SJWs at Yale Claim a Couple of Scalps

Nicholas and Erika Christakis, the husband and wife professors who were at the center of the Halloween costume brouhaha at Yale University last October, are in full retreat. After a months-long SJW temper tantrum over the issue, the Christakises have announced that they will step down as the heads of Silliman College (a residential college at Yale) effective in July.

The professors had decided last year not to teach classes from the start of the spring semester. Nicholas will continue on as a tenured professor at Yale University, National Review reports, but Erika has decided to no longer teach there.

I am stepping down from serving as Head of Silliman College at Yale @Silliman2. This is our only public statement. pic.twitter.com/lhx3JZnsgR

— Nicholas Christakis (@NAChristakis) May 25, 2016

As you may remember, Yale’s Intercultural Affairs Council sent an email to students shortly before Halloween last year instructing them to avoid wearing costumes that could be perceived as “culturally unaware or insensitive.”

When one professor had the temerity to gently and respectfully suggest that students might be capable (and perhaps even better off) navigating these waters themselves rather than relying on university oversight, she was condemned, shouted down, and ultimately chased off campus.

Yale University’s failure to rein in these anti-free speech cry-bullies on campus earned them a “Jefferson Muzzles award” last month. At the news that the couple had jumped ship, National Review’s Ian Tuttle lamented that “the response of most members of the Yale community has been to hope the controversy disappears, rather than tell the overgrown toddlers masquerading as college students to grow up.”

Why should the Christakises voluntarily continue in this thankless babysitting gig? They deserve better. It’s an indication of their large-heartedness that they’re not scorching the earth on the way out. They’d be within their rights to do so. Unfortunately, their departure means that the bullying worked, and the tactic is now certain to be reprised.

This of course does not bode well for universities that lack the desire or the intestinal fortitude to deal with the perpetually triggered cry-bullies who infest their campuses. As Mizzou discovered, to their chagrin, many parents are not eager to shell out tens of thousands of their hard-earned dollars each year to send their kids to institutionalized special-snowflake safe spaces that discourage free speech and critical thinking.