Government-education censorship alliance is the greatest threat to democracy

Revelations that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) created "disinformation" groups at Stanford University and the University of Washington to censor political speech leading up to the 2020 election should outrage and alarm every American. Free exchange of ideas is the lifeblood of a democracy and the unholy alliance between the government and higher education institutions must be fully exposed and broken up to preserve our Constitutional Republic.

Under this partnership, higher education institutions acted as conduits between the government and Big Tech to remove speech that government officials found unacceptable to achieve their political ends. Researchers would review ‘misinformation’ reports submitted by federal officials, compile lists of offending posts, and then submit them to social media companies with specific recommendations. These recommendations reduced the post's discoverability and led to shadow bans and even suspension of accounts. Approximately 35 percent of the content they flagged was removed from social media platforms.

The effort targeted those who held opinions that went contrary to prevailing narratives, especially regarding corruption allegations against Biden, the integrity of the 2020 election, and COVID mask and vaccine policies. Countless Americans were censored, silenced, and shadow-banned during the 2020 election cycle. It was part of a concerted effort to exert control over our behavior and dictate what We the People are allowed to say, see, and hear. And it worked.

The House Committee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government and the Twitter Files have exposed the far-reaching impact of the Election Integrity Partnership between the government, Stanford, and the University of Washington. The 2020 election could have been much different if factual information wasn’t covered up. Just consider how one in six Biden voters surveyed stated that they would not have voted or changed their vote if they had known about the Hunter Biden laptop scandal and the Joe Biden corruption allegations.

Given the ‘success’ of this project, the Biden administration expanded the government-higher education alliance in June 2021 through the National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism. Since then, a plethora of new partnerships between the government and higher education have emerged to shape our perceptions and opinions. For example, the National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded $5 million taxpayer dollars to the University of Wisconsin to develop a system that can detect and "strategically correct" what the government perceives as misinformation. This is in addition to $7.5 million awarded to ten other universities to work on similar censorship-type programs, and $40 million awarded to 15 higher education institutions under the "Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention Grant."

All of these programs reflect the ever-expanding authority of the federal government and are part of a broader effort to exert control over our thoughts and opinions. This goes against the fabric of our Constitution, and our universities should not be working to advance dehumanizing social control tools and tactics at the behest of the government.

While the Biden administration asserts the National Strategy aims to prevent domestic terrorism, it is a clear attempt to control behavior. Under the strategy, even the slightest criticism of the government and its policies can be labeled anti-government and/or anti-authority sentiment. Anti-government and anti-authority sentiment are never defined, allowing a wide net to be cast. This limitless power has resulted in various groups being targeted, including parents at school board meetings, traditional Catholics, and Trump supporters.

The heart of the American experiment lies in the freedom to speak openly and criticize the government without fear of retribution. When we are no longer free to exercise our liberties, tyranny is inevitable – and this is the greatest threat to democracy.

The good news is that we’re not powerless. We can and must take steps to curtail this insidious alliance. First, any institution that assists the government should not be allowed to evade accountability, including higher education. Those affected by the censorship efforts of the Stanford "disinformation" group should pursue lawsuits against the institution. By holding higher education institutions accountable, they will be less willing to aid the government in turning Orwell’s 1984 into a reality.

We also need to hold government officials accountable. Any bureaucrat who knowingly and willfully aims to deny our constitutional rights should be fired and prosecuted. Under Title 18 U.S.C. § 242 — Deprivation of Rights Under Color of Law — prohibits the willful deprivation of rights while acting under the pretense of law. Also, Title 18 U.S.C. § 241 — Conspiracy Against Rights —makes it illegal to violate constitutional rights through force, intimidation, or threats.

The alliance between ideological zealots within government and academia must be dismantled. We must defend our God-given liberties and the principles that define our nation. Our Constitutional Republic is at stake, and the time for action is now.

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/government-education-censorship-alliance-greatest-threat-democracy

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Night of the Living Ed: Zombie Public Schools, Drained of Pandemic Lifeblood, Haunt the Land

A significant but unknown number of public schools across the U.S., particularly in big cities, have lost so many students in the last half-decade that many of their classrooms sit empty. Gone is the loud clatter of students bursting through crowded hallways and slamming lockers.

The harm from these half-empty schools is inflicted directly on all students in a district. Without enough per-pupil state funding to cover their costs, they require financial subsidies to remain open, forcing district-wide cutbacks in academic programs.

