Unscientific Justification for My Coffee Dependency

Posted on October 14, 2015 by Eric Thomas Weber

Silly chart that I made unscientifically to show a slight correlation between increased coffee consumption and increased per capita GDP.

I was thinking about coffee because I love it, and a silly idea struck me. I’m not a quantitative researcher and the silly activity I spent a few minutes on this morning is utterly unscientific and drawn from sources that confer no serious credibility. Therefore, I urge anyone looking at this not to cite it in any kind of research or writing, unless you’re writing about silliness.

I wondered whether one could show some correlation between growth in coffee consumption and economic growth. Selecting out an inconvenient year before my chart starts, I got a bit of a correlation. Both go up! See?!

It gave me a chuckle, so I thought I’d share. Even if it’s just a silly thought to make me feel better about my dependency on coffee…

The Nonsense of Beating Sense into Kids

Posted on October 13, 2015 by Eric Thomas Weber

Eric Thomas Weber, first published September 1, 2015 in The Prindle Post.

The start of another academic year is cause to reflect on the aims of education and the fact that 19 states in the U.S. still use corporal punishment in public schools. Many have yet to learn the counterproductive and harmful effects of disciplining kids with violence. Nowhere is the mistake more troubling than in our public schools.

‘The board of education’ by Wesley Fryer is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0 (via Flickr)

I have argued elsewhere against school corporal punishment on grounds of the right to security of person and given the Platonic warning that “nothing taught by force stays in the soul.” The aims of education offer a further, crucial reason why we ought to end the use of corporal punishment in public schools.

What is school for? Somewhere at the heart of the answer should be the idea of educating people to be critical thinkers. John Dewey once argued that such a goal is implicit in the “supreme intellectual obligation.” That obligation calls for empowering all citizens with the scientific attitudes and intellectual habits of mind necessary to appreciate wisdom and to put it to use. Expert scientists must push the envelope of knowledge, but if intellectuals are to benefit humanity, the masses of people need to be sufficiently critical thinkers to benefit from scientific innovations.

Critical thinking involves the development of a skeptical attitude, one which expects or hopes to uncover justification or evidence. It appreciates well-founded authorities, understanding authority as a relationship of trust based on good reasons for it. For schools to cultivate critical thinking in young people, kids need to be comfortable questioning their teachers, administrators, and parents. In public schools, we need safe environments in which intellects are allowed and enabled to experiment, to be creative, and to learn whether and why some authorities are warranted, when they are.

Corporal punishment in public schools inhibits the cultivation of critical thinking. It teaches one that a justifiable means to one’s ends is violence. It impedes the development of “scientific attitudes and intellectual habits of mind.” A kid is understandably less inclined to question an authority that beats him or her, especially with the sanction of public policy.

Photo of the map Southern Echo created of Mississippi counties and their use of corporal punishment in the 2009-2010 and 2010-2011 school years.

Click image for a PDF.

Consider the kind of environment created in 2009-2010 in the South Panola School District in Mississippi, where corporal punishment was recorded 2,572 times in a 180-day school year. That averages out to the use of physical violence every 20-30 minutes each day. Such environments impede the development of critical thinking, rather than encouraging it.

What do young people learn when they are struck? It is true that studies show an immediate though very short-lived change in young people’s behavior after corporal punishment. They also show, however, that students who are subjected to violence do not develop better long-term habits. In fact, school- and in-home corporal punishments are associated with higher levels ofdepression, anxiety, drug use, crime, and other unfortunate consequences, as well as mental disorders. In school settings, then, corporal punishment fails to teach kids what it purports and is doing them educational harm.

The common refrain heard in response is that if you spare the rod, you’ll spoil the child. A priest pointed out to me, however, that this is a reference to the shepherd’s rod. Shepherds steer and redirect sheep with a tap or nudge of the rod. A tap or a push gives redirection and disciplines a herd. A beating does not. It makes the animal flee when it can get away.

In poor southern states still using corporal punishment, when young people reach the age at which they can leave school, flocks of them do.

Rather than teaching young people not to question authorities, we should strive to cultivate understanding of scientific and moral authority. We can teach respect for truth, good reasoning, good faith, and good will. Teaching kids that if they go out of line they will be struck tells them that if they think differently, they will be met with pain and shown the extent to which they are unsuited for education.

