Education

Protest Ethics: From The Self-Immolation School Of Outrage, But Even Dumber

/ Jack Marshall / 34 Comments

I can’t assign this to The Great Stupid files, but it’s still astoundingly stupid.

Ren Gladu, owner of Ren’s Mobile Gas Station in the college town of Amherst, Massachusetts (Hampshire College, Amherst and UMass are nearby), announced that he will stop selling gas to protest high gas prices.

“I don’t want to be part of it anymore,” Ren Gladu, owner of Ren’s Mobile, told the Daily Hampshire Gazette. “This is the biggest ripoff that ever has happened to people in my lifetime.”

Gradu decided he would not charge customers any higher than $4.75 earlier this month, and when ExxonMobil increased the price per gallon by 20 cents for two consecutive days, Gradu put up signs that read “Out of Gas.”

“Dealing with Mobil, they don’t think through their pricing policies anymore,” Gradu stated. “I’ve served their product, but I refuse to do it anymore, because they’re only getting richer.”

Mobil hasn’t thought through its pricing policies? Won’t one of those well-educated college students drop by and explain supply and demand to this poor guy? They might also try to explain that he needs to stop listening to people like Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders and Rep. Ocasio-Cortez as they try to spin their party out of its self-inflicted inflation disaster.

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George Washington University Insults The Nation’s History

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

Of course, we have seen this coming for a long time, and I will be surprised if the creeping, craven effort to erase George Washington and the legacy of the Founders from the school that now bears his name will stop; it may even accelerate.

The George Washington University Board of Trustees finally decided to discontinue the use of the school’s “Colonials” moniker based on the recommendation of —believe it or not—the “Special Committee on the Colonials Moniker.” In case you have the historical literacy of a horseshoe crab, before what is now the United States of America won its independence, it was made up of colonies, and its occupants fighting for their nascent nation were often called “colonials” because that’s what they were. These colonials were completely responsible today for the United States’ existence and everything it has achieved. The leader of the army of colonials was George Washington, and the first President of the radical new nation established by those colonials was that same great man. Thus to conclude that referring to various teams and groups associated with the educational institution named in his honor as Colonials is anything but descriptive, justified, and an honor is, to be blunt, bats.

However a gross majority of the people running the institutes of higher education in the U.S. are shallow, fearful, pandering fools, and GW’s leaders are clearly in that group. Here is the revolting statement by Board Chair Grace Speights: Continue reading →

KABOOM! There Goes My Head! A Convicted Murderer Is Admitted To Law School

/ Jack Marshall / 28 Comments

Just when I think The Great Stupid has reached peak stupid, there is a new high. I don’t see how society can get more stupid than this, but I now know that it will. You know in movies when someone says, “There’s no good way to say this, so I’m just going to say it”?

Here is as much of the announcement by Mitchel Hamline Law School, an institution I was mercifully unaware of until now, that I can re-post without gagging:

Mitchell Hamline School of Law will welcome Maureen Onyelobi into its juris doctor program this fall, making Mitchell Hamline the first ABA-approved law school in the country to educate currently incarcerated individuals.

It’s a moment nearly three years in the making as part of a collective effort by the Prison to Law Pipeline, a program of All Square and its newly formed subsidiary, the Legal Revolution. The effort aims to transform the law through initiatives that center racial equity, wellness, and the expertise of those most impacted by the law…

“Learning the law is a vital vehicle for freedom and lasting change in our community,” said Elizer Darris, chair of the board of the Legal Revolution. “Maureen’s acceptance is social proof that the time for change is now and the energy is here to change it.”

…“Mitchell Hamline has a long history of looking for ways to expand the idea of who gets to go to law school,” said Dean Niedwiecki. “It’s important for people who are incarcerated to better understand the criminal justice system, and this is one important way to do that. Our students will also benefit from having Maureen in class with them.”

…A series of factors made Onyelobi’s acceptance to law school possible. The American Bar Association recently granted a variance to allow her to attend classes entirely online, which she will do from Shakopee. The variance will allow Mitchell Hamline to admit up to two incarcerated students each academic year for five years. Onyelobi’s tuition will be paid through private fundraising and the same scholarship assistance available to all Mitchell Hamline students.

The Prison to Law Pipeline also has the full support of Commissioner Paul Schnell of the Minnesota Department of Corrections…

Guess what the official announcement conveniently leaves out! Oh, only the fact that Onyelobi was convicted as an accomplice to first-degree murder, received a mandatory sentence of life in prison with no chance of parole. Continue reading →

Lapsed Sunday Sundown Ethics, 6/12-13/2022: Something!

/ Jack Marshall / 28 Comments

[I hate when this happens: I had yesterday’s ethics short (well, shorter) notes almost ready to post,  things got complicated, and now it’s the next day. Well, I like that sundown photo, so to hell with it.]

