Beautiful weather, a low cost of living and gorgeous natural surroundings haven’t stopped Louisiana’s capital city from making it big in the world of crime and murder. Baton Rouge has outdone the rest of the state, which is [itself] 40 percent more violent than the nation as a whole. New Orleans is more popular, so Baton Rouge seized the opportunity to top the violent crime list. Baton Rouge isn’t a very large city, but it manages to attract attention by having 49 murders annually. If you have a death wish, it’s a great destination.
Why would you send your kid to school there?
… sex dolls, the composer of the immortal Plastic Fantastic Lover has died.
Yes, American university football made it for one week without any criminal behavior. This may be a record.
But all good things must come to an end, and one of Penn State’s most revered players stole a bike and then dumped it because “he did not feel like walking back to his residence building that day.”
Since this is simply the sort of thing you do when you are King of the Campus, locals doubt he will suffer any consequences.
Not easy to do, but this New York Times writer manages it.
Regardless of what happens to Kavanaugh, … this scandal has given us an X-ray view of the rotten foundations of elite male power. Despite Donald Trump’s populist posturing, there are few people more obsessed with Ivy League credentials. Kavanaugh’s nomination shows how sick the cultures that produce those credentials — and thus our ruling class — can be.
… His story shows, in lurid microcosm, how a certain class of men guard and perpetuate their privileges. Women who struggle ceaselessly to be smart enough, attractive enough, ambitious enough and likable enough have been playing a rigged game. As they realize that, their incandescent fury is remaking our politics. We’ll know things have changed when palling around with sexual abusers carries more stigma than being abused does.
Best headline today.
On Sunday, [a Yale student] wrote on Twitter that it’s easy to forget, in an “insular” place such as Yale, that, when students who behave badly graduate, “they don’t disappear but instead become part of the fabric of society, & a certain type ascends & ascends.” It’s “been unbearable at times to watch men I know have hurt my friends ascend within clubs to leadership,” she continued, adding, “How will we feel seeing which of them rise in their fields, our fields, invincible & untouchable?”
There’s a reason they call it predatory capitalism, babe.
Read and learn.
*************
You want more on predatory?
Pure. Animal. Kingdom.
I witnessed efforts by Mark Judge, Brett Kavanaugh and others to “target” particular girls so they could be taken advantage of; it was usually a girl that was especially vulnerable because she was alone at the party or shy.
*************
Even when they become a global laughingstock, there’s always a faithful retainer to tell them otherwise.
The White House has just placed Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross in charge of its effort to appoint Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. Ross will be the public face of Kavanaugh’s defense.
When you meet a boy
That you hate a lot
And you want to say
All the hate you’ve got
If a trope should start
As you stand and jeer
Better keep your art
Out of danger, dear
For a “serpent covered
In Vaseline”
Is a bit too strange
To be truly mean
So try once again
To consult your muse
If you really want
To revile Ted Cruz
*****************
*****************
PS: For inspiration, go here – see esp. “a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.”
You’ve had a ringside seat for ‘thesdan snobbery for years on this blog … I mean, in my Snapshots from Home category I’ve tried to educate you on the inner workings of the place Brett K. and I call home…
And while it’s true that UD‘s ‘thesdan coordinates (father a scientist at NIH; mother president Mason/Dixon English Cocker Spaniel Club; Garrett Park Elementary, Kensington Junior High; Walter Johnson High; performing with voice and guitar, when a teenager, at a ‘thesdan McGovern rally; local school named after my rich important Uncle Mario) are less impressive than Kavanaugh’s (more money; private schools), she knows her way around the local status markers.
And when it comes to which nearby beach a ‘thesdan chooses, I’m afraid Mark Judge – just discovered hiding in Bethany Beach – has somewhat fallen down. While raucous working-class Ocean City is totally out of the question (though Brett K. apparently went there for Beach Week, which is acceptable) (and careful readers will recall my father’s family, the Rapoports, owned property there as early as 1905), boring Bethany (scattered big houses on the ocean) is only a bit better. The socially acceptable place to be is of course UD‘s beloved Rehoboth Beach (she’ll soon be there with a bunch of friends for their traditional Sea Witch Festival get-together), with its lively, civilized, commercial as well as residential life. (Henlopen Acres, steps from Rehoboth, is the richest town in Delaware – the ‘thesda of Delaware, in other words.)
UD plays online robots (and gives herself only sixty seconds per move). She’s wondering when/if all of the new Scrabble words will actually be added…
She’s especially excited about OK and ZEN. It’s about time!
**********
As sexual violence against American women grabs the headlines, it’s important to remember what much of the rest of the world looks like.
[Mona] Eltahawy … attributes [violent hatred of women in the Muslim world] to “a toxic mix of religion and culture”. And to this I would add the political oppression and stasis that enabled these structures to become de facto governance, where entrenched tribal allegiances, pre-Islamic mores and social tradition trumped weak political culture. A general retardation that extends not just to women but to every aspect of personal freedom and civic rights.
That benighted world is watching, which makes it all the more important that women here shed light on what happened to them when they became a focus of male hatred.
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.
New York Times
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.
The Electron Pencil
It’s [UD's] intellectual honesty that makes her blog required reading.
Professor Mondo
There's always something delightful and thought intriguing to be found at Margaret Soltan's no-holds-barred, firebrand tinged blog about university life.
AcademicPub
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.
Dagblog
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.
Dissent: The Blog
[UD belittles] Mrs. Palin's degree in communications from the University of Idaho...
The Wall Street Journal
Professor Margaret Soltan, blogging at University Diaries... provide[s] an important voice that challenges the status quo.
Lee Skallerup Bessette, Inside Higher Education
[University Diaries offers] the kind of attention to detail in the use of language that makes reading worthwhile.
Sean Dorrance Kelly, Harvard University
Margaret Soltan's ire is a national treasure.
Roland Greene, Stanford University
The irrepressibly to-the-point Margaret Soltan...
Carlat Psychiatry Blog
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...
Outside the Beltway
From Margaret Soltan's excellent coverage of the Bernard Madoff scandal comes this tip...
Money Law
University Diaries offers a long-running, focused, and extremely effective critique of the university as we know it.
Anthony Grafton, American Historical Association
The inimitable Margaret Soltan is, as usual, worth reading. ...
Medical Humanities Blog
I awake this morning to find that the excellent Margaret Soltan has linked here and thereby singlehandedly given [this blog] its heaviest traffic...
Ducks and Drakes
As Margaret Soltan, one of the best academic bloggers, points out, pressure is mounting ...
The Bitch Girls
Many of us bloggers worry that we don’t post enough to keep people’s interest: Margaret Soltan posts every day, and I more or less thought she was the gold standard.
Tenured Radical
University Diaries by Margaret Soltan is one of the best windows onto US university life that I know.
Mary Beard, A Don's Life
[University Diaries offers] a broad sense of what's going on in education today, framed by a passionate and knowledgeable reporter.
More magazine, Canada
If deity were an elected office, I would quit my job to get her on the ballot.
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