Endings and Beginnings
Tonight was the last episode of The O.C. Man, did it suck. None of my favorite characters came back. I never figured out where Cohen buried Zach Stevens. Cohen married Summer (duh), Julie chose to be single (with no apparent source of income) and Sandy and Kirsten moved back to Berkeley, like I always figured they would. The series ended with Ryan Atwood becoming an architect and seeing a troubled kid by a public phone, much like Ryan in season one. It implied that Ryan was going to help him. Stupid fucking ending. I'm pissed.
However, tonight sparked the burgeoning stupidity that is bound to ruin a man's career. I had heard the murmering about Professor Leonard Kaplan's allegedly "racist" remarks for a little while now, but tonight there was a full-fledged news story on crazy Lenny. As someone who has been in Legal Process with Kaplan, and paid enough attention to portray him in a semi-satirical manner, I can say with some certainty that his remarks were taken way out of context. Kaplan tended to push the edge in an effort to make us think. Granted, most of the time I was silently mocking him, surfing the internet, or contemplating how drunk I was going to get at bar review. However, I know that he said alot of things that could be taken out of context, but were by no means racist. I can't believe I'm doing this, but I have to defend Leonard Kaplan. The man made alot remarks that were by no means "PC," but most definitely not racist. I realize that most of my readers (all four) are now giving me the label of "racist." So be it. I'm sick of all the hypocrites at this school who are all about free speech until they don't like what is being said. The founding fathers intended for society to be a forum for finding truth through debate. To my knowledge, nobody challenged Kaplan during class. They ran out and complained to the dean. In my world, that's called being a coward. If we can't learn to defend our views in public, instead of making self-assured assumptions of what we feel is right, then none of us have any business becoming lawyers. The beauty of free speech is seeking truth through adversity, and I find it a shame that we're going to discount Kaplan's questionable remarks as racism, rather than talk about them in context. He was a fucking terrible teacher, but he deserves a fair shake. Let's give him one.
Finally, I'm going to file bar review in the chategory of "endings." I show up consistently, and nobody ever joins me. I vaguely recognize a few 1L faces, but they don't have souls, so they don't count as people. If there is one thing I learned in law school, it's drinking. Don't let me down, people. On that note, I will be unable to attend for several weeks. Fucking Friday mornings.
posted by Johnny Utah @ 11:39 PM
8 Comments:
I'm with you on Kaplan, although he could use a more credible supporter than Wheeler. I figure what happened was everyone in the class was surfing the internet/dreaming about how much they'd like to kick Kaplan squah in the nuts, then suddenly heard what he was saying about the Hmong people, and never heard the premise of his statements. Now, even in context, most of what Kaplan says is rambling, incoherent garbage, but taken out of context, they can certainly end up sounding like this.
The Kaplan thing has gotten completely out of control. I heard an unsubstantiated rumor today that the story was on Good Morning America. I haven't been able to verify that that happened, but I wouldn't be surprised.
There's that forum on Thursday, I think I'm going to go, if for no other reason than I want to see what kind of nonsense gets talked about.
What really pisses me off about the whole thing is that, even though it's the big, huge piece of gossip at the school, I still have not been able to track down two consistent accounts of what happened.
I have to disagree with the three of you, and here's why: The students in question did not just go to the Dean, they met with Kaplan first. They talked to him about his remarks, and asked him what he was basing them on. He could not give them a satisfactory answer (i.e. what his sources were etc.) and he offered only a non-apology ("I'm sorry you feel that way but I don't take back anything I said").
I would not judge a man by one offhand remark he made, but I would judge a man by how he handles the consequences of those remarks.
The whole thing still lacks context...as bad of a teacher as he is, I'm pretty certain that he had a point. And like every law teacher, he couldn't just say it, he had to explore it tangentially. What's being ignored is the subject of what he was teaching and why the remarks taken in context were probably not racist. Without the ellipses and snippets I saw in the news, I'm confident the remarks were not that bad, but rather the result of over-sensitivity.
