A&M professor investigated for criticizing Dan Patrick? Sounds like cancel culture | Opinion
We all know that some politicians have thin skin and that some people just tend toward obsequiousness. But the lengths to which Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s office may have interfered to seek punishment of a Texas A&M University professor’s criticism of him — and the A&M chancellor’s quick obedience — goes well beyond abuse of power.
The Texas Tribune reported that Joy Alonzo, an A&M professor and an expert on the opioid crisis, lectured on the topic at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston. According to several people present, she criticized the lieutenant governor’s office on the issue, although no one has reported exactly what she said.
In the audience was the daughter of Texas Land Commissioner Dawn Buckingham, a senator until she won the statewide office last year. Soon after the lecture, Patrick’s chief of staff sent A&M System Chancellor John Sharp a link to Alonzo’s professional bio, according to public records obtained by the Tribune. The story suggests the student complained to her mom, who mentioned it either to Patrick directly or Patrick’s chief of staff.
Sharp soon texted Patrick directly: “Joy Alonzo has been placed on administrative leave pending investigation re firing her. shud [sic] be finished by end of week.”
An internal investigation could not confirm any wrongdoing by Alonzo and she kept her job.
There are two massive issues with what’s portrayed in this story as we see it, provided it’s accurate. One: Patrick shouldn’t be wielding his political influence and power as a weapon to threaten or bully others into punching below their weight in response to criticism that was apparently so vague and mild that no one can seem to recall the exact slight. It’s unethical. It’s unbecoming of his office. It’s what people think politicians do which makes people hate them.
In a statement, Texas A&M University System spokesman Laylan Copelin said Sharp’s text to Patrick was a “typical update,” and that it’s normal for Sharp to “keep elected officials informed when something at Texas A&M might interest them.”
It sounds like baloney. It’s pretty clear that Patrick or his staff wouldn’t brook criticism and demanded that Sharp take action.
This is not nearly as important as the ethics of what’s happened but worth mentioning nonetheless: The whole event honestly portrays Patrick, or at least aides acting on his behalf, as kind of wimpy. We know he got a text confirming an investigation of Alonzo over the criticism and did not intervene. Patrick hearing some criticism and going to the head of the entire system to deal with the professor is cancel culture at its finest — and we thought conservatives were against that.
It shows how thin-skinned and sensitive Patrick is. Will his office hunt down any smear made online? In every classroom? Texas is a large state. Is he to be offended at every slight and use his position to chill that offense? Patrick should be made of sterner stuff, although, frankly, so should Sharp.
Sharp, a former statewide officeholder himself, shouldn’t have been so quick to acquiesce to the demands of a politician, whatever his position or ideology. If it had been raised, he could have told Patrick he would review the matter, but promising Patrick, as he did via text, that she would be placed on leave pending an investigation that could lead to firing her that same morning smacks of the kind of boundary-less relationships people often accuse those in political power of having — and stories like this are the reason why.
Patrick might be terrified because he led a crusade against tenure. Last year, he proposed ending university tenure to get rid of folks who teach critical race theory. He’s also spearheaded Texas’ efforts to ban universities’ diversity, equity and inclusion policies — and succeeded. Is Patrick, in his third-term as lieutenant governor, really so paranoid about university staff and faculty?
Second, and just as importantly, Patrick and Sharp should be passionate defenders of free speech in the public arena. Sharp is chancellor of a reputable place of higher education, the place where an abundance of ideas of all ranges should be spoken and tested and spoken and tested again. This is the beauty of education in America: Free speech abounds here, or at least it should.
We can think of only a handful of examples of something Alonzo could have said that would deserve to be chilled so quickly — something personally insulting, perhaps, that was an unprofessional moment — and it’s not clear she said anything deserving of the kind of shutdown she received.
Alonzo was invited to speak on the topic of opioid policy, and she let her professional opinion be known. Even if she was wrong, is she not entitled to say it and respect her students enough to decide whether to side with or against her? Is speech so fragile in Texas that it must be shut down at the mere scent of criticism?
One way of testing this is to imagine if the shoe were on the other foot, ideologically speaking: If a right-leaning professor smeared a Democratic lieutenant governor who then targeted the professor through a system official several levels above her, conservatives would be outraged. As well they should.
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