Maroon blues

Cross posted on Political Arguments.

Via Will Baude. As David Brooks and Tom Wolfe scold academia for being a little loose with its morals, Stanley Kurtz chides the University of Chicago for being a little loose with its intellect. Will Baude comes to the Maroons' defense, and enlists several current and former bloggers with Chicago affiliations to his side.

The point, however, shouldn't that Chicago is a "haven for conservative scholars". It's that Chicago doesn't much care whom you pray to, vote for, picket or boycott in your own free time, as long as you do good research and teach well. There are clearly excesses on the left and right by those who think that all social institutions must march in righteous lockstep to the promissed land. It is the social function of academia to account for it all, not to join in the march.