Patterico's Pontifications

5/8/2017

Struggling To Remain A Vibrant Intellectual Community

Filed under: General — Dana @ 6:48 pm



[guest post by Dana]

Rod Dreher published fascinating email exchange sent to him by a source inside Duke Divinity School (DDS). The emails reveal the chasm between some staff members at DDS, a school which claims to be the embodiment of Duke University’s motto: Eruditio et Religio—Knowledge and Faith. The exchange begins when Anathea Portier-Young, an Associate Professor of Old Testament, strongly encourages colleagues to participate in an upcoming training designed to combat racial inequality:

On behalf of the Faculty Diversity and Inclusion Standing Committee, I strongly urge you to participate in the Racial Equity Institute Phase I Training planned for March 4 and 5. We have secured funding from the Provost to provide this training free to our community and we hope that this will be a first step in a longer process of working to ensure that DDS is an institution that is both equitable and anti-racist in its practices and culture…Those who have participated in the training have described it as transformative, powerful, and life-changing.

ALL Staff and Faculty are invited to register for this important event by which DDS can begin its own commitment to become an anti-racist institution.

Assuredly, today’s diversity and inclusion trainings are the inevitable outgrowth of liberal orthodoxy and driven by that which is deemed politically correct. And given that DDS claims to be on a mission to cultivate a vibrant community through theological education on Scripture, and engagement with the living Christian tradition, this is when Paul J. Griffiths, Warren Chair of Catholic Theology, boldly entered what would become a revealing exchange of emails:

I’m responding to Thea’s exhortation that we should attend the Racial Equity Institute Phase 1 Training scheduled for 4-5 March. In her message she made her ideological commitments clear. I’ll do the same, in the interests of free exchange.

I exhort you not to attend this training. Don’t lay waste your time by doing so. It’ll be, I predict with confidence, intellectually flaccid: there’ll be bromides, clichés, and amen-corner rah-rahs in plenty. When (if) it gets beyond that, its illiberal roots and totalitarian tendencies will show. Events of this sort are definitively anti-intellectual. (Re)trainings of intellectuals by bureaucrats and apparatchiks have a long and ignoble history; I hope you’ll keep that history in mind as you think about this instance.

We here at Duke Divinity have a mission. Such things as this training are at best a distraction from it and at worst inimical to it. Our mission is to thnk, read, write, and teach about the triune Lord of Christian confession. This is a hard thing. Each of us should be tense with the effort of it, thrumming like a tautly triple-woven steel thread with the work of it, consumed by the fire of it, ever eager for more of it. We have neither time nor resources to waste. This training is a waste. Please, ignore it. Keep your eyes on the prize.

“Thrumming like a tautly triple-woven steel thread with the work of it” because the mission is Christianity. Nothing should get in the way of that. Nothing should be more compelling. And nothing should supersede that divine call. That Griffifths was compelled to make this statement is amusing in light of those at DDS who seem to feel that Jesus’s own words, “Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another,” aren’t quite cutting it in the How-we-are-to-live department at a school of… divinity. Side note rant: Oh? What’s that you say? I am oversimplifying today’s cultural complexities of racism and inequity by reducing its rectification to a childish command spoken in the New Testament? Well, maybe, just maybe Jesus knew all too well that there would be nothing new under the sun and that the one constant in this life would always be the befouled heart of man. Every man. So perhaps when He cuts like a laser through the bullshit layers of ego and self, straight through the bone down to the darkest and most self-deceived stronghold of all, the human heart, His massaging of this command into the organ of life is precisely what transforms our minds to that which is pleasing to Him. This having nothing to do with a man-made training and politics, but rather a transformation that requires our own dark night of the soul as we yield to that which is greater than our own smugness.

At this point, the Dean of Duke Divinity School, Elaine Heath, got involved in the chain of emails. After enthusiastically supporting the training, and claiming that it would increase intellectual strength and spiritual vitality, she trained her sights on Griffiths’s email. Unfortunately, rather than address his points with any actual intellectual strength, she chose instead to misrepresent him:

It is certainly appropriate to use mass emails to share announcements or information that is helpful to the larger community, such as information about the REI training opportunity. It is inappropriate and unprofessional to use mass emails to make disparaging statements–including arguments ad hominem–in order to humiliate or undermine individual colleagues or groups of colleagues with whom we disagree. The use of mass emails to express racism, sexism, and other forms of bigotry is offensive and unacceptable, especially in a Christian institution.

As St. Paul wrote to the church in Corinth, regardless of how exquisite our gifts are, if we do not exercise them with love our words are just noise.

