America’s Educational System Is Experiencing a “Mass Psychosis”

David Barnhizer

The assault on the university and America’s entire educational system has been unfolding for decades. Until recently it had been a largely stealth process where most Americans never even knew what was going on. University faculty were thought of as being among the most intelligent and intellectually balanced members of our society. They were “egg heads” and deep “thinkers” after truth, immersed in knowledge creation and learning. They were supposed to be divorced from raw politics, not advancing Identity agendas that were often highly personal to them and thus deeply subjective.

Above all, university faculty and administrators were never supposed to be one-sided activists. That doesn’t mean they avoid any discussion of key social issues. But is does mean that they don’t prejudge, or do biased teaching and research that fits into their personal political agendas while concealing their intent behind a mask of intellectual prestige and pretension. We assumed they were imparting their special intellectual and analytical skills, knowledge, methods and balanced perspectives to university students. As discussed in my 2024 book, Conformity Colleges: The Destruction of Intellectual Creativity and Dissent in America’s Universities, we were wrong.

We also trusted our K-12 teachers, administrators, and boards to be wise and dedicated professionals rather than Woke ideologues. Once again, we were wrong. As is detailed in my 2021 book, “Un-Canceling” America, many teachers and educational administrators are working to “destabilize” and transform their students, educational institutions, and America itself. Numerous examples are set out in “Un-Canceling” America of administrators telling teachers to “keep on with what they had been doing to advance a Woke agenda and Critical Race Theory themes”, but to hide that agenda from parents.

As “Un-Canceling” America demonstrates through numerous examples, Woke K-12 teachers bragged about their activism and the fact that they were turning young children into Woke activists who would advance their agenda. Their comments read like little children thrilled at being able to “put one over” on their own parents.

Elite Universities Are a Driving Force, but K-12 Education is a “Critical” Target Because That is When Children Are Most Vulnerable and Susceptible

In the K-12 system, teachers are dealing with highly suggestive children whose minds are still developing. Many are vulnerable, anxious, and in the early phases of trying to understand the world into which they have been thrust. They see teachers as strong, caring, and nurturing authority figures. For such young people, ideological systems such as Critical Race Theory can be perceived as powerful and prophetic, regardless of how CRT is restated for political purposes. The practitioners of Wokeism, CRT, and Radical Progressivism—like the earlier European “Deconstructionists” to whom they owe allegiance—use continually shifting landscapes made up of “big” words that can be made to mean anything the advocates choose.

This manipulation of powerful and moralistic constructs establishes control and creates what philosopher Eric Hoffer called “true believers.” Hoffer, in The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements (1951), described how the “fault finding man of words” attacks a dominant orthodoxy in order to undermine its perceived legitimacy and hold on power. This is one function of the intellectual, but due to the combination of naivete and self-interest, few intellectual “prophets” have the experience or wisdom needed to prepare for what occurs after they have helped others gain power.

Francois Furet, for example, describes the treatment of intellectuals under Soviet Marxism, a situation in which the Marxist revolutionaries had first relied on such intellectuals to create cracks in the defenses of the existing political system in Europe and Russia. In Russia, following the 1917 Revolution, the newly installed Soviet Marxists either co-opted the intellectuals into becoming state propagandists, exiled or executed them if it was determined they posed a danger to the State. See, Francois Furet, The Passing of an Illusion: The Idea of Communism in the Twentieth Century (1999).

The problem is that once in power, revolutionary ideologues who base their crusades on claims of hate, oppression, injustice, and inequity, always themselves become the “Oppressors.” The Soviet Marxists ruthlessly suppressed independent thought and subverted the less conscientious or more cowardly intellectuals into serving the ends of the totalitarian state. They understood, as did Mao Zedong, that naive and uncontrolled intellectuals, “Liberals” as Mao wrote in a 1937 tract, because they asked too many questions and challenged authority and were therefore dangerous to those now in power.

In the preliminary stages, this is what is occurring in America with the Woke, Crits, and Radical Progressives. They are seeking nothing less than to undermine and weaken the unique system America represents, and effectively parallel what occurred in Europe to facilitate the rise of the Soviet Union. The reality for us at this point is that we are not as naive, and unless we are stupid or an agent of the Progressive “revolutionaries” know what lies on the “other side” of their “revolutionary transformation” if they are successful.

