I Speak Up

It is inherently dangerous for a conservative to speak their mind on campus. That was true back in my first-go-round, and it's doubly true now, even in the entitled air of law school. But today, for the first time ever, I had to speak up. I was in a seminar, 20 people around a single conference table, discussing of all things Ben Franklin's autobiography. To my shock the professor and the class all berated the man. His success? No doubt due to exploitation. His lifelong study of character and its application to the self? A façade to hide his sins from view. His lifelong aversion to alcohol? A lie to cover addictions.  His voracious appetite for consensual sex? Misogynistic, sexist, and, there's that word again, exploitive. He was even blamed for delaying the onset of the American novel.

 Said the professor: "I would say we were all in a agreement, but from some of the facial contortions in the room I'd say there is opposition. Dan?" And boy, out it came. "This is the new Americanism, this cynicism. We aren't allowed to have heroes anymore. We worship failure and disparage success. We bat around labels that I doubt anyone here can actually define and slap them on everyone, even 300 year old dead men. I'm supposed to believe that anyone at this table can sleep with whoever they want, in what quantity and position they want, and it's ok - and I'm not saying it's not - but I'm supposed to judge a man for having sex 250 years ago?  We all absorb and repeat 90% of what society says is ok in 2018 but somehow magically think someone in 1740 should feel the same, or that we'd be any different? It's bunk. It's wrong, and it's unfair to a great man. And for the record, he writes 10x better than Melville."  Yeah, I said it. A few ums, a few stammers, a few commas in the wrong place, but I said it.  Cue silence. Then a guy across the table, who had nodded as I ranted, finally spoke up and agreed with me, and the guy next to him nodded his own affirmation. But let me tell you, the ride on the elevator with some of the other classmates was AWKWARD.