***

There are not too many speeches that have had a tangible impact on world events, but June 12 is the anniversary of one of them:  President Reagan challenging Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev to “tear down this wall” in 1987.  Two years later, on November 9, 1989, the Berlin Wall came down. Liberals and left-leaning historians disliked Reagan so much that to this day they deny him his well-earned credit for undermining Soviet communism. On the anniversary of his death last week, Twitter was full of ugly, vicious attacks on his achievements and character. Nothing inspires hate more than someone who proves that your fondest beliefs are garbage. Here is what Reagan said to the crowd of West Berliners:

“There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace.” He then called upon his Soviet counterpart: “Secretary General Gorbachev, if you seek peace—if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe—if you seek liberalization: come here, to this gate. Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate. Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.”

All delivered, as usual, with the skills of a professional and experienced actor.

1. Ugh. Why is the principle of moral luck so elusive? A baseball controversy erupted in Chicago last week because ancient and “old school” White Sox manager Tony LaRussa intentionally walked Dodgers shortstop Trea Turner with a runner on second base  and a count of one ball and two strikesin order to have relief pitcher Bennett Sousa face Max Muncy instead. Muncy promptly hit a three-run home run to give the Dodgers a 10-5 lead in a game they would eventually win 11-9. A live microphone  caught one fan yelling “He’s got two strikes, Tony!” and “Tony, what are you doing?” before Muncy homered. The intentional walk is a baseball strategy that has largely gone into disuse because statistics don’t support it except in very specific situations. The White Sox have been a disappointing team so far this season, and that tactic by LaRussa seemed to catalyze a fan consensus that he is too old, behind the times, and the reason for the team’s performance. (He was booed in Chicago the last two games, and also faced “Fire Tony!” chants.)

So here comes ESPN’s esteemed David Schoenfield to write, “Now, to be fair here, the pounding on La Russa is also a little unfair. If Muncy strikes out, it looks like a good move.”

No, no, NO, you idiot! Whether or not the tactic is a wise one must be determined when it is executed, not after its results are known. La Russa had no control over whether Muncy homered or struck out once he had ordered the intentional base on balls. What a third party, or subsequent events, do cannot change whether a decision was competent or incompetent. That’s just luck. Continue reading →

Georgetown Law Center Finally Reinstated Ilya Shapiro. Big Whoop! [Corrected]

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

Yesterday, after a 122-day punitive investigation into a 45-word tweet, Georgetown University Law Center finally reinstated Ilya Shapiro as the senior lecturer and executive director for the Georgetown Center for the Constitution. It should not take a four-month investigation to reinstate a faculty member for clearly-protected political expression, even had his controversial tweet not been self-evidently true, which it was. But that’s Georgetown for you.
Way back in January, Ethics Alarms first reported on this embarrassment to my law school alma mater and former employer. Following President Biden’s woke-pandering pledge to appoint a black woman to fill a looming vacancy on the Supreme Court, Shapiro issued a sharp tweet opining that restricting the choice of justices by race and gender was not the best way to identify the most qualified or experienced jurist. For this he was called a racist by the Law Center’s dean, and suspended. I followed the episode (with disgust) in several posts: exploring the unethical conduct of Dean Treanor, regarding a letter of protest signed by many law school professors (but none from GULC); on the alumni and student protest led by Luke Bunting; and cheering Federal Judge Ho’s support for Shapiro in an address at the law school.

If The Last Post (About Emerson College Promoting Anti-White Racism) Bothered You, Samuel L. Jackson Has A Suggestion Before You Read This One…[UPDATED!]

/ Jack Marshall / 31 Comments

In Illinois, Oak Park and River Forest High School administrators will now require teachers to adjust their classroom grading scales to account for the skin color or ethnicity of its students. Let me repeat that…

Oak Park and River Forest High School administrators will now require teachers to adjust their classroom grading scales to account for the skin color or ethnicity of its students.

This is called “Transformative Education Professional Development & Grading.” It’s transformative, all right. It is a great way to transform black students into societal cripples who cannot master what many behavioral scientists believe are the most crucial skills for life success, because they are given an institutional pass.

This ridiculous and divisive concept is, of course, yet another effort to eliminate persistent discrepancies between racial groups by pretending that they are caused by racism, and lowering standards so everyone has an equally low bar to clear.  OPRF will order its teachers to exclude from their grading assessments variables it says disproportionately hurt the grades of black students, like for missing class, misbehaving in school or failing to turn in  assignments. This will, you know—don’t they know?—set up black students to skip work, misbehave in other settings, and fail to complete their assigned jobs and tasks. Continue reading →

The Popular Culture Embraces Emerson College As Emerson College Embraces Anti-White Racism

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

As frequent readers here know, I frequently hear more ethics alarms in seemingly small things than in the major stories everyone else is talking about. This is one of those situations.

Boston’s Emerson College [full disclosure: my aunt got her speech degree there) is being promoted in the 4th season of Netflix’s cult fantasy/horror series “Stranger Things.” One of the shows heroines, Nancy Wheeler (played by Natalia Dyer), ostentatiously wears an Emerson T-shirt: she’s attending the liberal arts college in the 1980s, where the Stephen King-referencing show takes place. Now Emerson is cool. Copies of the shirt are being sold to support the victims’ families in Uvalde.