There should be no doubt that what is playing out in America’s schools and core institutions is a “stealth” strategy involving brainwashing, indoctrination, and power-grabbing—not honest teaching. The intention is to create a kind of quasi-religious devotion operating through the dynamics of “original sin” and “collective guilt” that appeals to our need to be part of something we think is deep, moral, and worthwhile.

An important part of this strategy involves taking control of the instruments of education and communication. When this is achieved, it allows those in power to shape what people know, how they think, and how they interpret the world. Applying this strategic approach to America’s K-12 educational systems is a critical step being taken by the Woke. Capturing our youths’ minds at an early age consolidates and sustains the power of ideologues and fanatics. It provides them with a critical mass of “true believers” that grows steadily over time.

This phenomenon holds true whether we are talking about Xi Jinping’s China of today with his mandating of “Xi Jinping Thought” to all schools in China at all levels, or Mao’s Red Guard. It mirrors the intent of the madrassa schools of Fundamentalist Islam, the Hitler Youth of Nazi Germany, and the young Komsomol of the former Soviet Union who brought their heavily biased form of literacy to rural areas. It applies now to many of America’s K-12 schools and universities. Yale, James Madison, UCLA, USC, Stanford, Syracuse, Portland State, Buffalo, and numerous other universities offer dramatic and dismaying examples.

A Very Small Taste of What Is Going On

As you read the following examples offered below, consider what is being done to the minds and hearts of our children and the consequences for our society. What appears here is just a small taste of what is taking place throughout K-12 systems and our universities. There are many, many more examples offered in my books, “No More Excuses!”: Parents Defending K-12 Education (2022), “Un-Canceling” America (2021) and Conformity Colleges: The Destruction of Intellectual Creativity and Dissent in America’s Universities (2024).

“The foundation of every state is the education of its youth.”—Diogenes

The ancient Greek philosopher and Cynic Diogenes not only carried a lantern in the streets of Athens in an unsuccessful search for an “honest man”, but provides us with the vital insight that: “The foundation of every state is the education of its youth.”

“This ‘feels’ like racism to me”

Barbara Kay, a Canadian Journalist, wrote me that:

“My 8-year-old granddaughter and her mother were working on a jigsaw puzzle, an image of a cat’s face surrounded by black background. We adults were complaining about the difficulty of joining up so many all-black pieces. My granddaughter said, without a shred of irony, “This feels like racism to me.” In George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984, children absorb the principle of Crimestop, the abrupt, instinctual, fear-driven self-silencing that precludes utterance of politically incorrect words that may invoke shaming or worse. My granddaughter’s public school teachers have installed a Crimestop-like app in her tender psyche. Just hearing the disembodied word “black” voiced in a mildly negative light triggers rote guilt.”

Starting Early: Babies Apparently Need Anti-Racism “Guidance”

“The Arizona Department of Education is conducting a review of its equity-related resources after material surfaced suggesting that babies and children of other ages harbored racial biases that should be addressed by adults. [T]he material warns that at three months, infants look more at the faces that match the race of their caregivers. A graphic maps out purported racial biases from infancy to 6+ years of age. The title of the graphic appears to be “They’re not too young to talk about race!” “Arizona teaching material suggests babies need anti-racism guidance.” Sam Dorman, 7/8/21.

“KinderCare Wants Parents to Talk about ‘Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion’ at Home with Their Six-Week-Old Children”

“A child care facility is encouraging parents to talk about “anti-racism” and “diversity, equity, and inclusion” at home with their children as young as six weeks old. KinderCare … is telling parents that “it’s never too early” to teach children about “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI) in the home. The organization’s DEI homepage promised to introduce students to “culturally responsive teaching,” which places students’ identity and emotions at the center of their education.”

Oregon’s Kindergartners Are Being Separated Into Differing “Identities!”

“The state of Oregon has adopted social studies standards for kindergartners that require children to understand their own identity groups and identify examples of racial injustice.… Kindergartners will “engage in respectful dialogue with classmates to define diversity comparing and contrasting visible and invisible similarities and differences,” according to the new standards. Kindergartners will also learn to “develop an understanding of one’s own identity groups including, but not limited to, race, gender, family, ethnicity, culture, religion, and ability,”…according to the new standards.

Kids in first grade will learn to “describe how individual and group characteristics are used to divide, unite, and categorize racial, ethnic, and social groups,” according to the new standards. Kids in third grade will learn how to “identify how systems of power, including white supremacy, institutional racism, racial hierarchy, and oppression affect the perspectives of different individuals and groups when examining an event, issue, or problem with an emphasis on multiple perspectives.” “Oregon’s racial standards for kindergartners requires kids to ‘identify possible solutions to injustices:’ The standards also require kindergartners to ‘identify examples of unfairness.,” Jessica Chasmar, 3/14/22.

