McCarthyism Is Well and Alive

"The fact is that you will never get agreement on such matters of opinion, and no university teacher I know seeks such agreement. The point of teaching a course is to expose students to ideas and arguments that are new to them and to help them think critically about controversial issues. Nothing pleases teachers more than to see students craft their own, original arguments, based on solid evidence, that dispute the point of view presented in class lectures. That is why the New York Times editorial is so wrong, and so dangerous. University teaching is not about fairness, and there is no body capable of imposing 'fair' views on teachers. It is about provoking students to think analytically and synthetically, and to reason on their own. In the assigned texts, in class discussion, and in lectures, the students are exposed to a wide range of views, whether fair or unfair.

Elected bodies throughout the United States, dominated by the Christian right, are now considering radical programs such as imposing the teaching of 'intelligent design' in biology classes, or abolishing academic tenure (the practice of not firing professors for their views). Even Congress has succumbed to the pressure: The House of Representatives passed an outrageous bill, HR 3077, mandating that area studies programs that receive federal money must 'foster debate on American foreign policy from diverse perspectives' -- a heavy-handed attempt to mandate pedagogy that supports the American administration in power and supports Israeli policies uncritically.

The New York Times is a bastion of liberalism and Enlightenment values in an increasingly hysterical and intolerant time. But it has lent this burgeoning movement legitimacy by calling for official oversight of views in the classroom. Its editors should stop to consider that any society that censors Joseph Massad's teaching is unlikely to stop there. The next step will be to censor the newspapers as well. 'Unfair,' 'liberal' "

The new McCarthyism