We can do better. There are nonviolent and effective forms of discipline. We should be teaching kids to explore ideas, to test authorities for the sake of learning, and to feel welcome and safe in educational environments. Corporal punishment has the opposite effects. Our schools could and should inspire and empower kids, nurturing them as critical thinkers. Those are aims to which meaningful education is rightly directed. A vital step forward must be, therefore, to abolish corporal punishment in our public schools.

Dr. Eric Thomas Weber is associate professor of Public Policy Leadership at the University of Mississippi and author of Uniting Mississippi (2015) and A Culture of Justice (in progress). He is representing only his own point of view. Follow him on Twitter @erictweber and connect on Facebook.

See the original article in The Prindle Post. Reprinted here with permission.

A State Divided Against Itself, Mississippi

Posted on October 11, 2015 by Eric Thomas Weber

Mississippi offers a clear example of Plato’s worry about disunity. One of the four virtues that he clarifies in The Republic is moderation, which is important for avoiding the extremes of behavior or of belief. What is most famous about Plato is his conclusion that the good city needs philosopher-kings, that leadership most fundamentally must be guided by wisdom. While that is true, it misses what Plato’s Socrates calls the greatest good for the city, the absence of which yields the greatest evil.

Plato’s Socrates asks “Is there any greater evil we can mention for the city than that which tears it apart and makes it many instead of one? Or any greater good than that which binds it together and makes it one?” Yes, wisdom is the most important virtue in one sense, for Plato, but when it comes to the public good, wisdom should be most concerned about division, and most fervently and wisely striving for unity. Without the latter, a state, divided against itself, only falls apart or fails at its aims.

I am looking forward to visiting the Clinton School for Public Service at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock on October 19th (if you’re in the area, mark your calendar). For those interested, I believe you’ll be able to watch the talk I give there via live Web stream. I should also be able to link to the video of it afterwards. And, as I’ve noted, I’ll give an interview on the Little Rock affiliate of NPR program, the “Clinton School Presents.”

In preparation for that trip and while talking with students, I’ve wondered about Alabama’s quick removal of its Confederate Battle Flags from public spaces. On the one hand, it was no surprise, given how atrocious the Charleston murders were. On the other, places like Alabama and Mississippi have been home to some of the most stubborn unwillingness to change. As places in which land is cheap and taxes are low, Alabama and Mississippi nevertheless struggle with economic development in part because of our troubled histories and the continued division and dysfunction that come from disunity.

The same day in Alabama, however, the Governor announced the removal of the Confederate Battle Flag and the commitment from Google to build a $600 million facility in the state. According to the Alabama Media Group, “The decision to take the flags down had nothing to do with the Google announcement, but the governor said economic development was part of the reason to avoid a fight.” The denial of a relationship between the two announcements sounds about as plausible as Nixon’s declaration that he’s not a crook.

As one of my students asked me this week, “How much has Mississippi missed out on because of our stubbornness?” Good question. More importantly, however, is the meaning of Mississippi’s recalcitrance. It means that people have yet to feel the pangs that they should in their hearts. We remain a state divided against itself, and we continue to suffer the consequences of the evil that tears us apart.

I’m glad to say that civil rights activist Myrlie Evers-Williams has joined the rally to change Mississippi’s flag, which features an emblem of the Confederate Battle Flag in its canton. There are those who have said that taking the flag down won’t change their hearts (1, 2, 3). To them, I say two things. First, it is alright for some people to be a lost cause, when so many other people are not. In a lovely garden, there are still unpleasant things living under a rock. That doesn’t mean we cannot enjoy the garden’s beauty, appreciating all that warrants sunlight. Second, Aristotle explained that one’s virtue, the state of one’s character, is a result of what we repeatedly do. Our habits matter. Public spaces are a visible place that inspires habits and maintains them. Changing those habits will only slowly bring about a change. It is also no guarantee. But, it is a wise step in the right direction towards healing, virtue, and unity.

As I finished my latest book, thinking about the possible titles for it, the most pressing challenge and opportunity for the state jumped out clearly. The difficulty for Mississippi, and, if resolved, the incredible opportunity for the state, would come from unity. No greater good could come to Mississippi than from that which will make it one, instead of many. There is therefore no greater cause I can see for the state than of Uniting Mississippi.

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Five Digital Tools I Use Every Day

Posted on October 5, 2015 by Eric Thomas Weber

On a pretty regular basis, I get asked about how I do certain techie things. Many of you tech savvy folks out there will be aware of these, or will use some variant on these tools. A number of folks I know are not aware of or experienced yet using at least one of these, so I thought it would be fun to say a few words about them.

