The Authoritarian Moment

by Ben Shapiro

  Scientific inquiry is forbidden. Now authoritarian leftism, citing The ScienceTM, rules.

  How far has this insanity gone? In June 2020, the American Physical Society, an organization of 55,000 physicists, closed down its offices as part of a “strike for black lives,” recommitting itself to “eradicate systemic racism and discrimination, especially in academia, and science.” Nature put out an article titled “Ten simple rules for building an anti-racist lab.” Princeton faculty—more than one thousand of them—issued a letter to the president proposing that all scientific departments create a senior thesis prize for research that “is actively anti-racist or expands our sense of how race is constructed in our society.”39

  In December 2020, a group of professors of computer science felt it necessary to write an open letter to the Association for Computing Machinery—the world’s largest computing society—decrying cancel culture. “We are a group of researchers, industry experts, academics, and educators, writing with sadness and alarm about the increasing use of repressive actions aimed at limiting the free and unfettered conduct of scientific research and debate,” the group of professors wrote. “Such actions have included calls for academic boycotts, attempts to get people fired, inviting mob attacks against ‘offending’ individuals, and the like. . . . We condemn all attempts to coerce scientific activities into supporting or opposing specific social-political beliefs, values, and attitudes, including attempts at preventing researchers from exploring questions of their choice, or at restricting the free discussion and debate of issues related to scientific research.”40

  The fact that such a letter was necessary in computer science demonstrates the depth of the problem. But it was necessary: earlier in 2020, NeurIPS, the most prestigious AI conference on the planet, required authors to submit papers only with a statement explaining how the research could impact politics—a question decidedly outside the bounds of science, but firmly within the bounds of The ScienceTM.41

  THE “DIVERSIFICATION” OF SCIENCE

  If science is supposed to be about the pursuit of truth via verification and falsification, the scientific community is supposed to be a meritocracy: those who do the best research ought to receive the most commendations. But when wokeism infuses science, the meritocracy falls by the wayside: the composition of the scientific community becomes subject to the same anti-scientific demand for demographic representation. To prove the point, in 2020, the Association of American Medical Colleges hosted professional racists Ibram X. Kendi and Nikole Hannah-Jones to explain that the standards for entrance into the scientific community ought to be changed in order to achieve demographic parity. Hannah-Jones explained to the annual meeting of the AAMC that when she requires a doctor, she tries to “seek out a black doctor”; Kendi explained that the lack of black doctors overall is a result of “stage 4 metastatic racism.” Kendi told the AAMC—which administers the Medical College Admissions Test—that standardized tests are racist, because standardized tests tend to weed out black and Latino students. “Either there’s something wrong with the test, or there’s something wrong with the test-takers,” Kendi said. And of course to suggest that not all individuals perform equally well on tests is to suggest that there is something wrong with some of the test takers—which would make you racist. All of this supposedly “anti-racist action,” Hannah-Jones agreed, is part and parcel of choosing “to undo the structures that racism created.”42

  This is insulting tripe. It’s insulting to those who achieve in the meritocracy; it’s even more insulting to those who are assumed victims of the system. More than insulting, however, such ridiculous race-based thinking is dangerous. After all, if the alternative to a meritocracy is wokeism, wouldn’t that necessarily mean the admission of less-than-qualified people to the highest ranks of science?

  Yes. But it’s happening nonetheless. According to Claremont McKenna professor Frederick Lynch, between 2013 and 2016, medical schools “admitted 57 percent of black applicants with a low MCAT of 24 to 26, but only 8 percent of whites and 6 percent of Asians with those same low scores.” Meanwhile, the National Science Foundation, a federal funding agency for science, says that it wants to pursue a “diverse STEM workforce”—not the best scientists of all races, but a specifically diverse group.43

  There is no evidence that a more diverse demographic research body should impact the findings of science. Science is not literature; personal experience should be of little relevance in chemistry. But to point this out is to meet with the rage of the mob. In June 2020, Brock University chemist Tomáš Hudlický printed an essay in Wiley’s Angewandt Chemie, a prominent chemistry journal. He argued that the push for diversity over merit in chemistry had damaged the standards of the field, stating that diversity training had “influenced hiring practices to the point where the candidate’s inclusion in one of the preferred social groups may override his or her qualifications.” He also explained the patently obvious truth that “hiring practices that suggest or even mandate equality in terms of absolute numbers of people in specific subgroups is counter-productive if it results in discrimination against the most meritorious candidates.”44 Chemists emerged from the woodwork to condemn the essay and its author; the Royal Society of Chemistry and the German Chemical Society penned a statement calling the essay “outdated, offensive and discriminatory,” adding “We will not stand for this. Diversity and equality are fantastic strengths in workplaces, in culture and in wider society. This is not only demonstrated by overwhelming evidence from decades of research, but we also hold it is morally the only acceptable position.”

