GEORGETOWN’S PHILODEMIC SOCIETY JOINS CANCEL MOB... The Despoiling of a Great Tradition and the First Step Toward Recovery

By Manuel A. Miranda

A few months ago, a Georgetown undergraduate wrote the first-ever article in support of the Philodemic Society’s actions (with the opportunistic help of President Jack DeGioia) to destroy one of the university’s architectural and historic gems, succumbing to the ludicrous claim by race activists that the Philodemic Society has a racist past.?

I responded and noted that in truth what had been sold to alumni as the removal of just a handful of former Confederates among the 34 portraits on the wall of the Victorian-decorated Hall was actually a racist scheme to remove all the “white faces.” ?My article suggested that we should look elsewhere to find the true racists in the Philodemic. I said out loud what many had observed and knew to be true.

The racists reacted in a manner that perhaps should not surprise us in these fascistic times. ?One Philodemic senior, who has now gone on to run the Arizona Democratic Party’s rapid response team, took the racist charge personally with a screed response on Facebook, the kind of response someone gives when they've been exposed. It was pretty good for a rapid responder.?It used all the tricks, including the creation of a young victim and the corralling of a herd. ?A few months earlier, when her fellow senior, Justin Drewer C’22, published the first ever dissent to the defacement of the Philodemic in The Hoya, the rapid responder took to Twitter with this screed, all but calling her classmate a racist for the mere objection. ?In fact, he had accepted the removal of a few portraits, her stated goal, and argued against more alterations. ?It seemed to me that with this kind of smoke, there was a fire.

Skills that make for an ideologue rapid responder are not, however, the skills that are prized in American debate and certainly not in the tradition of the Philodemic.?The rapid responder utilized the single most discrediting tool in debate: an ad hominem attack.?In each of her responses, she merely demonizes the speaker and never actually responded to the issue raised.??Justin Drewer must not “care about Black people,” she writes on social media! ?In her Facebook tirade on me, she writes that I am “hateful” and my use of the word “racist” – a word she practically coined in her Georgetown career – was “debasing.” The rapid responder never denied my allegation that she participated in a racist scheme to remove “white faces,” the evidence of which is the Philodemic Hall today, empty of portraits.

What came next was more startling and showed the degradation that the Philodemic Society has suffered in these recent years under the influence of race hustlers and woke bullies, who even forced the Society to end a three decade tradition of meeting at Martin’s Tavern after debates.

More of a caricature of the modern college campus, the race hustlers got an unsuspecting undergraduate to move a resolution not just to censure me for my remarks or to contradict me, as adults might do, they purported to remove my membership status and to ban me from all future debates!?That is remarkable given that I am one of the people most responsible for the 1990 revival of the Philodemic, its survival during the 1990s, and the founder of its alumni association. ?

A resolution to oust and ban someone, anyone, for the expression of an opinion is the ultimate ad hominem attack. ?Each time I think about it I still nod my head, chuckle, and roll my eyes. It was so unthinkable for any debating society to do, let alone my Philodemic Society of which I had been so proud.

The provocative action was not only a bit Veruca Salt, it was bad judgment given that I’m a published columnist who has written on race scams.?They were seeking to “cancel me!” Hmmm. ?So I published my first piece on this matter in a national newspaper under the banner "Georgetown is reigniting another Civil War."

In fairness, the ad hominem resolution to cancel me was not written by an undergraduate. ?It was crafted secretly by a recent alumnus named Daniel Ernst (C’18) who first set the Society to removing Confederates from the walls when he was a student in 2018.?The bad judgment was his.?When he graduated, he went on to lead “Greater Boston Young Democrats.”?The undergraduate who ranted the most in favor of silencing me at the offending meeting naturally was the chairwoman of the Philodemic’s “slavery committee” that had led the exposed racist scheme, and much worse.?Like the Arizona rapid responder and the Massachusetts liberal, she graduated and went on to work for a race-focused Democrat strategist.

Let me know if you see a pattern.

So, let me address the substance of the matter further since some have taken umbrage. ?I did not use the word “racist” lightly nor without diligence. ?In fact, I was slow to see the truth of what was happening.?I never opposed removing a handful of Confederates but I was opposed to letting the university reimagine the great Hall into an all-purpose conference and reception room, remove Philodemic Hall’s unique artistry and historic value and to falsely wrap the Society into Jack DeGioia’s tiresome performative self-flagellation over slavery.

One day last March, it finally dawned on me and I timidly put this question to an undergraduate: ?“Have you considered the possibility that the scheme has never been about 7 [portraits]??Wouldn’t you want to get rid of all the white faces if you were them??Of course, they can’t come out and say it.?You aim for seven that you can easiest taint but ask for all to be replaced.?That is what they did, and that is what has happened in fact so far.”

The unequivocal response jolted me:?“Oh absolutely, I know for a fact that they do.?If you look at the report closely they marked only 3-4 as “permanent retention” and the rest as “more research required” or some as “eventual replacement”. They have also explicitly stated at certain public forums that they want to take down “white men” thus there isn’t any uncertainty regarding that either.“

I was shown a text by Max Zhang '23 stating that he wanted to be rid of all the "white faces." Zhang would become the chairman of the Committee.

That led me to ask other undergraduates. One undergraduate had actually considered filing a Bias Report against the Philodemic because of the discomfort she felt over the racially charged language of the racist scheme’s promoters.?One recalled how the slavery committee chairwoman had responded when visiting Howard students had asked about the photographs on the wall. ?“We are going to get rid of all these “white faces”,” was her public response. ?One undergraduate said that the racists had made going to debates unpleasant.?

After publishing his one article in The Hoya, senior Justin Drewer volunteered for one last keynote performance in the Philodemic.?The Society witnessed that night something that had never happened in three decades, if ever. ?In reaction to his published mere dissent on the reimagining of the Philodemic Room a group of hysterical fascisti left the room when he merely rose to the podium. That is an old academic leftist tactic called “shunning.” One member of the slavery committee, Max Zhang '23, noted that night that anyone who opposed removing the portraits was a “white supremacist.” He is a senior still.

To be clear, I don't think most current Philodemicians are racists, and most did not understand what the slavery committee was doing to pursue their racist scheme.?Most of the racists have graduated, but a few remain. It is obvious. It is also understandable that no one wants to see their best buddies or elders in a negative light. I get it.

In any case, the more important crucible the Society now faces is not the future of the Hall or whether racists are fomenting a woke agenda.?Rather, a very small number have pursued practices of shunning, silencing, ouster, canceling, and other abusive tactics commonly associated with extremism. Last spring, the slavery committee’s chairwoman even asked the University administration to send uniformed guards to a Philodemic event for fear that someone might speak a dissenting viewpoint about her scheme. According to an undergraduate, the administrator agreed to the request!

Wokesters have introduced into the oldest collegiate debate society in the Americas, and sanctified, the use of the ad hominem attack rather than debating honestly the substance of a matter. The race hustlers not only wrecked a historic landmark room, they have robbed the university of its last space for the free exchange of ideas, untethered to the most petty, ideological and childish practices of a modern campus. ??

It all makes for quite a story, to have a debating society afraid of debate and taking measures to keep dissenting voices from speaking. The question now is, perhaps one the Philodemic Society could debate, what is more disturbing: to be called racists or to act like fascists? To be clear, not to be fascists, but to act like them.