1. Evernote

I know people who swear by some note-taking software. If you’ve got a great one, awesome! I have found Evernote to be fantastic and if your tools can do these things, by all means, stick with them.

When I browsing the Web, I want to keep info from a page, but I don’t want to make yet another bookmark or to make a PDF file. I just want to save it to read later. Evernote has a button/extension you can install for your brower, and it will save content you choose – the whole page or parts of it – to your Evernote. You can add a tag and categorize where it goes. Later, just text search something you remember about it, and boom. The waiting room at the dentist’s office becomes reading time space.

I often take notes in meetings, though I’m getting better about bringing a latop for them. On my laptop, I’ll usually take my notes in Evernote. You can attach files, pictures, audio, video, other files (PDFs, etc). When I take handwritten notes, however, which is still common for me, I then take a photo with my cellphone camera (which has gotten super high quality). You may need to practice a bit taking good pics of your notes, but I find it takes me almost no time at all to keep a digital copy of my handwritten notes. PLUS, Evernote processes them (I don’t know how long the delay is between posting and processing), and then you can text-search your handwriting. Yes. It’s awesome.

I use this for saving receipts, notes, Web pages for later, photos of anything I want to remember at some point, etc. You can also record a note for yourself to remember something later. I admit that I’ve not yet started doing that, but I love the idea and will give it a go. I love having access to my notes all in one place, organizable by “Notebook” and tags, and more. You can share notebooks with people too, which is great for teamwork, at work and in family needs.

Oh, and I find Evernote to be the best tool for grocery lists, with super-easy to add checkable boxes in front of “Bananas.”

2. Dropbox

By now, most people will have heard of or use some variant on Dropbox. You’d think so. Alas, many of my students still do not know the pain of losing a ton of work time to a crashed hard drive. When they do, they come to learn about Dropbox, or they do if they’re smart. I use dropbox on my desktop computer, laptop, iPad, and cellphone. When I’m on the go, if I have a network connection (including via my cell service), I can get access to any of my files on my cell and send a file, read it, edit it, etc, as needed. If I’ve got my laptop, I’ve got my static copies that I can work on in full depth and synchronize as soon as I get a connection again.

Now that my cellphone can be a wifi hotspot, I am only ever disconnected when on a plane that doesn’t provide internet access. Super backed up files. Synchronization. Plus, when I do that thing where you “save over the file that you wanted to make a new copy of before you… damn it!” That thing – when you do that, Dropbox can let you recover the file – to one of several possible past versions of the file.

Another favorite feature of Dropbox is the auto-sync of my phone’s photos to Dropbox. When I take photos of the kids, of a pretty scene, of anything important, if my phone has a digital connection (this setting can be customized), it will automatically upload my video or photo to Dropbox. So, if I capture a photo and love it, but 10 minutes later my phone totally dies or is lost, I’d still have the photo. That’s pretty great. This feature turns out to be super helpful in other ways. For, while Evernote will put a picture synced into my notes program, Dropbox will just get a file onto my computer. If I want a sheet of paper to be a photo on my computer that I can either use as a photo for a Web design function, or that I can turn into a PDF file, it’s so quick. I snap the photo, it syncs online, then my desktop syncs it, and poof. I can use the file on my desktop, no wires. It’s brilliant.

3. WordPress

I had heard of WordPress some time ago, with people telling me it was powerful. I didn’t understand. WordPress is a blog platform. I used to think that blogs were lame. Here’s my lame former blog.

Blogs didn’t used to seem cool because: a) They weren’t very customizable and therefore looked stupid, I thought; b) They looked like an easy platform for self-publishing that had all the hang-ups of that association – no built-in audience, no quality control, etc.; and c) They seemed so ubiquitous that people could easily ignore them. There are many dead blogs, my old one among them. So, why are we talking about WordPress?

Prior to WordPress, I was using Dreamweaver, a tank of a program, the Photoshop of Web design, I thought, and was managing my sites. It took some work each time you wanted to post something, though, going through Photoshop for sizing and other reasons, like adding text, etc. Adding video was a nightmare. Then, on top of that, my site was pretty static.

When experts I know had a look at my old site, now here, they told me it wasn’t easy to glance at it and know what I’m about. What I discovered was that my whole site was basically more like the “About” page on interesting, dynamic sites.

