Let’s make sure my cancellation is the last. That begins by standing up and saying no to the mob.
Dorian Abbot, October 5, 2021
I am a professor who just had a prestigious public science lecture at MIT
cancelled because of an outrage mob on Twitter. My crime? Arguing for
academic evaluations based on academic merit. This is the story of how a
cancellation is carried out, why it should worry all of us, and what we
can do to stop this dangerous trend.
I
have been a professor in the Department of the Geophysical Sciences at
the University of Chicago for the past 10 years. I work on topics
ranging from climate change to the possibility of life on extrasolar
planets using mathematics, physics, and computer simulation.
I have never considered myself a political person. For example, a few days before an election I go to
ISideWith.com
and answer the policy questions, then I assign my vote using a weighted
draw based on my overlap with the candidates. It’s an efficient
algorithm that works perfectly for a nerd like me.
But
I started to get alarmed about five years ago as I noticed an
increasing number of issues and viewpoints become impossible to discuss
on campus. I mostly just wanted to do my science and not have anyone
yell at me, and I thought that if I kept my mouth shut the problem would
eventually go away. I knew that speaking out would likely bring serious
reputational and professional consequences. And for a number of years I
just didn’t think it was worth it.
But
the street violence of the summer of 2020, some of which I witnessed
personally in Chicago, and the justifications and dishonesty that
accompanied it, convinced me that I could no longer remain silent in
good conscience.
In the fall of 2020 I started advocating openly for academic freedom and merit-based evaluations. I recorded some short YouTube videos in which I argued for the importance of treating each person as an
individual worthy of dignity and respect. In an academic context, that
means giving everyone a fair and equal opportunity when they apply for a
position as well as allowing them to express their opinions openly,
even if you disagree with them.
As a result, I was immediately targeted for
cancellation
, primarily by a group of graduate students in my department. Whistleblowers later
revealed
that the attack was partially planned and coordinated on the Ford
Foundation Fellowship Program listserv by a graduate student in my
department. (Please do not attack this person or any of the people who
attacked me.)
That group of graduate students organized a letter of denunciation.
It claimed that I threatened the “safety and belonging of all
underrepresented groups within the department,” and it was presented to
my department chair. The letter demanded that my teaching and research
be restricted in a way that would cripple my ability to function as a
scientist. A strong
statement in support of faculty free expression by University of Chicago
President Robert Zimmer put an end to that, and that is where things
stood until the summer of 2021.
On August 12, a colleague and I wrote an
op-ed in Newsweek
in which we argued that Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) as it
currently is implemented on campus “violates the ethical and legal
principle of equal treatment” and “treats persons as merely means to an
end, giving primacy to a statistic over the individuality of a human
being.” We proposed instead “an alternative framework called Merit,
Fairness, and Equality (MFE) whereby university applicants are treated
as individuals and evaluated through a rigorous and unbiased process
based on their merit and qualifications alone.” We noted that this would
mean an end to legacy and athletic admission advantages, which
significantly favor white applicants.
Shortly
thereafter, my detractors developed a new strategy to try to isolate me
and intimidate everyone else into silence: They argued on Twitter that
I should not be invited to give science seminars at other universities and
coordinated replacement speakers.
This is an effective and increasingly common way to ratchet up the cost
of dissenting because disseminating new work to colleagues is an
important part of the scientific endeavor.
Sure enough, this strategy was employed when I was chosen to give the Carlson Lecture at MIT
— a major honor in my field. It is an annual public talk given to a
large audience and my topic was “climate and the potential for life on
other planets.” On September 22, a new Twitter mob, composed of a group
of MIT students, postdocs, and recent alumni,
demanded that I be uninvited
It worked. And quickly...........To Read More.....
