MARK MIRSKY
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utable public and even private colleges assume, cannot simply function as
private enterprises.
I was told that in both the Levin and the jeffries cases, the lawyers in
the State Attorney General's office arguing for the college administra–
tion did not adequately present either its views or the facts. One hopes
that it is only an instance then of an incompetent defense. The decisions,
however, were ominous, for they signaled that the judicial system is sus–
ceptible to the dread symptom of "political correctness," the virus of
"victimology." Despite opinions which were deliberately provocative,
both men were confirmed in their role as victims. A kind of malpractice
glee seemed to have seized the judicial system - everyone is a victim. The
courts awarded a large cash penalty to Professor jeffries, who had not
gone into painful retreat upon his dismissal as chairman but embarked,
like Professor Levin, on the lecture circuit, where both profited from the
publicity and considerably supplemented their salaries.
When Professor jeffries's views about a world split between "sun
people" and "ice people" were trumpeted in the media, no one ques–
tioned how he could have been put on curriculum committees of the
State of New York. His attitude had been well known to
The New
York Times
and to state officials for many years, but there was no review
of his appointment and no public demand for his review. (At the time of
his appointment, I was informed, there
was
some questioning of his
qualifications, by some alumni and trustees.) The attitude that race or
race and gender are the facts determining the direction of an individual's
life seems to me as questionable as choosing sexual preference or nation–
ality as one's overriding identity.
In
the rhetoric of such advocacy, I feel
as if the intuition that has matured in American democracy, that the in–
dividual is distinct from background, color, creed, and gender, has been
subsumed . Yet it is exactly the constitutional defense of the individual
and the right of free speech that brought Professors Levin and jeffries
their court victories.
In
their speeches and reviews, there are heaps of victims on their side,
with a few desertions, dangerous or dumb, to the other side. Lost as well
in their manifestoes is the idea of self-criticism, humor, the agonized
questioning of one's own assumptions, all of which distinguish literature,
the profounder reaches of religious thought, psychoanalysis, and other
forms of intellectual speculation. Such self-scrutiny, based on a notion of
the individual as distinct from a society of truth-bearers (or a society of
intelligence or guilt-bearers), is a form of a too-often degraded political
virtue, humility. Being humble and claiming to be a victim, though of–
ten confused, are two very different points of view.
Political correctness is finally a judgment of political discretion or,
