Ecolog: I regret to report that approximately 90 percent (depending on how one "counts" moderate responses, it might be 95) of the off-list responses have not only reinforced the notion that fear and intimidation do exist, but have revealed that the phenomenon exists much farther up the food chain than I could have (or was willing to have) imagined. One correspondent, who asked to be paraphrased, not quoted, implied that the hue and cry (I am paraphrasing) was a "blame someone else" group, unfairly targeting faculty, institutions, and the government, and contained a fair amount of misinformation about how academia works.
What surprised me most was the high level of those (many Ph.D's, even tenured professors) confirming responses, and expressing concern over the phenomenon. What surprised me even more was the reluctance to post to ecolog, regardless of the "side" of the issue. There's a message in there somewhere . . . or is there? I have known for some time that what I will shorten by calling "cutthroat politics" existed outside of academia that I thought for years consisted of a minority of twerps, turns out to be all too real in ecology (with a small "e" as one correspondent put it) too, if the complainants are to be taken seriously. Among my academic friends I am given to think that geologists, for example, are just one big happy family, and that certain social scientists are nearly all bloodthirsty dragons. One such friend was, after receiving a master's degree from a "second-tier" state institution, required to get a new master's from the upper-tier institution, and was finally driven off-shore for a Ph.D (from an arguably superior institution in a "first-world" country). Another was simply hassled to the point of having to wear a colostomy bag. I won't go on . . . While I don't doubt for a second that there are whiners out there who want to shift the blame to a "tough professor" or "the system," that does not mean that I doubt the validity of the complainants. I do not conclude, from this inadequate (though surprisingly large) sample, and almost offhand enquiry, that 90 percent of the system consists of rotten, insecure, pompous egocentrics; neither can I conclude that their numbers are demonstrated to be insignificant either. I suspect that the reality varies with the institution and with students and graduates who have not yet received tenure. Good teaching might drive bad teaching out of circulation, but if the pack of hyenas (no offense to this lovely animal) is big enough, the converse could easily be the case. I am under no illusion (yea, the number of off-list responses proscribes any such thought) that fear will evaporate and that those clutching onto their "positions" will suddenly "get religion" and become welcoming of criticism or any less derisive of opinions other than their own, with or without evidence. What I do hope is that the intellectually secure on review committees will learn to spot budding poseurs and refuse to admit them into the upper ranks--nay, to vote in their favor at all (should some Ph.D's, CEO's, CFO's, etc. [presumably mere 'whiners?'] be flipping burgers as a career?). This I hope for all sorts of organizations and institutions, not just academia. In the dog-eat-dog worlds of government and private enterprise where I spent most of my time, I have found, over the last several decades, that bs'ers were somehow able to trump those with real ability. I found, in fact, that the only reason those of real ability remain in many institutions, public and private, is to carry water for the deadwood and gasbags. Finally, one thing I could not understand in my years of reading Ecolog, is why so few of the 12,000+? subscribers actually posted. Some lurk for the sole purpose of getting jobs. Others just lurk. And a handful actually post. One respondent confided that the quality of the discourse was beneath his or her standards--boring and inconsequential. It makes me kinda wonder, though, whether or not the quality of the discourse is enhanced or diminished by the fear-of-posting factor. I have noticed, for example, that most discussions do simply lose steam, often just before a conclusions seems to be at hand. All this does not shake my faith in the potential of Ecolog. It does leave me with the impression that more of that potential goes unrealized than I once thought. Will that be helped or hindered by driving all the elephants into the closet? WT PS: (Confidential to students and most non-tenured faculty: Regrettably, I must conclude that y'all are right--posting, even to Ecolog actually could be hazardous to your future.) "To be, or not to be, that is the question." --William Shakespeare, Hamlet. It is the responsibility of the journalist to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. --paraphrasing H. L. Menken
