Ibram Kendi assailed by left as 'huckster' 'charlatan' as backlash to antiracism center grows: 'Real damage'

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The backlash against Ibram X. Kendi and Boston University doesn't appear to be fading, as two academics wrote scathing commentaries attacking the liberal figure and the university for peddling his "antiracist" ideology.

Last week, following many layoffs at the center, workers came forward with bombshell allegations that the center "exploited" staff and "blew through" millions of dollars in grant money while failing to deliver on its promises.

Progressive professor Tyler Austin Harper said the center's "implosion" proved how "White American elites on both sides of the political spectrum," were "always waiting in the wings to turn a shiny new Black intellectual into a mouthpiece for their political agenda," in his Washington Post op-ed, Thursday.

Harper, an assistant professor of environmental studies at Bates University, described Kendi as a "huckster" who was "happy to cash in on America's racial trauma" by transforming into an "antiracism guru" during the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement.

FED-UP STAFF SEETHE OVER BOSTON U'S ANTIRACIST CENTER: ‘COLOSSAL WASTE OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS’

Ibran X. Kendi announced the move of his antiracist research center in 2020. (Getty Images)

Kendi's philosophy, covered in his book, "How to be an Antiracist," did "real damage" because it diminished the evil of racism and made it common, Harper argued.

"Racism, Kendi argued, was not a grand metaphysical evil that afflicts a smattering of bucktoothed bigots. Rather, racism is everywhere, in everyone, all the time. Kendi’s second big idea was that racism is mundane," he wrote. 

"[I]n my view the real damage that Kendi’s philosophy has wrought on American culture is in the way he turned words like ‘racism’ and ‘white supremacy’ into banal, everyday terms like any others," Harper added. "Once reserved for the gravest of racial trespasses, thanks to the influence of Kendi and other charlatans like Robin DiAngelo, 'racism' is now routinely employed to describe anything from workplace microaggressions to terrorist attacks. The march on Charlottesville was white supremacy, but so too is asking Black people to show up to Zoom meetings on time."

He argued the blame didn't strictly target Kendi, but on the universities and rich liberal donors who were "eager to purchase their own absolution by bulk-buying anti-racist indulgences."

IBRAM X. KENDI RESPONDS TO BOSTON UNIVERSITY'S ANTIRACIST CENTER LAYOFFS

Kendi is the author of children's book "Antiracist Baby." (Fox News | Respective authors)

While the fellow Black academic said he didn't "condone Kendi's race grift," he did understand how "easy it would be to become a grifter" when universities and corporations pay high dollar for Black academics to become spokespersons for race issues. "His rise in 2020, and his ignominious decline today, are a mirror held up to liberal America. His failure, intellectual and moral, is as much ours as it is his," Harper concluded.

Harper wasn't the only academic condemning the Antiracist Center's founder and Boston University following the staff complaints. 

BU professor of theology David Decosimo also commented on the center's downfall in an opinion piece for The Wall Street Journal. He blamed university leaders for contributing to the "cultural hysteria" on racism following the death of George Floyd.

Calling the research center's downfall, "entirely predictable," he explained how the university went to great lengths in June 2020 after hiring Kendi, to "make antiracism central to every discipline and a requirement for all faculty hiring."

Even progressive faculty became "disturbed" by the changes, Decosimo said, but feared speaking up and being labeled a "racist."

Boston University progressive faculty feared being called a ‘racist’ for opposing antiracist initiatives on campus, a BU professor claimed. (Jim Steinfeldt/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)

He explained how he had warned university officials at the time about making any ideology, Kendi's included, "institutional orthodoxy," during a Zoom meeting and a subsequent letter, but nothing changed.

The "real culprit" in this saga, is the "countless universities" who behaved similarly to Boston University, he argued.

"And to this day at universities everywhere, activist faculty and administrators are still quietly working to institutionalize Mr. Kendi’s vision. They have made embracing 'diversity, equity and inclusion' a criterion for hiring and tenure, have rewritten disciplinary standards to privilege antiracist ideology, and are discerning ways to circumvent the Supreme Court’s affirmative-action ruling," he warned.

This "moral hysteria" of the antiracist movement has threatened intellectual freedom at the university level, he feared.

"Whether driven by moral hysteria, cynical careerism or fear of being labeled racist, this violation of scholarly ideals and liberal principles betrays the norms necessary for intellectual life and human flourishing. It courts disaster, at this moment especially, that universities can’t afford," Decosimo concluded.

Boston University and the Center for Antiracist Research did not immediately respond to requests for comment. 

The college previously told FOX News Digital it was expanding a probe into the antiracist center's "management culture" following the staff complaints.

"We received complaints after the Center for Antiracist Research recently laid off a number of employees. Those complaints focused on the center’s culture and its grant management practices. We previously initiated an examination of those grant management practices and that will continue. Based on additional information provided to us, we are expanding our inquiry to include the Center’s management culture and the faculty and staff’s experience with it," a spokesperson said.

"We recognize the importance of Dr. Kendi’s work and the significant impact it has had on antiracist thinking and policy. Boston University and Dr. Kendi believe strongly in the Center’s mission, and while he takes strong exception to the allegations made in recent complaints and media reports, we look forward to working with him as we conduct our assessment," the statement concluded.

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