In my previously written pieces, The Promising Young Man Defence and Libertarianism should not be hostile to women’s liberation, I covered examples of ‘important’ men and their ability to slide away from systemic and social punishment for their sexual and violent history against women and girls. Or, in some cases against boys. There is a precarious inhuman consistency where wealth, fame and hierarchical importance, can at times both label a man as a target for accusations and punishment for crimes, or, allow them a pass. A current lawsuit regarding the rape and abuse of a female student at Cornell University by seven fraternity brothers has exposed another institutional cover up of a gang rape. The disciplinary response from the university was shameful, some of the accused rapists had to write an essay as punishment, or were suspended. Two years after the rape, wider public awareness has led to the re-opening of the case where legal and social vengeance against the accused rapists-abusers may now occur.
The Chi Phi fraternity of which the rapist belonged has been shut down. It took pressure and awareness in the mainstream media to do more than brush the assault aside. As far as the university and anyone other than the victim was concerned, it could be dismissed and downplayed as “boys letting off some steam,” or whatever other excuse passes in the minds of those who make excuses for such violations. It was rape. Not a scandal. Rape.
The elite status of academic institutions takes a hit from time to time, but they remain impervious to anything other than a brief staining which often washes away. Jason Arday, up until his unfortunate suicide, showed the eagerness of an elite university such as Cambridge in hiring and platforming a man who was revealed by his own stories of disbelief and the investigations of journalists into his claims and past, to be a liar. He bluffed and lied his way to becoming a professor and academic celebrity, all based on his mental health status and racial credentials, which afforded him values that transcend merit. His ascent was based on his boasts and claims. “Trust me bro,” was his source for all things and the faculty responsible for his elevated status, lapped it up. The need to have an autistic, neurodiverse, marginalised professor of colour was ever important for Cambridge University.
When anyone challenged his lies, including investigative journalists, the local police and those from the university helped protect his deceptions. Journalists, other faculty members or students were prohibited from challenging or questioning his claims. It was racist to do so. Or, whenever academics or their institutions are called into question, anti-intellectual. Once the heights of his hubris had become too much, he was exposed and sadly he took his own life.
The Cornell and Cambridge scandals became such because the institutions which society, government and academy entrust with truth and apparent openness revealed themselves to be gatekeepers which do anything other than reveal the truth or allow it to flourish. The rape of a student at the hands of what otherwise may have been tomorrow’s political and academic leaders, only became a scandal because the rape was discovered by the public. The institution, despite it’s pretentious grandstands and politically correct theatrics was no more than a rapists sanctuary as it would have been generations ago. The only difference is that privileged social justice advocates were placated and invited in on the cover up of rape. It’s not only rape and the claims of a liar which is to be concealed.
The American Civil Liberties Union and Amnesty International USA, published a 287-page joint report earlier this month on the systemic suppression of anti-genocide speech from within US colleges. The investigation covered 80 academic institutions across 28 states and found discriminatory actions, police call outs and surveillance on students and faculty members who had criticised the Israeli government’s policy of genocide against the Palestinians and Gaza specifically.
The myth of university is that even dangerous and unpopular ideas have a home to be explored, discussed and debated. That such institutions should be a melting point of belief and ideologies, exploration and experimentation. A place for discourse. Instead, it has become a venue for homogenised thought, ‘safe spaces’ of privileged ideologies and where free speech is suppressed. This, inevitably means that despite the platitudes of inclusion and a preformative dance of justice, that even the sanctity of a woman’s right to not be raped, or that apartheid and genocide should be challenged are also to become suppressed. The institution itself, as sacred as any religion, is beyond the spiritual exceptionalism of the church, it instead exists as a lynch pin between power and social allowances. In the end, it’s a church of lies, and where merit goes to die beneath the expedience of virtue signals and symbolic justice. Like any gate keeping entity it becomes a power upon itself.
In a generation the genocide of Gaza may pass with shame, ‘how could it have happened, who stood by and allowed it, who enabled, who committed it?’ The victims, buried in unmarked graves, pushed out of their homes will be more numbers for history in the pages of foreign policy and imperialism. The scandal over the Cornell University rape, lost to time. Only the victim will remember it with the indignity of pain. The men who covered it up and those who raped their victim likely will slither free of any true justice and with certainty shall find themselves burrowing inside the protected coffers of academia and government. The asset of whatever connections they hold, or credentials that gatekeeper institutions validate will ensure that no matter how putrid their crime, somewhere, somehow the hands they have shaken, will provide them with a handout. The mob, the media and those who are told they are allowed to be outraged in this moment, would have forgotten and moved on.
Brock Turner of Stanford University, was an accomplished athlete who received a lenient three-month jail term for sexually assaulting his unconscious victim. Any outrage, soon dwindled away. Turner remained unscathed, along with the academic and legal professionals who disregarded the rights and dignity of his victim. Jamesis Winston from Florida State University, another athlete was cleared of criminal charges for his sexual assault. And Baylor University had systemic ‘failures’ where administration staff covered up allegations of sexual assault from it’s football players. It turns out that college athletes are a profitable asset to American academia. Victims are less important to the powerful institutions.