Heath’s inaccurate reading of Griffiths’s comments then compelled Professor Thomas Pfau, a 26 year member of the DDS faculty, to jump into the fray. Stating that he viewed the school as an “intellectual asylum,” he expressed solidarity with Griffiths regarding the demand that yet one more training in a “seemingly endless string of surveys, memos, and training sessions” was being made. And one more demand that had no relation to that for which he (and others at DDS) were originally hired. Pfau reasonably suggested the school make every effort to remain a vibrant intellectual community while simultaneously calling out the Dean:

So if faculty members choose to say in public (as Paul Griffiths has just done) what so many are saying in private, one might at the very least want to listen to and engage their concerns, especially if one holds sharply opposed views. Any academic unit, DDS included, can only flourish if differences of opinion on any variety of subjects are respected and engaged on their intrinsic merits. Having reviewed Paul Griffiths’ note several times, I find nothing in it that could even remotely be said to “express racism, sexism, and other forms of bigotry.” To suggest anything of the sort strikes me as either gravely imperceptive or as intellectually dishonest. Instead, if a faculty member raises serious doubts about the efficacy and methods of an initiative aimed at combating racial and other kinds of bias – and about the ways in which such training manifestly encroaches on the time faculty need to pursue their primary mission of teaching and research – then this view ought as a matter of course be respected as a legitimate exercise of judgment and expression. And while Paul Griffiths casts his criticisms in harsh terms, it would be nothing less than politically coercive and intellectually irresponsible to imply that his statement amounts to an “expression of racism.”

If DDS wishes to remain a vibrant intellectual community, then all kinds of different perspectives must be engaged analytically and in good faith, as propositions and judgments warranting earnest scrutiny rather than facile condemnation. To tar communications such as the one that Paul Griffiths has shared with the faculty as politically retrograde, let alone to contemplate institutional sanctions, is to take an alarmingly illiberal approach that, ironically, will end up confirming at least some of Paul Griffiths’s criticisms regarding the proposed initiative. Those struggling to grasp the difference between honest engagement and institutional censorship ought to revisit Herbert Marcuse’s account of “repressive tolerance.”

Read the whole thing. It’s not only instructive but also clealy illustrates the heights of intellectual dishonesty to which some will stoop when trying to malign those who resist.

(Cross-posted at The Jury Talks Back.)

–Dana

117 Responses to “Struggling To Remain A Vibrant Intellectual Community”

  1. Keep your eyes on the prize, indeed.

    Dana (023079)

  2. There is no such thing as a triple-woven steel thread. Tautly or otherwise.

    It seems to me that a guy who objects to “bromides, clichés, and amen-corner rah-rahs” should look at the beam in his own speechifying before commenting on the mote in his neighbor’s.

    nk (dbc370)

  3. nk, he was probably just trying to update the Exhorter

    And if one prevail against him, two shall withstand him; and a threefold cord is not quickly broken

    KJV, so Hoagie doesn’t need to worry about leftist translation.
    I would make a remark about Duke—but my alma mater is probably just as bad.
    But I see that Dr. Griffiths has resigned, so the enemy has won this particular skirmish.

    BTW, Dana, that “side rant” in italics is too good to buried like that. Deserves a post of its own.

    kishnevi (9dfc8c)

  4. A scholar of Augustine, Griffiths’ main interests and pursuits are philosophical theology and the philosophy of religion — particularly Christianity and Buddhism. He received a doctoral degree in Buddhist Studies in 1983 from the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and his early works established him as one of the most incisive interpreters of Yogācāra Buddhist philosophy. His works on Buddhism include On Being Mindless (Lasalle, IL: Open Court, 1991) and On Being Buddha (Albany: SUNY Press, 1994). After converting from Anglicanism to Roman Catholicism and accepting the Schmitt Chair of Catholic Studies at UIC, he has largely given up his work in Buddhist Studies.

    Ok, then.

    nk (dbc370)

  5. Things are so bad now that it’s interesting to see where the lines are being drawn.

    This sure sounds like re-education and it will not be stopped by the old but by the young. I wish I had more faith in today’s youth.

    harkin (65fb70)

  6. She seems as clueless as Candida moss

    https://divinity.duke.edu/faculty/anathea-portier-young

    narciso (d43435)

  7. As I said, purge. The Communists don’t give two hoots about law or differences of opinion. There Right is so lacking in wisdom as to see the trains heading right at it. So we argue. Yawn.

    You know what, if you don’t believe me, just see what Islam is jamming down our throats with their militaristic ways. Left is on its way and has learned from them. Fake outrage, pretend victimization and violence is the way to go after the Right.

    Blah Blah (44eaa0)

  8. Just wait until robotic labor leaves 99% of the population unemployed and redundant.

    nk (dbc370)

  9. Robot mechanics.
    Job security.

    mg (31009b)

  10. Hey, nk for you:

    Googled Triple Woven Steel Thread –
    About 68,400 results (0.88 seconds)
    Sponsored
    Shop for triple woven steel thread on Google

    Of all the critiques of a metaphor “it does not exist” is pretty weak.

    Steven Malynn (d29fc3)

  11. Link me to one, just one, site that actually has it and is not Google-ad clickbait.

    nk (dbc370)

  12. The point, moreover, is not whether whether we should look for a chimerical thread so we can thrum like it, but whether Dr. Griffiths was using words as a club, to beat a colleague with, and not as a means to express an idea clearly and fairly.

    nk (dbc370)

  13. oh my goodness today’s a sad day for the putin

    Japan Reports Successful Gas Output Test From Methane Hydrate

    Japan’s trade ministry on Monday reported success in producing gas last week by extracting methane gas from methane hydrate deposits offshore Japan’s central coast.