The Bank School “is teaching white 6-year-olds they’re born racist”

“An elite Manhattan school is teaching white students as young as 6 that they’re born racist and should feel guilty benefiting from “white privilege,” while heaping praise and cupcakes on their black peers. … “Teaching Kindergartners about White Privilege,” 7/2/16.

Candace Owens Warns the Left Has Created an Educational System Putting Blacks Back on the “Plantation”

“The left-wing leaders of public school systems across America are “replacing education with indoctrination,” author and activist Candace Owens [has stated]. Owens, the author of the recent book Blackout: How Black America Can Make Its Second Escape from the Democratic Plantation. “If we continue to allow the Democrat Party to control education, we are guaranteeing them the future because the youth is the future,” she stated. “If you are a Black American and you go through the public school system like I went through, you come out and you are basically a propagandist for the left and you don’t realize it,” Owens [said]. “I started on the left, although I was not politically active,” she recalled. “Author, activist tells Mark Levin public schools shaped her into ‘propagandist for the left,’” Charles Creitz, 9/13/20.

Examples of the Decline and Fall of American Education

“I want us to be feared.” The Abolitionist Teaching Network’s [Co-founder Bettina] Love [said] that the network would “create a national database of antiracist school counselors, therapists and lawyers.” She said her group planned to pay its “activists in residence” to travel around the country and “go into schools or communities and do the work of dismantling.” “If you don’t recognize that White supremacy is in everything we do, then we got a problem,” Love, who also chairs the board of directors, said.” “Biden admin promotes radical group pushing critical race theory in schools: A critical race theory handbook is intended to disrupt Whiteness and oppression,” Ethan Barton, 7/21/21.

“Academics are fast becoming a thing of the past in public schools. In their place [are] behavioral psychology and “social and emotional learning” (SEL) designed not to educate, but to transform children’s core values, attitudes, beliefs, and behavior. Alex Newman writes:

“Once upon a time, education meant learning how to read, write, do math, and think. It meant learning history and science as well.…Today, government schools use advanced methods including SEL to instill in children a radical new and oftentimes contradictory “politically correct” value system.” “Trading Academics for Far-Left ‘Social-Emotional Learning,’” Alex Newman, 8/21/20.

“Destabilizing a kid’s racism or homophobia or transphobia!”

“Philadelphia public school teacher worries about 'conservative' parents listening in on virtual classes.” Lucas Manfredi, 8/10/20. “So, this fall, virtual class discussion will have many potential spectators — parents, siblings, etc. — in the same room. We’ll never be quite sure who is overhearing the discourse. What does this do for our equity/inclusion work?” … I am most intrigued by the damage that ‘helicopter/snowplow’ parents can do in the host conversations about gender/sexuality," … If we are engaged in the messy work of destabilizing a kid’s racism or homophobia or transphobia — how much do we want their classmates’ parents piling on?”.

A pro-Antifa teacher in California bragged

about turning his students into far-left “revolutionaries”

“I have 180 days to turn them into revolutionaries…scare the f--k out of them”. The teacher also said he tracks his students’ political leanings throughout the course of the year and that “every year, they get further and further left.” “I’ve met so many people in my life who, when they met me, thought I was off the wall, and now they’re all Marxists,” he said. Like why can’t we, you know, take up arms against the state?” Jessica Chasmar, 8/31/21.

Another fanatical California teacher hangs

“'F--- the Police,' 'F--- Amerikkka' posters in classroom”

“A parent at Alexander Hamilton High School slamming the "disgusting brainwashing of students with taxpayer dollars" shared photos with Parents Defending Education, a national nonprofit, that were taken inside his child's classroom. The first photo shows a Palestinian flag, a transgender flag, a Black Lives Matter flag and a Pride flag prominently displayed on the blackboard. Another photo shows two posters that read, "F--- Amerikkka. This is Native land" and F--- the Police.” “California teacher hangs 'F--- the Police,' 'F--- Amerikkka' posters in classroom”, Jessica Chasmar, 9/16/21.