What’s a dynamic site? First of all, it posts new content regularly, which is why you’d want to come back. Secondly, it is feature-full, making it easy to post photos, video, audio, links, and social media tools. Thirdly, it is dynamically sizing – in other words it is a template/platform that takes the content you put in it and automatically is setup to make the content look good on different sized devices, like cellphones, laptops, huge desktop monitors, etc. Most importantly, it is hyper-shareable on social media outlets. You can find content you’re interested in and share just that content quickly and easily with friends and contacts on social media or via email.

WordPress does all of that for you. The thing that sealed the deal for me was the design. I looked everywhere and was not thrilled with the free designs I could find. Then, I happened on Michael Hyatt’s Web site. I’ll tell you more about him later, but he’s got super deluxe customization of a platform that he created (or had created given his parameters, one of those). Given what I wanted to do, his GetNoticedTheme did everything I wanted and needed, which was a pretty big and powerful list — I get that WordPress is powerful now.

You can get a lot of the power of WordPress with other themes. For a fantastic one that does it all for you, I paid about $250, a one-time fee. That’s a lot if you’re just having fun. For a professional expense it was quite reasonable, I thought. I’ll write another piece sometime about Michael’s excellent book, Platform. More on that later. For what it’s worth, I listened to the audio version. I’m one of those people who loves to read how-to books, and this hit a number of cylinders for me.

4. Audible

I’m a recent convert to audio books. WOW. I don’t know how I had been surviving before I found Audible. I love reading work stuff, and I do tons of it at work. There are so many things that need doing for which I love the distraction of an audio book. Cleaning the kitchen, going for a walk, making a long car ride go faster.

There’s also a “sleep” function. You can have audible read you to sleep. You can set it for 15 minutes, 30 minutes, an hour, etc. I LOVE this function. Reasonably, some of you are wondering, “but how do you have it read to you without bothering your sweet wife?” Good question. She introduced me to Audible and to the answer to this question, by the way. SleepPhones. They’re awesome. You can pay a bunch more for wireless ones. I find that I fall asleep with these on and then at some point bat them off. They end up on the floor or under my pillow.

If I were worried about assassination attempts while I’m sleeping, I’d still be comforted by the fact that the wire is pretty think and would surely break before really hurting me. That said, for non-strangling purposes it’s well built and has been great to date. I find I watch very little TV now, when I used to watch more than I’d care to admit. Now I want to get back to my book — and I rarely read fiction. I’ve always been a much bigger nonfiction reader. That said, I do enjoy having fiction read to me on Audible, especially be a great voice actor. That’s been great.

As I said, I listened to Michael Hyatt’s book, Platform, on Audible. It’s a great tool.

5. ToodleDo

Last but not least, is ToodleDo. It’s the ultimate Web-based to-do software. It’s built on the ideas developed in a best-selling book about productivity.

BEAR WITH ME!

It sounds mind-numbingly boring to imagine anyone reading a book about productivity, let alone to read one, you’d think. You’d be quite reasonable. BUT, David Allen’s book is an NYT bestseller for a reason. It’s called Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity. It’s on Audible, by the way. The basic idea of the book is that we stress a ton about the many things that need to manage, but that worry us because we might be forgetting something.

The feeling that I’m forgetting something is indeed one of the most common causes of stress that I felt for years. Once I thought through Allen’s point, I found it so much easier to relax. The solution is not quick at first, but becomes easy after initial changes and the setting of some good habits.

The first step is the big one: write down every thing that you have to do. That’s a much bigger task than it may seem. You’ve got many big projects. No, those are not one thing. They are many. Break down your biggest projects into their component parts. Lay them all out. Yes, at first it will freak you out. Chill, friend.

Once you’ve taken the time (possibly) hours it may take you at first to do this, you’ll find that between 10 and 30 things you need to do will each take about 2 minutes. Go ahead and immediately take care of those. Within an hour or so, you’ll have lifted hundreds of pounds of stress off your shoulders. That’s the way it felt to me.

After that, you’re left with quite a few things to do. That said, all of them will each take considerably more than 2 minutes. If you’re going to get them done, you’ll need to schedule time in which to do them. That’s the next step. Look at your week’s calendar and then back at your list. Plan intelligently to juggle deadlines, and schedule the time you’ll need over time to get each project done. As new stuff comes up, break it down into digestibles that you can get done now and that you need to put on your to do list, which you can schedule as Allen suggests, once a week, like on a Monday morning, perhaps.

That’s where ToodleDo comes in. It is as fully featured a To Do tool as you could imagine. That might intimidate at first. It’s super-customizable, so you need to play with it and see what you’re most often looking to find out or to track. You can share lists with team members, assigning different tasks to different people. You can have “context” tages, “projects” folders, and in addition to tasks, you can have subtasks, all with attachments, notes, deadlines, start dates and times, a timer, and more. It’s pretty remarkable.

