My friend and colleague Elizabeth Corey:
Certainly the professoriate leans leftward. But it turns out that people from right and left can agree on many things despite our differences: for example, what to read in our courses, pedagogical practices, and how to care for our students. In short, we live and work among people who differ from us in all sorts of ways, yet it’s possible and sometimes even delightful to become friends with those we thought initially we wouldn’t like. The friend/enemy dichotomy doesn’t make sense here. We must bridge all kinds of divides, not search and destroy. Only within the rarefied environment of the internet or within certain think tanks can we surround ourselves with people who agree with us and echo our opinions. And that would be boring, or so I think.
Elizabeth is being firebombed on Twitter by Christopher Rufo, to whom she’s responding here. She suggests a drink and a conversation, but I don’t think conversation is something Rufo does. He follows Carl Schmitt while Elizabeth follows Jesus.