Harvard's 'Rebellious Daughter'

The wonderful thing about being a woman, wrote Agatha Christie, is to wonder what is going to happen to you next.

Curiously, the newly appointed President of Harvard, Dr. Drew Gilpin Faust. feels the same way.  As Sara Rimer writes:

I’ve always done more than I ever thought I would. Becoming a professor — I never would have imagined that. Writing books — I never would have imagined that. Getting a Ph.D. — I’m not sure I would even have imagined that. I’ve lived my life a step at a time. Things sort of happened.

As described by Rimer, Dr. Faust fits perfectly into the liberal narrative.  Daughter of white Southern privilege, she rejected her past, marched in civil-rights marches, and became a feminist pioneer in the academy.  You can’t get any better than that.

If life sorta just happened to turn out right for Faust, that’s where happenstance ends.  She is going to make sure that things don’t sort of “just happen” for women at Harvard any more.

Asked Sunday whether her appointment signified the end of sex inequities at the university, Dr. Faust said: “Of course not. There is a lot of work still to be done, especially in the sciences.”

We can be sure that whatever that work is, it will not include “inclusion” for conservatives.  What was true in Boston for the Irish 150 years ago is certainly true in the university today: “Conservatives Need Not Apply.”