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Friday, March 10, 2006
"I Believe I Am." -- A Little More on the Strike
I don't think I could ever have anticipated the overwhelming volume of comments, the enthusiasm, or, at times, the naked bitterness that my previous two postings (here and here) on the UNICCO strike have generated. Certainly, I never meant to exacerbate what was, already, a testy situation. At the town hall (video here), one of my colleagues suggested that we who have moved class off campus have done it with no cost to ourselves. I respectfully submit that the last few days have put that notion to rest, if nothing else.
That being said, I want to step back a bit, and try to re-center the debate. For those new to the party, this brouhaha isn't really about the merits of the strike; it's about a small handful of UM law professors who, in support of the strike, have decided to hold class off campus. I am one of them.
The real question here, and the one that seems to have dominated the comment threads, is whether, as a professor, I have an obligation to those students who would prefer to remain on campus that transcends my obligation to everyone else, including my colleagues, other students, and the support staff whose work allows me to teach. It really is that simple.
Those who disagree with me would say "yes." My job is to teach on-campus, and everything else is secondary. To me, what's fascinating about this on a meta-level (or, as one of the commentors put it, as "a teaching moment"), is what this says more broadly about the role of the professor, and particularly, the role of the law school professor. Simply put, those who object don't see my consideration of the strikers' rights (or of those students who won't cross the picket line) as "part of my job." Rescheduling or moving class for a conference or other "professionial committment," on the other hand, is part of my job, and is not met with such vitriol (that is, unless I schedule the make-up for 8:00 a.m. on Friday morning).
Indeed, what this really goes to is the fundamental question: What is the job of a law professor? As importantly, who gets to answer that question? The students who pay their tuition (and much of our salaries)? The University administration? The profession as a whole? Us? Suffice it to say, these are not issues that were addressed at the AALS New Law Professors Conference. [Note to AALS: Add this for next year.]
Now, I don't pretend to have all the answers. I'm a first-year, first-time prawf, smart enough only to know that I don't know everything. But this experience has made me step back and think...
What's perhaps been the most surprising to me is the extent to which those students who have been the most outspoken critics of what I've done have no qualms or hesitation about their entitlement -- their right -- to dictate to me the terms of my job. And maybe they're right. They are, after all, consumers in a very angsty market. But are they really "buying us"? Isn't this the logic by which Ben Stiller's character says he's Christine Taylor's character's "boss" in Dodgeball? ["You work for the bank, the bank works for me, so ipso facto . . . ."]
But I had always understood the academy generally, and the legal academy specifically, as characterized by the autonomy it bestows upon its members. Autonomy to decide what to teach, and how to teach it. I would've thought that "how" also included at least some flexibility with respect to "when and where." This is why we get to cancel classes when we have conflicts, religious, professional, or otherwise. This is why we get to have some control over where, as well.
And so, I pose this as a question, especially to my more senior colleagues here and elsewhere: Where is the line? At what point do we cease being servants to our student masters? We can say no to requests for recommendations. We can say no to requests that we advise student papers. We certainly get to design our own syllabi, even for the most black-letter, bar-essential classes. Indeed, the real stick we wield is our proverbial red pen. But apparently, we don't get to inconvenience some of our students in the interests of others (and other members of our community). Isn't there something of a disconnect here? Doesn't part of our portfolio include the authority and the responsibility to make that decision?
As bothersome, but separately: I pride myself on being as approachable, open, outgoing, and welcoming of all students as I possibly can, and I like to think that I've succeeded, but even that hasn't stopped UM students this week from questioning my dedication to them and to their education. That's really taken me aback.
I'm not sure where this leaves me, except with lots of questions, and a quote from Rudy that prompted the title of this post. Toward the end of the movie, when Rudy learns that he won't dress for the Georgia Tech game, a bunch of the Notre Dame players, led by senior captain Roland Steele, go see Coach Devane and offer their spot for his. Devane, shocked that Steele is willing to not play so the walk-on practice-squad kid can, tells him "you're an All-American and our captain. Act like it." Steele responds: "I believe I am."
And so it goes.
Posted by Steve Vladeck on March 10, 2006 at 01:12 AM in Steve Vladeck | Permalink
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"What's perhaps been the most surprising to me is the extent to which those students who have been the most outspoken critics of what I've done have no qualms or hesitation about their entitlement -- their right -- to dictate to me the terms of my job."
