I'm interested where you draw the "free speech" line (if anywhere) regarding foreign students from hostile nations who openly want to destroy the West. It's one thing for US citizens to express stupid ideas it's another to bring in (or keep in) hostile actors who want the destruction of the US. Here is a question: would you be for censoring a CNN hire if said hire was a Russian propagandist selected by Putin to officially channel Russian propaganda tailored to US citizens?
Regarding the level of anti-semitism on campus, with respect, both of you seem oblivious to the maginatitude of what Jewish students are going through on campus. I think it would behoove both of you to check out this conversation regarding college anti-semitism with Harvard's Dara Horn: https://youtu.be/ZxS8iATYQqY?si=D8TiAMcBwZB8iiYp
Glenn - Burn a flag. Sure. People will rally around you. Now, go burn a Koran. See how much the "free speech" people on the left stick up for you. Or imagine the Nazis (all 3 of them) wanted to march in Skokie. Imagine the outpouring of support they'd get from Harvard and Columbia academics.
Sorry, I can't feel sympathy for the "academic freedom" of people who have such a one-sided history of not supporting free speech.
Again, I think in the long run the best way to promote free speech is something like "tit for tat" (the strategy that wins the iterated Prisoner's Dilemma game).
Two points. If Khalil is deported, it will likely be based on his conduct and memberships/employment - like (from what I read in the press) working for UNRWA and not stating that on his visa application. And Rajiv is correct that the universities sowed their own problems years ago with discriminatory DEI - antisemitism was often part of that but now, after October 7th, has become more salient. In that regard, one can think of UN anti Zionist resolutions -- how many such resolutions against actual oppressive regimes? Comparing that preponderance against Jews and Israel on college campuses, the issue is not just double standards as Glenn and Rajiv whine about. It is also about demonization and delegimatization of the State of Israel. Looking only at the college campus example is a bit too ivory towerish. C'mon down and see what's going on in the town.
Conservatives have been unhappy with American universities for some time which is why they have Think Tanks like the Heritage Foundation. They certainly have some valid concerns. But what often happens in situations like this as grievances stretch over decades is perspective is skewed, and radicals gain control of the narrative. The Trump Administration is filled with conservative radicals which are determined to punish the LEFT. Grievance, punishment and forced submissions are pretty much what Trump is about.
Conservatives don’t care that advances in medicine and science are hindered by their actions. As long as they own the Libs, anything goes. Trump loves the uneducated.
They cancelled the meeting that determines the targets for the influenza vaccine.
I am amazed that academics have such a blind spot about these things. Our universities have been created based on the funding that was produced by a capitalist system. A large % of that funding has come from Jewish donors and alumni. The current crop of academics tried to change the system and its priorities, excluding donors & alumni in the process, through force & coercion. Did they expect the financiers of their platform to say, oh you're right, let's tear down Western civilization and abolish Israel because it a colonial project? And when the donors & alumni (and part of the student population) fights back, they scream academic freedom. Well academic freedom means you should be allowed teach that Israel is a colonial project. But it does not mean that you can force the school to adopt that as a position outside of the usual processes of consent. This is why the Trump Administration was able to issue the executive order. Public sentiment is on their side. People don't want to pay $100K a year so that their child can't access parts of campus. Or to hear antisemitic rhetoric on a daily basis. That behavior cannot be acceptable in a space that has to be shared by all students. There is a difference between protesting the war in Gaza and using the platform that your hosts have provided you with, free of charge, to wrest power away from those who have it. As for the discussion on freedom of speech, had Mohamad Khalil's speech been uttered outside of the U.S., his visa would not have been approved. That his defense is the speech is acceptable now that he is already hear is a ridiculous standard. If the speech would disqualify him from entering, then it should disqualify him from being here. And truth is he has no one to blame but himself as he failed to consider the impact his speech and actions would have on people who support the Israeli project, something there is no room for in the world he inhabits.
The actions Trump and his admin are taking are not unprovoked or without cause.
The riots and takeovers at Columbia specifically and other campuses went beyond just protest. If you want to talk about free speech on university campuses you have acknowledge the past 20+ years of growing "protests" directed at any wrongthink. You have speakers threatened and their events cancelled. You have professors ran out of town. You have at their boldest violent "protests" like at Columbia where certain ethnicities were singled out and threatened. Glenn, you are well aware of these. Columbia is just a poster child for a host of underlying problems at these universities.