Oregon teacher removes American flag, says it

“stands for violence and menace and intolerance”

“A Portland-area teacher who opposes her district’s vote to ban Black Lives Matter and LGBTQ Pride symbols in schools told local media that she removed the American flag from her classroom because it represents “violence and menace and intolerance.” “Oregon teacher removes American flag from classroom, says it 'stands for violence and menace and intolerance’: Gail Grobey argues Old Glory is 'most political symbol there is’”, Jessica Chasmar, 9/15/21.

Betsy McCaughey, former New York Lieutenant Governor, explains:

“SEL sounds beneficial, but that’s a disguise. In truth, it indoctrinates kids with extremist ideas many parents don’t condone. … West Hartford, Connecticut, elementary school parents are in an uproar. They’re complaining that teachers are putting words such as “nonbinary” on the chalkboard and telling kids, including kindergarteners, they can live life as a gender different from what they were assigned at birth. Parents were told by school authorities that they can’t opt their children out.” … “West Hartford is reported to hammer away grade after grade, starting with a kindergarten-level book about a teddy bear who knows in his heart he is a girl teddy, not a boy teddy. “Social and Emotional Indoctrination in Schools”, Betsy McCaughey, 11/24/21.

The Absurdity of “A Psychoeducational Lesson”

With Teachers Using Scripted Texts for the Sessions?

"Maryland's most populous county, Montgomery County, launched a "psychoeducational lesson" teaching children in schools that there is a "dual pandemic" involving COVID-19 and "systemic racism." Materials recommended that teachers buy the Ibram X. Kendi book "Antiracist Baby" as "the perfect gift" for "ages baby to age 3.” … “This material details how extremist race politics and CRT are being used to target children for politi-cal ends," Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said in a statement on the documents. "These CRT-laden teachings have no place in any American classroom.” “Maryland's most populous county told students there is a 'double pandemic' of COVID and racism: Materials pushed Ibram X. Kendi's book 'Antiracist Baby' as 'the perfect gift' for toddlers, infants”, Tyler O'Neil, 11/4/21.

Syracuse professor calls 9/11 “an attack on the heteropatriarchal capitalistic systems that America relies upon to wrangle other countries into passivity”

“Syracuse University assistant professor Jenn M. Jackson … tweeted an unpopular take about 9/11 over the weekend by asking why so many “white pundits” still talk about the terror attack 20 years later. … Jackson followed up by tweeting that the 9/11 terror attacks were an assault on America's “heteropatriarchal capitalistic systems.”… It was an attack on the heteropatriarchal capitalistic systems that America relies upon to wrangle other countries into passivity. It was an attack on the systems many white Americans fight to protect.” “Syracuse assistant professor 'disturbed' by how many 'white pundits' still talk about 9/11: Academic calls 9/11 'an attack on the heteropatriarchal capitalistic systems that America relies upon to wrangle other countries into passivity’”, Cortney O'Brien, Danielle Wallace, 9/13/21.

Producing a Generation of Woke Illiterates.

“A majority of American fourth-and eighth-graders can’t read or do math at grade level, according to the Education Department. Whenever someone asks me about critical race theory, that statistic comes to mind. What’s the priority, teaching math and reading, or turning elementary schools into social-justice boot camps? Our jails and prisons already have too many woke illiterates.” “Foolish schools going for woke — lagging US kids need 3 Rs, not race theory,” Jason L. Riley, 7/13/21.

“Social promotion — moving the kids on to the next grade, no matter how unprepared they are — hides the truth.”

“By high school, the scams get more elaborate, yielding [an] endless series of “worthless diploma” scandals — only to have more pop up. [T]hose state “educrats” are watering down and even eliminating the testing and other standards that make that cheating “necessary.” “Are you sure your kid can read? All too many US public schools won’t tell you the truth,” Michael Benjamin, 10/2/21.

“The latest results from the Nation’s Report Card show that only 22% of 12th-grade students are proficient in science.” “Allocating more time and effort away from core subjects like math and science could theoretically harm those outcomes,” Corey DeAngelis.

Data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress—reveals that of the 27 US urban school districts that reported their results for 2019, not one reported a majority of Black eighth-graders as being proficient in either math or reading.

Parents need to demand accountability from schools.

Chicago Pastor Corey Brooks describes the situation at a school near him. “Only 6% of the kids at the school are proficient in reading, and only 4% of the kids are proficient in math.”…“Rooftop Revelations: Parents must say ‘no more excuses’ when it comes to educating their kids: Parents need to demand accountability from schools, Pastor Corey Brooks says,” Eli Steele, 1/27/22.

