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‘Aaron Hernandez’s life, and now his death, has become a window into and something of an indictment of what we value and idolize. His ability to catch and run with a football led some, first at the University of Florida, then within the Patriots organization, to excuse or overlook transgressions that would have sent others less talented packing.’

Things have gotten so twisted that no one asks why a violent sociopath was not only admitted to a respectable American university, but aggressively recruited.

Why are so many universities, like the University of Florida, criminally negligent (hello, Baylor) in welcoming to their campus community people who stand a reasonable chance of hurting members of that community (and environs) very badly?

Why – as if it weren’t bad enough – do these universities actually indoctrinate these admitted students in ever more heightened aggression (see, for instance, the EAT YOUR ENEMIES sign at the luxurious new cafeteria for University of Oregon athletes)?

*****************

I mean, duh. You want the biggest and nastiest and most hopped-up fucking assholes out there for your football team.

So what’s all of this doing at a university?

Margaret Soltan, April 19, 2017 2:21PM
Posted in: sport

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One Response to “‘Aaron Hernandez’s life, and now his death, has become a window into and something of an indictment of what we value and idolize. His ability to catch and run with a football led some, first at the University of Florida, then within the Patriots organization, to excuse or overlook transgressions that would have sent others less talented packing.’”

  1. dmf Says:

    maybe there is something cancer like in all of this, phys-ed classes mutating into gladiatorial games, we need a kind of genealogical inquiry into the ancient greek roots…

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UD REVIEWED

Dr. Bernard Carroll, known as the "conscience of psychiatry," contributed to various blogs, including Margaret Soltan's University Diaries, for which he sometimes wrote limericks under the name Adam.
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George Washington University English professor Margaret Soltan writes a blog called University Diaries, in which she decries the Twilight Zone-ish state our holy land’s institutes of higher ed find themselves in these days.
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It’s [UD's] intellectual honesty that makes her blog required reading.
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There's always something delightful and thought intriguing to be found at Margaret Soltan's no-holds-barred, firebrand tinged blog about university life.
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You can get your RDA of academic liars, cheats, and greedy frauds at University Diaries. All disciplines, plus athletics.
truffula, commenting at Historiann

Margaret Soltan at University Diaries blogs superbly and tirelessly about [university sports] corruption.
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University Diaries. Hosted by Margaret Soltan, professor of English at George Washington University. Boy is she pissed — mostly about athletics and funding, the usual scandals — but also about distance learning and diploma mills. She likes poems too. And she sings.
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[UD belittles] Mrs. Palin's degree in communications from the University of Idaho...
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Professor Margaret Soltan, blogging at University Diaries... provide[s] an important voice that challenges the status quo.
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[University Diaries offers] the kind of attention to detail in the use of language that makes reading worthwhile.
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Margaret Soltan's ire is a national treasure.
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Margaret Soltan, whose blog lords it over the rest of ours like a benevolent tyrant...
Perplexed with Narrow Passages

Margaret Soltan is no fan of college sports and her diatribes on the subject can be condescending and annoying. But she makes a good point here...
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