Why do we extend to universities the priviledge and advantage of being tax-free and partly if not largely tax-supported institutions?
What is it that they do which is so special? Is it their duty to be conservators of knowledge and wisdom, or to be "adversarial" critics of society?
I would make the case that few of the great thinkers of world history worked for universities, almost none of the great writers, and, until the past 30-40 years, few to none of the great scientists. I would make thae case that, in a world of high liteeracy and high levels of education, professsors no longer represent a unique intellectual priesthood as they might have in the Middle Ages. And I would make the case that there is nothing about being a professor which renders their views of anything outside of their teaching expertise of any more value than my own views.
Mark Bauerlein takes on The Adversarial Campus. One quote:
...the Adversarial Campus Argument isn't really an argument. It's an attitude. And attitudes aren't overcome by evidence, especially when they do so much for people who bear them. For, think of what the Adversarial Campus does for professors. It flatters the ego, ennobling teachers into dissidents and gadflies. They feel underpaid and overworked, mentally superior but underappreciated, and any notion that compensates is attractive. It gives their isolation from zones of power, money, and fame a functional value. Yes, they're marginal, but that's because they impart threatening ideas. The powerlessness they feel rises into a meaningful political condition.
Read the whole, brief essay.
Also, David Thompson on the same topic. A quote:
The idea of academic administrators and professors picturing themselves as Luke Skywalker figures - pitted against an evil empire of oppressive bourgeois vales - is rather quaint and not without comic potential. And, as we’ve seen, ‘rebellion’ of this kind is often difficult to distinguish from absurdity, psychodrama and reactionary role-play.