I have found that I can be more productive when using these tools than without, and that the productivity is lower stress (I’m not at zero on that metric, but I strive for relaxing, pleasant work time).

So…

Each of these tools has a corresponding program for smartphones. I use all of them. I have not used WordPress often on my phone, but I can. Plus, if I come to have a habit of writing short notes or pieces that I want on my site, it is a good tool for doing that. For the other tools, I used them nearly daily if not many-times a day each. So, if a few people found something useful in these notes, great! If not, when you get asked about some of these tools, if these descriptions were clear enough, you can point newbies here for a few thoughts about five digital tools I use every day.

If you haven’t already, follow me on Twitter @EricTWeber and “like” my Facebook Author page.

Southern Secessionist Defends MS Flag – MPB Intvw

Posted on September 29, 2015 by Eric Thomas Weber

You need to watch this. William Flowers, a man from Georgia, came to a demonstration in Jackson, MS, as a leader in the effort to defend the Mississippi flag, which features an emblem of the Confederate Battle Flag. He leads the self-described southern nationalist group, League of the South.

This interview is not simply someone with a video camera. This is Mississippi Public Broadcasting interviewing a spokesman for the organized protest.

Cartoon posted with permission, copyright Clayton Jones. Claytoonz.com

The man speaks of the cultural attack on southern heritage as a genocide. That is the language and strategy of the Ku Klux Klan. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I returned home from Germany this August to find a message on my answering machine from a Presidential candidate arguing for a fight against the genocide of the white race. This man refers to genocide of southerners, which is novel, at least to my experience.

The argument reminds me of a powerful cartoon by Clay Jones, on right, featuring an African American man carrying a shot child, grieving silently, next to a wailing southern white man carrying his Confederate Battle Flag, in a shape resembling the child on left.

When asked about secession, Flowers openly advocates for it. He is explicitly a secessionist, who then says that he’d prefer a political solution. That sounds like a threat to me.

If you ever needed a demonstration that the Confederate Battle Flag is divisive, this fellow made it crystal clear. He refers to heritage, then dismisses any relation to slavery. He’s unhinged. We have this stuff scanned and online now. Mississippi’s first statement explaining its causes for secession says that slavery was its fundamental cause.

If you’ve visited my site before, you know where I stand on this. If you haven’t check out:

“Sometimes Heritage Does Harm,”
“Racism Defies the ‘Greatest Commandment’,”
“What a Flag Has to Do with Justice,” and
“Governor, Take Down the Flag“

But seriously, watch this first:

If you can’t see this video in your RSS reader or email, then click here.

It’s 7.5 minutes long, but you can get the most important stuff within the first 3 minutes.

If you haven’t already, visit and “like” my Facebook author page and connect with me on Twitter (@EricTWeber).

‘We’re Number 10!’ Reasons the U.S. Is Losing Ground

Posted on September 23, 2015 by Eric Thomas Weber

The United States for so long has been a champion of innovation, but because of powerful special interests and also because of some unwise reasons, we are losing a great deal of ground. When I was growing up, we would hear chants that “We’re Number 1!” especially around the time of the Olympics. Americans were proud. We thought, whether rightly or not, that we were or had the best of everything that counted. Travel abroad offers reason for humility. I found a striking example when I visited Germany this past August. There were solar panels everywhere.

The U.S. is known for innovation for a number of reasons. The first is that early on the country was guided by a pioneer spirit. While Europe was strongly controlled by longstanding conventions, in the Americas, so many things were new. Much of the countryside was “wild,” a characteristic that was harmful when ascribed to the native peoples. Considering the wilderness of forests, bears, and other things that could kill you, there was much to do to survive. Innovations were necessary.

Beyond that, as de Tocqueville and later Max Weber pointed out (no relation, by the way), America had an industrious spirit and brought a Protestant work ethic to its industries. While the U.S. had its many troubling capitalist robber barons, it also has long been a land of invention and creativity. It’s remarkable how many inventions came from the United States, like the light bulb, the telegraph, and the telephone.

When you consider that the United States invented the automobile, it seems sad that Ford Motor Company failed to innovate and anticipate the changing market for fuel. With increasing gas prices, which of course fluctuate, demand naturally has risen for smaller, more fuel efficient vehicles. My wife and I bought a Prius. It has a 10 gallon tank of gas, or thereabouts. That might seem small. On that 10 or 11 gallon tank, we can drive 5.5 – 6 hours from Oxford, MS to Altanta, GA. True story. We get there needing to fill up soon, but we get there (I’ve got family there, so we’ve done it several times).

