What a mess.
Glenn ‘Shemy’ Schembechler, son of legendary Wolverines football coach Bo Schembechler, the winningest coach in Michigan football history who took the Wolverines to 10 Rose Bowls, was was hired as the University of Michigan’s assistant director of recruiting on May 17. Three says later he was fired (well, “forced to resign”). His demise was caused by his habit of “liking” controversial tweets on Twitter.
A statement from the school attributed Schembechler’s forced resignation to social media activity that “caused concern and pain for individuals in our community.” Here’s one of those “liked tweets,” in a Twitter tiff over a quote from Thomas Sowell:
Ethics Observations:
- We can’t know if any of the other tweets liked by Shemy were genuinely racist or bigoted, because he purged more than 1500 “liking” tweets from his account before resigning. The fact that he did this is ethically ambiguous. He might have done it to protect “individuals” in the Michigan community from “pain.” He might have done it to hide evidence of his racist tendencies. He probably did it as a desperate effort to save his job.
- It is fair to say, however, that if you have that many tweets that could be used to make a case that you are racially biased, you 1) spend far too much time on social media and 2) aren’t too smart, and maybe not even smart enough to work as an assistant director of recruiting.
- It is a national and educational tragedy that current campuses are so obsessed with race, social justice posturing and ideological conformity that an employee, faculty member or student is risking “canceling” by openly taking contrarian positions, but that’s reality. Unless Schembechler was prepared to take a principled stand (and was sufficiently articulate and informed to do it competently), creating that kind of a Twitter trail is its own evidence of being less than alert, responsible, and trustworthy.
- The fact that his hiring was probably a sop to the memory of his father rather than based entirely on his own merits certainly made him more vulnerable. If he was hired because his name on the staff made alumni and students feel all warm and nostalgic inside, any activities or statements that undermined that single benefit of having him around would tend to make him a liability. If you get a job because of positive biases in your favor, you had better be prepared to show you should have been hired for the right reasons. Obviously, Shemy was not prepared.
- Twitter needs some more neutral designations for a user wanting to show that he or she thinks that another user’s post is worth reading. “Like” implies agreement; so does re-tweeting. Until it does have such nuanced designations, however, competent tweeting requires that a user know that liking another tweet or re-tweeting it without a clarifying comment will be taken to mean “I agree with this.”
- The debate that generated the tweet above that Schembechler “liked” was triggered by the moronic comment by “NattyBowditch” below…
And therein lies a problem. Do you doubt that if the ex-employee had “liked” Natty’s dumb tweet instead of that of Natty’s critic, he would have been accused of causing “pain”? I don’t.
Ethics Alarms 
Any division one football recruiter who admits to even knowing who Thomas Sowell is won’t last in his job a minute.
How many extant Michigan fans even know who Bo Schembechler was? It was nearly fifty years ago Bo punched that opposing player in the Gator Bowl (pretty sure) and punched his ticket out of Ann Arbor. Most of the people who loved Bo are either dead or in nursing homes.
Bill, you may be thinking of Woody Hayes from Ohio State. Schembechler may have had his own issues regarding his son and sexual assault, at least according to Wikipedia. Not going to gossip; don’t care.
Ooops. Hah. Woody and Bo were both Big 10, overbearing, midwestern assholes extraordinaire. At least that’s my excuse.
No, Schembechler retired in the 90’s. That was 30 years ago, not 50. I mean…it seems like 50, but it isn’t.
Woody Hayes, Gator Bowl, December 29, 1978. Christmas spirit eh?
Mrs. OB and I were out with my favorite cousin and his wife at a restaurant/bar on Key Biscayne (since burned down) in Miami and saw it happen live on the TV behind the bar. “Did I just see what I just saw?” Almost as memorable as the Moon landing.
And what a shame.
One of the things I always ask a client when facing a case like this (employment lawyers often see this type of thing, i.e., off-duty conduct that raises employer concerns) is, “Can you articulate exactly how this act affects the job?” Here, you can make a pretty fair case that a recruiter who links to certain types of statements on race is going to limit his effectiveness in bringing minority players to campus. Just as important, his activity is going to give competing recruiters at other schools a boatload of rhetorical ammunition to use in the world of minority athletes that will affect Michigan’s ability to recruit minority athletes across all of its athletic programs. The fact that Bo Jr. might be using “like” for another purpose is an irrelevant defense because that would require an explanation, and he won’t get a chance to explain to the people that will have those tweets placed in front of them. I don’t think it’s fair, but this is a situation where, as Jack notes, you have to be thinking far enough ahead to understand what will happen when you put your opinions out in the public square.
Absolutely. He’d be a dead man walking into a black prospect’s house before or after some other team’s recruiter had had a chance to slime him. Of course, the ADs are the owners, the (predominantly withe) fans are the owners’ privileged children, and the coaches and assistant coaches are the field bosses of the big-time athletics college plantations. The entire endeavor is a stain on the soul of the country.
“Here, you can make a pretty fair case that a recruiter who links to certain types of statements on race is going to limit his effectiveness in bringing minority players to campus. Just as important, his activity is going to give competing recruiters at other schools a boatload of rhetorical ammunition to use in the world of minority athletes that will affect Michigan’s ability to recruit minority athletes across all of its athletic programs. ”
This speaks volumes about a school’s desire to find both top students with athletic ability for their programs. How is recruiting an individual to attend a school based only on his or her ability to play a sport any different than going to a market to buy a piece of meat. I could have used other trade references but this one will suffice. The only reason for doing so is for the school to profit from the physical abilities of that student. How is that different from other markets where people are bought and paid for?
The purpose of a university is to educate and if the prospective student cannot at this point be at least willing to understand or accept alternative points of view he or she has no business taking a place in a college that could otherwise have gone to a less athletic but better qualified scholastic prospect.
Question: Is it ethical to recruit students who could not otherwise be granted admission on scholastic grounds for the purpose of fielding a team of athletes who are chose only for their ability to bring income into a school via the commercialization of their athletic programs?
A few years ago, one of the advice columnists – Abby, I think – had a letter that questioned whether social media likes meant the clicker actually liked the post or was just acknowledging having seen it. The columnist claimed she used it for the latter.
I felt that was unwise.
Unless Shemy was under that same clueless understanding of the meaning of likes, I think he should have been more careful. Nevertheless, I’m willing to believe that many of his likes were for things not racist at all.