Emil Kirkegaard on schooling and intelligence, and their limited relationship:

And speaking of education:

The specifications for said installation are quite detailed, including soundproofing, wall handles, and knee pads. For safety and comfort, one assumes.

Heather Mac Donald on progressive evasions and the consequent cultivation of anti-white sentiment:

We’ve been here before, of course. More than once.

Helen Joyce on the perversity of wokeness:

And finally, a thread on what happens when, in the name fostering progress and sensitivity, the police start hiring the sexually dysmorphic.

Apparently, these be-wigged individuals are bringing tolerance and understanding by harassing people manically, and repeatedly lying, and stalking women and sending them headless birds, and strangling people, and attacking a woman with a hammer. Oh, and hoarding explosives, obviously.

If that isn’t sufficiently bizarre, I do have more.

Feel free to share your own links and snippets, on any subject, in the comments.

And in lofty academic news:

Because victimhood is currency and status, and therefore terribly competitive.

The particulars of that “interconnected nature” are, sadly, not disclosed. Instead, the word “intersectionality” is deployed as some self-explanatory justification, both for the expansion of the museum and, one assumes, the additional funding.

The Museum of Sexist Objects is, it seems, a triumph in every possible way, according to those paid to curate its wonders, and to generally look busy while nobody cares. With Ferris State history professor Tracy Busch adding that the museum “has accomplished its vision by increasing awareness of the damage that sexism causes to not only women and girls, but also to men and the LGBTQ+ community.” Though, again, specifics on these points are not articulated.

Other priorities, however, are made clear:

Objects deemed sexist and reprehensible – sorry, “artefacts of intolerance” – include a child’s ironing playset, a set of false eyelashes, a joke sign about beer being better than women, a glamour calendar featuring pneumatic ladies in minimal lingerie, a “Hillary Sucks” poster, and, bizarrely, a signed publicity photograph of Dr Condoleezza Rice.

Other morally corrupting artefacts include a Condoleezza Rice promotional bobble-head doll – “Condi 2008” – which is somehow sexist and oppressive, unlike the near-identical promotional bobble-head dolls of male politicians.

Oh, and a 1997 novelty foodstuff by the name of Pasta Boobs.

Needless to say, the corresponding novelty pasta for ladies’ hen parties – shaped as you’d imagine – was not deemed worthy of inclusion.

Readers who feel an urge to tut about such things, and to generally disapprove, can do so, thanks to the museum’s website, which can be found here.

Readers may recall this item from four months ago:

I was of course referring to Ms Shellyne Rodriguez, an art teacher at Hunter College, New York, and whose activities include menacing students whose views diverge from her own, shouting profanities at said students, vandalising their property, and chasing people down the street armed with a machete.

A liveliness subsequently blamed on “racists, white nationalists, and misogynists.”

In a turn of events unlikely to surprise regulars of this parish, it seems that Ms Rodriguez, our self-styled “black Marxist” and “public intellectual,” has a new position, this time at the Cooper Union School of Art in Manhattan. Where students will apparently be treated to our gentle maiden’s insights on,

Oh, and,

A coexistence achieved, one assumes, via screamed profanities, fits of physical intimidation, and holding machetes to people’s necks.

Readers are invited to speculate as to what it might take for a progressive educator to become unemployable.

Update, via the comments:

Our art instructor’s list of professed woes – supposedly mitigating circumstances – is of course extensive, and the relevance of many items escapes me, even allowing for the usual contrivance. Apparently, if you think a professional educator should behave like an adult, and not, say, threaten to decapitate people who ask questions about her childish and aggressive behaviour, then this is part of an “attack” on “women, trans people, black people, Latinx people, migrants, and beyond.”

A boldness that suggests Ms Rodriguez is very much accustomed to indulgence and being exempt from normal academic proprieties, and indeed civilisational basics. Rather than, as she pretends, being downtrodden at every turn.

Rafi adds, drily,

Indeed. What catches the eye isn’t Ms Rodriguez’s meagre scholarship – in which “critical studies,” i.e., Marxoid question-begging, seems more prominent than any aesthetic discernment – or even her equally meagre artistic abilities, which call to mind the daubing of a B-minus student, aged maybe 15:

Given the progressive chokehold on academia, and the neurotic racial imperatives consequently in play, corruption and rotting standards are to be expected. It’s the standard trajectory of ideological capture. This is the utopian path chosen by our self-imagined betters.

But it is, I think, interesting just how unhinged – and threatening – a progressive educator can be without having to consider an entirely different line of work.

