Fish, not just for breakfast anymore

Today’s New York Times includes a link to the blog opinion piece by Stanley Fish called God Talk. I am a fan of Fish, and often have some piece of his in a pile on my desk waiting to be read, or waiting to be filed for reference in some currently unknown project.

What strikes me most today about the academy and the discussion on religion is how false much of it rings. Today’s discussion by Fish reminded me of a professional conference I once attended where they brought in a debate team for after lunch entertainment.

This was five years ago before much of the debate about gay marriage was settled, so as a topic it seemed provocative. However, the debate ended up being a debate over civil union versus marriage. It wasn’t much of a debate, because those that had given the topic had already decided that one of the two was the right answer.

Now I realize that collegiate debate doesn’t have a lot to do with the fleshing out of ideas, rather it’s about scoring points and judges. However, I think it is still and interesting example of where the institution of higher education gets many of these debates wrong.

Despite how you feel about gay marriage or any other hot button issue, the debate has to happen over the real conflict. The conflict is whether or not gay marriage is an option. The debate is pretty robust and over some key foundational concepts of what it means to be human, religious faith, psychology, law and a host of other disciplines. To start the debate somewhere other than at the core just doesn’t do much good. It alienates the University from those truly seeking answers.

I think Fish has some good thoughts in this piece, and I hope the debate about God and the meaning of life at Universities and elsewhere picks up steam and grows deeper. The answers to these questions shape every discipline.