I think you're making a mistake by assuming the one student at that Town Hall (who even many students who disagree with your decision think was very out of line) and one or two commentators represent those who criticize your decision. Virtually everyone who disagrees with you on this doesn't seem to dispute that ultimately it's your call, but are criticizing you for other reasons.
Posted by: Anthony | Mar 10, 2006 1:31:23 AM
Let me help you out here. You are an employee (professors forget this sometimes). You have job duties. Determining whether you can have an off-campus class (aside from any political/freedom of expression issues) is your employer's decision, not yours. If administration lets you do it, you're golden. If your employer required you to write recommendations for anyone who asked for one you would have to do that as well. The reason you have autonomy to decide who to write a letter for is because your employer does not require this as part of your job.
I don't think the question is what is permissible, but what you feel is morally acceptable. Are you a utilitarian? Do you hold some values above all others? From what I've seen you seem to be a somewhat lost Associate Professor trying to make a statement. If you're going to hold class off campus do so because you are making a statement, not because it is objectively the best thing to do...
Posted by: gottabekiddingme | Mar 10, 2006 1:45:20 AM
Hey Professor, thought you might be interested in thoughts at the xoxohth community regarding this debate. Here's the link: http://www.xoxohth.com/thread.php?thread_id=376307&mc=129&forum_id=2&PHPSESSID=c44254aaff6b936b5a2b37c57001026c
Personally, I disagree with your stand, but I respect your open defense of your position and your willingness to facilitate debate.
Posted by: BP | Mar 10, 2006 2:00:29 AM
URL cut off...included here
http://www.xoxohth.com/thread.php?thread_id=376307&mc=129&forum_id=2&
PHPSESSID=c44254aaff6b936b5a2b37c57001026c
Posted by: BP | Mar 10, 2006 2:02:06 AM
It appears you have not fully reasoned through your notion of professional autonomy. You are an employee, your students are customers of your employer. Much of the autonomy you describe is illusory. You don't have the "power of the red pen" because someone likes you and thinks you're a swell guy, you have it because grades are a sorting mechanism. Similarly, the right to refuse recommendations acts as a sorting mechanism that prevents them from becoming worthless. Students consent to these impositions because being sorted is to their advantage. Without grades, nobody from UM would be hired. With them, a select few students at the top of the class have a fighting chance. Your autonomy starts and stops with the impact it has on your employer's customers.
Furthermore, although I watched the video and the student falls much closer to "douchebag" than "eloquent speaker", I didn't see him try to dictate the terms of your job. He merely complained about the actions of a disobedient employee, similar to how I would complain about a surly fast food worker who botched my order. Given your Marxist proclivities, I'm surprised that you are taking a position contrary to consumer rights.
Posted by: Hugs and Kisses, Hope This Helps! | Mar 10, 2006 2:05:36 AM
Steve: all this talk is just hot air unless you publicly pledge to treat right-wing causes exactly the same way as you now treat the left-wing cause. To paraphrase Matt Bodie’s delightful hypothetical from a few days ago: if abortion protesters put up a sign on campus “This is the save-the-babies week. Don’t cross the line if you oppose abortion!” and a group of your students announces that crossing the line violates their fundamental moral beliefs, you pledge to move your class outside campus. And you pledge to do the same for all student demands to meet outside campus so long as such demands are based on proclaimed moral belief. If you publicly pledge so, I will be the first to get off your case because you will demonstrate that you are in fact viewpoint neutral.
Please don’t start arguing that strike picket is somehow different from the abortion (or any other) picket because of “history.” First, the fact that cause A has a longer history than cause B does not mean cause A still generates more emotions, is more socially significant, or is more “symbolic” than cause B. Second, pointing to history advantages one worldview over the other, so you can’t do so while claiming to be viewpoint neutral. Third, your nod to history seems to be red herring in any case: in this country, walkouts on the grounds of pure moral revulsion have been just as common (if not more common) as walkouts in demand for higher pay. Most of the civil rights protests fit the pattern.
Should I hold my breath in anticipation of your pledge of viewpoint neutrality?