Naomi Wolf has alleged that Yale University was involved in the cover up of her sexual harassment from professor Harold Bloom. The incidents occurred in the early 1980s, Wolf claims she made complaints known about the professors harassment, but due to his importance, the university downplayed the assault and dismissed the violations. Bloom, a prominent and important professor for the university, transcended any value that a student, like Wolf was then. Now, that Naomi Wolf is a prominent and accomplished person in her own right, we know about the assault that occurred to her. Had she not have become so famous, then it’s unlikely Bloom’s indecencies and Yale’s cover up of such, would be known.
When Sinead O’Connor ripped up a photograph of Pope John Paul II, as protest over the catholic churches cover up of child sex abuse. She was mostly mocked. When she symbolically ripped the Pope’s photo in half on Saturday Night Live, in 1992 she became a punchline. Celebrities such as Joe Pesci and members of the SNL staff pushed back and ridiculed her. It was popular to do so. Safe to tease her. The church, and pope were, and remain, sacred and important institutions. O’Connor ever an activist for justice defied the orthodoxy of the time, and spoke up against the known incidents of child rape and the protection of priests and those inside the Church who had violated the innocent. Over time, it has become ‘safe’ and allowable to challenge and condemn the church outside of atheist circles of criticism. In 1992, even non-Catholics rallied around the Pope and the church to project solidarity against O’Connor.
Academia remains a sacred institution, despite the degradation of traditional principles of dedication to knowledge and learning, along with contemporary ideals that have become vogue, the behemoths transcend such scandals. They will remain as gatekeepers and retain their funding. They will never lose power and authority, let alone prestige. Members may be punished or moved on, or promoted on, and scandals such as rape and corruption will remain as smudges to be wiped clean, mostly forgotten.
There will be, and likely has been many more Jason Arday’s. When Oprah’s Book Club pushed James Frey’s, A Million Little Pieces, for it to become a prominent and well received book. The lies and inauthentic content was a self serving example of an audience and publishing mechanism in need to believe, and validate a liars invention. The damage then was relatively minimal. The credibility to those who pushed the book, or who did not confirm Frey’s claims was slight. In the case of Arday, the student’s he passed through his course, are they less valid as graduates, has the pseudo-intellectual nature of some subjects become so contorted that it doesn’t even matter? Arday, was revealed to be a liar. He could not have ascended the ranks of academia like he did, if he was a mathematics professor, if his claims that 1×1=2, with the certainty of Terrence Howard, his students would fail in the field of mathematics. At this time, Terryology is not a valid field of study. With enough funding, that may change. Only some fields could project Arday to importance. Anyone who had run a marathon would never have believed his boasts as a runner, yet inside the institution of academia obvious lies were willingly believed. Maybe, they were needed to believe, so that he could become a brand, a product.
Important to the academic institution, like college athletes can be.
When it comes to the concealing of scandals, such as rape, to even call them scandals is a travesty. How is it that such faculty were so confident they could cover up the violation of a student? Where does such hubris and importance stem from? It’s one thing for the Church to do so, it can invent a theological and spiritual element to validate any decision it’s anointed make. When it comes to institutions allegedly dedicated to the pursuit of truth, those forged in prominence from the Renaissance, the age of Reason and the Enlightenment, where is such dignity now? How do such institutions differ from a church, rather than to be beholden as gatekeepers and monopolies on truth and knowledge. When do such institutions lose their validity and credibility among their peers and society at large?
In decades time, when the genocide in Gaza is looked back on, will those institutions which with a cowards profit concealed injustice and snuffed free speech stand as proud? Will such institutions that now deny writers, and guest speakers from speaking, because the subjects they cover contravene a current ideological agenda, find courage? When did dangerous ideas die? When did discourse suffocate? And, will such institutions reclaim intellectual dignity, or will they remain as behemoths well after the next rape is covered up? The have become tenured in the minds of society, the common person, and government have entrusted them so deeply that there is no doubt that no matter how many controversies, scandals, destruction of free speech, genocide enabling and rapes, rapes and rapes, occur, that the churches of academia shall remain.
Funding, credentialism and privilege is all that matters. Genocide to rape, con-artists to cover up. None really matter, so long as a scapegoat here and there is found. Like the church, these institutions are too powerful to even be challenged. They will exist and thrive, and most of you really don’t care other than to feel an outrage when the media let’s you know it’s safe to do so. You need their degrees and the credibility they allow for. They provide jobs and they, are the lock and key to a career in certain fields.
And, like many in 1992, when Sinead O’Connor ripped the photo of the pope in half, when it comes to certain injustices the the mobs outrage took it’s time to come around. Quantum audent dicere, or How Dare They. I’ll tell you why, because you keep letting them. Because you need their degrees.