There is also the financial aspect. As many have pointed out why have these univerisities sat on massive endowments while sucking up more and more federal money? What has it bought the tax payer? These "protests" at Columbia, hateful philosophies like DEI and CRT, anti-scientific toe-the-line support of radical trans rhetoric or Fauci's Covid response? All this plus exponentially rising tuition costs for watered down degrees that will never payoff those loans. Bloated admins paid massive salaries make sure this gravy train continues.
The most sensitive measurement equipment from any of these Universities could not detect the amount of sympathy I have to give.
And don't forget that Dr. Carole Hooven's, biologist, life was made impossible at Harvard for teaching that there are only 2 sexes. She resigned from Harvard.
It was really illuminating to hear Rajiv draw a connection between academia in 1930s Germany and the state of American academia today. I would argue that the assault on academia in the United States actually began during the first Trump administration in 2018 when then Attorney General Jeff Sessions launched the ill fated China Initiative, which purported to root out academic espionage but in actuality mostly harassed and prosecuted academics of Chinese descent for administrative lapses such as failing to disclose ties to Chinese institutions, regardless of how untoward such ties actually were.
As my prior comment illustrates, anti-China mania also led the NIH to cancelling scores of Chinese American scientists, many of whom later returned to China to resume their careers. If Jerome Karabel was correct in proclaiming Asian Americans the new Jews, then surely Sinophobia has become to some extent the new anti-Semitism, in which a disproportionately successful minority group is viewed through an adversarial lens of hostility.
Rajiv is correct to point out that mainland China is certainly a less hospitable place for the social sciences and humanities given CCP censorship, but in the hard sciences there's already evidence of a significant shift in momentum towards China. I've been casually following the rise of Chinese science and technology in recent years and when one looks at major metrics such as the Nature Index, the rapid growth of China over the past 10-15 years has been truly stunning.
This rise has been directly aided and abetted by the rampant climate of anti-China sentiment on both sides of the political aisle in this country. Many Americans may not be aware of the extent to which immigrant groups such as Chinese or Indian Americans contribute disproportionately to STEM in this country. Driving away those people won't hamper the rise of the countries these immigrants hail from, but rather the opposite.
A bill was recently proposed by Congress to ban all Chinese nationals from obtaining student visas to study in this country. Even with the decline in the last couple of years, there were still almost 280,000 Chinese nationals studying in America in 2024. In my opinion, the attacks against Chinese students and academics in present day America almost certainly mirrors the attacks on Jewish academics in Germany during the 1930s. In the latter instance, elite Jewish immigration to America helped this country become the global center of science and technology post WW2 at the expense of German preeminence. We're witnessing something very similar happening today vis-a-vis the United States and China.
Yan Shen wrote: "In my opinion, the attacks against Chinese students and academics in present day America almost certainly mirrors the attacks on Jewish academics in Germany during the 1930s."
Offhand, one significant difference occurs to me. I'm not an expert on the history of Nazi Germany, but weren't those Jewish academics actually German citizens for the most part, not foreign students or professors? And the attacks on Jews in German universities were part of a systematic program to strip Jews of their property, their jobs and businesses, and ultimately their lives.
I do agree with you that broadly discouraging Chinese academics from coming to America probably causes the U.S. more harm than good, except in the case of actual spies or others with malicious intentions.
You're right on all counts, but without the humanities and social sciences you will not have institutions that attract undergraduate students from across the world as we do, and this is part of what fuels our economy, both helping offset a trade deficit and making its presence felt in a range of products
Well I don't understand is, these universities have billions of dollars in endowments but they don't use them for any of this stuff they always use the government's money
Go Trump. Maybe, with a few Academic Pirate surges between, in 20 years or so our Universities will begin to be something the former greats of Western Academia would recognize.
I don't think so. Trump does not do anything with skill or deep thought, his moves are grievance based, nothing more. Trump is good at disruption, not building and he cares not what he destroys-check out the USFL. There are certainly problems with the U.S. University and the Left is responsible for many of these ills but what Trump is doing is dangerous, ill conceived, stupid and illegal.
Trump as a national leader is very different from Trump as a celebrity business owner. He is the first great digital hero. Few seem to grasp that we have entered a new era of human struggle. Trump is an avatar of the anger and disgust of the intellectual and ideological depredations of the left. The Academy, especially the humanities, are strongholds of this corruption- and the fight is on. A fight they brought on themselves, and one they will most certainly lose.
Today’s outsiders will be tomorrow’s academicians. Mark my words.
Dr. Loury & Sethi,
I'm interested where you draw the "free speech" line (if anywhere) regarding foreign students from hostile nations who openly want to destroy the West. It's one thing for US citizens to express stupid ideas it's another to bring in (or keep in) hostile actors who want the destruction of the US. Here is a question: would you be for censoring a CNN hire if said hire was a Russian propagandist selected by Putin to officially channel Russian propaganda tailored to US citizens?
