Michael Bloom

Wow, they turned my 293 page book into a 7 minute video! This is a really compelling telling of how the phone-based childhood replaced the play-based childhood, and what we must do now. Thanks @kiteandkeymedia! @LetGrowOrg

How to reduce antisemitism on campus: In 2018, Andrew Sullivan (@sullydish) warned that "we all live on campus now." He described the identitarianism that had captured elite schools, and he correctly predicted that it would soon spread beyond campus and change society in ways that make liberal democracy more difficult: "When elite universities shift their entire worldview away from liberal education as we have long known it toward the imperatives of an identity-based “social justice” movement, the broader culture is in danger of drifting away from liberal democracy as well. If elites believe that the core truth of our society is a system of interlocking and oppressive power structures based around immutable characteristics like race or sex or sexual orientation, then sooner rather than later, this will be reflected in our culture at large. What matters most of all in these colleges — your membership in a group that is embedded in a hierarchy of oppression — will soon enough be what matters in the society as a whole." In Sullivan's most recent post, he shows the direct causal path between campus identitarianism and the new wave of campus antisemitism: "Freedom of speech in the Ivy League extends exclusively to the voices of the oppressed; they are also permitted to disrupt classes, deplatform or shout down controversial speakers, hurl obscenities, force members of oppressor groups — i.e. Jewish students and teachers in the latest case — into locked libraries and offices during protests, and blocked from classrooms. Jewish students have even been assaulted — at Harvard, at Columbia, at UMass Amherst, at Tulane. Assaults by woke students used to be rare, such as the 2017 mob at Middlebury that put Allison Stanger in a neck brace — but since 10/7, they’re intensifying. If a member of an oppressor class says something edgy, it is a form of violence. If a member of an oppressed class commits actual violence, it’s speech. That’s why many Harvard students instantly supported a fundamentalist terror cult that killed, tortured, systematically raped and kidnapped Jews just for being Jews in their own country. Because they have been taught it’s the only moral position to take. They’ve diligently read their Fanon, and must be puzzled over what the problem is. Palestinians are victims of a “colonial,” “white,” “settler-state” and any violence they commit is thereby justified." tinyurl.com/kanr7yxc In other words: The only way to end antisemitism on campus is to end the identitarianism. Don't be satisfied by a university president who promises a new center or commission on antisemitism. It won't have much effect on campus culture as long as a critical mass of students (5-10%?) are taught to see everything through oppressor/victim glasses, in which "punching up" is virtuous, even when the punching is not metaphorical. And if these new centers try to incorporate Jews as a new victim class, as some of them will, it will just make things worse, and it will harm Jewish students. Young people who embrace identitarianism become disempowered, depressed, and difficult to work with. Sullivan's prescription is much more challenging than just endowing another center: "End DEI in its entirety. Fire all the administrators whose only job is to enforce its toxic orthodoxy. Admit students on academic merit alone. Save standardized testing — which in fact helps minorities, and it’s “the best way to distinguish smart poor kids from stupid rich kids,” as Steven Pinker said this week. Restore grading so that it actually means something again. Expel students who shut or shout down speech or deplatform speakers. Pay no attention to the race or sex or orientation or gender identity of your students, and see them as free human beings with open minds. Treat them equally as individuals seeking to learn, if you can remember such a concept." Whether or not you agree with all of these measures, I think Sullivan's insight is the key to getting this right: Antisemitism will sprout wherever the soil supports it. It always has, it always will. The spores are everywhere, especially in the age of TikTok. The cure is to change the properties of the soil, not just to plant a new center for the study of antisemitism in soil that is fertile ground for antisemitism. I expect that the Ivies will implement only superficial measures, to placate donors. But please don't give up on the entire higher ed sector. The cultural revolution that swept across the academy in 2015-2016 may have met its Waterloo last Tuesday, in that congressional hearing room. Now is the time to support schools that break from the pack, under bold leadership. Now is the time to support organizations that are supporting reforms and reformers. The outlook for higher ed is dark right now, and trust in the sector continues to fall. But I am excited by the new possibilities for major change that have opened up in the last week.

Timur is right. The reason why universities lost legitimacy so quickly after 2015 is that they embraced identitarianism, which is offensive to the great majority of Americans who believe in equal rights, equal opportunity, and e pluribus unum.