April 24, 2008

$250,000 Prize Awarded to Penn Professor, a Fierce Critic of Speech Codes

Alan Charles Kors, a historian at the University of Pennsylvania who has been a longtime scourge of political correctness, speech codes, and other issues in higher education, has been awarded a $250,000 prize by the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation. The citation for the Bradley Prize, to be presented in June, recognizes Mr. Kors as both a scholar of European intellectual history and a defender of free speech.

Mr. Kors drew notice in 1998 as a co-author of The Shadow University: The Betrayal of Liberty on America’s Campuses, a withering attack on “campus Stalinists” bent on enforcing left-wing views. He and his co-author, Harvey A. Silverglate, subsequently founded an organization dedicated to protecting what they described as victims of political correctness. The group, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, or FIRE, has since made a name for itself as an outspoken critic of campus speech codes and advocate for people said to have violated the codes. —Andrew Mytelka

Comments

1. Great book, great man. You are correct in calling Kors “a longtime scourge of [practitioners of] political correctness, speech codes,” etc. He has been highly effective, because he’s smart and he’s right and because no pliant liberal has ever said, “I will not be scourged! I am samurai!” (Thank you, James Clavell.)

   — S. Britchky    Apr 24, 01:48 PM    #

2. A right-wing foundation gives a lot of money to a right-wing professor.

   And this is news… why, exactly?

   (FIRE is great… as long as you’re espousing conservative views. If you’re a liberal, they’re not interested in helping you.)

   — MS    Apr 24, 02:09 PM    #

3. Ooh, Aah; more civility in academe!

   — rm    Apr 24, 03:56 PM    #

4. It is interesting that no attempt is made to characterize the foundation making the award. Does the Pioneer Fund still exist?

   — Droste    Apr 24, 04:16 PM    #

5. Whatever the political leanings of the professor, foundation, or respondents, the fact is I HATE political correctness. Why must we always be offended? I’m a garbageman and I’m darned proud of it. :o)

   — Michael    Apr 24, 04:25 PM    #

6. Euphemism as a cultural and political precept is an American invention. PC is a conspicuous emanation of it. How can anyone be victimized by it?

   — Faridoun Farrokh    Apr 24, 04:35 PM    #

7. The older I get, the more of a First Amendment absolutist I become. This is welcome news.

   I don’t believe MS’ characterisation of FIRE is correct, incidentally. The organisation spoke out in defence of Ward Churchill’s right to describe the victims of 9/11 as “little Eichmanns” without being sanctioned by his employers (though not his right to commit academic misconduct); the student journalists at Colorado State who were penalised for an editorial declaring “F*** Bush”; the individual at Columbia who expressed the hope that as many American soldiers in Iraq as possible would be killed; and numerous others whose views could not by any stretch of the imagination be described as “conservative.”

   — Gustave    Apr 24, 04:36 PM    #

8. Both MS and Droste ‘argue’ by labeling individuals and organizations. Obviously, once so-labeled, they assume, the argument is over and all right-thinking readers will abhor the individual, the organization and the prize.

   The type of knee-jerk required should be repudiated by all who decide issues based on evidence and argument. Such rhetorical attempts to short-circuit thought are reprehensible and only add noise to the conversation.

   — arnold asrelsky    Apr 24, 05:45 PM    #

9. Some one called me bald the other day and I was very offended. I am not bald, I am follicularly challenged.

   — Jason    Apr 24, 06:55 PM    #

10. Its always interesting to see how politically correct the correctors of political correctedness are…. “all MEN are created equal” meant almost exactly what it said (well, not African men….)

    — BE!    Apr 24, 11:49 PM    #

11. This should be entitled, “The Rip Van Winkle” award. Time to get your bow-ties pressed and polish up your two-step: those who rage against PC are quite over the hill (I presume the rest of their time is spent raging against the deleterious effects of the gramophone).

    — Margaret Fuller    Apr 25, 07:16 AM    #

12. Several feminist bloggers recently posted that my university should be subject to Title IX sanctions because of a bit of anti-feminist satire I posted on a personal blog. While your systers are out gunning for anyone who questions the new orthodoxy, Dr. Fuller, PC will need to be challenged.

    Congratulations to Alan Kors.

    — Gerard Harbison    Apr 25, 08:22 AM    #

13. I’d like to thank Arnold for his insipid rant in elaboration of my brief statement. Am I to assume, therefore, he is acquainted with both the subject foundation and the Pioneer Fund?

    — Droste    Apr 25, 09:19 AM    #

14. Arnold nailed them: MS and Droste demonstrate that people offer guilt-by-association as a valid argument simply because they don’t have any better ones. Alan Charles Kors is not “right wing” by any reasonable definition, and never has been (look him up!) but is characterized as such by the leftishly inclined because he does not kowtow to left-wing orthodoxy, as they do. FIRE, as Gustave usefully points out, is not ideological in its choice of cases; if more of them concern conservative students, that’s because in the current academic climate, administrators disproportionately use speech codes to target conservative students. MS could have looked it up before flailing about.
    As for Droste’s obsession with the Pioneer Fund, he’s arguing guilt-by-non-association. Kors is a historian. The Pioneer Fund supports research in genetics and related fields, and its grantees are among the most widely cited authorities in their fields. Of course, genetics is very politically incorrect. Where did Droste do his research, Rolling Stone?

    — Linda Seebach    Apr 25, 12:07 PM    #

15. And an association with Rolling Stone would make me guilty of what, Linda? Perhaps I should search for a “reasonable definition” of guilt by association that would simply provide an opportunity to use a definition supporting my position, as Linda aptly demonstrates. Mr. Kors in a fine historian and a conservative. It is not “bad” to call him conservative, but it is accurate. Do his fans feel that identifying him as conservative will associate him with topics and individuals about which they feel guilt? Guilt by association, like other forms of stereotyping, is an unfortunate but inevitable short cut in the human thinking process when one does not have all the information. So enough already!

    Be careful to practice what you preach…at least in your adjoining sentences!

    — Droste    Apr 25, 01:16 PM    #

16. To those who “hate” political correctness, I would argue that virtually everyone practices PC in speech, which is essentially speech that seeks to consciously avoid offending. If we think of PC in speech as an attempt to not perpetuate the marginalization of certain people/groups by getting rid of words that are associated with that marginalization, how can that be seen as anything other than admirable? Now, the manipulative or power-mongering purposes for which this principle has been corrupted are a different matter, but to say that one hates PC in speech is naive at best. Then again, some might feel perfectly fine about bringing back “cripple,” “darkie,” “mental retard,” and “Mr. and Mrs. John Doe.” There might be a lot of votes for the latter…

    — Philip Gaines    Apr 25, 03:45 PM    #

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