Regarding the level of anti-semitism on campus, with respect, both of you seem oblivious to the maginatitude of what Jewish students are going through on campus. I think it would behoove both of you to check out this conversation regarding college anti-semitism with Harvard's Dara Horn: https://youtu.be/ZxS8iATYQqY?si=D8TiAMcBwZB8iiYp
Glenn - Burn a flag. Sure. People will rally around you. Now, go burn a Koran. See how much the "free speech" people on the left stick up for you. Or imagine the Nazis (all 3 of them) wanted to march in Skokie. Imagine the outpouring of support they'd get from Harvard and Columbia academics.
Sorry, I can't feel sympathy for the "academic freedom" of people who have such a one-sided history of not supporting free speech.
Again, I think in the long run the best way to promote free speech is something like "tit for tat" (the strategy that wins the iterated Prisoner's Dilemma game).
Two points. If Khalil is deported, it will likely be based on his conduct and memberships/employment - like (from what I read in the press) working for UNRWA and not stating that on his visa application. And Rajiv is correct that the universities sowed their own problems years ago with discriminatory DEI - antisemitism was often part of that but now, after October 7th, has become more salient. In that regard, one can think of UN anti Zionist resolutions -- how many such resolutions against actual oppressive regimes? Comparing that preponderance against Jews and Israel on college campuses, the issue is not just double standards as Glenn and Rajiv whine about. It is also about demonization and delegimatization of the State of Israel. Looking only at the college campus example is a bit too ivory towerish. C'mon down and see what's going on in the town.
Conservatives have been unhappy with American universities for some time which is why they have Think Tanks like the Heritage Foundation. They certainly have some valid concerns. But what often happens in situations like this as grievances stretch over decades is perspective is skewed, and radicals gain control of the narrative. The Trump Administration is filled with conservative radicals which are determined to punish the LEFT. Grievance, punishment and forced submissions are pretty much what Trump is about.
Conservatives don’t care that advances in medicine and science are hindered by their actions. As long as they own the Libs, anything goes. Trump loves the uneducated.
They cancelled the meeting that determines the targets for the influenza vaccine.
I really expected better from Glenn Loury.
I am amazed that academics have such a blind spot about these things. Our universities have been created based on the funding that was produced by a capitalist system. A large % of that funding has come from Jewish donors and alumni. The current crop of academics tried to change the system and its priorities, excluding donors & alumni in the process, through force & coercion. Did they expect the financiers of their platform to say, oh you're right, let's tear down Western civilization and abolish Israel because it a colonial project? And when the donors & alumni (and part of the student population) fights back, they scream academic freedom. Well academic freedom means you should be allowed teach that Israel is a colonial project. But it does not mean that you can force the school to adopt that as a position outside of the usual processes of consent. This is why the Trump Administration was able to issue the executive order. Public sentiment is on their side. People don't want to pay $100K a year so that their child can't access parts of campus. Or to hear antisemitic rhetoric on a daily basis. That behavior cannot be acceptable in a space that has to be shared by all students. There is a difference between protesting the war in Gaza and using the platform that your hosts have provided you with, free of charge, to wrest power away from those who have it. As for the discussion on freedom of speech, had Mohamad Khalil's speech been uttered outside of the U.S., his visa would not have been approved. That his defense is the speech is acceptable now that he is already hear is a ridiculous standard. If the speech would disqualify him from entering, then it should disqualify him from being here. And truth is he has no one to blame but himself as he failed to consider the impact his speech and actions would have on people who support the Israeli project, something there is no room for in the world he inhabits.
The actions Trump and his admin are taking are not unprovoked or without cause.
The riots and takeovers at Columbia specifically and other campuses went beyond just protest. If you want to talk about free speech on university campuses you have acknowledge the past 20+ years of growing "protests" directed at any wrongthink. You have speakers threatened and their events cancelled. You have professors ran out of town. You have at their boldest violent "protests" like at Columbia where certain ethnicities were singled out and threatened. Glenn, you are well aware of these. Columbia is just a poster child for a host of underlying problems at these universities.
There is also the financial aspect. As many have pointed out why have these univerisities sat on massive endowments while sucking up more and more federal money? What has it bought the tax payer? These "protests" at Columbia, hateful philosophies like DEI and CRT, anti-scientific toe-the-line support of radical trans rhetoric or Fauci's Covid response? All this plus exponentially rising tuition costs for watered down degrees that will never payoff those loans. Bloated admins paid massive salaries make sure this gravy train continues.