    The tests being run at two different wells are the first since 2013, when Japan achieved the world’s first-ever extraction of gas from offshore deposits of methane hydrate, a frozen gas known as “flammable ice”.

    Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) said the methane hydrate production tests will continue for a combined four to five weeks. Japan’s first methane hydrate tests in 2013 ended abruptly after less than a week due to
    problems with sand flowing into the well.

    this is the clean energy source cory sweetcheeks booker has worked to ban in america

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  14. Miss potter young seems to miss that to the Jews of that era, apocalypse was a real thing.

    narciso (976795)

  15. by resigning Mr. Griffiths kind of mooted the whole argument i think

    fascism wins again

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  16. Sigh. That’s the kind of gang he joined. If he didn’t want to import heroin, he should have stayed with the Corleones at UIC and not joined the Barzinnis at Duke.

    All these stories about academic infighting remind me of the plot of the Godfather. “Hey, Professor, that’s the racket you went into.”

    nk (dbc370)

  17. But I sense more than that here. When our priest of more than thirty years retired, my church hired a divinity school wonder boy. The parish council put up with him as long as it could but finally fired him. In discussions, the word “arrogant” outnumbered all the others.

    I think Griffiths, feeling secure in his Warren chair and his doctorate in Buddhism, felt he could beat up an untenured associate professor and she’d just have to take it. Arrogant.

    nk (dbc370)

  18. Point taken nk, but duke divinity generated mind arson, griffith is one less antivirus program available.

    narciso (976795)

  19. Finished reading the entire exchange. Not once did the leftists mention Jesus, following the Word of God, or His path to salvation. They did not cite Prof. Griffiths words, but instead made accusations that would’ve been dismissed by any rational court.

    That is not a house of God and has no business using the word “divinity” in its name.

    May the Lord wipe them clean and rebuild in His name.

    NJRob (68f3b2)

  20. But I sense more than that here. When our priest of more than thirty years retired, my church hired a divinity school wonder boy. The parish council put up with him as long as it could but finally fired him. In discussions, the word “arrogant” outnumbered all the others.

    I think Griffiths, feeling secure in his Warren chair and his doctorate in Buddhism, felt he could beat up an untenured associate professor and she’d just have to take it. Arrogant.

    nk (dbc370) — 5/9/2017 @ 7:10 am

    Or perhaps he just tired of being told that he and those like him are racist and must be continually reeducated. That only leftist speech is permissible on campus. So he responded calling out this act for what it was… another attempt at indoctrination that has nothing to do with the teaching of the Word.

    NJRob (68f3b2)

  21. Very possible. I read the whole exchange, too, and I agree with the comment of one student that Duke is a “sh!tshow”. We knew that way back with the lacrosse team lynching.

    nk (dbc370)

  22. Was he part of the 88, or not of the body.

    narciso (976795)

  23. I read the entire thing also NJRob and found it to be an example of intellectual assholery, a waste of time and further proof higher education (if you can call it that) needs its funding cut. People who have this much time on their hands and get paid for it are poof modern colleges are no more than vast waste lands.

    Rev.Hoagie® (630eca)

  24. White House Climate Change Meeting Postponed

    this is what happens when you put your special needs super hawt ooh yeah ooh yeah i so bad wanna tap that stripper daughter in charge of policy Mr. President

    lesson learned

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  25. Standing up to bullies is SOP for members of the Patriarchy, but a proud moment, none-the less.

    ThOR (c9324e)

  26. “I read the entire thing also NJRob and found it to be an example of intellectual assholery.”

    – Rev. Hoagie

    Bingo. I was trying to find the right words to describe the whole situation, but that hits the nail on the head for me.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  27. I hesitate to jump in, but once again it saddens me to hear people who aren’t academics talk about academia with great authority and certainty.

    Generally speaking, nk, “associate professors” are tenured. I was one of the few exceptions due to seniority and a new position, until I earned tenure at my current institution (in fact, when I was originally made associate professor here, many of my friends assumed I had tenure). The professor in question was an associate professor in 2012 according to her CV, so it is most unlikely she is not tenured.

    You are welcome to your own opinion, but being a difficult person who disagrees with dogma should not be grounds for punishment and scapegoating, let alone accusations of bigotry.

    Simon Jester (80f908)

  28. We are never getting to Luna federation, at this point, well 2 timothy is always onn point.

    narciso (58ede9)

  29. btw check out this fake news from Associated Press propaganda sluts Catherine Lucey & Michael Biesecker

    The Paris accord, signed by nearly 200 nations in 2015, was never ratified by the Senate due to the staunch oppositions of Republicans.

