“The Chair” on Netflix — A review

Like many academic colleagues, I avidly watched the Netflix show “Chair” to the end. It’s clearly meant to be an entertainment, with caricatured characters, but it’s far from unrealistic. Many things (good and bad) seemed all-too-real: the casual sexism, the love of scholarship, genuine affection (and also sometimes disdain) for students, the familial fondness for long-time colleagues, the subtle, good-humoured jabs, the age-ism, the big egos….

But none of that was the main critical theme of the show, which to me was the failure of institutional processes to manage the dialectic between the students’ demand for higher standards for ethics and self-reflection in the power-structure, and the administration’s inertial, hide-bound, reflexive desire to avoid any major changes of any sort, and brush troublesome things under old, fraying carpets.

Discussing this in the context of tired, provocative tropes like “political correctness” misses the point. Look, in this culture, I am free to engage in offensive speech. Personally, I am loth to offend anyone, and consider deliberately offensive speech to be a monumentally wasteful act of unkindness. I value my time, and the goodwill of those around me, so I like to avoid being offensive. But I indeed have offended people, almost always unintentionally (not in any major way so far, thankfully). When I have done so, I am often “called out” for it, most often by young people. I am always very uncomfortable when that happens, and often feel that those who are offended are being “over-sensitive”. But turnabout is fair play. The caller-out’s freedom to make one uncomfortable is entirely on par with one’s own freedom to be offensive. I like the University atmosphere the way it is. If we can’t give feedback, and discuss openly at the University (and hopefully learn something in the process) then who are we? what are we for?

What I (and many others) fear is the way INSTITUTIONAL PROCESSES are perceived to work, and I think this perception is well-reified in this (fictional) show. If I were to offend someone, I understand that I would be called out. At this point, I would ideally hope that (if demanded) a fair, “innocent until proven guilty” institutional process would kick in, all reasonable evidence gathered in a due process context, and a judgement handed out by a set of fair-minded members of the community (students and faculty). I also hope that mitigating attention would be paid to the history of the potential offender. I also hope that these processes would be organized in a deliberative and transparent manner, so it’s an opportunity for everyone to learn, and be better.

I understand there are genuine trip-wires. Many institutions (not just Universities) in America suffer from deep rot: Racism, sexism, x-phobia, have all long biased admission, hiring and promotion practices. Thankfully, Universities like my own are particularly well-aware of these issues, and trying to change.

And yet.

Offenders, whether fairly accused are not, are to be adjudicated in this complex, troubled, kinetic, institutional context.While trying to atone for “original sins”, institutions must still be fair to those accused of giving offense. Universities in particular (because we are, willy-nilly, teaching the next generation of leaders) must showcase the highest levels of fairness and transparency.

I want to believe that I will get a fair hearing if I’m accused. At the moment, I don’t. I hope I’m wrong.