Are Too Many Professors Excellent Sheep?

About this episode

The episode discusses the lack of courage among professors in addressing controversial topics, featuring insights from historian Jonathan Zimmerman.

We have been dying to discuss an article called “Why Aren’t Professors Braver?” since it was first published in The Chronicle of Higher Education back in September. It’s by the psychologist Paul Bloom and it starts with an ode to the professoriate: We tend to be pretty smart. We are sometimes socially inept, but in a sweet way. We are genuinely excited about ideas…We are often generous... mentoring students in ways that don’t lead to any tangible rewards. And we are a peaceable lot. If you’re sitting at a bar, minding your own business, and some drunk takes a swing at you, the drunk is unlikely to be a professor. In spite of our many praiseworthy traits, Bloom says that professors aren’t particularly courageous. When controversial or sensitive topics arise, he claims that we tend to be “too censorious and too self-censoring.” “Why,” Bloom asks, “are even tenured professors, people with the most secure jobs on Earth, so unwilling to speak their minds?” We have posed this question many times since we both became faculty members--and we could think of no better person to hash it out with than our friend, UPenn professor Jonathan Zimmerman . Jon is a historian of education who has…

People in this episode

Hosts: Amna Khalid, Jeff Snyder

Guest: Jonathan Zimmerman

Topics covered

• academic courage
• professors
• self-censorship
• education history
• mentorship

Keywords

• professors
• courage
• self-censorship
• education
• mentorship

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: University of Pennsylvania, West Chester University, New York University

Books & works: Whose America: Culture Wars in the Public Schools, Too Hot to Handle: A Global History of Sex Education, The Amateur

More episodes of Banished

• "Virtually No Institution of Higher Learning is Safe" · May 12, 2026 · 42 min
• Are Diverse Democracies an Endangered Species? · March 23, 2026 · 40 min
• That Book Is Dangerous! · October 3, 2025 · 21 min
• Authoritarians in the Academy · September 23, 2025 · 28 min
• Supercharged since October 7 · February 17, 2025 · 23 min
• Who Speaks the Language of Social Justice? · February 8, 2025 · 18 min