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  30. U of Toronto Professor Jordan Peterson talks about the individual and how Christianity represented the full flower of the idea that society must be organized around the notion of the sovereign individual. The new religion of racism and whiteness is regressive, and must be stopped.

    https://jordanbpeterson.com/2016/12/new-years-letter/

    Patricia (5fc097)

  31. To Dana’s larger point, I do think that Griffiths was unfairly maligned and seriously wronged. Like Pfau, I find nothing in Griffiths’ statement that could even remotely be said to “express racism, sexism, and other forms of bigotry.”

    That said, Griffiths presented his case very poorly. He was arrogant, as nk indicates, and his assertion that he and his colleagues don’t have the time or the resources to participate in events like these (or even “time to waste,” more broadly) seems to be contradicted by the existing evidence. To that extent, the dean’s statement (that “it is inappropriate and unprofessional to use mass emails to make disparaging statements–including arguments ad hominem–in order to humiliate or undermine individual colleagues or groups of colleagues with whom we disagree”) seems fair enough. But the next sentence from the dean was blatantly ugly, unfair, and coercive.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  32. wha???

    Mr. Leviticus Mr. Griffiths didn’t do any ad hominems on the fascist snowflake hoochie at all. The Dean’s a nasty mendacious fundamentally dishonest sleazer what gets her rocks off on mischaracterizing what other people say and stirring the pot.

    If Mr. Griffiths has broken an actual for reals email policy then she needs to cite the policy, not make crap up.

    Really i don’t see how any of this is even dean twatburger’s business.

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  33. Thank you, Simon, I am always mixing up associate with assistant.

    nk (dbc370)

  34. i can make you some flash cards

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  35. Thank you, happyfeet, but there’d be no end to it. I had to look up hermeneutics, too.

    nk (dbc370)

  36. happyfeet,

    Accusing someone of having an “ideological commitment” to illiberality, totalitarianism, and anti-intellectualism seems like ad hominem to me – particularly insofar as Griffiths had not attended the training (which had not yet occurred), and thus could not comment on its actual content.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  37. Bureaucrats and apparatchiks, too. In the middle of that paragraph, they are fairly understood to mean the people giving the symposium.

    nk (dbc370)

  38. In the red corner, we have Paul Griffiths, keeper of the flame of the mind and defender of intellectualism, thrumming like a tautly triple-woven steel thread with passion for the principled pursuit of truth!

    In the blue corner, we have Anathea Portier-Young, ideologically committed to totalitarianism, waster of time, flunky to bureaucrats and apparatchiks!

    Faculty of Duke Divinity School: The time has come for choosing sides!

    Leviticus (efada1)

  39. symposium = training

    nk (dbc370)

  40. Cross-posted with nk. I was about the say that Griffiths had accused Portier-Young of being a bureaucrat and an apparatchik (for that same reason), but I suspect she wasn’t actually giving the symposium so much as urging her colleagues to attend.

    Her “exhortation” seems fairly innocuous, either way. Don’t want to attend, Griffiths? Too much truth to digest? Too much “trenchant” observation to contribute? Don’t attend. Thrum away in your office or wherever. You don’t need to attack the other professor for wasting everyone’s time, and puff yourself up in the process.

    The guy acted like a dick. It certainly doesn’t justify the response, but it’s part of the equation.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  41. Leviticus (efada1) — 5/9/2017 @ 9:40 am

    Like Pfau, I find nothing in Griffiths’ statement that could even remotely be said to “express racism, sexism, and other forms of bigotry.”

    Anathea Portier-Young was urging (although not requiring) people to attend some kind of workship that was going to lecture people about racism. In Orthodox Jewish terms this would be, lehavdil, something that would give them Mussar and chizuk.

    Paul J. Griffiths termed it a waste of time, and also something that should not be the main concern of the faculty, and outright asked for this event to be failure. Clearly therefore, since he was against something aimed to prevent racism and other bad stuff, that meant (according to her) that he was was for “racism, sexism, and other forms of bigotry.” The logic is impeccable.

    The problem is that Paul Griffiths didn’t tell the truth or underplayed it.

    He didn’t believe that it would beintellectually flaccid with bromides, clichés, and amen-corner rah-rahs in plenty. He thought what they would be saying would be outright wrong: illiberal with totalitarian tendencies, and it was something that needed to be stopped.

    Anathea Portier-Young was urging

    That said, Griffiths presented his case very poorly. He was arrogant, as nk indicates, and his assertion that he and his colleagues don’t have the time or the resources to participate in events like these (or even “time to waste,” more broadly) seems to be contradicted by the existing evidence. To that extent, the dean’s statement (that “it is inappropriate and unprofessional to use mass emails to make disparaging statements–including arguments ad hominem–in order to humiliate or undermine individual colleagues or groups of colleagues with whom we disagree”) seems fair enough. But the next sentence from the dean was blatantly ugly, unfair, and coercive.

    Sammy Finkelman (7b1b59)

  42. 32. Dr. Peterson sounds like he drank too deeply at the New Age springs. At the least, he would need to explain how the individual focus he sees in Christianity meshes with the idea of the Body of Christ/the community of believers/etc–whatever concept you wish to use to refer to the Church.