  What overwhelming evidence suggests that prioritizing racial diversity over scientific ability is a fantastic strength? The statement cited no such evidence. But the moral statement—an unscientific statement, to be sure—was clear. The journal deleted the article, and added a statement: “Something went very wrong here and we’re committed to do[ing] better.” Two editors were suspended. Sixteen board members, including three Nobel Prize winners, resigned. They put out a joint statement lamenting the “journal’s publishing practices,” which they said had “suppressed ethnic and gender diversity.” Fellow scientists called for Hudlický to be fired.45

  CONCLUSION

  In October 2020, the politicization of science—and its replacement with The ScienceTM—became more obvious than ever before. Scientific American, perhaps the foremost popular science publication in America, issued the first presidential endorsement in its 175-year history. Naturally, they endorsed Joe Biden. “We do not do this lightly,” the editors intoned. “The evidence and the science show that Donald Trump has badly damaged the U.S. and its people—because he rejects evidence and science.” Joe Biden, by contrast, was providing “fact-based plans to protect our health, our economy and the environment.” Those fact-based plans were, of course, simply liberal policy prescriptions, open to debate. But Scientific American spoke in the name of The ScienceTM.46 Not to be outdone, Nature similarly endorsed Joe Biden. “We cannot stand by and let science be undermined,” the editorial board explained. Among their reasons: Trump’s rejection of the Iran nuclear deal, a decidedly ultracrepidarian concern.47 The New England Journal of Medicine, another prominent medical journal, suggested that Trump be booted from office for his Covid response. Yes, Trump’s Covid rhetoric was wild and inconsistent. But even Trump’s most ardent critics, were they honest, would recognize that Biden provided no actual Covid plan of his own. “Reasonable people will certainly disagree about the many political positions taken by candidates. But truth is neither liberal nor conservative,” NEJM stated.48

  No, science is neither liberal nor conservative. But The ScienceTM—the radicalized version of science in which scientists speak their politics, and in which political actors set the limits of science—is certainly a tool of authoritarian leftists. And it predominates across the scientific world. Americans still trust their doctors to tell them the truth; they still trust scientists to speak on issues within their purview. But incr
easingly, they reject the automatic institutional legitimacy of the self-described scientific establishment. And they should. We can only hope that scientists realize that scientific credibility relies not on membership in the New Ruling Class but in the pure legitimacy of the scientific process before the entire field—a field that has transformed the world in extraordinary ways—collapses.

  Chapter 5

  Your Authoritarian Boss

  In December 2020, I received an email from a fan. The fan explained that she worked at a Fortune 50 company—a company that had “quotas on who they want to hire and put into position of leadership based solely on skin color.” At a company meeting, this fan voiced her opinion that the company should not support programs rooted in racial composition. “All 5 of the participants in the meeting immediately called my manager and their managers to voice deep concerns,” she related. “My manager asked if I was still a good fit and I came close to losing my job.” Her question, she wrote, was simple: “Should I immediately start looking for another role outside the company?”

  I receive these sorts of emails daily. Multiple times a day, in fact. Over the past two years, the velocity of such emails has increased at an arithmetic rate; whenever we open the phone lines on my radio show, the board fills with employees concerned that mere expression of dissent will cost them their livelihood.

  And they are right to be worried.

  America’s corporations used to be reliably apolitical. If anything, the business world trended toward conservatism. From 2000 to 2017, executives at the biggest public companies gave overwhelmingly to Republicans: according to the National Bureau of Economic Research, 18.6 percent of CEOs routinely donated to Democrats, while 57.7 percent donated to Republicans. Yet over time, while the percentage of Republican CEOs remained far higher than that of Democratic CEOs, more and more CEOs began preferring political neutrality to Republican giving. And the disparity between Republicans and Democrats in the West and Northeast—read California and New York—is far lower than in other regions of the country, with those who are neutral comprising a heavy percentage.1

  Now, today’s corporations are bastions of authoritarian leftism. During the Black Lives Matter summer, nearly every major corporation in America put out a statement decrying systemic American racism, mirroring the priorities of the woke Left. What’s more, nearly all of these corporations put out internal statements effectively warning employees against dissent. Walmart, historically a Republican-leaning corporation, put out a letter from Doug McMillon pledging to “help replace the structures of systemic racism, and build in their place frameworks of equity and justice that solidify our commitment to the belief that, without question, Black Lives Matter.” McMillon pledged more minority hiring, “listening, learning and elevating the voices of our Black and African American associates,” and spending $100 million to “provide counsel across Walmart to increase understanding and improve efforts that promote equity and address the structural racism that persists in America.”2 The fact that Walmart had to close hundreds of stores due to the threat of BLM looting went unmentioned.3

  Major corporations tripped over themselves to issue public statements denouncing racism—and, more broadly, America’s supposed systemic racism. Many of the corporations pledged to fund their own quasi-religious indulgences, which would alleviate their supposed complicity in the racist system. Tim Cook of Apple issued a letter stating that America’s racist past “is still present today—not only in the form of violence, but in the everyday experience of deeply rooted discrimination,” and offered funding for the Equal Justice Initiative,4 a progressive organization that blames historic racism for nearly every modern ill. Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, issued a letter stating, “It’s incumbent upon us to use our platforms, our resources, to drive systemic change”;5 the company stated that it would spend $150 million on “diversity and inclusion investment,” aiming to “double the number of Black and African American people managers, senior individual contributors, and senior leaders in the United States by 2025.”6 Netflix issued a statement commanding, “To be silent is to be complicit,” and pledged $100 million to build “economic opportunity for Black communities.” That commitment followed CEO Reed Hastings announcing he would donate $120 million to black colleges.7

