Take action: ask Professor Dawkins not to teach at £18k college
I’ve just sent this to Richard Dawkins:
Dear Professor Dawkins,
I am saddened to hear of your involvement in the £18,000 a year “New College for the Humanities”.
I have always respected you as a public intellectual. But that you have allowed this position to be used to promote a private university – and so the principle of privatisation of universities – saddens me.
In particular, the New College for the Humanities will charge the majority of students £18,000 per year. This amount – double the maximum for public universities – means that the demographic able to attend this college will be highly skewed. While a few of the very brightest from average backgrounds may receive scholarships, most learning from you at this institution will only be able to attend because of the wealth of their parents.
I believe that this is dangerous. The existence of such institutions in Britain will encourage elites to perpetuate down generations. They will ensure that parental wealth has more and more to do with success in life.
Your profile is such that the media will always choose you as a face for the institution. Any role you have there will imply support for the existence of this institution.
It will give credibility to government plans to further privatise Higher Education and so may bolster their case for further funding cuts. It will certainly do little to help the current shortfall.
As such I’m asking if you would consider politely declining the offer from Prof Grayling to teach at this establishment.
Yours sincerely,
Adam Ramsay and others
The newly established ‘Common People’ campaign group are asking people to email Prof Dawkins and letting him know you disagree with his decision. You can send this letter – or your own – here.
I recal hearing about a Mexican man many years ago working at a factory that manufactured parts for military use, as soon as the man found out that the small part he was making went towards things that could kill people, he quit his job. His conscience told him that other families like his own could die because of what he made, despite the fact that there was little work elsewhere except labouring for small pay. Manufacturing weapons might not compare to working at a private university, but Richard Dawkins and wealthy people have a choice, unlike others who will join the ranks of the unemployed. I wonder if Mr. Dawkins and others who have profitted from their education in a myriad of ways and most of all financially, who are far from having to prostitute themselves to earn a crust, enter into a pact that will erode a system that has given young people from a range of backgrounds an opportunity to enter into Universities and all they had to offer, to one that will narrow it for only those whose can afford the fees or have ‘networked’ their way in, or shown exceptional talent.
Having noticed that Niall Ferguson is on the list as well makes me inclined to have another go at Dawkins for the hell of it. Isn’t it a bit ironic that Dawkins, who makes such a big deal out of being a solid, old fashioned positivist should end up as a lightweight, middle brow, media brand, all spin and no substance? How very postmodern.
I guess Dawkins is being unfairly singled out here but, what, in a humanities college, is he actually going to teach? I like his pop-science books (though I prefer Stephen J. Gould), and I have ‘The God Delusion’ on my shelf – it’s a fun read. And I appreciate that this isn’t meant to be a heavyweight book, but the man seems to be entirely innocent of any serious knowledge of the sociology and anthropology of religion, he’s not a philosopher of science. At Oxford his chair is in the ‘public understanding of science’ – which is a public service surely, not an academic discipline.
A ‘private’ education never did Caroline Lucas any harm. Or Cameron, Clegg and Osborne etc. Seemingly much to the contrary.
Still, this isn’t a great idea. Actually, come to think about it, it stinks. However, in the days of the internet, freely ‘obtainable’ ebooks and the like, the only reason to go to a Uni is to network and get in with the in-crowd. It’s never been primarily about education. Indeed, some of the thickest people I know have been to University and benefited from it – careerwise – if not intellectually.
Jim,
I’d accept that I was pretty angry when I wrote the former, and had perhaps calmed down by the latter, but from my perspective he is clearly a) an interesting and intellegent man with useful thoughts and b) a wind up merchant.
But, my main reaction is ‘fair cop’.
It struck me when I read it the fist time because I thought it was plain wrong. He’s a quietly spoken man who makes his points in a reasoned way.
He may have strong opinions (and I’m personally not a down the line secularist so don’t agree with everything he says) but they are provokative because of what they are, not because he courts controversy or expresses himself in a needlessly insensitive way.
The criticisms I have of Dawkins rest upon his arguments, as they should, not the man himself who has done little to merit the scorn he provokes which has an element of bandwagonig to it to my mind.
I should also say that I don’t think that describing a man as obnoxious when you want to slate him and then saying you resspect him when writing a letter to appeal to him are consistent positons.
But I’ll leave the inconsistency point there I think rather than labour the point and risk gettng it out of proportion.
I respect his brain and his ideas ‘respect him as a public intellectual’ I also think much of his behaviour is obnoxious. These are not mutually exclusive… (well spotted)
Adam, two posts back you described Dawkins as obnoxious. Now you say you’ve always respected him. Out of interest – which is it?