“Diva Kitty” seems to think that my blog is her litter box. Anyone who wants to can check the DIW comment threads for her copious products, but they’re not going to show up here anytime soon.

I still intend to get back here with a couple of comments on Prof. Leiter and Prof. Neal, but I’m taking the kids on vacation tomorrow, so I will be away for a week or more.

I could use an editor, no doubt about it. I’ll fix the homonym, at least. Have a nice time with the kids.

KC is less forgivable in this circumstance, although his response is certainly true to form. He had the chance to claim professorial license (and, responsibility), and explain to KB that that toss-away hyperbole about NCCU substantially weakened her argument and that its rhetorical excess impaired the substance of her argument. I can’t believe KC failed to see that logical flaw. So his failure to disclose it—given he seems to be in the business of analysis—seems mindfully stubborn, and therefore, well, pure “tribalism effect.”

And Debrah? Well, know that your thoughtful posts, and responses to your readers gives her plenty of opportunity to do better. I have little hope.

I have the impression that Johnson does have a sincere interest in encouraging students, and that it’s a role he fulfills quite effectively in other circumstances. But when he has a partisan agenda it doesn’t seem to leave much room for careful argumentation—doesn’t seem to leave room for much of anything besides nailing the bad guys. So no surprise that he has like-minded fans.

Ellah, I have no idea where you live; however, if you have lived in the Triangle more than a few years, then you know that this comment is not only false, it’s rather comical.

No other school in all my days on this earth has ever come out against anyone like a third-world lynch mob the way NCCU did—-(and in most respects, still does, because its students and alumni continue to push the ugly fantasy that “something happened”)—-in the Spring of 2006.

There animalistic antics at an NCCU news conference were on the national news. My relatives in Seattle saw it. Friends living in Tokyo saw it.

You have not one leg to stand on. Just emotional bile designed to change the subject and “move on”……..criticizing people like KC simply because he is now recognized as the premiere voice of reason and the go-to analyst regarding this HOAX from the beginning.

“But Johnson’s inability (?) to address the logical failure of her argument makes it also sadly apparent that despite his being a professor, he could not bring himself to acknowledge the logical weakness of a (former) student’s column. He could have supported the thesis, but still pointed out the illogic of the argument and helped her along by refining it for her. His failure to do so is exactly the ‘tribalism effect,’ which you explain so clearly in this post.”

KC and none of us are obligated to alter Kristin Butler’s chronicling of reality……simply because she outlines and then details everything that took place. She was an honest journalist here when the ones who have been in the business for decades didn’t have the balls to tell the truth.

Butler gave a nod to civilization by telling the real story.

Perhaps you guys should make a detour and direct your energies toward those who really have serious issues and who employ double standards and choose to prop up a known prostitute…..attempting to “dress her up” as they downplay her criminality.

As if anyone who knows anything about this case would do anything but wince.

Keep trying.

However, I’m afraid that many inside the academy have already embarrassed themselves beyond rehabilitation.

How ‘bout that—it’s the poster girl for mindless tribal loyalty! It’s funny, because the comment about how attorneys suing Duke should put me on their “deposition list” started as advice to Debrah to put me on her ignore list. And I think she’s trying, but I guess she still has to straighten out the occasional commenter who doesn’t toe the party line—and her intolerance for any thing but the party line is truly remarkable. I like the reference to “you guys,” especially after Ralph DuBose did the same thing, and then the apparent certainly that “us guys” are intent on “moving on,” because, well, that’s just the kind of people we are.

Just fyi, Debrah, the short comment you posted right after this one isn’t gonna be cleared.

As to NCCU awarding a degree in Criminal Justice to the false accuser. This is a woman that the N.C. AG described as too delusional and unstable to be tried for filing a false report - the state could not prove intent; in other words because the accuser was so mentally ill that she could not reasonably be expected to seperate reality from her fantasies. And she has in the past been convicted of trying to kill a police officer in addition to multiple previous episodes of false accusation. This persons get a degree in Cr. Justice. And so K. Butler says “Oh. My. God!” more or less. And you guys chorttle about how she is somehow using “illogic”.
She is doing fine, imho.

The funny thing is that I also said that I can’t reconcile Mangum’s history with a degree related to criminal justice. I think NCCU and people who speak out for it should treat your concerns as legitimate and reasonable. That’s clear from my post, and if you think all I did was chortle and call Butler illogical, you’re not much of a reader—I did neither of those things. Or else you don’t have to read more than a sentence here and there because you already know what “us guys” are saying. And it’s not that hard to figure out 2 or 3 reasons that I’m writing all this stuff. My point is not that the “criminals” aren’t so bad after all.

But Johnson’s inability (?) to address the logical failure of her argument makes it also sadly apparent that despite his being a professor, he could not bring himself to acknowledge the logical weakness of a (former) student’s column. He could have supported the thesis, but still pointed out the illogic of the argument and helped her along by refining it for her. His failure to do so is exactly the “tribalism effect,” which you explain so clearly in this post.

The undergraduate experience can be a bit of a fishbowl, so there’s definitely hope for Kristin Butler. I don’t doubt that her intention really was to generate some constructive dialog. Probably Johnson has the same intention, but he seems to be pretty much set in his ways.

Yes, it’s natural for people to coalesce around shared interests or beliefs without making any conscious effort to form a community or a “tribe.” That’s not tribalism, though. Tribalism is a way of thinking about one’s own group in relation to the others (here’s a definition)—uncritical loyalty to your own group and broad generalizations about the character and qualities of the other groups. You came up with a fine example—The Criminals, The Heroes, and The Cowards.