Posted by: Kate Litvak | Mar 10, 2006 12:34:04 PM
Litvak, it depends on your perspective on being viewpoint neutral. As Vladeck's Rudy analogy indicates, as a professor he's the all-american, and the janitors are just a bunch of scrubs. That is WHY he is standing up for them. I think it's pretty sad that our society has become so right wing that all sympathy for the underdog has been drained out of it--except in sports, so the analogy is a savvy one. I like this part though: "Second, pointing to history advantages one worldview over the other, so you can’t do so while claiming to be viewpoint neutral." Yeah, um, definitely. The facts are biased!
Posted by: Bart Motes | Mar 10, 2006 1:22:21 PM
Bart: If we want to stick to Kate's example, the right might say: "Who can imagine a more under underdog than an unborn fetus?"
Posted by: billb | Mar 10, 2006 1:26:09 PM
Bart writes: "As Vladeck's Rudy analogy indicates, as a professor he's the all-american, and the janitors are just a bunch of scrubs. That is WHY he is standing up for them."
The suggestion that "the janitors are just a bunch of scrubs" explains exactly why the Rudy analogy has been bothering me since I first read this post.
Posted by: CL | Mar 10, 2006 1:38:33 PM
Who is really the underdog at a law school? Sympathetic striking workers or the big, bad, evil man trying to put them down? I'll put it this way, which would be a more acceptable move by a professor, actively supporting striking workers or actively criticizing striking workers? Students face the same decision. If any belief needs more protection it's the anti-union belief.
btw... you're no Rudy.... and making references to movies doesn't make your argument any more logical or compelling...
Posted by: wrong again | Mar 10, 2006 2:14:25 PM
Steve:
As a tenured law prof., I think you're doing the correct thing for the correct reasons. Strikes require people to take a stand on one side or the other, for both historical and economic reasons. You are not the first employee, co-worker, or even professor that has refused to cross a picket line and you won't be the last. There is a long and honorable tradition of employees acting to aid their fellow employees, even if it means some alteration of how their job is done or even not doing the job at all. Without that history, this country would be a much worse place. And, as I don't have to tell you, in any number of cases, such acts are even legally protected.
Your decision bothers some of your "customers," the students. As has been repeatedly noted, you would bother some whatever you did. Further, it's a necessary part of a strike to bother customers and thus create inconveniences that put pressure on the employer. That's how American labor law has decided that labor relations matters are ultimately settled, when push comes to shove.
Students don't have a "right" that no class ever be rescheduled or moved. Profs. cancel and reschedule classes for all manner of reasons. Again, I once cancelled and rescheduled a class for Yom Kippur. I had a great seminar at Michigan that met at a law prof.'s house.
At the end of the day, professors do decide what material is taught, how it is taught, and yes, how to respond to a major event within the campus community. You should listen to those who disagree with you respectfully and explain your position, as I believe you have (I'm the "teaching moment" guy). Beyond that, it's your call. Yeah, you've gotten a surprising amount of vitriol for it, but my guess is the strikers are having a harder time. Solidarity.
Posted by: Joseph Slater | Mar 10, 2006 3:26:36 PM
Slater: There's a difference between rescheduling an occasional class and indefinitely relocating it (a pretty wide gulf, IMNSHO).
Posted by: billb | Mar 10, 2006 3:45:28 PM
Whew, Ms. Litvak! A little analogy's a dangerous thing! How 'bout I get some of my long-haired granola-eating friends together and make a line saying don't cross if you want to stop global warming? Yeah, then I'll make one saying don't cross if you hate George Bush! Yeah, that's the ticket! Then I'll make one that says don't cross if you like listening to music! Yeah! All those wacky liberal professors will never cross! Then we'll never have school again, ever! And maybe if you can prop up some more straw men, we can have even more fun! Yeah!
Here's my suggestion: Less TV, more fiber!
Posted by: Andrew | Mar 10, 2006 3:52:08 PM
The hypo Matt suggested isn't that implausible. There are other scenarios in which a heretofore trivial act was consciously politicized. I'm reminded of a Princeton alum who was baffled to find himself vilified for wearing shorts one day. It turned out that a major campus group had declared that day "Wear Jeans If You Support [Cause]" day, and he unwittingly had made a dress decision that indicated he was against the Cause.