We're supposed to be critical thinkers and that entails getting close to "the line" and being able to confront it. Being unomfortable with something doesn't mean you can discount it as racism. One recent conversation that jumps to mind is someone who said that black people commit more crimes. Statistically speaking, the declarant had some support with arrest, conviction, and incarceration statistics. However, it wasn't the people who immediately jumped to the label of "racist" that were most convincing during rebuttal, but rather the people who questioned the basis of the statistics and whether they could really support such a broad proclamation.
I know that's not exactly the same thing, but the fact of the matter is that at worst, Kaplan made a statement supported by questionable facts. He didn't use racial slurs, endorse supremecist ideology, or attack the Hmong students. He made an argument premised on something that wasn't 100 percent sound. Lawyers are trained to do just that. Kaplan isn't completely off base factually with his statement. Lot's of reputable news sources focus on the growing gang problem among Hmong cultures, and traditionally, there IS a system of "purchasing" Hmong wives. His statements were overinclusive (i.e. "All") but still, a valid argument and it shouldn't be our place to villify the guy because he ventured outside the realm of PC. We may not be comfortable with his medium for teaching formalism, but that's where debate should come into play instead of judgment. Honestly, if I were i nhis shoes, I'm not sure I would have apologized either.
Something we haven't talked about is, assuming Kaplan's remarks were racist (and I'm withholding judgment on that until I get some facts), then what do we do? Should we fire the guy for taking an unpopular (not to mention incorrect) viewpoint?
In Kaplan's case (assuming that the remarks were intended to be racist) it seems easy to say that the remarks have no academic value. But, as Kristin pointed out to me, the larger concern is that making a determination here gets the school involved in the business of line drawing. Eventually, there will be an unclear case, and the school, having set the precedent, will have to make a questionable decision about what speech is worth protecting and what speech isn't. The slippery slope will be in full play at that point and, intentionally or otherwise, the only possible result is censorship.
The fact of the matter is that running the risk of getting offended is part of the price you pay for living in a free society. The fact that someone can say something incredibly racist is part and parcel of freedom of thought and speech.
From what I've heard, Kaplan's accusers aren't taking the position that he was being intentionally racist...and if we have to draw a line eventually, that's where I would draw it. I wouldn't fire someone for offensive or incorrect remarks unless they were malicious and without any educational value. I won't give any examples, but I'm sure we could all use our imagination to determine where the line would be there.
Maybe I'm beating the dead horse here, but I remain of the opinion that it's not wrong to be unpopular. If that were the case, most of Madison would be banished from my part of the state. I don't even think it's wrong to be ignorant. If that were wrong, half the faculty should be fired. Legal education can be mutual, and maybe that's what will go on here. But firing the guy for anything less than intentional malicious racism would be a travesty to free expression and a curriculum grounded in critical thought.
Perhaps I could show up dressed as Lenny on Thursday and explain some things to the student body. Uhhh, uhh...
I agree that what should be done is a huge question not easily resolved. Personally, I do not think Kaplan should be fired, and I would also draw the line at malicious intentional racism for someone to be fired.
On the out of context issue, I think that's just something we can never know for sure. We weren't in the class, and we can speculate forever about whether the remarks were taken out of context, but that won't answer any concerns we have.
I agree that the strongest argument against a claim based on sketchy statistics is to attack the statistics themselves and/or postulate another reason for the result (i.e. blacks are disproportionately poor and that contributes to their high rate of crime commission). The impression I received from the students who were in the class and met with Kaplan is that at no time did he allow that there might be an explanation beyond race for the Hmong statistics. This is, again, hearsay, but I do trust the students I heard it from.
I don't think we're on different pages, I just think we have different levels of trust in individuals' accounts. I'm interested to see what Kaplan has to say tonight.
To be fair, none of Kaplan's remarks ever have educational value.
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