Yesterday, we had a meeting in support of the Physics program. The department Chair started off well by saying that a university without physics is a glorified community college.
Unfortunately, then he immediately proceeded to spoil the mood of solidarity and support by saying that there are many other departments that are less profitable than his and that should be eliminated first. The audience that consisted of Chairs of other departments experienced an immediate cooling of supportive feelings for physics.
“I have a list of the departments that I think should be eliminated right here,” the physicist ranted. “I can read it out if you want!”
Everybody sat there, feeling embarrassed and very lacking in solidarity.
On the positive side, the student newspaper came out with an excellent article covering the preceding meeting (yes, too many meetings, for sure) regarding the evisceration of physics. The last sentence of the article is now repeated by everybody on campus. We now greet each other with it.
The administration asked us not to talk about this to anybody outside the university, which is why I’m doing the exact opposite.
P.S. Since the publication of this post, the linked article was censored and the last sentence which was “Fuck the Chancellor” was removed.
Clarissa's Blog 
He was absolutely right. He should have read it: Gender studies, Africana, Sociology…
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Instead, he named Music, Theater and Dance, Art and Design.
I’d like to see a colleague with the balls the size of minor planets in the solar system who’d be able to mention aloud the list you gave.
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Thanks for giving the list. That is just sad and shows a complete lack of awareness. I was half expecting to see chemistry on it since based on your link they are forcing them to integrate into it (that must be every physicist nightmare).
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Chemistry and biology have tons of students, so they are safe from elimination.
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All the majors you mention are invaluable and great for inspiration and creativity. I also think that students with those degrees have good opportunities in the job market in America. Graduates in music, art and design are snapped up by employers in my country as soon as they graduate
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This is definitely not about employability and value of the degree. Our most successful program is Psychology that has 500+ majors yet fails to place them in jobs. I mean, seriously, who’d hire a psychology BA who is not allowed to do any clinical practice? What jobs can they do? But it’s a successful program because it hands out diplomas like candy to students who are barely literate. Of course, physics can’t compete because there’s no way to get anybody graduate from physics without having them do actual work and have actual brains.
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“Gender studies, Africana, Sociology…”
You don’t understand modern Neoliberalism. Older neoliberalism was all about saving money in terms of ‘rational’ expenditures (while ignoring how systems work).
Modern, leftist Neoliberalism is more like a multilevel marketing scheme where the whole point is to create more neoliberalism and departments like gender studies are the mine where new areas of cishetnormative patriarchy or white supremacy can be found so they can be used as justification for eliminating more jobs.
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The administration is saying openly – this isn’t about saving money. The goal is to get rid of people. There are too many people, we are being told openly and sincerely.
And I don’t only mean salaried people. Under this leadership, we went from 14,000 students to 12,000. As programs get eliminated, we’ll lose more.
It looks like the ideal world of these administrators is the one where they come to an empty campus, talk at each other about diversity, and write endless policy papers about it. No students, no professors. Empty hallways decorated with BLM signs.
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LOL, sometimes your humour is even darker than mine ;-D
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“ideal world of these administrators is … an empty campus, …No students, no professors. Empty hallways decorated with BLM signs.”
Why does so much of modernity have to look like a parody of dystopian sci fi?
I think human beings have learned too much and can no longer handle more overt knowledge and so now they’re unconsciously trying to destroy as much knowledge as possible so that it can be learned again and maybe when we get to this point next time humans will be able to handle it….
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\ There are too many people, we are being told openly and sincerely.
Too many people for what?
After listening to AI lectures, I’ve started fearing future in which general AI will eliminate entire professions, including for white-collar workers.
If people aren’t needed now, what’ll happen then?
In such situation, worrying about falling birth rates seems weird, unless one worries they aren’t falling fast enough.
Even for failed states wishing to use soldiers as pawns to be burned under open enemy fire, drones and other hi-tech weapons will soon make infantry troops irrelevant, like trying to outrun a car on a horse.