The notion that reasonably powerful groups could politicize anything seems disturbing though only if you think there's no requirement of a nexus between the activity and the forced choice. "Don't patronize the store where the workers are underpaid" seems clearly to have such a nexus. "Don't patronize the law school where the staff is underpaid" seems weaker but still plausible. "Don't patronize the law school because Operation Rescue says doing so means you support abortion" seems like it lacks such a nexus. But "Don't patronize the law school because that means you're supporting the pro-choice faculty," well, that seems a bit more plausible.
Posted by: Dave | Mar 10, 2006 4:17:04 PM
Dear Joseph Slater: it’s funny that you urge Steve to admit something that he vehemently denies: that moving the class off-campus is a political act, rather than a viewpoint-neutral attempt to accommodate students who have quirky moral objections to class attendance. If he announces that he agrees with you, he’ll just shoot himself in the foot as far as his proclaimed viewpoint-neutrality goes.
By the way, the “teaching moments” stuff demonstrates a spectacular naiveté and a spectacular arrogance on a part of a faculty member. If some guy preaching the evils of unions wouldn’t change _your_ mind, why in the world do you think that your own preaching would change your students’ minds? I oppose political propaganda in the classroom not because I believe it to be consequential (I don’t), but because I believe it to be the most arrogant case of professorial self-indulgence.
For the rest of my (mostly anonymous and angry) critics: I never said that the pledge of viewpoint-neutrality must include only right-wing causes. If some left-wing group decides to boycott classes because (a) the school does not admit enough minorities, or (b) does not put enough effort into pro bono activities, or (c) does not divest itself from Israel, or (d) does not use environmentally-efficient heating, a viewpoint-neutral Steve Vladeck would have to accommodate those demands as well. I am looking forward to reading about the viewpoint-neutral havoc that these demands will cause.
Posted by: Kate Litvak | Mar 10, 2006 5:27:50 PM
Kate is correct. The real question isn't the loaded one Steve frames:
"The real question here, and the one that seems to have dominated the comment threads, is whether, as a professor, I have an obligation to those students who would prefer to remain on campus that transcends my obligation to everyone else, including my colleagues, other students, and the support staff whose work allows me to teach. It really is that simple."
The real question is why Steve decided that the pro-union sentiment trumped the opposite sentiment. "The majority voted that way" is a sound reason, I think. "Because I'm the prof and that's my choice" is a candid reason.
But some variation of "because that's the only neutral/objective/reasonable choice" cannot be sustained until we can prove that no reasonable person would ever choose to cross that picket line.
There is another choice: put the teacher's political views aside and teach at the regular time/place for the picket crossers and at an arranged time/place for the students who have said they willingly embrace inconvenience to support the union. Any other choice necessarily requires the prof to choose up sides, which should be done, if at all, with candor about that fact.
Steve, I applaud your efforts to make the discussion public, and I regret that vitriol has been tossed your way. I hope you don't view these comments as a personal attack, because you don't deserve that.
Posted by: been there | Mar 10, 2006 5:53:00 PM
BillB:
I agree that if a large number of classes are relocated, the greater the distinction is between that and one class being rescheduled. Most strikes at academic institutions are relatively short-lived affairs, but if this turns out to be an exception, you're absolutely right that my comparison on that point would have less force.
Kate Litvak:
I don't speak for Steve. However, I took Steve to mean that, given a series of choices that all had some political content, he took the one that was the most neutral. If that's what he meant, I agree.
First, again, either crossing or not crossing the line is a political act. This is not equivalent to you suddenly announcing that X random act = support for Y random cause. Contra your earlier implications, history and context do matter. Apart from labor relations, for example, you would be unlikely to convince a lot of folks in Northern Ireland that wearing green or orange in certain times and places could signify whatever you wanted or didn't want it to signify.
Additionally, as Dave points out above and others have repeatedly explained, strikes are not merely symbolic actions. Crossing or not crossing a picket line is designed to have a particular economic effect on the employer, and thus aid or not aid a strike.
And again, in many labor actions, co-workers supporting strikes simply refuse to work at all.
Steve has not taken that option. He is continuing to provide teaching services. He is doing that at an alternate site which he describes as relatively convenient. Thus, students whose values dictate that they should never cross a picket line, or never cross a picket line of strikes they support, are accomodated. Students who support management and would like to cross a line to indicate that are merely being denied a convenient opportunity to cross a picket line for the 90 minutes (or so) that Steve's class meets.
