Jennifer, I can’t help wondering how the issues you highlight fit into the “rebranding” process that SUNY Fredonia is currently engaged in. Conscious efforts to construct an identity inevitably lead to thinking about what we are not, as well as what we are. Most faculty and students I talk to tell me that what we are – or wish to be – includes tolerance and inclusivity, and this vision is proudly proclaimed in the university’s baccalaureate goals. But of course, “rebranding” is a concept drawn from marketing, its methods explicitly rooted in economic goals. If decision-makers conclude that our economic best interests don’t coincide with our broader community’s understanding of who we wish to be, how will the differences be resolved? You are right to raise the question of who benefits, and who wields power, in this process. By the way, if you didn’t see “The Fredonia Follower’s” delightful lampoon of the rebranding process, I highly recommend it.

In Russia, where power is wielded less subtly, it is perhaps easier to see the roots of intolerance aimed at the LGBT community. Vladimir Putin, supported by his tame Russian Duma, leads the way, promulgating laws that seek to “rebrand” Russia in a narrowly ethno-centric, male-centric, and Slavic way. There is no subterfuge about what Russia’s ruling class wants Russia not to be. The rising tide of intolerance in Russia has come as Putin’s popularity has slipped; he is looking for scapegoats, and it is always the people who most visibly challenge our sense of identity who suffer when this happens.

Do you suppose the narrowing vision of public higher education in America is falling victim to a similarly exclusionary process? As states defund public universities and insist that they focus tightly on economic outcomes for students, is the ability of public universities to promote and practice tolerance and inclusivity threatened? I fear that the utilitarian mind-set that dominates public discourse about higher education leaves little room for people who come to us seeking understanding of what it means to be tolerant, inclusive, human. If this is true, then we should be paying very close attention to the outcome of state-sponsored intolerance in Russia; it can teach us the consequences of incivility.