    As antidote, or counterpoint, this might be helpful
    http://rabbisacks.org/not-in-gods-name/
    If you’ve not read it yet….one of Rabbi Sacks’s themes in the book is the idea that the Bible teaches the need to balance the individual and the community.

    kishnevi (0de685)

  43. That said, Griffiths presented his case very poorly. he was pulling his punches. He knew exactly the kind of stuff they would be saying: We’re all sinners, and we’re sinning in this way, and the “sins” were worse than nonsense, and other people should be stopped and called out out when they sin that way.

    He was arrogant, as nk indicates, and his assertion that he and his colleagues don’t have the time or the resources to participate in events like these (or even “time to waste,” more broadly) seems to be contradicted by the existing evidence. To that extent, the dean’s statement (that “it is inappropriate and unprofessional to use mass emails to make disparaging statements–including arguments ad hominem–in order to humiliate or undermine individual colleagues or groups of colleagues with whom we disagree”) seems fair enough. But the next sentence from the dean was blatantly ugly, unfair, and coercive.

    Well, if someone opposes efforts against sin, they must pro-sin, right?

    Sammy Finkelman (7b1b59)

  44. BTW, I find it slightly absurd that a woman whose name sort of translates as “lack of God” teaches at a Divinity School. But perhaps at Duke such a name is absolutely on point.

    kishnevi (0de685)

  45. i still think it’s a big big stretch to characterize Mr. Griffiths initial email as containing anything of an ad hominem nature

    it’s just push back; it’s not personal at all

    he just thinks this stupid packaged program is going to be a huge waste of time, and an unpleasant waste of time, and he’s probably right

    who wants to spend a weekend bathing in social justice puke and pablum

    you have to remember

    the disease of social justice spreads so easily cause everyone’s afraid to hit reply all and professionally say hey stop cluttering my inbox with your fascist crap you silly bint

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  46. “the disease of social justice spreads so easily cause everyone’s afraid to hit reply all and professionally say hey stop cluttering my inbox with your fascist crap you silly bint”

    – happyfeet

    I’ve acknowledged that saying “hey stop cluttering my inbox with your fascist crap you silly bit” doesn’t make Griffiths a racist or a sexist – it just makes him a dick.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  47. *bint

    My apologies.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  48. maybe we need more dicks like Mr. Griffiths in america

    this is what i’m inclined to think

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  49. Maybe, maybe not. I think we can agree that we certainly need fewer dicks like Elaine Heath and Anathea Portier-Young.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  50. If I’m hankering for amen corner rah-rahs, I just channel surf to whoever is showing Good Times at a particular time.

    And happy, Meghan did right this time against Female Clark Kent.

    urbanleftbehind (99ff92)

  51. Nobody was forcing Griffiths to attend this training. He could have just spent the whole weekend in his office, doggedly pursuing the mission of Duke Divinity, single-mindedly consumed by the fire of thinking, reading, writing, and teaching about the triune Lord of Christian confession, emerging only to relieve himself. But instead he took a potshot at a colleague and got (unfairly!) skeletonized for it.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  52. yes yes

    what a horrible place to work

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  53. An even worse place to learn.

    kishnevi (0de685)

  54. ugh cable news is so hard for me to watch Mr. ulb

    just processing the colors is super taxing

    i like the chick in white she gets it

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  55. Nobody was forcing Griffiths to attend this training.

    I don’t think Griffiths ever claimed he was being forced. The original message strongly urged everyone to attend the training; Griffiths was urging everyone to not attend. If it’s not reasonable for Griffiths to argue against attending, then it’s not reasonable for Portier-Young to argue for attending.

    Chuck Bartowski (bc1c71)

  56. the hoochies involved took a wee small contretemps and turned it into a big ugly white trash social justice hoedown

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  57. Portier-Young’s unsolicited initial missive, by implication, impugns the character of the recipients. Dr. Griffith objects to the insult and the charade of “training” and shares his objections with others who have been similarly impugned. He speaks forthrightly about the dishonesty of political indoctrination masquerading as “training”. How is he the “dick”?

    There is a reflex among some to think that chivalry and graciousness command passivity in the face of bullying. Nonsense. It is just that sort of passivity which has put us in our current position. If more of us would follow Dr. Griffith’s lead and stand up to bullying there would be a lot less of it.

    ThOR (c9324e)

  58. Oh you think you can opt out As some other authority put it’you will not be allowed to be uninvolved’*

    narciso (5577ad)

  59. Who’s being a “snowflake” now? It’s not “bullying” to invite one’s colleagues to attend a training on racial equity and anti-racism, and no – an invitation to said training does not imply that the recipient is a racist.

    Leviticus (cc120d)

  60. Remember the movie ‘ the wave’ based on a real incident in 1967, an allegory about nazism

    narciso (5577ad)

  61. thea’s the snowflake

    dean twatburger’s the tool

    and Mr. Griffiths, he flat out isn’t having none of it

    i can make you flash cards

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  62. But that’s exactly how he is characterized by Heath. Dissenters are bigots, plain and simple. Fall out of line and you will be punished – how is that not bullying?