This strikes me as being as close to neutral as one could get in a situation where complete neutrality is not possible. If you don't buy that, then I would analogize it to a teacher who reschedules a class on Yom Kippur, even if there are some students who object because they are Jew-hating, religion-hating, or just don't want to be bothered.
Finally, you write: the “teaching moments” stuff demonstrates a spectacular naiveté and a spectacular arrogance on a part of a faculty member. If some guy preaching the evils of unions wouldn’t change _your_ mind, why in the world do you think that your own preaching would change your students’ minds?
Substantively, I'm *not* saying my goal is to change my students' minds. That's not the point of a "teaching moment." On the other hand, it's not "arrogant" to think that a labor law prof. could use an incident of labor relations close to home to explore labor relations history, law, and policy, with students who I generally presume don't know as much about that stuff as I do -- which is why I'm paid to teach them that subject. I wouldn't insist or expect everyone to agree with me as to my *conclusions*, but I am fairly certain that I could tell at least some people at least some stuff about the law, traditions, and policy debates about labor that they didn't know, and thus help them have more fully-informed opinions.
Finally, do see any hypocricy labeling your peers "spectacularly arrogant" while simultaneously accusing them of "spectacular naiveté"?
Posted by: Joseph Slater | Mar 10, 2006 6:20:14 PM
Joseph: spectacularly arrogant people are very often also spectacularly naive -- mostly about their own prowess. Why this simple observation constitutes hypocrisy is beyond me.
Posted by: Kate Litvak | Mar 10, 2006 7:50:10 PM
Hey Litvak, you've only got two critics on this thread apart from Slater, and as far as I can see neither of us are anonymous. And speaking for myself, I'm certainly not angry. But hey, personal attacks sure beat substantive argument, huh?
billb said: If we want to stick to Kate's example, the right might say: "Who can imagine a more under underdog than an unborn fetus?"
Good point, but it's not really analogous. If the university was financing abortions, maybe. Besides which, a 15 year old single pregnant woman with no financial support is pretty vulnerable, so I'd say its a wash.
CL is bothered that I refer to the janitors as a bunch of scrubs and the Rudy analogy generally. The point is that it's harder to replace a professor than a janitor and that's why its great that solidarity is being shown. Similarly, it's tougher to replace an All-American captain of your team than a walk-on, so the Rudy analogy seems like a good one.
Bottom line: I think Vladek is doing something modestly brave and certainly admirable in showing solidarity with his co-workers. For some, who just hate unions, like, I dunno, corporate law scholars at UT Law, this is offensive. The rest of us have some basic sympathy for people trying to eke out a living by cleaning up everyone else's you know what. Maybe at some basic level it is inescapably political. Funny how doing the right thing in this era has to be political.
Posted by: Bart Motes | Mar 10, 2006 8:11:22 PM
Joseph.
You state, and I agree, that "First, again, either crossing or not crossing the line is a political act." But then you deny that any particular choice has political meaning if the chooser could make the opposite choice another time, another place. Well, that's always true for all pro-union and pro-management students. So, you offer an inconsistent argument.
The logical conclusion of your first statement -- the correct argument -- is that any prof who holds the class offsite is forcing some students to undertake a particular political act or miss class. Why not just embrace that entailment of your own argument? Then offer a justification of forcing that political act on some students who disagree.
"The majority voted that way" is a valid justification, but can be offered only if the prof would have cross the picket if the majority voted that way. That appears not to be the case here.
"It's the same as routine re-scheduling" would contradict your first statement.
"It's the same as Yom Kippur" doesn't work, because when the prof observes Yom Kippur, it's not forcing a political or religious act on all the students, as you concede is the case for the strike.
The only reason I can glean so far is "I want to observe the picket line and I have chosen not to give the pro-management students' choice any weight."
Posted by: been there | Mar 10, 2006 11:00:51 PM
Kate: "Dear Joseph Slater: it’s funny that you urge Steve to admit something that he vehemently denies: that moving the class off-campus is a political act, rather than a viewpoint-neutral attempt to accommodate students who have quirky moral objections to class attendance."
Is this right? My first reaction to this event was that moving the classes off campus would be objectionable to the striking workers, because it undermined their strategy of forced choice. If professors create a scenario where students can continue to attend class without making a political choice, then the wind has been taken out of the picketers' sails.
