By An Old Friend
Fri, Mar 26, 2021 3:14 a.m.Glenn Reynolds: Punching Back at the Woke Works [brief]
AOF: If it comes to this, I favor physically punching, too.
How to beat the woke: Never apologize, rally friends and punch back harder
Americans hate woke culture, as I noted in these pages not too long ago. Black, white, Republican and Democrat, a large majority of Americans oppose it. Even people like former President Barack Obama, Bill Maher and ultra-liberal comedienne Sarah Silverman hate it (Maher calls it "Stalinist").
But it keeps going. Why is that? And what can you do about it — especially if you or someone you are close to comes under attack? In short, it keeps going because it's easy and fun — and you have to make it less so.
Lesson one: Don't panic — and don't give in. Ian Prior, of Loudoun County, Va., publishes The Daily Malarkey, an Internet humor site that goes after what he calls the "Chardonnay Antifa." As he recently recounted to Fox News, after he published an op-ed attacking political correctness, he found himself on the sharp end of woke attacks led by a group of teachers, administrators, and woke citizens.
According to news reports, the Loudoun Stalinists put together a list of people opposing their policies and planned to "hack" them, "expose" them and "infiltrate" them. Did Prior chicken out?
No. He called them out, he mocked them, and he made sure the whole thing got as much attention as possible. Now there's a criminal investigation into the group. The publicity not only generated blowback against the people who targeted him, it also brought in lots of new subscribers to The Daily Malarkey. Win-win.
Learn from this. Never apologize, don't act afraid, and, to borrow a phrase from Obama, "punch back twice as hard." Call the mob out for what it is: a bunch of bad people trying to pretend they stand for something moral. Going after people for their political views this way isn't an act of morality. It's an attempt at political terrorism, and it's un-American.
The second lesson: Stick together. The woke mob tries to isolate its victims and to make others afraid to stand up for them. Instead, it's important to ask for help from friends and potential supporters, if you're a target, and to offer it to the targets if you're on the sidelines. Solidarity.
This is what's going on with the University of San Diego Law School, whose dean shamefully capitulated to an absurd student campaign against a professor who did nothing wrong. In a post on his personal blog, Professor Thomas Smith said that those who dismiss the possibility that the Wuhan coronavirus escaped from a lab there were "swallowing whole a set of Chinese" — and here he used an scatological phrase meaning, in effect, "balderdash."
He was, of course, referring to the Chinese regime's denials, which are facing growing scientific skepticism.
Asian students complained — preposterously — that this was somehow a racist slur against Chinese people, rather than a criticism of the brutal Communist regime. Rather than telling them that, as law students, they needed to work on their reading skills, Dean Robert Schapiro issued a craven response, suggesting that there was some basis to the complaints. In an e-mail to the law-school community, he charged Smith with "bias" and with using "offensive" language and announced an investigation.
But here's where the story changes. Some of the most eminent faculty members at the law school — including such big names as Larry Alexander, Maimon Schwarzschild, Steve Smith, Chris Wonnell and Gail Heriot — fired back at Schapiro. They wrote: "We are concerned that treating these complaints the way you are doing validates student reactions and strained interpretations that are misguided, that reflect a lack of critical thinking and that will chill faculty members' teaching and scholarship."
But here's where the story changes. Some of the most eminent faculty members at the law school — including such big names as Larry Alexander, Maimon Schwarzschild, Steve Smith, Chris Wonnell and Gail Heriot — fired back at Schapiro. They wrote: "We are concerned that treating these complaints the way you are doing validates student reactions and strained interpretations that are misguided, that reflect a lack of critical thinking and that will chill faculty members' teaching and scholarship."
Then outside groups got involved, including various organizations that fight for free inquiry and free speech on campus. These included the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, which sues universities over such things. FIRE demanded that the university "immediately cease" its investigation of Smith.
[N.S.: FIRE didn't used to engage in litigation. Has something changed, or did Reynolds err?]
It's a bad week for Dean Schapiro. And that's lesson three. University and corporate bosses give into the woke because it's painless and easier than fighting them. Make it painful and difficult instead, and they'll change their ways. Take this to heart. The sane can win.
Glenn Harlan Reynolds is a professor of law at the University of Tennessee and founder of the InstaPundit.com blog.
3 comments:
WHITE,BASKETBALL REF WILLIAM RIPPLE PLEADS "NOT GUILTY" AT ARRAIGNMENT
(WZZMTV)MUSKEGON, Mich — A referee who was charged with assault, accused of putting his hands on and pushing a Muskegon basketball coach, has entered a not guilty plea.
Referee William Glenn Ripple, 69, was arraigned via Zoom Thursday by Muskegon County District Judge Geoffrey Nolan. Ripple posted a $1,000 bond and the District Court is scheduling a pretrial for April.
The charges stem from an incident at a high school basketball game last week. Video showed Ripple putting his hands on Muskegon coach Keith Guy’s chest late in a boys basketball game against Zeeland East.
The MHSAA said in a statement Monday that it does not condone any official making intentional contact with a coach:
"The MHSAA takes these incidents seriously. The official involved will be notified of the penalty once the investigation has been completed. We do not share penalties released for players, coaches or officials, although we believe officials should be held to the same standards and consequences that a coach would face if the circumstances were reversed."
Ripple was later suspended by the MHSAA.
GRA:As I said previously--Ripple's hand action was not a shove--but what Michael Drejka received from Markeis McGlockton WAS a shove.I describe Ripple's contact as somewhere between a pat and a nudge.
NOT ASSAULT.
And we still don't know what was said between Ripple and Guy.
--GRA
There is a long-practiced trick in basketball: if an opponent makes contact with you, you go flying backwards in the hopes that a referee will declare it a foul and you can go to the free-throw line. Looks like this coach was trying to practice this deception outside the game as well. Of course blacks have a long history of playing victim. One such black trick is to go for an interview with a small business. When they are not hired, they threaten a discrimination suit and try to get a settlement from the business. Of course big shot black leaders practice the same scam against big business and have been outrageously successful.
Stop apologizing. Say NO. Turn you back on them and say go to hell.
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