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My inclination is to be someone who respects science and experts, but I find this difficult to adhere to when it comes to academia. Academics have historically occupied a very important place in society as those who have devoted their lives to understanding the world around us and, as a result, were key in forming how people actually understand the world around us. They are supposed to be the trusted and truth-oriented intellectuals, but I just don’t think that is the case and I have grown increasingly skeptical of academia.
I simply don’t think it has a descriptive orientation anymore, nor do think it is any longer the realm of truth-seeking. It seems to have either a normative orientation or a quais-descriptive orientation in which the endeavor is regarded as truth-seeking and it actually does have some descriptive value, but it’s done by people who a. Got into academia because they were passionate about one side of an issue b. Have a similar set of values and thus perspective c. Ask a question from a common and loaded perspective d. Focus on questions that are important to the structural integrity of a specific line of reasoning
Probably intertwined with 1, academia appears to be pretty ideologically homogenous, and that homogeneity exists reasonably far to the left. Even if they are trying to be unbiased, it’s exceptionally difficult to recognize ones own bias as bias; it’s just regarded as normal. And I think a unique element of progressivism is, I’m not sure whether it’s dogmatism but I think there is a relatively unique tendency to not distinguish between values/opinions and fact. i just don’t find progressives often framing their convictions as opinions. So if someone like that is conducting academic research, if they do not regard their opinions as opinions, they do not regard their bias as bias, and thus they do not perceive themselves as having a bias to control for. As a result academic research which is normative in nature is being presented and absorbed as if it is descriptive in nature. I think an example of this relates to the DEI space, in which I think most people would agree that that issue does not appear to allow much room for disagreement, despite the fact that it is exceptionally complex, deals with ambiguous and nebulous structures (not saying they don’t exist, but they aren’t exactly things you can reach out and touch and describe in unambiguous terms)
You should be careful to not talk broadly about academia unless you actually mean it in its entirety. If you have a problem with specific fields, then you should say that instead. To tar all of academia would require a great deal of evidence, of which you haven't posted any.
I think it would be easier to list the places where it isn't a problem than list the bad eggs.
That might be your null hypothesis, it isn't mine. I want to see evidence of the problem permeating all of academia if that's the claim the OP wants to make.
Sure. State the way I would demonstrate the evidence.
List the fields you include in academia.
Demonstrate on the per-field basis that the field is mostly ideologically homogenous in favor of the left (I would tentatively accept the conflation of liberals and progressives in this context, but not liberalism and progressivism).
Demonstrate on a per-field basis that the field's mainstream or dominant narrative/consensus about it's own subject is progressive-coded or aligned.
Demonstrate on a per-field basis that the narrative is wrong (This is an implication from the OP).
Demonstrate on a per-field basis that a person is subject to more than just scholarly ostracism for questioning the mainstream narrative.
That is an extreme amount of work and it is stacked against the person making the very non-extraordinary claim. Particularly part 4 is, because if the hypothesis is correct, publishing counter narratives will be difficult/impossible.
More importantly, shouldn't academic fields have to continually prove that they are credible? It seems silly to assume credibility, otherwise I can start a pet psychiatry field, and under your system, this is a credible academic field until someone does lots of work to prove 2-5 on your list.
The claim is that all of academia is tainted by progressives. I warned the OP against claiming such a thing and made it clear they would have to provide a great deal of evidence to demonstrate it. This is why I suggested sticking to specific fields to make that complaint about, because the work is already done in many cases. If they had talked about it, I would agree with the OP that a field like CRT (or would it be Critical Race Studies?) is hopelessly captured by social progressives. But just because I agree in this case doesn't mean I'll let a bad argument slide.
Critical studies. Education. Sociology. Psychology. Journalism/Communication. Business. Law. Those are pretty much the large departments (for most universities) where publishing something related to race/sex would be relevant. You'd be hard pressed to get a paper published in any of the major journals in those fields if your conclusion was "race discrimination against URMs (or whatever the popular phrase is now) is an illusion." If your career was largely oriented to publishing such papers, I don't think you'd get a tenure track position at a place equaling the quality and relevancy of your publication. See, for example, https://twitter.com/ProfDBernstein/status/1642600739489849344
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