The most sensitive measurement equipment from any of these Universities could not detect the amount of sympathy I have to give.
Thanks for having me on Glenn, a pleasure as always.
And don't forget that Dr. Carole Hooven's, biologist, life was made impossible at Harvard for teaching that there are only 2 sexes. She resigned from Harvard.
Yes this is a good example, I should have mentioned it in addition to Dorian Abbott etc ...
It was really illuminating to hear Rajiv draw a connection between academia in 1930s Germany and the state of American academia today. I would argue that the assault on academia in the United States actually began during the first Trump administration in 2018 when then Attorney General Jeff Sessions launched the ill fated China Initiative, which purported to root out academic espionage but in actuality mostly harassed and prosecuted academics of Chinese descent for administrative lapses such as failing to disclose ties to Chinese institutions, regardless of how untoward such ties actually were.
https://glennloury.substack.com/p/heather-mac-donald-when-race-trumps/comment/15474209
As my prior comment illustrates, anti-China mania also led the NIH to cancelling scores of Chinese American scientists, many of whom later returned to China to resume their careers. If Jerome Karabel was correct in proclaiming Asian Americans the new Jews, then surely Sinophobia has become to some extent the new anti-Semitism, in which a disproportionately successful minority group is viewed through an adversarial lens of hostility.
Rajiv is correct to point out that mainland China is certainly a less hospitable place for the social sciences and humanities given CCP censorship, but in the hard sciences there's already evidence of a significant shift in momentum towards China. I've been casually following the rise of Chinese science and technology in recent years and when one looks at major metrics such as the Nature Index, the rapid growth of China over the past 10-15 years has been truly stunning.
https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2024/06/12/china-has-become-a-scientific-superpower
This rise has been directly aided and abetted by the rampant climate of anti-China sentiment on both sides of the political aisle in this country. Many Americans may not be aware of the extent to which immigrant groups such as Chinese or Indian Americans contribute disproportionately to STEM in this country. Driving away those people won't hamper the rise of the countries these immigrants hail from, but rather the opposite.
A bill was recently proposed by Congress to ban all Chinese nationals from obtaining student visas to study in this country. Even with the decline in the last couple of years, there were still almost 280,000 Chinese nationals studying in America in 2024. In my opinion, the attacks against Chinese students and academics in present day America almost certainly mirrors the attacks on Jewish academics in Germany during the 1930s. In the latter instance, elite Jewish immigration to America helped this country become the global center of science and technology post WW2 at the expense of German preeminence. We're witnessing something very similar happening today vis-a-vis the United States and China.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/chinese-students-visa-gop-bill-rcna197098
Yan Shen wrote: "In my opinion, the attacks against Chinese students and academics in present day America almost certainly mirrors the attacks on Jewish academics in Germany during the 1930s."
Offhand, one significant difference occurs to me. I'm not an expert on the history of Nazi Germany, but weren't those Jewish academics actually German citizens for the most part, not foreign students or professors? And the attacks on Jews in German universities were part of a systematic program to strip Jews of their property, their jobs and businesses, and ultimately their lives.
I do agree with you that broadly discouraging Chinese academics from coming to America probably causes the U.S. more harm than good, except in the case of actual spies or others with malicious intentions.
You're right on all counts, but without the humanities and social sciences you will not have institutions that attract undergraduate students from across the world as we do, and this is part of what fuels our economy, both helping offset a trade deficit and making its presence felt in a range of products
https://rajivsethi.substack.com/p/barbie-and-the-american-economy
Well I don't understand is, these universities have billions of dollars in endowments but they don't use them for any of this stuff they always use the government's money
Go Trump. Maybe, with a few Academic Pirate surges between, in 20 years or so our Universities will begin to be something the former greats of Western Academia would recognize.
I don't think so. Trump does not do anything with skill or deep thought, his moves are grievance based, nothing more. Trump is good at disruption, not building and he cares not what he destroys-check out the USFL. There are certainly problems with the U.S. University and the Left is responsible for many of these ills but what Trump is doing is dangerous, ill conceived, stupid and illegal.
Trump as a national leader is very different from Trump as a celebrity business owner. He is the first great digital hero. Few seem to grasp that we have entered a new era of human struggle. Trump is an avatar of the anger and disgust of the intellectual and ideological depredations of the left. The Academy, especially the humanities, are strongholds of this corruption- and the fight is on. A fight they brought on themselves, and one they will most certainly lose.
Today’s outsiders will be tomorrow’s academicians. Mark my words.