So I‘m a bit shocked about something:
- a bit more than a week ago, #Columbia cancelled some degrees of graduates/alumni who spoke out against the Israeli way of handling their conflict with Palestine.
- now this past week, #Erdogan had his main competitor‘s degrees cancelled.
Cancelling of already given, non-honorary degrees for political reasons (if they caught someone cheating it’s a bit different, obviously) was something that even in the most authoritarian regimes wasn‘t really done.
The US under #Trump is trailblazing new degrees of how to be a dictator that so far wasn‘t compatible with being part of the Western World.
#ruleoflaw #universities #freedomofteaching
The rulers of #flaweddemocracies and #authoritarian states all over are going to copy the US on stuff like this, making the World worse. I hope #MAGA voters are proud.
What I find shocking is that I have not seen anybody put these pieces of the puzzle together yet.
We do need to talk about how the US getting rid of #democraticnorms and #ruleoflaw norms makes it easier for strongmen everywhere to do the same.
It normalizes coups like the ongoing one in #Turkey, repressive measures like the sonic cannon in #Serbia, making pride marches illegal like in #Hungary. We do need to make sure that this is not normal, that this is incompatible with our common values. #Turkiye
🦕 Justus ☠️ Tóth 🏁 Römeth