Higher Education: Far from Christianized

How might universities that are affiliated with a Christian organization, or “Church,” apply the values enunciated and illustrated in the gospels in ways that distinguish such schools as specifically Christian? Do academic administrators at colleges and universities that are formally affiliated with Christianity apply the preachments by Jesus in the New Testament, let alone ask the question? At most, the question, when asked, is usually answered in terms of increasing financial aid, but in the gospels Jesus is not oriented to programs, but instead to interpersonal relations, specially as bear on the marginalized or outsiders in general—the proverbial last being first and most people who regard themselves as first, as last. How might faculty members who delimit their application of academic colleagues to scholar who are on the same faculty, hence at the same college or university? An unlikely example of a Christian values being applied by a professor at Yale, a university whose privileging of exclusivity and thus exclusion is well ensconced (and known) can be contrasted with the organizational culture at the Roman Catholic Church’s official university in the United States. Any cleric administrators at the Vatican who regard the Protestant denominations, or sects, as instances of compromised Christianity might want to take note of the contrast between the Catholic University of America and Yale.

The full essay is at "Higher Education."

Texas School Policies Violently Enforced: Police in Schools

An organizational policy, whether in an educational, religious, or business organization, is not law. Accordingly, “police tactics” are inappropriately used on people who violate policies. The proliferation of off-duty police officers in retail in more than one of the U.S. states (and perhaps in the E.U. as well), complete with lethal weapons, renders the distinction between policy and law especially relevant and even pressing. To be sure, trespassing is indeed a crime, even though some municipal police departments in Florida have refused to recognize it as such, as, for example, when a property owner illegally enters a rented apartment, but in a store, absent a decision by a manager to have a person removed from the premises, store “police” cannot legally act violently against the public as long as no crime is being committed—even if a store policy is being violated.

The full essay is at "Police Enforcing Texas School Policies with Violence."

Bad Management as Unethical: On Reckless Bus Drivers in Boston

The corruption of an individual manager or non-supervisory employee, or even a government official can be distinguished between the collusion of multiple levels, as I contend has been the case at least as of 2023 in Boston, Massachusetts in regard to the government and the Commonwealth’s most populous region’s mass transit system—in particular, its bus service. I contend that the government has been looking the other way as the management of the local bus transit has held off from firing reckless bus drivers, who thus sordidly feel entitled to ignore the training—assuming it is not deficient—by driving recklessly by riding the accelerator pedal before stomping down on the brake pedal at the last minute, literally, in stopping. With positions to fill, the company’s management treats such driving at best with a slap on the wrist, with the government looking on rather than divesting the management of its disincentive to fire even dangerous drivers. Such corruption is systemic in nature, and thus is much worse than the corruption of an individual. Ultimately, it is the public—which includes the electorate—which goes unprotected while bus riders have to put up with jolting rides.

The full essay is at "Bad Management as Unethical: On Reckless Bus Drivers."