UNC vs. GOP
April 15, 2013 - by
Now that UNC-Chapel Hill has a new chancellor, maybe it can move beyond the battles over sexual assaults and athletics-versus-academics and get on with the real war – the one with the new Republican majority in Raleigh.
And it will be war.
This is a fundamental social, cultural and political conflict. It is free inquiry versus free enterprise, scholars versus CEOs, free-thinkers versus true believers. It is, writ large, the same battle that has gone on since Jesse Helms railed against Chapel Hill in the 1960s. It is, 50 years later, the Speaker Ban Law sequel.
It is the ultimate brawl between the two traditions that have long defined North Carolina politics: the liberalism of Chapel Hill against the conservatism of North Carolina’s rural areas, fundamentalist churches and selected boardrooms.
But this time the anti-UNC crowd controls the legislature and the Governor’s office.
Governor McCrory, though he is quick now to defend liberal arts, has questioned gender studies and any studies that don’t put “butts in jobs.” Art Pope has long railed against what he sees as UNC’s hostility to business. And then there is a strong streak of anti-intellectualism in some Republican quarters.
In past years, UNC could count on the solid support of North Carolina’s newspapers. That relationship, especially with the N&O, has been strained by battles over public records. Some veteran N&O hands question whether the paper has gone too far and is damaging the university.
This wouldn’t be the nation’s first war between the academic world and a business-government complex that wants to “reform” academia. See the University of Virginia.
And here, like there, it could become a fight to the death of one side or the other.
Does Chancellor Folt know what she’s getting into? Holden Thorp certainly knows what he’s getting out of: big-time college athletics, the N&O’s firing range and Art Pope’s turf.
As an N.C. State alum, I could sit back and enjoy this. After all, State doesn’t face the same hostility. It puts butts in jobs: scientists, engineers and agribusiness managers. (And even a few of us history majors.)
But Chapel Hill is an essential element of North Carolina’s progressive tradition. Which is why it’s in the crosshairs.
And why it’s worth fighting for.
Posted in General, North Carolina - Republicans
UNC vs. GOP
April 15, 2013/
Now that UNC-Chapel Hill has a new chancellor, maybe it can move beyond the battles over sexual assaults and athletics-versus-academics and get on with the real war – the one with the new Republican majority in Raleigh.
And it will be war.
This is a fundamental social, cultural and political conflict. It is free inquiry versus free enterprise, scholars versus CEOs, free-thinkers versus true believers. It is, writ large, the same battle that has gone on since Jesse Helms railed against Chapel Hill in the 1960s. It is, 50 years later, the Speaker Ban Law sequel.
It is the ultimate brawl between the two traditions that have long defined North Carolina politics: the liberalism of Chapel Hill against the conservatism of North Carolina’s rural areas, fundamentalist churches and selected boardrooms.
But this time the anti-UNC crowd controls the legislature and the Governor’s office.
Governor McCrory, though he is quick now to defend liberal arts, has questioned gender studies and any studies that don’t put “butts in jobs.” Art Pope has long railed against what he sees as UNC’s hostility to business. And then there is a strong streak of anti-intellectualism in some Republican quarters.
In past years, UNC could count on the solid support of North Carolina’s newspapers. That relationship, especially with the N&O, has been strained by battles over public records. Some veteran N&O hands question whether the paper has gone too far and is damaging the university.
This wouldn’t be the nation’s first war between the academic world and a business-government complex that wants to “reform” academia. See the University of Virginia.
And here, like there, it could become a fight to the death of one side or the other.
Does Chancellor Folt know what she’s getting into? Holden Thorp certainly knows what he’s getting out of: big-time college athletics, the N&O’s firing range and Art Pope’s turf.
As an N.C. State alum, I could sit back and enjoy this. After all, State doesn’t face the same hostility. It puts butts in jobs: scientists, engineers and agribusiness managers. (And even a few of us history majors.)
But Chapel Hill is an essential element of North Carolina’s progressive tradition. Which is why it’s in the crosshairs.
And why it’s worth fighting for.
Posted in General, North Carolina - Republicans