Sci-fi years ago worried about mass production of soldiers via cloning, artificial wombs, etc. Little did those writers know they were foolishly optimistic to think anyone would need people in the first place.
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The Chancellor simply says “too many people.” And his facial expression when he says these words drips contempt and repulsion. Somebody asked, “but what is the point of a university if not to bring people together?” Abd I swear, he looked so confused like he couldn’t even process the thought.
You are right in everything you say. Neoliberalism is deeply anti-human. I don’t know how else to warn people. We will pay for the exhilaration it offers us by getting ourselves out of existence.
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You’re right. They really loved them remote classes during Covid, I remember that.
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Did he read the list? I am really curious to know what was on it. Did he go after gender studies, humanities, or fellow science departments? Inquiring minds want to know.
I guess now we know what the Physics head would do if you were both chased by a hungry lion. His strategy would be to run faster so that the lion eats you first. The thought of working together to fight the lion would probably not occur to him. My advice is not to go safari hunting with this guy.
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Music, Theater and Dance, Art and Design.
These programs do cost a lot because they need studios, workshops, materials. So, of course, does physics with its costly labs. Once you start playing Hunger Games, you probably won’t win.
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I think Chemistry and Biology (especially if you need animal facilities) is probably more costly. Our Physics department is perennially angry about Chemistry startup packages. Integrating them into Chemistry adds another layer of humiliation to the plan to dissolve them. I bet chemists are not too excited about this plan either.
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Chemistry is livid because nobody even asked them whether they want to do it. It’s tons of extra work for the Chair and the secretary for no extra pay. People are mad but nobody cares.
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Your administration is inept even in their plan to eliminate the departments. They should have threatened to eliminate several science departments at the same time and then merge them into one “natural sciences” department that will administer the physics/chemistry (and perhaps even biology) programs. That way, you will not have a Chemistry department complaining about having to take Physics, since there will be no Chemistry anymore and whoever is in charge will do the work necessary because the alternative is to be let go. An added bonus is slimming down several departments at the same time.
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Random Reader
Hey, nobody has accused them of thinking ;-D
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“The last sentence of the article is now repeated by everybody on campus.”
I can’t access the article (thank you dumb EU regulations). Can anyone help with the last sentence (or the whole article)?
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Fuck the Chancellor is the famous last sentence.
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“uck the Chancellor is the famous last sentence”
I approve of this sentiment.
You gotta love student journalism. I had a great time (and some stress) on student newspapers back in the day. I miss them here…
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Now that the article was censored, I hope students are paying attention to who is assaulting their freedom of journalism and why.
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If that sentence was there at some point, they removed it now.
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Can you believe the blatant censorship?
Disgusting.
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I accessed the article and saw the original last sentence, yet now it has been changed to the toothless version of “Don’t talk about this as faculty lines. Talk about this as human beings, because that is who you are about to impact.”
It conveniently evades naming any active agents promoting the destruction, while talking re solidarity.
Wonder how this change was achieved.
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Dude, they censored it! Wow. Libs are teaching these young journalists an important lesson about who’ll always censor and always destroy freedom.
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Now the ending is back saying “Cut the Chancellor” with an explanation in the comments that they misheard. They may have as well changed it to “Let’s go Brandon!”
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This is an absolute shit show.
No, they didn’t mishear. What was said was “fuck the Chancellor.”
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I find it amazing that people who think nothing of all kinds of depravity are suddenly very prudish about using the f-word (I don’t use that kind of language as a matter of principle so excuse me for not typing it out).
I had to have a conversation recently with a very religious female student who was made very uncomfortable by having a trans-woman (who clearly is quite an imposing man) using women’s restrooms while she was there. She was asking me if it was OK. But sure, let’s censor the f-words and pretend we misheard them because using those is unseemly.
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“What was said was “fuck the Chancellor””
Are you sure it wasn’t “Let’s go to Branson!” You are close to St Louis and then you just take I-44 and can be there in a couple of hours.
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No, it was probably “black lives matter.” Nobody should say anything else in public anyway.
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