Questioning why the adults can’t seem to muster the guts to say “no” to the woke might seem like a lost cause. There are no doubt many reasons and influences that go into this morass. Andrew Sullivan has waded into the puddle in an effort to explain why woke is winning.

It’s been a staggering achievement, when you come to think of it. Critical theory was once an esoteric academic pursuit. Now it has become the core, underlying philosophy of the majority of American cultural institutions, universities, media, corporations, liberal churches, NGOs, philanthropies, and, of course, mainstream journalism. This summer felt like a psychic break from old-school liberalism, a moment when a big part of the American elite just decided to junk the principles that have long defined American democratic life, and embrace what Bari Weiss calls “a mixture of postmodernism, postcolonialism, identity politics, neo-Marxism, critical race theory, intersectionality, and the therapeutic mentality.”

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Kavanaugh? Nope, she can’t even step foot in the Supreme Court anymore knowing that “rapist” is on the bench. Kozinski? Not a chance. Cuomo? Ah, yes. Cuomo.

I am a journalist myself, and I am wholly in favor of a sober and serious probe into Cuomo’s alleged conduct. It’s not a terrible thing to allow an independent investigator to gather all the facts and arrive at a formal conclusion before calling for his immediate ouster. To allow a formal fact-finding process to play out is neither a disparagement of his accusers—whose accounts should be taken absolutely seriously—nor a get-out-of-jail-free card for the governor. It is merely an acknowledgment of something that should have been clear from the vitally important beginnings of the #MeToo era: There is a difference between having the media surface and report predation, and having something akin to a formal process investigate and determine what occurred and what should be done about it.

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The Supreme Court heard oral argument in Brnovich v. Democratic National Committee, a case of extreme importance to both political parties for all the wrong reasons.

Though the Voting Rights Act seeks to protect minority voting rights, as a practical matter litigation under it tends to proceed on partisan lines. When Justice Amy Coney Barrett asked a lawyer for the Arizona Republican Party why his client cared about whether votes cast at the wrong precinct should be counted, he gave a candid answer.

“Because it puts us at a competitive disadvantage relative to Democrats,” said the lawyer, Michael A. Carvin. “Politics is a zero-sum game, and every extra vote they get through unlawful interpretations of Section 2 hurts us.”

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The token punching bag at the New York Times, Bret Stephens, made an interesting observation in his post-mortem on  the Smith College fiasco:

Why does the embrace of social justice pedagogies seem to have gone hand in hand with deteriorating race relations on campus?

One answer is that if many students are enjoying a diet of courses on critical race theory, and employees are trained on the fine points of microaggressions, they might take to heart what they are taught and notice what they have been trained to see. Continue reading →

Is there a reason why educators in Oregon believe that black students are incapable of learning math? They believe so and have put together this document, A Pathway to Equitable Math Instruction, Dismantling Racism in Mathematics Instruction, to explain it. If this were about math teachers being racist, a horrible if odd notion as if math teachers would discriminate more or differently than any other teacher, that would be one thing.

But that’s not what it’s about. Columbia prof john McWhorter explains. Continue reading →

Like many people, I was enthralled by Amanda Gorman’s poem read at Biden’s inauguration, and said so at the time. While it didn’t occur to me, why wouldn’t such a wonderful poem be translated into other languages so that people around the world could enjoy and appreciate it? Then again, it didn’t occur to me that this, too, would be turned into a controversy, another racial sinkhole.

A few years back, a white person refusing to translate a poem by a black person would almost certainly have reflected racist dismissal of the black person. But that was then. This is now. Continue reading →

Do you remember Tara Reade? Joe Biden probably does, not that it’s the sort of thing he wants to talk about, and with good reason. As he brought the Title IX Avenging Angel, Catherine Lhamon into the White House and plans to undo the minimal due process created by the DeVos regs, Biden dodged that bullet with the complicity of the unduly passionate who put “believe women” far below beat Trump on the “to do” list.

New York Governor Andy Cuomo wasn’t a lot different than Biden when it came to capitalizing on the popularity of “campus rape” as a means to show his feelings toward “survivors.” But now, like Biden when accused by Reade, Cuomo finds himself the target. Continue reading →

The House has passed the Equality Act, which amends the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by prohibiting discrimination “based on sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity in areas including public accommodations and facilities, education, federal funding, employment, housing, credit, and the jury system.” How one claims, or questions, such an identity is a mystery. The findings are replete with references to “gender nonbinary” people, but never define what that means or to whom it refers. It only refers once to “queer,” which it protects even if it’s just a random undefined word stuck in there after LGBT.

Discrimination can occur on the basis of the sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, pregnancy, childbirth, or a related medical condition of an individual, as well as because of sex-based stereotypes. Each of these factors alone can serve as the basis for discrimination, and each is a form of sex discrimination.

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The “liberal paradox,” simply stated, is that liberals are so tolerant and principled with regard to the inherent virtue of freedom that they defend speech that would end their existence. Why tolerate those who would eliminate you? Because they trust that better ideas will prevail over worse ideas, freedom over fascism. It’s a bit idealistic and, perhaps, self-defeating, but that’s pretty much the point.

At the New York Times, Michelle Goldberg tries to usurp the paradox for her own purposes. Continue reading →

No, Facebook, Twitter and Google are not monopolies. They are hugely popular, at least for the moment, which gives rise to the appearance, if not the reality, that they own the new digital public square. The problem is that the square isn’t public, and it’s only the new public square because that’s where people hang out. Nobody forces people to go there. Nobody prevents people from going to the real public square. This is just what people choose to do.

And nobody elected Zuck, Jack or any other tech scion to be the defender of either free speech or protector from hate speech. To the extent they are, that’s their choice, whether because of their personal views or market conditions. You’re entitled to your views. They are too. Continue reading →