The Morning Briefing: Academia Needs a Purge, Not a Reshuffling
PJ MediaJan 03
Claudine Gay Resigns as Harvard President
The Facts
Harvard President Claudine Gay — the first Black leader of the school — on Tuesday resigned her position in the face of allegations that she plagiarized several academic writings, and weeks after her controversial testimony in front of the US Congress about campus antisemitism.
Gay, who denied plagiarizing any works, said in a statement that she was distressed over her "commitments to confronting hate and upholding scholarly rigor" being challenged by critics.
The Spin
Right narrative
It's about time that Gay, a serial plagiarizer who made deeply concerning remarks about antisemitism, was held accountable. Her feckless response to the hate running rampant on her campus since October should've gotten her canned long ago. But this is what we've come to expect from the leftist institutions of indoctrination that pass themselves off as institutions of higher learning. More must be done to clean abhorrent ideologies out of America's university administrations.
Left narrative
The right's bad faith crusade against diversity in education and its attempt to undermine, and eventually remove, every Black leader who’s elevated to a higher position has taken another victim. Harvard has set a bad example by caving and allowing Gay to step down, but there’s still an opportunity to fight back against these attacks, and in turn, continue the fight to integrate people from marginalized communities into the power structure of these institutions.