“Math and reading test scores for the country’s 13-year-olds have dropped sharply in comparison to numbers from 2012, with some of the lowest-scoring test takers falling the furthest behind. U.S. News and World Report reported that this was the first major score drop in the subjects since the NAEP began tracking long-term academic achievement trends in the 1970s.” “Student test scores fall for first time in national test’s history,” Monique Beals, 10/14/21.

“In 2019, only 37% of third-graders in Illinois demonstrated grade-level proficiency in English-language arts, and when it came to math only 41% could demonstrate grade-level proficiency. [In relation to such failures in basic learning at which the teachers were supposedly skilled and proficient, Eli Steele asked himself] Why would the state of Illinois consider new standards when it failed to uphold the most basic and universal of education standards? The disconnect between the progressive ideology driving these new standards and the realities on the ground could not be starker.”

NYC’s Maspeth High School created fake classes, awarded bogus credits, and fixed grades to push students to graduate — “even if the diploma was not worth the paper on which it was printed,” an investigative report charges.”

“Sixty-five percent of black and brown children don’t meet proficiency in the NYC Department of Education.” New York City [Mayor] Eric Adams spelled it out recently. That means: “Our school system is dysfunctional and we have to stop acting like it’s not. We sometimes have to call a thing the thing and be honest about the basic essentials.”

$38 Billion Down the Drain? “If school achievement depended only on funding, New York’s kids would be performing twice as well as other American children. Alas, they’re not…with no path toward better results. [According to its website, the New York City public schools have a budget of $38 BILLION in 2021/2022, and spent $30,772 per student this past year.] The NYC system leads the nation in spending per student…In the 2018-19 school year, New York shelled out $25,139 per kid, “more than any other state and nearly twice the national average of $13,187.”“New York keeps spending more on schools and getting less results,” NY Post Editorial Board, 1/30/22.

Nearly half of the 20,500 public high school students in Baltimore earned less than a D average. “Project Baltimore obtained a chart assembled by Baltimore City Schools.…In the first three quarters of this past school year, 41% of all Baltimore City high school students, earned below a 1.0 grade point average. In other words, nearly half of the 20,500 public high school students in Baltimore earned less than a D average.”

“In Baltimore, (a city that ranks 5th nationally in major city school funding) across five schools, they couldn’t find a single child that was proficient in reading and writing and math. ”

“A Baltimore high school student failed all but three classes over four years and [still] almost graduated near the top half of his class with a 0.13 GPA. … Hundreds of students are flunking classes at the Augusta Fells Savage Institute of Visual Arts in west Baltimore that her son attended.”

Baltimore School Administrator. “I’ve seen many transcripts, many report cards, like this particular student.” “I get angry. There’s nothing but frustration. We see on the news the crime that occurs, the murders, the shootings, we know that there are high levels of poverty in Baltimore,” the administrator said. “His transcript is not unusual to me. I’ve seen many transcripts, many report cards, like this particular student.”

“This is terrible,” [City Council candidate] Jovani Patterson said in regard to Baltimore public schools. “This is just further perpetuating a cycle of poverty, of despair.” “They take [the schools administrators]. They take. They take. Yet, despite the amount of money they get. We don’t see much change. [It isn’t about a lack of resources.] Our schools outspend 97% of other major school districts,” Patterson said. “It’s heartbreaking.” “If almost half of our kids are failing, what options do they have after high school?”

Baltimore is just one of many. More than half of New York City’s school kids struggle with basic math and English. According to the NYS Department of Education 2019 report on state test results, 45.6% of students in grades 3-8 were proficient in math and only 47.4% of students in grades 3 to 8 scored at proficient levels in English.

A Modern Version of Hustlers, Grifters and “Snake Oil” Salesmen

Take a moment to think about the complex of skills, techniques, training, relationships, context, forms of interaction between the “Teacher Therapist” and multiple students. Consider also differing teacher and student motivations, levels and types of experience, trust, and superior and inferior power relationships where the teachers as authority figures have significant leverage over young students. Then think about the limited length of interactions, and the numerous other considerations about what would be required to achieve what is claimed by Woke teachers who are intent on “transforming” students to clones who accept the “omniscient” instructors’ beliefs. The absurdity and moral questionability of such a process are a contemptible abuse of power on the part of the teachers and schools.