Update 2:

Being a supposedly “marginalised” individual, maybe Ms Rodriguez was merely heeding the deep, deep wisdom of fellow “educator” Ms Shellene Drakes-Tull, mentioned here previously, and who informs us that expectations of workplace professionalism are scandalously racist, and that brown-skinned employees must be allowed to “bring their whole selves to work.” A wholeness of self that includes behaving in ways likely to be “interpreted as violent or aggressive.”

It turns out that a dislike of being bullied by the childish and emotionally incontinent is merely evidence of “deep, inherent bias and deeply inherent systemic racism.”

How terribly convenient.

Should further examples of suboptimal educators be required, see also this and this, and, well, any number of posts here tagged academia. The political leanings of the individuals in question will not be entirely surprising.

Also, open thread. Share ye links and bicker.

One for the totally-balanced-educator files:

Meet DeDe Duffy. A preschool teacher in Cape Coral, FL. She says she teaches her students that if they don’t like their parents, they can find another family.

She also says she teaches them to be gay.

These are the people teaching your kids. pic.twitter.com/e5HJFzMOvD

— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) September 11, 2023

Those pre-school children are in good hands, clearly. Ms Duffy’s pronouns, since you ask, are they and them.

Update, via the comments:

Rafi adds,

Well, it would be nice – refreshing, even – if these people worked out their serious mental health issues on their own time. Rather than, as seems to be the fashion, inflicting them on other people’s children.

Chris G offers the following,

Indeed. Ditto TikTok likes. And yet, as we’ve seen many times, the more scrupulously woke a teacher is, the more likely he is to issue the class instructions to remember his birthday, to use his made-up pronouns, to browse his social media accounts, and to tell him, seemingly daily, just how pretty he is.

Ms Duffy has now locked her social media accounts, so further illumination is, sadly, denied us. But it occurs to me that if I were employed to work with small children, I don’t think I would choose to film myself having eye-widening meltdowns – or to then share the recordings with lots of random strangers on TikTok and Instagram.

But maybe that’s just me. Shy soul that I am.

Azi asks,

The supply of bedlamite educators does seem all but inexhaustible. Such that one might wonder whether schools and universities, those fiefdoms of the progressive, are actively favouring the psychologically marginal. Presumably, there are people doing the hiring who think that emotional instability and pretentious “non-binary” pronouns denote an ideal candidate, an exemplar for impressionable children.

Rather than… well, you know.

Variations in human ability continue to frustrate those who would perfect us:

You see, if a problem can’t be solved, the next-best thing is to hide it:

The genius of the “equity-focussed” policies, also being advanced in California and elsewhere, is that they are likely to have negative consequences for both ends of the ability spectrum. The cognitively untalented will be spared the normal incentives to master at least the basics, even the basics of behaviour, while the gifted will be denied access to advanced material more suited to their abilities, resulting in boredom and demoralisation.

Again, hiding that bothersome unevenness in effort and ability.

Readers will note that the retreat from clear metrics into euphemism and pernicious fuzzwords – chief among which, “equity” – not only makes it difficult to determine pupils’ academic progress and actual competence, but also has a secondary effect of making it more difficult to identify the shortcomings of progressive educators and administrators. A coincidence, I’m sure.

The pernicious woo named “equity” – which roughly translates as equality of outcome regardless of inputs – has of course been mentioned here before.

If the examples linked above aren’t sufficiently striking, I do have more.

Consider this an open thread. Share ye links and bicker.

A tale of a girls’ tennis team, a locker room, and a high-school hiring dispute.

First, the view from afar, all rather fragrant and elevated:

And,

The words “transphobia” and “hate” were of course deployed.

And now the view from close quarters:

See? All totally innocent and above-board. Not weird or creepy at all. Oh, and then there was the time Mr Yates followed a sixteen-year-old girl – a girl he wasn’t coaching – into the girls’ bathroom, otherwise unoccupied, and attempted to strike up a random conversation, resulting in the girl’s alarm and some hurried texting.

The reprimand mentioned above – or rather, reprimands, because, well, what’s behaviour without a pattern? – did not seem to deter Mr Yates. Nor did the provision of private bathroom and changing facilities, typically used by sports officials, including coaches. Direct appeals from the girls also failed to discourage him from parading around their locker room in a bra-and-panties ensemble and various states of undress. Such that the girls were left in little doubt that their cross-dressing coach was, as one board member put it, “still fully a man.” And all while seeking out details of the girls’ menstruation cycles and their preferences in underwear.

