This blog has long argued the importance of rescinding honorary degrees from, er, some of their recipients. Examples:
Bernard Madoff
Theodore McCarrick
Bill Cosby
Lance Armstrong
Sepp Blatter
Donald Trump
Sheldon Silver
James Levine
Almost all of these sex and/or money scumsters eventually lost the honor aura conferred upon them by America’s debauched universities (debauched because, in almost every case, a touch of due diligence would have uncovered enough rumors to stay their hand, but these schools apparently didn’t care).
But what about, say, a law degree? An actual degree you work for and pay for? Is there behavior dishonorable enough to justify rescinding a BA or a JD?
What about an MD? UD has argued that Jumana Nagarwala, who put her Hopkins MD to use allegedly slicing off the genitals of little girls all over the midwest, should have that degree rescinded under… call it the Mengele Rule. It’s pretty easy to argue that people who got BAs under false pretenses (as in the Varsity Blues case, where rejects took the place of qualified applicants because their parents faked their applications and paid various well-connected criminals enormous sums of money to help them) should have their degrees revoked. The principle here is that a legitimate university has a reputation to defend, and when it harbors filthy crooks it should formally, publicly, expel them.
And a lawyer? A student who attends your school in order to learn the laws of our land in order to use those same laws to destroy it? This is much like the 9/11 pilots who attended flight school here solely in order to crash their planes into buildings. It would seem to be rather at odds with the purpose of a legal education, a serious education in the rule of law in our democracy. If I were Chicago I’d be pretty fucking embarrassed to be the school that taught John Eastman the law solely in order for him to twist it to destroy the country. I mean, is my face red!
It’s not too early for UD‘s beloved U of C to start considering a process by which they can cleanly disassociate themselves from this piece of shit.
June 22nd, 2022 at 10:22AM
Poor, ill-starred Northern Illinois University, had one of its graduate students rise to Speaker of the House with the ability to write some land purchases and some roads into a transportation bill, and brought in Bill Cosby to dedicate the sports arena, er, “convocation center,” and later had to rescind honorary degrees to both. The roads and the vacant land are still here, and the basketball teams underachieve in the mostly empty arena.
June 22nd, 2022 at 10:59AM
Stephen: The business of rescinding honorary degrees is never done. Be grateful NIU didn’t have to sandblast names off of buildings – something that happens surprisingly often.
June 23rd, 2022 at 4:21PM
The university only recently began cultivating alumni with the kind of money to name buildings. It’s likely, though, that in the Northwestern mode, naming rights to athletic facilities will come with expiration dates!