  Even the most tangential and irrelevant companies chimed in. Ice cream company Ben & Jerry’s issued a statement: “We must dismantle white supremacy. . . . What happened to George Floyd was not the result of a bad apple; it was the predictable consequence of a racist and prejudiced system and culture that has treated black bodies as the enemy from the beginning.”8 And it would be remiss not to mention that Gushers partnered with Fruit by the Foot to fight systemic racism, trumpeting, “We stand with those fighting for justice.”9

  These statements and actions weren’t merely meaningless public breast-beating. Corporations began taking internal actions to cram down the radical Left’s viewpoint on American systemic racism. Corporation after corporation mandated so-called diversity training for employees—training that often included admonitions about the evils of whiteness and the prevalence of societal white supremacy. Dissent from this orthodoxy could be met with suspension or firing. Employees at Cisco lost their jobs after writing that “All Lives Matter” and that the phrase “Black Lives Matter” fosters racism;10 Sacramento Kings broadcaster Grant Napear lost his job for tweeting that “all lives matter”;11 Leslie Neal-Boylan, dean of University of Massachusetts Lowell’s nursing school, lost her job after stating, “BLACK LIVES MATTER, but also, EVERYONE’S LIFE MATTERS”—which, after all, is the hallmark of nursing;12 an employee at B&H Photo lost his job for writing, “I cannot support the organization called ‘Black Lives Matter’ until it clearly states that all lives matter equally regardless of race, ethnicity, religion or creed, then denounces any acts of violence that is happening in their name. In the meantime, I fully support the wonderful organization called ‘America’ where EVERY life matters. E pluribus unum!”13

  Even corporate heads weren’t immune from the pressure: CrossFit CEO Greg Glassman was forced to resign from his company after controversial comments about George Floyd; two officials from the Poetry Foundation stepped down after their pro-BLM statement was considered too mealy-mouthed; the editor in chief of Bon Appétit was forced out after an old photograph circulated of him dressed in Puerto Rican garb.14

  To be clear, none of these corporations—all beneficiaries of a free market in hiring, firing, and customer base—actually believe that America is “systemically racist” in the same way the authoritarian leftists mean. These corporations merely mirror what most Americans think when they hear the term “systemic racism”—that racism still exists. And they say that “black lives matter” because, of course, black lives do matter. But the very term “black lives matter” is semantically overloaded: it’s unclear, when used, whether it signifies a belief in the value of black lives (undeniable), the evils of the American system that supposedly devalues black lives today (an extreme notion lacking serious evidence), or support for the Black Lives Matter organization (which pushes actual Marxist radicalism).

  Corporations, then, merely do what they do in order to make money. As always.

  And herein lies the problem.

  As we’ve examined, the authoritarian Left believes that America’s systemic racism is evident in every aspect of American society—that all inequalities in American life are traceable to fundamental inequities in the American system. That means that for the authoritarian leftists who promote the “systemic racism” lie, systemic racism is evidenced by the simple presence of successful corporations. Successful corporations, in supporting the notion that America is systemically racist, are chipping away at the foundations of their own existence.

  There is something undeniably ironic about corporations pretending support for a worldview that sees their very presence as evil. Black Lives Matters cofounder Patrisse Cullors infamously proclaimed, “We do have an ideological frame
. Myself and Alicia [Garza], in particular, are trained organizers; we are trained Marxists. We are superversed on, sort of, ideological theories. And I think what we really try to do is build a movement that could be utilized by many, many Black folks.” Black Lives Matter DC openly advocated for “creating the conditions for Black Liberation through the abolition of systems and institutions of white supremacy, capitalism, patriarchy and colonialism.”15

  Yet corporate employees fear speaking up about the decency of America, against racial preferences, against racial separatism. When corporations began posting black squares on Instagram to signify support for BLM, employees often did the same, seeking safety in symbolic virtue signaling. Failure to abide by the increasingly political diktats of the corporate overlords may risk your job.

  What’s more, everyone lives in fear of retroactive cancellation. It’s not merely about you posting something your employer sees. It’s about a culture of snitching, led by our media, that may out a ten-year-old Facebook post and get you canned from your job. In internet parlance, this has become known as “resurfacing”—the phenomenon whereby a person who doesn’t like you very much finds a Bad Old Tweet and then tells your employer, hoping for a firing. It works. Resurfacing has become so common that NBC News ran a piece in 2018 guiding Americans on how to “delete old tweets before they come back to haunt you.”16

  All of which is a recipe for silence.

  The nature of the business world requires adherence to top-down rules, the threat of expulsion, and fear of external consequences. Counterintuitively, then, the institutional pillar thought to guard most against the excesses of authoritarian leftism crumbled quickly and inexorably once the stars aligned.