[numbers_guy]

There is nowhere to run and hide. Europe is worse than the US on this front. China also demands party loyalty. In a sense this is just the human condition. The ruling faction demands loyalty. Only a very advanced human civilization could move past that and allow criticism of the ruling class. Maybe the US had achieved that for a brief movement in the past or maybe it was just an illusion.

EDIT: For people wondering why I think it's worse in Europe, it's because in Europe the ruling class and the universities are on the same side. And when I say Europe, I mean UK, France and Germany.

[jmcgough]

My PhD friends are moving to Canada and Hong Kong now. Neither are perfect, but they are better than America now in terms of academic freedom, and won't yank your funding in the middle of a 5 year research project just for petty revenge. Half of what you hear about China is propaganda - America is the bad place now.

[A_D_E_P_T]

I'm in Europe. It's not even close to being worse than the US on that front. Places like the Fraunhofer Institute and the Max Planck Institute are perpetually well-funded, and are largely unaffected by politics. Good places to do research.

[buyucu]

As a German government funded scientist, is it safe to criticise Israel or use the 'G' word for what Israel is doing? Or would they do the same thing they did to Helen Fares?

[breppp]

Wouldn't get to this because in Germany such a demonstration would be dispersed far earlier, not to mention the nazi symbolism displayed in UCLA

[A_D_E_P_T]

In any case, penalties would apply to the perpetrators themselves, as individuals. I've never heard of a case where the institution itself would suffer from a significant funding cut, to say nothing of a very sudden funding collapse.

[breppp]

That could be the case, but free speech is much more sacred in the United States than in Germany.

For example the anti-swastika or anti-cult laws, which I am not against, it's just a different approach to something like this happening

[A_D_E_P_T]

> but free speech is much more sacred in the United States than in Germany.

In the abstract. In actual practice, it's not clear, and you could even build quite a strong case for the opposite view. "Cancellation" over mere words has been commonplace for over ten years, and is much more common to the US than to Europe. And as for laws... What just happened to Tao and UCLA has, to the best of my knowledge, never taken place in Europe in recent decades.

[FirmwareBurner]

>Fraunhofer Institute and the Max Planck Institute are perpetually well-funded, and are largely unaffected by politics

Oh, so I can freely go up against the German government's policies and have my career in academia unaffected and keep my government funding?

I lived in Germany and don't remember people or organisations ever being able to break government rules with no consequences (unless they had high friends in politics).

Something smells here.

[enaaem]

Funny thing is that UCLA is getting defunded because some people there were criticising a FOREIGN government.

[FirmwareBurner]

Go work in German academia and criticize the FOREIGN government of Israel.

I'm sure the German government will react with much more leniency than the US.

[ben_w]

In this case, the analogy should be "Go work in German academia *where the students* criticize the FOREIGN government of Israel."

AFAICT, no German academic institutions have lost funding as a result of the student's protests. Those protests were stopped, police action etc., but no funding change to the academic institutions.

[enaaem]

Note that you are affected by OTHER people's opinion on a foreign nation.

[davrosthedalek]

As long as you are not a "Beamte", i.e. a special case of state employee, yes.

[FirmwareBurner]

Sorry I don't buy it. Which examples are there of academics going against the government policies and still keeping their jobs and funds?

I lived in Germany and the moment you don't do what the government says you get the full shaft. Nobody let's you rebel against the government with no consequences, not in US, not in Germany, not in UK, nowhere.

People painting Germany like a bastion of free speech are coping hard. Only if you consider free speech doing and saying only what the government says.

[A_D_E_P_T]

It's hard to prove a negative. Can you show us an example of anything like what's happening at UCLA (collective punishment of an entire institution) or an example of an individual professor being harshly penalized or sanctioned for expressing personal political opinions?

[FirmwareBurner]

Don't spin this around, what I asked you is not a negative.

People here argued that the US is fascist because in academia you can't get away with breaking governments rules getting you defunded and pointing at Germany for being superior in this regard.

So then I asked for proof that in other countries you can get away in academia with breaking the government's rules and not get defunded. It really is that simple.

[hnfong]

Generally, I do agree that in most if not all places, if you get government funding, you can't go against government policy.

However, in this case, it's quite hard to argue that Terrence Tao had anything to do with antisemitism or anything against Trump's policies. Actually I don't think Terrence Tao did anything that Trump cared about. This isn't really a free speech issue, it's more like some fundamental instability in the US, and maybe the US government is running out on money and trying to cut down on research expenditure using excuses.

[klooney]

Does AfD support qualify as forbidden speech?

[lawn]

> why I think it's worse in Europe, it's because in Europe the ruling class and the universities are on the same side

Sounds like a feature, not a bug.

> And when I say Europe, I mean UK, France and Germany.

Europe is much larger and more diverse than those three countries. Scandinavia for example consistently top the list in most well-being statistics.

[ben_w]

> Sounds like a feature, not a bug.

In fairness, it can be either, and which it is depends if in the specific case it's more accurate to phrase it as "the ruling classes are on the side of the universities" (good) or as "the universities are on the side of the ruling class" (bad).

[Applejinx]

Yeah, it was called the United States and if it was an illusion it would not have been the weakness exploited in this way. America was real and can well be again: turns out allowing such diversity and multiculturalism gave rise to things like New York City, California etc etc. known for being giant piles of messy commerce and influence from all over the place.

It's never been any different, all the way back to when Germans or Irish or whoever were the 'demonized immigrants'. This is what made America great. Anytime we want it, those conditions can return. It was no illusion.

[diggan]

> Europe is worse than the US on this front.

On the front of funding research? Considering that one is constantly adding more funds for research, while the other one is removing funds, I'm not sure how accurate that is.

[delusional]

What are you on about? I live in Europe. We don't terminate all contact to random universities because they said something the führer didn't like.

If you truly believe that the whole world is "just as bad" as this, then you are unimaginably far to the right.

[amelius]

I agree with you, but that choice of word doesn't make much sense here.

[luckylion]

I wouldn't say it's "just as bad", but I also couldn't imagine a big university publicly and strongly going against the federal government in Germany on "culture war" issues.

If you're fully aligned, there's no telling what would happen if you weren't, and you can't use "nothing happens" as evidence that nothing would happen - you're always allowed to share the opinions of whoever funds you.

If Germany got a right-wing government on the federal level, I expect to see either funding being slashed or universities adjusting their positions.

[FirmwareBurner]

Thank you for the voice or reason.

It's silly to say that EU is better jut because people don't see the government interfere with universities in the EU, when EU universities would never go against the central government to begin with, because that's where all their money comes from. Why would you bite the hand that feeds you?

Meanwhile universities like Harvard have so much private money they can publicly tell Trump to shove it. EU universities don't have this privilege so they exercise a degree of self censorship based on how the government tells them to dance.

[tsm]

>Europe is worse than the US on this front

Would you please expand on this?

[BDPW]

Like the German diplomats recently speaking out against their governments policy on Gaza and Israel?

Or Dutch professors openly criticizing the plans by the right-wing government (which just fell) as being damaging, unproductive amd sometimes unconstitutional?

The only examples I see are the opposite of what you say. Can you name any examples in Germany, Sweden, Norway or Holland? (Those are the countries that I'm confident talking about at least)