“I visited one school that takes up an entire city block but there were only five classrooms used, plus a library, a computer room, and an afterschool room,” said Sam Davis, a member of the Board of Education in Oakland, California. “As our budget officer said, if you don’t have enough students for two teams to play kickball, there are a lot of other academic activities that are not going to be sustainable either.”

But nothing in public education is more controversial and difficult than closing a neighborhood school. The protests that recently flared up in cities like Oakland and Denver over proposals to shut low-enrollment schools, which also tend to be the worst academic performers in districts, are just a prelude of the reckoning to come, according to interviews with school leaders, researchers, educators, and charter officials.

The permanent closure of schools slowed drastically during the pandemic, even though many urban districts suffered a major exodus of students, with double-digit losses in New York City and Los Angeles. Many hollowed-out districts have temporarily sidestepped the tempest of shutting schools because Congress provided them with a historic windfall of pandemic-related funding and wide latitude in spending it, said Georgetown Professor Marguerite Roza, who directs the Edunomics Lab.

But the $190 billion lifeline – called the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund – ends next September. So school leaders are facing mounting pressure to shrink their oversized districts, setting up the next battleground over public schools.

“Many districts have too many schools, not enough kids, and are propping them up with federal relief funds,” Roza said. “And they haven’t laid the groundwork for closures when the funding goes away. Imagine the anger and protests when families learn suddenly that their schools are on the list to close.”

With aid flowing during the pandemic, districts shut an average of 810 schools a year in 2021 and 2022, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. That’s far less than the 1,350 average from 2011 to 2020, a difference that underscores the magnitude of the problem of zombie schools.

Why Schools Are Hard to Close

In the business and nonprofit sectors, wasteful spending is typically reined in by downsizing operations into fewer buildings and personnel. But public schools often find protection from the calls for efficiency. The first wave of pandemic-era proposals to shut schools in several districts has been countered by a formidable coalition of local advocates, forcing school boards to backpedal on their consolidation plans.

Families are leading the protests at school board meetings. Some have sentimental ties to neighborhood schools that go back generations, and others cite transportation issues in switching to another location that’s further from home. Teachers unions have joined the fight in Oakland and other cities, arguing that closures pose unfair labor practices. And racial justice advocates have succeeded in reframing the issue as a matter of equality rather than wasteful spending since nearly all the schools to be closed serve mostly black and Latino kids.

Districts like Seattle that aim to shutter schools often cite reasons that are out of their control. The birth rate has been dropping since 2007, according to federal data, chipping away at enrollment. Families are also leaving cities like Los Angeles and Chicago because of the rising cost of living and concerns over crime and homelessness. San Francisco, for instance, lost 7.5% of its population between 2020 and 2022, according to the census.

But public schools share in the blame. With test scores on the Nation’s Report Card in decline since 2012, families have been quitting traditional schools in search of a better education and a safer environment at charters, micro, and home schools. Charter enrollment, for instance, grew 7% from 2020 to 2022, while district schools lost 3.5% of students, according to the National Alliance of Public Charter Schools.

School districts can’t do anything about the birth rate. But many of them do control the fate of charters. In Los Angeles and other cities facing closures, school boards that formerly encouraged the expansion of charters have grown hostile toward them and blocked their expansion, in part to preserve their own enrollment.

How Zombie Schools Hurt Education

Some districts are now devising proposals to close under-enrolled facilities because of the financial burden they create.

Even a school at half capacity needs a principal, support and food service staff, custodians, and sometimes a nurse, librarian, and counselor. Education is highly labor-intensive, with compensation comprising at least 85% of a school’s expenses, Georgetown’s Roza says.

Since zombie schools don’t cover their own expenses, superintendents have to pull resources from other schools and programs to subsidize them. Funding for art, music, special education, and advanced placement classes may be cut, affecting students throughout the district.

“In the end, districts have to spread resources too thinly, across too many buildings, and nobody gets served well,” Roza says.

https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2023/11/28/night_of_the_living_ed_zombie_public_schools_drained_of_pandemic_lifeblood_haunt_the_land_993686.html?mc_cid=1a3b0578c8&mc_eid=012a6b3e32

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UK: KCL’s sinister diversity and inclusion policies

Last week the King’s College London LGBTQ staff network, called Proudly King’s, demonstrated its intellectual level and its view of women by tweeting a picture of a woman holding a banner saying ‘TERF FART (Feminist Appropriating Radical Transphobes)’. If you thought that endorsing this kind of behaviour would make you less likely to be promoted to professor, you might be surprised to see the King’s academic promotion criteria.

