Another thing I want to mention is that it’s perfectly okay for a faculty member to force us to stare at a BLM background on her zoom for hours but imagine somebody turning on a MAGA background. We’d never hear the end of the outraged squealing.
And that’s in spite of the fact that MAGA supporters aren’t torching buildings, looting stores, beating up passersby, and stabbing or shooting black people who don’t live up to their high standards. This is all being done strictly by the BLM crowd.
As much as I disagree with you about many things concerning Trump, MAGA, and BLM, I do agree that we need an ethos of nonpartisanship in academia. A MAGA Zoom background would cause petitions, HR investigations, and in the best case scenario would be resolved in a closed door meeting with the Dean. In the worst case, lawyers would get involved.
Displays of support for an elected official supported by a substantial fraction of the public should be met with something other than massive displays of weakness.
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The situation you are describing – with closed door meetings and lawyers involved – we are already in the midst of one. It was triggered by a professor criticizing Fauci as “having a long history of ineffectiveness and alarmism.” That’s all it took.
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Christ. In what sort of setting or context was the comment made?
I disagree with the comment but it has to be fair game for debate.
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We were discussing the possibility of the local schools reopening. Once the professor in question mentioned Fauci, he was accused of being alt-right because, apparently, there’s something on alt-right memes that was worded very similarly to what he said. So now he’s in a grievance process with a colleague who feels his safety is imperiled by having to work alongside an alt-right person.
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If you are called into one of these meeting you should speak Russian. When they ask you why, you should say that you are having flashbacks to the Soviet era.
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