Smoke 'Em If You Got 'Em Podcast 239. Ellie Avishai on the Unraveling of a Free-Speech University
Nancy and Sarah speak with Ellie Avishai, who offers an inside look at how the ambitious project to build a bold new university — based on liberalism and open dialogue — fell victim to some of the same censorious behavior it sought to oust. The University of Austin was announced in 2021 with big names attached, perhaps none bigger (or more controversial) than Bari Weiss. Touting itself as a “coalition of the sane” at a time when college campuses seemed to be veering off-course, UATX was an inspiration to many, including Avishai, who joined forces with UATX through her own project, the Mill Institute, to help educators foster more open dialogue in classrooms. As a recent Politico story lays out, things did not go as planned.
We talk about why a modest social media post led to Avishai getting booted from UATX and how the dogma of woke is transforming into the dogma of anti-woke, not just at one university but throughout culture.
Also discussed:
* How education departments got flooded with reductive social justice ideas
* The prescriptive, anti-meaning-making stuff that went on in the social justice movement…
* “… to be clear, this wasn’t just Harvard.”
* Also: Harvard is pretty awesome!
* Intellectual “space spaces” versus psychological “safe spaces”
* “If you can’t teach Plato in a college course, you’re out of your mind.”
* #MeToo controversy at UATX
* How do you prove the strength of your core ideas if you won’t let them be tested?
* Where is Bari Weiss in all this?
* When open dialogue is perceived as weak sauce
* Cannibal-Americans?
Plus, ‘70s football greatness, three books to read aloud in bed, the phenomenon that is Heated Rivalry, and much more!