    ThOR (c9324e)

  63. The authority was Michelle Obama in 2008, this is how Zimmerman became public enemy no 1, ditto the Aig cleanup crew.

    narciso (5577ad)

  64. BTW, reading the full piece I had the impression that Griffiths viewed the impending meeting with the dean as a set up of some sort–either to accuse him afterwards of things he did not say (but would have no evidence or witnesses to back his denial up), or to try to bully him into surrender, in true Cultural Revolution self condemnation style.

    kishnevi (0de685)

  65. Yes, dear lord, YES!

    These training sessions have descended into nothing more or less than political re-education. Not attending is considered a sign of subversive, incorrect behavior. Attending is practically pointless – given overt racism is completely stamped out, oh, and also illegal, it spends its time dictating and noting various micro non-racist behaviors and calling them racism. For example, NOT attending is a sign of racism, as is not fully participating, not agreeing with everything the instructors says, or asking any sorts of questions, especially any that embarrass the person teaching the class. I’ve had to attend more than one of these, and they are intellectually vacuous affairs that everyone feels uncomfortable at – even ethnically diverse students.

    If a person is doing one’s job correctly, they scarcely have time (or need) to engage in racism. I have never met a professional that cared a whit about it in 25 years, being too busy performing their actual jobs to care the color of the person they were working with.

    Tenn (131b65)

  66. I must answer this question: How did Dr. Griffith know the training was a waste of time without first attending it?

    Answer: “On behalf of the Faculty Diversity and Inclusion Standing Committee” and “Racial Equity Institute Phase I Training”. The words used answer the question. Or in more easily understandably words – I don’t have to taste a turd to know I probably won’t care for the flavor.

    Note that it does not trying to make the school “non-racist”. It already is, as are ALL other schools in the United Sates. It is trying to make the school “anti-racist”, which implies some sort of active commitment to root out bad thoughts in people. It implies enlisting people for a cause.

    How much of our students precious money is being flushed down this toilet each and every year? Does anyone even care?

    Tenn (131b65)

  67. This is a lie:

    “Racism is a fierce, ever-present, challenging force, one which has structured the thinking, behavior, and actions of individuals and institutions since the beginning of U.S. history. To understand racism and effectively begin dismantling it requires an equally fierce, consistent, and committed effort”

    That Professor Griffiths responds hostilely to a lie is to his credit.

    nk, here is a link to a triple woven steel product – 100 pages worth. http://ecatalog.hubbell-wiring.com/press/catalog/v.pdf

    Steven Malynn (d29fc3)

  68. “If a person is doing one’s job correctly, they scarcely have time (or need) to engage in racism. I have never met a professional that cared a whit about it in 25 years, being too busy performing their actual jobs to care the color of the person they were working with.”

    – Tenn

    Guess that settles it, then.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  69. “This is a lie.”

    – Steven Malynn

    It’s actually called an “opinion.”

    Leviticus (efada1)

  70. By the way, Griffiths was insulting the REI race-baiters, not the academic cheerleaders for REI.

    Steven Malynn (d29fc3)

  71. it’s very very dangerous to have an opinion at a university anymore

    best to stick with lies

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  72. Leviticus, that paragraph I quoted is from the course syllabus at issue – it is intellectually dishonest to claim REI is stating an opinion – it is proselytizing their view of reality.

    There is a difference (however small) between “I think you are a racist” and “you are a racist”.

    One is a statement of personal perception, the other claims to be a statement of objective fact.

    Hiding behind “but its just an opinion” is garbage. And I’ll be so arrogant as to claim, the uselessness of such hiding is a fact, not an opinion.

    Steven Malynn (d29fc3)

  73. Claim whatever you want. I’m not hiding behind anything. Reasonable minds may differ.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  74. not at duke they can’t

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  75. Since he was able to spare a few moments and tear himself away, however laboriously, from his all-consuming passion for his work to respond to his peer’s invitation, Griffiths might have simply questioned the need for such a training at DDS – thus shifting the burden to Portier-Young and her cohort to explain why such a training was needed.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  76. “not at duke they can’t”

    – happyfeet

    Well, nobody likes Duke anyway.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  77. Again: I agree with the overall point, that this guy got railroaded and that incidents like this are becoming way, way too common, especially on university campuses. It’s extremely scary how little respect the left has for the principles of free speech anymore.

    But it’s hard to sympathize with the guy because he did, at the outset, act like a dick.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  78. it may seem like he acted like a dick but this could’ve been the proverbial straw

    in context it could just as easily be that he showed remarkable restraint and self-mastery

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  79. Certainly possible. We don’t know all the facts, of course.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  80. The dean’s letter references Griffiths’ “inappropriate behavior in faculty meetings over the past two years,” but she cannot be relied on as a source, I don’t think.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  81. “I’ve acknowledged that saying “hey stop cluttering my inbox with your fascist crap you silly bit” doesn’t make Griffiths a racist or a sexist – it just makes him a dick.”