Indeed, when subsequently challenged, Mr Yates, seen here, invoked “discrimination” and insisted that he is entitled to use “any bathroom.” The school is currently weighing the views of parents against the prospect of legal action and accusations of “transphobia,” with another meeting on the matter scheduled for September. Mr Yates is, he says, “completely overwhelmed with how the community is coming out and supporting me.”

At which point, readers may wonder whether such overwhelming support, largely from progressive women, is actually part of the problem.

Above, Mr Yates, being supported.

Update, via the comments, where Nikw211 adds,

Well, one might think so. And yet here we are.

Still, it’s interesting to see how Mr Yates’ supporters – again, largely progressive women – will merrily elevate themselves with the airing of modish views, their displays of compassion and inclusivity, while in effect screwing over the girls. Girls, who, by disapproving, even politely, become low-status.

Update 2:

A decision has been reached regarding the future of Mr Yates’ teaching career. And by extension, his workplace interest in the panties of young girls. See if you can guess which way it went.

Update 3:

The further adventures of our strapping madam.

I’d suggest that this is precisely what raises doubts as to Ms Ashley Markham’s fitness to be a school principal in charge of 12-year-olds.

This is a school principal. These are the people in charge of your children’s education. pic.twitter.com/kJOZtPhmal

— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) August 21, 2023

To boast of abandoning reality at the drop of a hat – and by extension, coercing others to be unrealistic too – and to boast of creating an environment in which manipulative pretension and mental illness thrive – is an odd moral flex.

Readers are welcome to ponder exactly how “safe” an environment is in which such practised affectations are dominant or mandatory, and in which one can expect to be scolded and punished for not wishing to pretend, for not wishing to become dishonest and absurd.

Oh, and by the way, should you ask Ms Markham about the implications of her position – say, as touched on above – she may make a smug and dismissive TikTok video in which she expects you to pay her $100 an hour, plus an extra $250, for an expert “consultation” on why she is right.

Lifted from the comments, which you’re reading of course.

From Montreal, via the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, another feat of unrelenting pretension:

The proud author, Ms Julia Wright, a student at McGill University, is, we learn, a them – a paranormally ungendered being. And all is not well:

As one might, all things considered.

Well, as possibilities, the words neurotic and aggravating come to mind. And we could perhaps throw in hysterical, as a bonus, what with the whole hyperventilating-and-vomiting thing.

As for rudeness, pressuring others to pretend things on demand, despite the reality right in front of them, is not the most obvious recipe for civility and mutual respect. Some, for instance, will have come to realise that The Pronoun Game, so very much in fashion, is often a way to exert power over others, by making them say things, publicly and repeatedly, that they don’t for a minute believe to be true. There is, after all, the issue of probity.

And once you start playing The Pronoun Game, a game of pretend, it’s by no means clear how you might stop pretending before things veer into farce. Which, as we’ve seen, they very often do.

And then of course there’s the fact that the Pronoun Game is by definition a game all about you, but which others are expected to play, or are coerced to play, albeit in small, supporting roles. Not an altogether thrilling prospect.

However, Ms Wright appears unconcerned by such details – which affect other people, people who aren’t her. Instead, she returns to a much more engaging subject – namely, herself and her extensive list of feelings:

Again, as so often, one has to ask – exactly which player in this drama is doing the misgendering? The unnamed presenter who sees a young woman named Julia and refers to her as she; or the young woman named Julia who expects to be perceived as something other than she is? Indeed, as something that doesn’t exist. The kind of young woman who tells us, with an air of triumph, “I had been thinking about my pronouns daily for over two years.” As one does, when one’s mental wellbeing is not at all in question.

But ours is an age in which self-preoccupied young women are encouraged to boast, in print, of their unhappy compulsions, and to bemoan the fact that they appear to be what they are – no more, no less – and consequently struggle to seem complicated and fascinating. Specifically, a miraculously sexless being, “neither a man nor a woman.”

Probably. Not everyone wants to play.

Perhaps the word fad would be less offensive. Or tedious status-game played by the pretentious and insufferable. I’m open to suggestions.

It occurs to me that being surrounded by students and professors, for whom faddishness and contrivance are often the stuff of status, may not be entirely helpful on the mental health front. If everyone around you is playing the same game, and pretending the same things, and doing it competitively, you could easily lose your bearings.

Ah yes, the woe of not being immediately and telepathically perceived as “non-binary,” and thus being denied the status of terribly interesting. As agonies go, it’s pretty niche. But given Ms Wright’s apparent lack of interest in how her Game Of Self may impose upon others, I’m tempted to suggest that respect, a reciprocal virtue, may not be the most apt card to play.

