4min chapter

The Forward cover image

Michael Shermer on Transgender Athletes in Sports

The Forward

CHAPTER

Introduction

A group of disaffected academics are starting a new university called the University of Austin. They're very much in favor of free speech and against censorship and cancel culture. So this summer, they're having these forbidden courses. I'm just basically how to think like a scientist and just look at the facts.

00:00
Speaker 2
All right, Michael, we're thank you for being here. Oh, you're welcome. It seems like good buds for some time now. You've been on the show before. Before we get in, of course, we're talking about this issue, which is this entire series has been about is Trans and Sport, which is, as I like to describe it, boy, this is a really complicated issue. And then you have other folks that say, actually, it's not very complicated at all. And I'm trying to listen to, I want to hear all sides of this debate, right? And highly politicized, fear-based debate. But before we get into that, I just have to ask, because I'm so curious, you said you're going to spend some time in Austin. Of course, I spent 30 years there and moving back there. And it was just there the other day, he index was 120. Oh, God. I know. It was,
Speaker 1
I was
Speaker 2
like, maybe the seven months of snow wasn't that bad. Right. But you said you've been spending time down there. There's a group down there starting a new university called the University of Austin. Right. Yes. Actually, a lot of people I know from California are
Speaker 1
moving to Austin. It seems to be the place to go. Like our mutual friend, Rogan, and a bunch of other people. Yeah. At any rate, there's this group of kind of disaffected academics who have been canceled for various anti-woke attitudes or free speech attitudes. They're very much in favor of free speech and against censorship and cancel culture and all that. And so they've formed this independent university. Right. Not that that's unusual. I mean, people go, oh my God, how can you start a new university? Right. These have to start somewhere. Right. You know, I went to Pepperdine University just up the hill from us here in Malibu. And I was graduated the first four year graduating class at the Malibu campus. I mean, somebody has to be first. And that was a Christian college at the time I was Christian. But so, you know, people start universities for various reasons. And this one appears to be no forbidden topics. No fear of cancel culture, no censorship. They're just going to talk about anything anybody wants to talk about, which you would think that would be the motto of every university everywhere. And it used to be until the last decade or 20 years, maybe or so. And the problem is, is that most academics are liberal. So universities have been largely captured by the Democratic Party. We know from voting records and donation records and supportive candidates records that are public, you know, something like the order of 90% of professors in the social sciences are Democrats or liberals. And it may be 70% in the biological sciences. The only one where it's not hugely slanted is economics. So you know, you get this bias that the students are not getting a fair hearing on hot button topics. And so the university also wants to kind of remedy that by. So this summer, they're having these forbidden courses. So I'm doing doing a lecture. I'm just basically how to think like a scientist and just look at the facts. Within actual campus? Well, this, no, they don't have a campus yet. It's in a hotel in Dallas, actually, not in Austin, which is okay, whatever. I think it's temporary. But I think they're hoping to open a campus in 2024, 2025 academic year. I think that's the goal. And they have money and they've raised apparently a couple hundred million dollars. I mean, that's what it takes to have physical buildings and
Speaker 2
professors on campus.

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