on the merit of the individual and their ability to take care of those in their charge, and not based on the color of their skin, their gender or sexual preferences.
As I have tried to unpack all this, the perspective that is growing for me is that for the last 20 or so years both administrations have been taking steps towards fascism while hiding their fascist actions behind intentions that sound anti-fascist. If this perspective is even partially correct, it would explain why so much of this has been so confusing for me.
This isn't quite 1930's Germany yet, but it's getting there. The next step to watch for would be any laws passed that regulate who can serve as faculty in universities or attempts to impose different leadership on universities that don't comply with demands.
Also I find the mask-ban strange and alarming. That example alone was probably enough of a red flag for me to more carefully scrutinize the good-faith of the rest of the letter.
Thank you for taking the time to actually engage with me constructively. Unfortunately many others decided to just downvote my questions.
I find it so disappointing that on a forum like Hacker News I am being downvoted for asking a question in good faith in an attempt to better understand a complex and nuanced topic.
When I ask ChatGPT to explain Facism to me, two aspects it pointed out were: - Suppression of political opposition, dissent, and individual freedoms. - Use of state power to enforce conformity.
I can see how the letter from the government to Harvard would be considered use of state power to enforce conformity. As someone who is open minded trying to understand the truth, the letter on first pass reads like they are using state power to unwind enforced ideological conformity. This is confusing, because on its surface it seems anti-fascist, so when people label it fascist (with charged emotions), it's hard for me to take them at their word without further explanation.
When the people who are concerned about the current actions of the government attack me for asking questions in an effort to actually understand their concerns rather than just accepting them, it makes me more suspicious of their viewpoints, not less.
Also, ChatGPT's thorough explanation of Fascism indicated to me that both administrations have been showing signs of increasing fascism, almost complimenting each other in their policies as they rock the cultural and institutional trunk of the united states back and forth with ever increasing momentum until it tips over into catastrophe. If such is the case, then maybe the only hope is for people to engage in these thorny issues with curiosity and nuance, to carefully sift out the bad from the good instead of assuming that everything the other side is doing is evil.
I have no control over what other people do, all I have control over is my own actions. I don't see a good way out of this mess that doesn't involve curiosity, empathy, understanding and reconciliation. So I will continue engage in the conversation with these intentions, and if people attack me for that then I suppose to will just have to accept what's inevitable.
Most governments recognize that large protests can influence public opinion against them. If you let such a protest occur and do nothing to satisfy the demands of the protesters, then things can get ugly quick. Freedom of speech and association are powerful things! There's not much an open, democratic government can do except respond to protests by addressing the underlying issues or crush the protest and hope that the public decides the protesters were wrong. What the Trump administration is trying to do here is reduce their risk by infringing on freedom of speech and association. It's fascist or totalitarian. Take your pick.
As for their claims that they're trying to "unwind enforced ideological conformity"... You can't do that by enforcing conformity to a different ideology, as they are attempting here. This is a case where you should pay less attention to words and more to actions.