Update, via the comments, which you’re reading of course:

When you browse the website of Portsmouth’s Mary Rose Museum, looking for information on artefacts from Tudor England… and this is what you get:

Because when you look at a sixteenth-century mirror salvaged from a warship belonging to Henry VIII, the first thing you want to know is how it might induce psychological crises in the sexually dysmorphic.

And,

It’s quality stuff. Just like being there, in the mists of history. And not at all inept, or jarring, or comically incongruous.

The word indirectly is, I fear, doing an awful lot of work. And thanks to peering through this “Queer lens,” readers will doubtless find that their understanding of Tudor history has been enriched no end.

We’re told – indeed, assured  – by Hannah McCann, of the museum’s collections and curatorial staff,

A comfort, I know.

Exactly why such “queering” is underway – what its relevance might be – is not, however, made clear. An explanation for this bolting-on of irrelevant, flimsy tat – in the name of “queer theory” – was not, it seems, deemed necessary. Nor is it entirely obvious how such “queering” of museum contents benefits those who wish to know more about Henry VIII’s favourite warship.

Update, via the comments:

Regarding the mysterious purpose of all this “queering” of sixteenth-century objects, Rafi adds, drily:

Indeed. That does seem to be the primary objective. That, and the modish tactic of identifying a thing that people find interesting and then inserting one’s own rather narrow and tedious politics, and by extension oneself. Looking through the catalogue notes, no other obvious benefit, for visitors, springs to mind. Unless we include the exercising of eyebrows by moving them up and down.

And the effect, the incongruity – the sheer cack-handedness of it – is quite bizarre. It reminded me of the ‘adverts’ in The Truman Show, in which Truman’s wife and neighbours suddenly, rather desperately, and often mid-sentence, draw attention to some cleaning product or chicken dinner.

Welcome to the world of queered history. It’s like actual history, but less so.

Update 2:

In the comments, John highlights a few lines from the Telegraph’s coverage of the story:

Well, you’d think that might be a more obvious line of historical enquiry, albeit more difficult to verify.

And it occurs to me that the contrived witterings quoted above – and the museum’s urge to share them as if they were scholarly and profound – says rather more about the state of our cultural institutions than it does about anything else.

Via ripx4nutmeg.

Further to recent rumblings on assumptions of racism, this caught my eye:

Who needs evidence when you have faith? https://t.co/G8zdjcT5yP

— Colin Wright (@SwipeWright) July 31, 2023

Today’s word is mindset.

Mr Dettlaff – sorry, Professor Dettlaff – has a PhD in social work and “formerly served as Dean of the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work.” He uses the term “white supremacist” quite freely, and entirely without irony.

Apparently, the professor was removed from his position as Dean for demanding the “abolition” of policing and incarceration, and demanding a “new, liberated society… free from violence and oppression.” And in which habitual criminals and assorted sociopaths roam freely and unimpeded.

In Professor Dettlaff’s imaginings, a world without physical consequences for robbery and predation would mean “individuals have everything they need to thrive.” Except, of course, any third-party protection from the aforementioned habitual criminals and assorted sociopaths. This “new, liberated society,” in which policing has been “firmly disavowed,” will, he insists, “truly keep us safe.”

It seems that Professor Dettlaff was deemed too ideologically deranged even for a modern university. Which is quite the feat.

He’s a “thought leader,” you know.

Also, this:

💜 I prepared a curricular unit for a state initiative on childhood adversity with a slide that stated that colonization, white supremacy, racism, and oppression were the root causes of trauma and was asked to provide references for the slide. 😳

— Leigh Kimberg (@LeighKimberg) July 29, 2023

Ms Kimberg, above, is all about “compassion, healing, justice and equity.” She likes to announce her pronouns to random passers-by.

Update, via the comments, which you’re reading, of course:

Regarding Ms Kimberg, pst314 notes,

Pretty much. It has, in fact, been referred to as a laundering operation. But it seems that even this minimal requirement is far too strenuous and distracting when there’s a “new society” to invent. One in which everyone has everything they need, in which the concept of law-enforcement is a distant memory, and in which carjackers gambol about like newborn lambs.

And it’s quite something to have a supposed educator demanding that the editors of supposedly academic journals stop even the most basic attempts to ensure that key assertions in their publications are not just made-up or wildly delusional. But this, it seems, is where we are.

Update 2:

Somewhat related, on prison and recidivism.

Also, open thread. Share ye links and bicker.