It’s no secret that the supply of oil in the world is a limited resource. If there’s any debate about it, the real question is when exactly we’ll have reached peak production that will then inevitably decline. There’s no doubt about the inevitability, just about when we’ll start to feel it. Even if it seems far off, we know that prices will rise again in our future. That’s a force for leading the market to want more efficient cars and sources of energy. Besides, why spend more on getting from A to B? Some people conspicuously consume gas, proud of the Hummers. Hell, I’d love to drive over something in one of those too. When I drive to Atlanta, however, I’ll get there a whole lot faster (not having to stop) and more cheaply if I can take a Prius.

In light of America’s history of innovation, it was a sad moment when Ford and the auto industry in the U.S. had to be bailed out during the financial crisis. The U.S. Government, which means you and me, bailed out the auto industry to the tune of nearly $80 Billion (yes, with a B). Much of that was recovered eventually, which is the good news, but we saw a loss of $9 Billion dollars that weren’t recovered. Why was there such a failure? Despite clear evidence that the market wanted more fuel efficient cars, Ford and others kept building sport utility vehicles. While Japan and South Korea made money hand over fist on fuel efficient cars, like the Prius, our auto industry defiantly rejected the idea that Americans cared about issues like the environment or fuel costs. You and I paid for that.

In August of this year, when Annie and I visited Germany, we took a train from Munich to Regensburg, in Bavaria, and then another from Regensburg to Berlin. First of all, the U.S. really needs to catch up on train infrastructure. Trains are awesome, even if one leg of our trip had its problems. So do highways (traffic, accidents, etc). As we went through the German countryside, we saw small towns in which houses had solar panels all over them.

The featured image in this post is an aerial view of something we saw in a lot of fields on our trip – solar energy farming. Germany is establishing the infrastructure, the technology, the expertise, and the innovation for new ways of harvesting energy, and they’re way ahead of the U.S. We’ll eventually be buying their tech, hiring their experts. The U.S. has been ridiculous about energy, perhaps because of Gore’s efforts to get people to care about global warming — if one party is more vocal on an issue, it must be a controversial matter, right? Wrong (If you’re a skeptic, be a smart one and read the 2014 IPCC report. Otherwise you don’t know what you’re talking about). Another reason is that the U.S. is an oil producer, so folks might think that it’s a bad thing to go after the renewables for that reason. That doesn’t make any sense of course. There were plenty of candle makers when Edison invented the lightbulb.

To anyone who says “Yeah, but solar panels are not so efficient and can’t replace yada yada…” Come on. The early automobile wasn’t perfect either. The glass would cut into you if it shattered. You had to crank the damned thing to get it started, while standing outside of the vehicle, etc. You don’t see advocates for the horse and carriage today. Problems or needs for efficiency and enhancement are precisely the places where the Germans are going to innovate and we’re going to give them our money and follow their lead. This isn’t the attitude of a nation that wants to be #1. It’s lazy and shortsighted.

American reluctance to dive into renewable energies is burying our heads in the sand. It’s counter to the American spirit of innovation. It’s also not wise in business terms. The defiant attitude that leads some people irrationally to dislike fuel efficient cars, solar panels, and preference for investing public funds in energy innovation over extensions of our eventual end of our oil abundance is precisely the reason why Zakaria said we’re living in a Post American World. Another reason is that the rest of the world is getting wise and “rising.” We’ll have oil for quite some time, but responsible people care about their grandkids, even when they don’t have them yet.

It’s time for the U.S. to snap out of this silliness and to want to be number 1 again, especially in terms of smart innovation.

P.S. If you enjoyed this piece, check out my earlier one called “Greening Industries and Green Industries in Mississippi.”

Eric Thomas Weber is associate professor of public policy leadership at the University of Mississippi, expressing only his own point of view. He is the author of Uniting Mississippi: Democracy and Leadership in the South (2015). Follow him on Twitter and “like” his Facebook page.

Mr. Bryant, Take Down the Flag

Posted on September 20, 2015 by Eric Thomas Weber

or "Governor, Take Down This Flag," in The Clarion Ledger, September 20, 2015, 2C.