    There were a lot of dead dicks in the Soviet Union.

    harkin (65fb70)

  82. No, he acted, at the outset, angry.

    According to him, he has put up with a years worth of “Diversity” proselytizing, and he was a vocal public opponent of the Diversity training, and assumption of racism. That his colleague spammed him with an exhortation to attend that which he found odious was the woman being a jerk.

    Steven Malynn (d29fc3)

  83. @ Leviticus,

    Again: I agree with the overall point, that this guy got railroaded and that incidents like this are becoming way, way too common, especially on university campuses. It’s extremely scary how little respect the left has for the principles of free speech anymore.

    But it’s hard to sympathize with the guy because he did, at the outset, act like a dick./blockquote>In matters of speech, it shouldn’t matter one whit whether he was behaving like a “dick” or not. Clearly Griffiths knew that he was playing with fire, and apparently he believed the risk was worth it:

    Heath asked to meet with Griffiths, according to the emails, but the professor and administrator couldn’t agree on the conditions for the meeting, and it never happened.

    Griffiths later emailed his colleagues with the subject line: “intellectual freedom and institutional discipline” at the school. He said he was now the target of two separate disciplinary proceedings, including a harassment complaint by Portier-Young, which was being handled by Duke’s Office for Institutional Equity. The dean, he said, had banned him from faculty meetings and promised that he would not receive future funds for research and travel.

    Heath cited Griffiths’ refusal to meet and his “inappropriate behavior in faculty meetings over the past two years.” Heath did not elaborate on what she meant by inappropriate behavior.

    Griffiths called the actions shameful “reprisals,” designed not to engage him on his views “but rather to discipline me for having expressed them.”

    “Duke Divinity is now a place in which too many thoughts can’t be spoken and too many disagreements remain veiled because of fear,” he wrote to the faculty. “I commend a renunciation of fear-based discipline to those who deploy and advocate it, and its replacement with confidence in speech.”

    Interesting to note that Heath is relatively new to the position as the Dean of DDS:

    A celebration to honor the inaugural year of the deanship of Elaine A. Heath will be held on Thursday, April 20. The event will begin with the 2017 Closing Convocation worship service for Duke Divinity School, which will be held at 11:25 a.m. in Duke Chapel. A community lunch will follow the service and will be served in the Divinity Café.

    A panel discussion will take place in Goodson Chapel at 2:30 p.m., focused on the theme “Calling the Church to Prophetic Witness.” Dean Heath will moderate this conversation about how to empower the church for prophetic ministry, spiritual formation and direction, Christian and justice activism, and the interconnectedness of Standing Rock and the environment.

    Dana (023079)

  84. Dean Heath practices “justice activism.” Oh joy.

    Steven Malynn (d29fc3)

  85. “Justice activism” sounds like something a leftist repeats over and over as he masturbates.

    Rev.Hoagie® (630eca)

  86. It’s amazing how few words of Jesus Christ are actually quoted in the Bible, yet he said so much compared to how many words these enlightened leftists use to say so little.

    Rev.Hoagie® (630eca)

  87. “In matters of speech, it shouldn’t matter one whit whether he was behaving like a “dick” or not.”

    – Dana

    It shouldn’t matter one whit as to our assessment of his right to speak without reprisal, but it may certainly affect levels of sympathy.

    Leviticus (efada1)

  88. Steven Malynn (d29fc3) — 5/9/2017 @ 12:34 pm

    I am aware of the existence of steel cables, Steven. I have even used them, from my motorcycles to my guitars. “Tautly triple-woven steel thread” is what we’re looking for. That thrums.

    nk (dbc370)

  89. 19 – “I think Griffiths, feeling secure in his Warren chair and his doctorate in Buddhism, felt he could beat up an untenured associate professor and she’d just have to take it. Arrogant.”

    Beat up? Seriously??

    Alinsky 101 – declare disagreement to be violence.

    harkin (9803a7)

  90. Did the training session even happen? Given Prof. Griffiths predictable (but correct) response, this seems like the perfect trap. The switch from Buddhism to Catholicism gives me pause. I had not seen such a rapid conversion since a Catholic sister teaching at my parish elementary school who agitated for woman priesthood suddenly converted to Judaism, likely so she could be a rabbi.

    urbanleftbehind (847a06)

  91. I don’t know if anyone’s bothered to look at the background of the SJW activist masquerading as a divinity teacher, and this is her alleged expertise:

    Her other research interests include the book of Genesis and its interpretation, constructions of identity, gender, and ethnicity, and traditions of violence and nonviolence in Old Testament and other early Jewish literature.

    And then there’s the SJW pretending to be a Dean.

    Her other publications include Missional.Monastic.Mainline (co-authored with Larry Duggins, 2014), The Mystic Way of Evangelism (2008), Naked Faith: The Mystical Theology of Phoebe Palmer (2009), Longing for Spring: A New Vision for Wesleyan Communities (co-authored with Scott Kisker, 2010), We Were the Least of These: Reading the Bible with Survivors of Sexual Abuse (2011), and The Gospel According to Twilight: Women, Sex, and God (2011).