Of course, how you read the symbolism of the move is key. No one embraces the interpretation I initially thought most reasonable, and now I see why: Steve and other UM profs who made the move to teach off-campus have done so while explicitly labeling that move one that reflects support for the strike. I wonder what would happen if they had said "We are indifferent to the strike but we want to make sure as many students attend class as possible. We think the marginal burdens on all students of going an extra mile out of the way to attend class are minor in comparison to the significant burdens imposed on students who would feel obliged not to attend class because of the strike if class were held on campus." I think this would have garnered a very different response, but I'm not sure.
As for the claim that not wanting to cross a picket line is merely a "quirky moral objection to class attendance," this reflects a pretty myopic view of American social history. Labor movements are largely moribund at the moment, but not terribly long ago the decision whether to cross a picket line was a commonplace moral dilemma for many Americans, and it was at least understood that whatever your position on the issue, it was a significant consideration rather than a mere idiosyncracy. In my home state of California, a recent farm workers' strike paralyzed business for several supermarkets, and caused many close relatives to make tough choices whether to cross picket lines to buy groceries. Some did; some didn't. But even those who went ahead and shopped at Vons despite the situation understood that what was at play was an important social issue; nothing like the "quirky moral objection" that Kate fliply dismisses.
Posted by: Dave | Mar 10, 2006 11:22:58 PM
Dave,
You are absolutely right that each time a person is confronted with the choice of crossing a picket, it presents a significant choice.
So far, though, Joseph and Steve have used a rhetorical strategy of strongly affirming the significance of the choice for people who honor the picket, but denying or drastically reducing the significance of the choice for people who want to cross the picket.
That strategy appears to render Steve's choice the only neutral/reasonable choice, but it's based on an invalid premise. It denies agency to the students who want to cross the picket to attend the scheduled class. It denies the political significance of that choice.
Posted by: been there | Mar 11, 2006 1:13:32 AM
It appears that law school professors making principled albeit strictly rhetorical stands is all the rage now. First we saw FAIR argue that they should be able to take a principled stand against military recruiters....AND it shouldn't cost them anything.
Now we have some UM profs taking a symbolic I-will-not-cross-a-picket-line stance and enlisting their students participation because...well, the students have no choice. (digression: what if the students who didn't want to take the class off-campus, took up FAIR's arguments that this form of protest was forced association and all that stuff....just wondering)
If Mr. Vladek really wants to nail that Rudy "I believe I am" analogy, he should get together with some of his like-minded fellow professors, march into the admin office (or, so as not to cross the picket line, you can meet at some local coffee shop where other 60's wannabes hang out) and offer to give up some of their pay to help the striking workers. SOLIDARITY!!
Posted by: Maryland Conservatarian | Mar 11, 2006 8:45:58 PM
One more general point on all of this. When labor unions and management can't agree, the union's ONLY option is to strike. Some might think that U.S. private sector labor law should adopt mandatory arbitration, some might think unions and strikes should all be made illegal. But that's all been decided for 70 years or so. When unions strike, their only leverage is to stop working and to try to dissuade customers and co-workers from dealing with the struck employer. There are all sorts of legal rules about who unions can and can't appeal to in this regard, but it's quite clear, as David said, that appeals to other employees at the struck employer is a central tactic. Strikes fail or succeed on who effective workers are at getting such support. This is what labor law and a long tradition of labor policy has created. You can like the system or not like it, but you can't pretend it doesn't exist, and you can't pretend there is any viable analogy to other political groups stating that certain acts symbolize certain positions on issues.
Been There:
I don't have anything new to say to your point. Again, I think it's a greater infringement to make a student cross a picket line whose principle is never to cross a picket line than it is an infringement on a pro-management student to make it inconvenient for a student to cross a picket line for the 90 minutes that class lasts. Again, the hard-core pro-union position, and one that has been adopted by millions of workers in all sorts of strikes, is that one doesn't cross a picket line AND doesn't do work for the employer. Again, there is no perfectly neutral answer/solution. But I think both that Steve has the MOST neutral solution. It's not a completely neutral position, and to the extent that some side has to be favored a bit, it is ultimately the prof.'s call, and I for one would be willing to say/defend that.
Kate:
I will defer to your expertise on "spectacular arrogance."