Even if it were appropriate to propagandize or use a teacher’s systemic power to take advantage of young children in their most formative years—and it is not—consider the range of skills required to create such a system of learning. Teachers dealing with significant numbers of students with different backgrounds, experiences, parenting and family situations, as well as other factors that play a role in determining who we become—are seeking to compel young students to confront and eliminate their so-called biases that are determined to be inappropriate by the “gurus” of the educational system. The complex factors to be dealt with include subconscious value systems, ethnic, gender, and racial mindsets, and other extremely nuanced and subtle emotional, experiential, and intellectual elements within each individual and generated by the diverse social conditions in which they function and develop.

Critical Race Theory and Woke advocates do not possess the kinds of skills and training that would be required even if their aims were honest education rather than indoctrination in the “teachers” own values. Nor should they be attempting what they admit they are seeking to do. Think about the fact that honest psychoanalysis on an individual or small group level takes very lengthy periods to have positive effects, and often still can’t achieve the desired curative goals. This demands hard and honest thought about the motives and legitimacy of K-12 teachers, and university faculty and administrators. They invariably lack the knowledge, experience, training, or intellectual and emotional abilities needed to be a therapist at all, but are attempting to do things to young students the pedagogic “puppet masters” lack the ability to perform.

The issues the “Woke” and “Critical” teachers claim they are dealing with involve extremely sensitive, personal, and private material. This includes important considerations involving racial and ethnic concerns, gender issues, social status, and interactions based on the color of a student’s skin. From an intellectual point of view, the Woke and Critical Race Theory advocates are traveling on a path from absurdity to lunacy. Just from a contextual perspective, such a capability cannot exist in the context of shifting and larger scale classroom settings.

In such contexts, teachers are tasked with identifying a range of nuanced and variable overt and covert biases across a class demographic of young students holding unformed or differential views and values. But regardless of the insurmountable context, in some mystical way these “Super” Psychotherapists in K-12 classrooms manage to “heal” their diverse students of their fundamental and often sub-conscious afflictions. The concept is patently absurd.

What is being described requires a serious process of professional psychological, counseling, and psychotherapeutic capability and lengthy training. The “Woke” teachers who claim to be “destabilizing” and “transforming” their students are dealing with intense and complex emotional factors that vary by individuals. This process simply cannot be done in a K-12 classroom with substantial numbers of students in a group in a range numbering probably 12-26 young students at vastly different levels of knowledge, beliefs and experiences.

Such a grouping of vulnerable young students have widely varying abilities to understand or cope with the dynamics involved, including the pressures of baring their inner values and beliefs to others, or professing to hold ones compatible with what students think are the ones supported by the majority or preferred by the teacher. Such a process is not one of healing, but of inculcating students with the teachers’ beliefs and values.

Thank God for FIRE, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression

Universities have been “investigating”, suppressing and canceling faculty members who resist their strategies. Hundreds of university faculty around the nation have been subjected to petitions and complaints that led to investigations for not being sufficiently “correct” in political views, for being culturally “insensitive”, or for using linguistic terms the Woke consider inappropriate.

FIRE, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, released a 2022 analysis of what was occurring in America’s universities. The report, “FIRE Statement on the Use of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Criteria in Faculty Hiring and Evaluation” included the following observations.

“Since 2015, FIRE has seen over 600 attempts to sanction scholars for protected speech, and most of those have been successful. The frequency of these incidents is accelerating: More than half have occurred since 2020. For some professors, even tenure is no longer a reliable shield against encroachments on academic freedom. In the last several years, nearly three dozen tenured professors have been fired for their protected expression, scholarship, or pedagogy. Meanwhile, hundreds of colleges and universities maintain bias reporting systems that encourage students to anonymously report peers or faculty for offensive-but-protected speech. Many hold training programs that compel speech, attempt to embed ideological bias in research review.

An institution dedicated to advancing the frontiers of human knowledge should recognize the fallibility of the human mind and promote the value of seriously entertaining the possibility of being wrong. Instead, many DEI statement mandates do the opposite, closing the debate on issues of societal importance. They require faculty to endorse or apply specific positions on race, gender, and related issues as if they are beyond question, and as if a professor who disputes them is ipso facto incompetent. … Moreover, in FIRE’s experience, DEI statement policies generally are not created by faculty — who, according to the principle of academic freedom, are the proper judges of their disciplinary peers’ academic qualifications — or tailored to particular positions or disciplines. Rather, DEI statement policies are commonly authored and imposed by administrators, and they often apply globally to an entire college or university.” “FIRE Statement on the Use of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Criteria in Faculty Hiring and Evaluation”, by FIRE, June 2, 2022.