My piece, “Mr. Bryant, Take Down the Flag,” came out in The Clarion Ledger this morning. In the printed version, the title is “Governor, Take Down this Flag.” For the next week or two, please head to the electronic version of the piece on the newspaper’s site. You can download and print a PDF of the article by clicking on the image of the printed version.

I’ll soon post the full article on my site. For now, be sure to check out my blogpost arguing that “Racism Defies the Greatest Commandment.”

“Violence Taught When Corporal Punishment Used”

Posted on September 16, 2015 by Eric Thomas Weber

Originally published in The Clarion Ledger, May 14, 2013, 9A.

The harsh treatment of prisoners in the U.S. causes much controversy, yet in our public schools, institutionalized
violence is commonplace.

In April, the Hattiesburg American reported that corporal punishment declined in Mississippi schools between 2007 and 2012 from more than 58,000 reported instances to around 39,000.

The use of corporal punishment varies greatly by school district. For the Lafayette County School District’s roughly 2,700 students, there were seven recorded cases of corporal punishment in the 2009-2010 school year and none the following year. By contrast, the Quitman County School District enrolls just under 1,300 students, yet recorded 1,594 instances of corporal punishment in the 2010-2011 academic year, which is only about 180 school days.

In the U.S., all 50 states permit corporal punishment in domestic settings. For public and private schools, however, only 19 states still practice it, while in Iowa and New Jersey it is illegal to perform in schools.

Iowa is a helpful state to use in comparison with Mississippi, since it is largely rural and has a comparable population size. Of course, Iowa has its problems, with seven schools districts named “dropout factories” in a 2007 Associated Press report. The same report called 44 of Mississippi’s schools “dropout factories.”

At best, corporal punishment in schools is not helping Mississippi. At worst, it is part of the problem.

According to studies, most parents find spankings in the home to be acceptable. It is important to distinguish parenting from schooling, however, and to watch out for institutional excesses. The 1980 federal case Hall v. Tawney said that excess corporal punishment in schools could violate a student’s “right to ultimate bodily security, the most fundamental aspect of personal privacy, (which) is unmistakably established in our constitutional decisions as an attribute of the ordered liberty that is the concern of substantive due process.”

Not all spankings in schools might be called excessive, of course, yet cases reported on in the Hattiesburg American raise serious concern. In 2011, 14-year-old Trey Clayton of Independence High School was paddled so severely that he fainted, “fell face-first onto the concrete floor … (and) had five shattered teeth and a lacerated chin,” according to reporter Marquita Brown.

Beyond legal concerns and the tragically severe cases, there are strong reasons to end institutionalized corporal punishment.

Bust of Socrates, Plato’s teacher.

First, students are compelled to be in school, and with good reason. Democratic societies must educate citizens to be self-governing. Yet Plato and other philosophers believed correctly, I think, that learning cannot take hold by compulsion. Socrates argued that “nothing taught by force stays in the soul.”

Compulsory schooling can address Plato’s worry, however, by showing students the value of education. It is vital to create an environment in which education is welcoming and inviting. Corporal punishment has the reverse effect.

Second, corporal punishment teaches students that when confronted with a challenge, adults use violence rather than reason to achieve our ends. It solidifies “school-to-prison pipelines” that the Justice Department is combating.

In Mississippi, we know that culture matters and that many of our schools are struggling. Corporal punishment is only one element of a culture which discourages students. Ending the practice, however, would contribute meaningfully to the reconstruction of an encouraging and positive culture of achievement in education.

Eric Thomas Weber is assistant professor of public policy leadership at the University of Mississippi and author of three books, including Democracy and Leadership (2013). He is representing only his own views. Follow @EricTWeber on Twitter. Visit EricThomasWeber.org.

One University with Great Leadership

Posted on September 12, 2015 by Eric Thomas Weber

At so many colleges and universities, administrators can be checked out and out of touch, or be disaffected pencil pushers. Faculty and their administrators rarely get along well. I am with folks who want to challenge leadership when it’s wrong. At the same time, it’s important to give credit where it is due. On top of that, when there is great leadership, we should recognize it and point it out, especially if we want more of it.

The Lyceum building at the University of Mississippi.

Some fantastic universities can be really poorly run. I recall hearing recently about some foolishness from Emory University’s President. He encouraged compromise in the public sphere with reference to the 3/5ths compromise as his guiding example. It was one of the awful elements of our Constitution. Fortunately, Emory will soon have a new President, who will, I hope, be a bit more thoughtful and wise in his public commentaries.