Posted by: Joseph Slater | Mar 12, 2006 6:01:02 PM
Do you have any evidence that this "don't cross a picket line" principle is held by any actual students in your class? Espcially at a school like Michigan, where the students are almost all from wealthy backgrounds where they probably wouldn't have bene taught this principle. If it's not a value actually held by the students, then your concern for students' moral values is misplaced. Would your concerns really vanish if the students told you they don't object to crossing picket lines?
My guess is that students are objecting because they see it principally as a symbolic statement of support for the union by the professor (which is probably accurate) and they object to having class rescheduled so the professor can make a political statement.
Posted by: Law student | Mar 12, 2006 8:15:08 PM
Joseph,
You said, "it is ultimately the prof.'s call." I am glad to see you "belly up to the bar" with a short & sweet explanation. That's the one the angry students ought to hear straight from the prof's mouth. It's the honest explanation.
I do appreciate the dialogue and am sorry you and Steve have suffered personal attacks.
Posted by: been there | Mar 12, 2006 8:26:20 PM
Been There:
I appreciate the dialogue too. I think you have made important and persuasive points.
Posted by: Joseph Slater | Mar 13, 2006 9:08:49 AM
Law Student:
First, Steve V. teaches at the University of Miami, not the University of Michigan. Second, as a graduate of Michigan Law, I'll say that while you have a point about the relatively wealthy backgrounds of many of its students (not me, sadly), there were in my day plenty of students who would not have crossed the picket line and I'm quite confident that's still true today. Finally, in earlier threads about the strike (this one is the third, I believe), Steve V. explained that he did in fact have students who did not want to cross the picket line, and I even believe some of them posted on the earlier threads.
Posted by: Joseph Slater | Mar 13, 2006 11:58:41 AM
Joseph: did you just call me arrogant and should I complain to the powers-to-be?
Incidentally, having strong opinions contrary to those of Prof. Slater does not constitute arrogance. Believing that one's pontification on political subjects in front of the captive audience has persuasive impact IS arrogance. Pretending that one’s political pontifications are viewpoint-neutral “teaching moments” is hypocrisy.
I am, of course, not suggesting that anyone on this thread would play such dirty tricks with his/her students and therefore not calling anyone either arrogant or hypocritical. Absolutely not.
Posted by: Kate Litvak | Mar 13, 2006 3:35:14 PM
This is not directed at anyone in particular but I would like to remind everyone to please play nicely or we'll pack up our toys and walk away.
Posted by: Dan Markel | Mar 13, 2006 10:10:09 PM
Kate:
This isn't about you and me, this is about how law professors should behave during a strike. You continue to ignore substantive points about that, including my earlier explanation that when I say "teaching moment" I most definitely do *not* mean "trying to convince my students to agree with me," but rather mean, "explain the history, policy concerns on both sides, and relevant legal rules, and let students form their own opinions."
The "spectacularly arrogant" phrase was, of course, yours in the first place, and it's disingenuous for you to pretend that insult was not directed at me and perhaps also at Steve. As to your feigned indignation at having one of your insults turned back on you, as they say on the playground, don't dish it out if you can't take it.
That's my last word on that. Per Dan's instruction, I would welcome a respectful debate on the substance, if there's anything left to say.
Posted by: Joseph Slater | Mar 14, 2006 12:02:09 PM
I think been there is right that the off-campus shift can't be styled politically neutral insofar as it advantages pro-worker students who don't want to cross the picket line at the expense of pro-management students who really really do.
But this is only true against the background of the strike itself. The off-campus move returns us to the pre-strike world in which going to class doesn't cause anyone pain or pleasure in terms of picket-line-crossing, though the price all students have to pay for that is what seems like the relatively minor cost of attending class off-campus.
As usual, much turns on what baseline against which you measure the impact of the policy. And, of course, this cost/benefit approach doesn't really capture a major metric along which people are evaluating the issue: the perceived symbolism of the off-campus move and the related sense that attending class requires one to show support for the political opinions underlying that symbolism.
Posted by: Dave | Mar 15, 2006 11:39:16 PM
Just wanted to let everyone know that an interesting discussion regarding career prospects out of UM Law is ensuing in the comments section of Professor Vladeck's previous blog post regarding this issue (the professor's initial blog post is called "When Students Strike Back -- Some Reactions").
Posted by: Louser | Mar 18, 2006 4:25:27 PM
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