Emerson College is an enthusiastic agent of anti-white racist ideology that indoctrinates its students accordingly.

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A New Tale Of The Wuhan Virus Ethics Train Wreck: The Home Test Cheating Algorithm

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

Will there ever be any appropriate consequences for the Machiavellian politicians, incompetent health professionals, irresponsible teachers and fear-mongering journalists who collectively pushed the United States into a foolish, destructive and reckless lockdown in response to the Wuhan virus and its relatives? The harm inflicted on the nation, its culture and the public has been , and continues to be, catastrophic. In comparison to so many of the disastrous results of this deep self-inflicted wound, the travails of a young student unjustly accused of cheating doesn’t seem that consequential. What it demonstrates, however, is how many victims of the Wuhan Virus Ethics Train Wreck we don’t know about. I’m sure there are millions.

In truth, we know there are millions. For example, millions of people were forced to take bar exams, tests and quizzes alone at home on their laptops. Such conditions are not conducive to trustworthy or even meaningful tests, but never mind: the education community was willing to sacrifice learning for fear and bad science. Then there was the special bonus of getting rid of President Trump by knee-capping the economy.

At least remote proctoring companies boomed, offering web browser extensions that “detect keystrokes and cursor movements, collect audio from a computer’s microphone, and record the screen and the feed from a computer’s camera, bringing surveillance methods used by law enforcement, employers and domestic abusers into an academic setting.” Of course, as we learned in “War Games,” handing over critical tasks requiring judgments to machines has its drawbacks.

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California Makes Its Values Depressingly Clear: Minority Privilege Over Children’s Lives

/ Jack Marshall / 23 Comments

Forget it, Jake, it’s California Town.

Two days after the Uvalde shooting, as all of California Democrats, progressives and anti-gun zealots were metaphorically screaming “Murderers!” at those who aren’t willing to gut the Second Amendment to pretend that various restrictions would stop evil lunatics like Ramos, the California State Senate voted to end a legal requirement that students who threaten violence against school officials be reported.

The old law mandated that whenever a school official was “attacked, assaulted, or physically threatened by any pupil,” staff must “promptly report the incident to specified law enforcement authorities.”

Gone. So, for example, the teacher in that screenshot above, taken from a video of an in-class assault, would not be obligated to report it. How odd that the state would eliminate such a restriction as the question rages over how so many people aware that the Uvalde shooter was an anti-social, gun-obsessed menace never alerted authorities. What could possibly be California’s thinking?

Oh, come on. It’s easy! I guessed—that proves it’s easy. The ACLU’s statement on why it supports the repeal tells all:

Decades of research show the long-term harm to young people of even minimal contact with the juvenile or criminal legal systems. Once students make contact with law enforcement, they are less likely to graduate high school and more likely to wind up in jail or prison. These harms fall disproportionately on students from marginalized groups: Black, Indigenous, and Latinx students, as well as students with disabilities, are disproportionately referred to law enforcement, cited, and arrested.

Taking the photo above as an example, that student is merely the victim of centuries of systemic racism, and justifiably enraged by a racist white supremacist culture. Reporting him just compounds the injustice.

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Morning Ethics Warm-Up, 5/26/2022: Mug Censorship, A Scientist Is Cancelled, And Happy Birthday Duke!

/ Jack Marshall / 21 Comments

John Wayne was born Marion Robert Morrison on this date in 1907, in Winterset, Iowa. His family eventually moved to Glendale, California, where he grew up and attended USC on a football scholarship. Through a series of events too complex to write about here, Wayne found his way into movies and eventually devoted his career to the mission of creating of an iconic American male hero. That creation, which included some dark elements as well as admirable ones (See “Red River,” “The Searchers” and “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance”) that still has a strong influence, and I believe an overwhelmingly positive one, on the culture.

In this he was assisted by two of the greatest of American film directors, Howard Hawks and John Ford, but creating “John Wayne” was Marion Morrison’s life’s work, to the extent where he refused to shoot a character (who has shot him and was running away) in the back in his final film, “The Shootist,” stating that it would violate the principles “John Wayne” stood for.

The man was not the character and didn’t claim to be. He was well-read, preferred to wear sports jackets and slacks, loved chess and by Hollywood standards—not a high bar admittedly— was an intellectual. Wayne once said that he never though of himself as John Wayne and still had “Marion Morrison” locked in his brain. They called him “Duke” in his pre-Wayne days, so he preferred that name off camera.

There are only five genuine Hollywood icons: Chaplin, Marilyn Monroe, Shirley Temple, Fred Astaire and John Wayne, and despite efforts to “cancel” him, Wayne remains the most vibrant, influential, and visible of the group. When I was teaching ethics to lawyers in Mongolia, the judges and lawyers knew virtually nothing about American culture, but they knew (and admired) John Wayne.

Mission accomplished.

1. I’m old enough to remember when it was conservatives who were always trying to censor free speech...apparently many triggered Democrats on social media are demanding that the websites that sell this mug be shut down, or that the mug be censored “like those racist Dr. Seuss books.”

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