    NJRob (68f3b2)

  92. Sigh. More moderation. Release please.

    NJRob (68f3b2)

  93. nk, Griffiths wrote a mixed metaphor to incorporate the concept of the trinity to something stronger for being triune – woven steel thread. That you don’t like the metaphor – because in practice steel cables don’t “thrum” (unless you are on a suspension bridge during a windy day) – is a different critique than “they don’t exist.”

    Griffiths is calling a Divinity School to be zealous towards the theology of the church, not the proselytization of the race industry – everyone who reads his e-mail gets it, except those who wish to call him a racist.

    Steven Malynn (d29fc3)

  94. Well said Mr. Malynn.

    NJRob (68f3b2)

  95. And you don’t think his use of language was just as mangled as the “intellectually flaccid” “bromides, clichés, and amen-corner rah-rahs” used by the “ignoble”, “illiberal” and “totalitarian” “bureaucrats and apparatchiks”. Ok.

    And triple-woven steel thread does not exist. Steel cables and strings that thrum do, and possibly even in triple-woven (as distinguished from triple-wound or three-braided) form. 😉

    nk (dbc370)

  96. No, nk, I don’t think the spur of the moment e-mailed metaphor was “flaccid” intellectually or otherwise. I do think you are nitpicking, and that the nitpicking is in place to obscure the message Griffiths was imparting.

    A metaphor does not need to refer to an actual existing object, to be effective. Else why use unicorns in one’s mocks?

    Steven Malynn (d29fc3)

  97. Dr. Griffiths obscured his own message by the same abuse of language he criticized, is what my nitpick is. He did not use words to communicate, he used them to attack, reducing his message to pedantic (it does not deserve to be called erudite) invective.

    nk (dbc370)

  98. But the part you are complaining about was not the “attack.”

    Again, the attack was just, and not pedantic.

    Are you saying that there is value in telling a divinity school they are all racists who must repent?

    Steven Malynn (d29fc3)

  99. Maybe this guy can succeed where I have failed: http://www.orwell.ru/library/essays/politics/english/e_polit/

    nk (dbc370)

  100. Yep, Orwell was never pedantic. lol.

    Steven Malynn (d29fc3)

  101. Still in moderation

    NJRob (222439)

  102. I’ll keep checking back NJRob.

    Steven Malynn (d29fc3)

  103. All I did was quite the 2 leftists official profiles. Apparently that deserves permanent moderation. The links are o their sites about their interests and expertise being about the social justice feminist aspects of the Bible and connecting the Bible to the works of fiction in Twilight.

    Real intellectual heavyweights here.

    NJRob (68f3b2)

  104. Quote*

    NJRob (68f3b2)

  105. NJRob,

    I didn’t see it in moderation, but let me look again.

    Dana (023079)

  106. Ty. 10:05pm

    NJRob (68f3b2)

  107. NJRob,

    I didn’t see a comment from you in the moderation queue . I checked the spam filter too. Maybe JVW or Patterico will be able to find it.

    Dana (023079)

  108. I don’t know if anyone’s bothered to look at the background of the SJW activist masquerading as a divinity teacher, and this is her alleged expertise:

    Her other research interests include the book of Genesis and its interpretation, constructions of identity, gender, and ethnicity, and traditions of violence and nonviolence in Old Testament and other early Jewish literature.

    And then there’s the SJW pretending to be a Dean.

    Her other publications include Missional.Monastic.Mainline (co-authored with Larry Duggins, 2014), The Mystic Way of Evangelism (2008), Naked Faith: The Mystical Theology of Phoebe Palmer (2009), Longing for Spring: A New Vision for Wesleyan Communities (co-authored with Scott Kisker, 2010), We Were the Least of These: Reading the Bible with Survivors of Sexual Abuse (2011), and The Gospel According to Twilight: Women, Sex, and God (2011).

    NJRob (68f3b2) — 5/9/2017 @ 10:05 pm Your comment is awaiting moderation.

    NJRob (68f3b2)

  109. No clue. I just posted it in full and there it is. But there’s the moderation remark as well.

    NJRob (68f3b2)

  110. Doesn’t have my quotes or bold for formatting, but you get the drift.

    NJRob (68f3b2)

  111. I linked porter young’s cv at the top of the tread, it is the kind of category error, redolent on Vonnegut in back to school.

    narciso (ba108c)

  112. NJRob,

    I just have no idea why WordPress would moderate your comment as written.

    Dana (023079)

  113. The dean obviously did not learn the proper lessons from Phoebe Palmer
    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoebe_Palmer

    kishnevi (a77570)

  114. I admit I wasn’t aware of phoebe Palmer, but it is disturbing she is imparting such terrible category error, then again it is duke.

    narciso (ba108c)

  115. No clue either Dana.

    Hopefully just a random glitch.

    It is instructional that this is happening at Duke… yet again.

    NJRob (68f3b2)


Powered by WordPress.

Page loaded in: 0.1502 secs.