When I was an undergraduate at Vanderbilt University, I remember hearing about how unhappy many were with the Chancellor there (before Gordon Gee). At SIU, where I got my Ph.D., the university went through a few chancellors while I was there. The last one before I left had plagiarized a big portion of his dissertation. I don’t even remember the name of the Chancellor at Ohio University, where I got my Master’s degree. Coming to the University of Mississippi, therefore, I felt surprised and blessed to meet and watch several great Chancellors who have many times done the right, courageous things to do.

I had cause to call Chancellor Dan Jones to action and to criticize the administration when a student and I got no response for nearly a year. That said, after we applied some pressure, we got the change that we wanted. Despite that one difficulty, I thought and still think very highly of Chancellor Jones. He made the right, tough decision many times. It’s important to call attention to examples like these. Last semester, he visited my Philosophy of Leadership course, where the students got to ask him questions about our readings, his experience, and what is worth losing one’s job over as a leader.

This morning, a Saturday, I wrote the University of Mississippi’s attorney and copied the Chancellor — presently Acting Chancellor Morris Stocks — about a pressing concern that I had this morning. The cause of my email isn’t the point here. The point is about the response I got. I wrote them at 9 am. In under two hours, I had heard from the university attorney, who answered us both. I then replied with a followup thought, given that feedback. Twenty minutes later, I heard from the Chancellor, who called my thought reasonable and who copied the relevant director at the university on that message. 37 minutes later, I heard from that director that he was going to take care of the issue — a response without a hint of complaint, only with appreciation for the thought and message. A plan was made in under 3 hours, before noon, on a Saturday, to resolve the concern I raised. My head is still spinning over the promptness of the replies I got.

To understand why this is a big deal, it might help to know a few more things about this little story (admittedly and necessarily short on some details). As an institution, our annual operating budget is just shy of $2 Billion — yes, with a “B.” We have a medical center, Schools of Pharmacy, Journalism, Accountancy, Applied Sciences, Business, and more (I’m in the College of Liberal Arts). I understand that we have over 800 full-time faculty members and we’re growing.

Despite that remarkable scale and complexity, I emailed top university leadership and heard from three of them within three hours time on a Saturday. The is ball rolling towards resolution of my concern. I had to take a moment to reflect on how lucky I am to be at an institution in which that could happen. There is good reason why the university is bursting at the seems with enrollment growth, fundraising, and increases in all of the right numbers, despite our share of setbacks and ugly moments. Some places have decreasing enrollment and some small schools are even shutting down as a result. By contrast, the University of Mississippi is growing. Even our tough moments, like election night 2012, offer opportunities for growth, like the candlelight vigil that was the subject of the cover photo for my recent book, Uniting Mississippi:

When there are reasons and ways in which we need to change, I’ll be among the first to encourage us to do so. I presently try to do that on a regular basis as it is. Today, I feel compelled to call attention to how responsive my university leadership has just been. Bad leadership would ignore some complaining professor’s email, especially on a Saturday. What can’t wait until Monday?

That’s not the response I got. At least one university has great leadership.

Photos from the book signing at Square Books

Posted on September 11, 2015 by Eric Thomas Weber

Thanks to Daniel Perea for snapping these pictures at the book signing on Wednesday (September 9th, 2015)! Daniel kindly agreed to let me have the copyright for the images (Weber, 2015). Please do not use these without permission. Visit my contact page and drop me a line if you’d like to use one, especially for press or promotional purposes for future events. Thank you, Daniel!

I also want to thank Cody Morrison and Square Books for being great hosts. It was a wonderful first book signing experience. I’m honored and was very grateful and encouraged to see a number of nice folks brave the weather to hear about Uniting Mississippi. I’m pleased to report that we sold all but two copies, though one of those remaining is now gone. Square Books has one left as I write this, though a new shipment will be there soon. I’ll head over at some point soon to sign those, as one of the really cool things about real, brick and mortar bookstores like Square Books, and about literary towns like Oxford, is that authors sign books here and you can get your new book already signed by the author. You can’t do that on the forest-river-yellow Web site site. Thanks again, Square Books!

Daniel Perea took these photos at my book signing for 'Uniting Mississippi,' held at Square Books.

Photo of Weber signing a book for Mrs. Gray in Oxford, MS.

To learn more about the book, visit my page for Uniting Mississippi. If you’d like to support local bookstores like Square Books, you can order your copy on their Web site here:

Buy ‘Uniting Mississippi’ from Square Books

You can also see a brochure about the book here:

Printable Adobe PDF Brochure for ‘Uniting Mississippi’

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