To apply for promotion to Reader or Professor, academics at King’s must write five pages on research, teaching and administration and one further page devoted to ‘Inclusion and Support’. Academics are told to use this section to describe how we ‘create an inclusive environment’ and ask us to discuss ‘activity undertaken to support the university’s equality, diversity and inclusion ambitions’. The guidance gives examples, including participating in Proudly King’s and with other groups such as ‘Athena Swan, Race Equality and Stonewall LGBTQ groups’.

Exactly why King’s wants its academics to participate in Stonewall activities is unclear. Stonewall has compared women campaigning for sex-based rights to antisemites; lesbians campaigning for sex-based rights to racists; and described calls for ‘respectful debate’ as questioning ‘trans people’s right to exist’. Stonewall has even campaigned against the UK’s Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) because of its attempts to uphold women’s sex-based rights.

It is wholly inappropriate for a university to single out one particular political perspective for special treatment in their promotion process. It sends a clear message that speaking against this political perspective is frowned upon, with an inevitable chilling effect on freedom of speech.

It also raises obvious legal concerns. The Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act places a duty on universities to secure the academic freedom of their staff to express their views without ‘the likelihood of them securing promotion… being reduced’. The Equality Act also outlaws indirect discrimination against staff who hold protected gender-critical beliefs.

Academic freedom is central to the functioning of a university. Without it, research has no credibility. If staff prioritise the political preferences of the EDI team over impartiality and scientific integrity, their research is worthless.

This is not a hypothetical issue. Examples of activist interference in science abound. The question on trans status in the last census was made all but useless by choosing a wording that was attractive to activists but all but incomprehensible to non-native English speakers. The Tavistock’s Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) pursued an activist-led approach to gender medicine that ignored routine and consistent data collection meaning that outcomes could not be accurately tracked. For years sports bodies pursued a fantasy approach to science where testosterone levels were deemed the only significant difference between males and females.

By embedding bias within the promotions process, King’s leadership are embedding a pattern of discrimination within the university against gender-critical beliefs. For example, earlier this year a research ethics committee at King’s objected to my plans ‘to find the views of athletes and volunteers on the question of when males should be allowed to compete in the female category in athletics’ because, by using the words male and female, I was guilty of ‘misgendering’. Perhaps right now my colleagues on that ethics committee are using this as an example of their commitment to inclusion as they complete their promotion applications.

Given its dubious legality, why did King’s implement this promotion process? King’s decision-making process has not been made public, but, to me this question seems easy to answer. As part of their Stonewall Workplace Equality Index submission King’s were asked ‘Does the organisation proactively recognise contributions to LGBT inclusion activity during employee performance appraisals?’ King’s answered this by directly quoting the offending guidance from our promotion application.

King’s won a gold award from Stonewall in the Workplace Equality Index. King’s was also 14th in Stonewall’s Top 100 employers, and second in higher education, just behind Cardiff university. Cardiff is a tough act to follow, mind: they defended violent threats to staff who dared to suggest the university leave Stonewall’s schemes as ‘free speech‘ even after one academic had their car window smashed.

King’s defence appears to be that the LGBTQ network is not the only way we might show our inclusivity. Other options suggested in the guidance include our staff network Elevate which ‘specifically addresses the challenges and barriers faced by those who identify as women and as non-binary’. King’s says that it is ‘proud of the work’ done by Elevate, but looking at their website Elevate appears to be little more than a shell. The ‘Projects’ and ‘Events and Activities’ sections of its website say simply ‘more details coming soon’. Its list of senior sponsors is ‘TBC’. Its only output to date appears to be a menopause toolkit featuring a menopause policy which omits the words woman and female entirely.

Women seeking promotion at King’s can also consider working for our Athena Swan network. Athena Swan is an award scheme in higher education that once promoted women in science, but which now promotes gender-identity theory. Athena Swan have removed the word woman from their founding principles, and even advised universities to even stop collecting data on the sex of staff until it was pointed out that this guidance was unlawful.

There is a clear pattern. All officially sanctioned opportunities at King’s for women to campaign for equal pay and promotion, also appear to require them to campaign against their sex-based rights.

This is unfortunate as there is plenty of work to do at King’s on equal pay and promotion. In my own department of mathematics, there are 31 professors. Only two are women.

Science, and science at King’s has a long history of discrimination against women. Rosalind Franklin is one of King’s most celebrated alumna. Her ‘Photograph 51’ taken in 1952 revealed the helical structure of DNA. However, Franklin did not enjoy her time at King’s, not least because men would not admit women to their common room. Women have been admitted to our common room for some time now. Perhaps it is time to take the next step and also allow them to speak.

https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/11/kcls-sinister-diversity-and-inclusion-policies/

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My other blogs: Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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