Ed.d., Ph.d., M.d., And Just Plain Old Doctor Of Whatever...dowhat

Discussion in 'General Discussions' started by Hopikrishnan, Dec 21, 2020.

  1. Hopikrishnan

    Hopikrishnan Platinum IL'ite

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    People from the Tamil Nation know that we have plenty of doctors. We see them on pre-election walls all over the state, on posters. Doctor Jayalalitha, Dr. Stalin, and so on. See link for the history: In doctorate lies stepping stone - DMK heir to get honorary degree usually reserved for CMs
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    Honorary doctorates are given to people who have a significant achievement in their field of culture, life, public service etc.. Recently desi's in America are made to realize that we are becoming a 3rd world country in our politics and economy. And now there is this flap about frivolous "doctorate" to people connected to Power.

    Doctor Jill Biden was asked to downplay the "doctor" and meld into the first-spouse job. And she had decided to call that Wall Street Journal opinion as misogynistic (women-hating), and many individuals and organizations have come out supporting her. All of this huffing-&-puffing had led to a thorough examination of Jill Biden's Ed.D degree, the one she claimed she "had worked so hard for".

    Here is a snippet from a recent analysis: "
    To call Jill Biden’s dissertation thin gruel is an insult to gruel. Whatever meager substance puddled in Bob Cratchit’s miserable bowl at mealtime was a bountiful feast compared with this paper. I wrote yesterday about the problems with this capstone project, the foundation of her Ed.D. degree and of the insistence of so many in recent days that we must call her “Dr.”

    Mrs. Biden’s only original research consists of interviews with two — that’s right, two — ex-students and a few colleagues at Delaware Technical Community College, where she used to teach, plus the results of a vacuous questionnaire she wrote that was returned by about 150 people who worked or studied there. Oh, and she also called two nearby community colleges seeking interviews about their retention rates. One of them wouldn’t answer the question; the other wouldn’t assign anyone to speak to her at all. Telling us about this misadventure serves no academic purpose, though it does fill up four pages of her generously spaced paper. The transcripts of her group chats with campus figures and colleagues take up nearly 30 pages out of 129. The questionnaires eat up another 18 pages.

    The dissertation, Student Retention at the Community College: Meeting Students’ Needs, shimmers with the wan, term-papery feel of middle school, although in defense of today’s middle schoolers, they at least know how to use spell-checking software, unlike Mrs. Biden. Her 2006 paper notes that at Delaware Tech, her then-employer, a third of students dissolve into the ether every year, and in order to pad out her micron-thin proposals, none of which have anything to support them except her beliefs and anecdotal evidence (she suggests building a student center and beefing up the “Wellness Center” while increasing counseling and mentoring services), she shovels in piles of drivel. Opinions will differ on which of her efforts is of least value, but a strong contender presents itself at the moment when she reaches over for the course catalog on her desk and quotes at length from page two of its boilerplate introduction (“The College respects and cares for students as individuals and maintains a friendly an open institution which welcomes all students and supports their aspirations for a better life”).

    (Jill) Biden’s style is atrocious, her research is comical, her reasoning is muddled, and as one finishes the final vacuous line of this student-newspaper-style exercise (“A student retention plan requires diligence and effort — but most of all, leadership”), it is impossible not to be reminded that the University of Delaware, which granted Mrs. Biden an Ed.D. in 2007, is deeply connected to her husband. A more exacting, or even minimally self-respecting, university would have directed Mrs. Biden’s paper to the nearest trash receptacle. Jill Biden looks like yet another member of the Biden family who successfully leveraged the family name to obtain things of value that otherwise would have lain far beyond the reach of someone of such meager talents.​

    The president-elect Joe Biden is also not known for his abilities in using the language, he has plagiarized others' speeches, and quite often lied about his academic credentials as well as his involvements in the civil rights movement, and about getting arrested with Nelson Mandela.

    I think it was a bad move for Jill Biden to have blown this issue up to expose herself, and her whole family for a reexamination of systematic malfeasance in their activities.

    It is generally accepted that a doctor (of whatever kind) is not addressed a doctor when s/he is coaching little league, or out shopping in Trader joe's. I go with this view. Among us desi's there are plenty of doctors --of science, engg, and medicine. Very few would insist on being called by their titles, not in a costco-queue for sure.

    What do you think ?
     
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  2. MalStrom

    MalStrom IL Hall of Fame

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    It is another attempt to demean a liberal woman by those on the right that are unable to move on from the election results.
    You are quoting as fact the opinion of a misogynist who writes for a conservative publication. He has succeeded in embarrassing himself but I am not sure what else that article has accomplished. The only drivel I’m seeing is what he wrote.
    Jill Biden has worked as a teacher her entire career and if she wants to call herself by her title then that’s her wish. I don’t usually refer to myself as Dr. but sometimes my students or people I am meeting for the first time will until I tell them it’s okay to use my given name. I work for a very accomplished medical doctor and I always refer to him by his title out of respect, even in social settings.
    I am sick and tired of women always having to defend themselves and being held to so much higher standards and told how they need to think and talk by men. Are they just insecure?
    Perhaps Dr. Biden should take a leaf from our current FLOTUS and pose near-naked on a bearskin rug if she wants more respect from the conservative media.
     
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  3. Rihana

    Rihana Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    The WSJ op-ed by Joseph Epstein, made this mistake:
    Unfortunately for him, he decided to use Jill Biden as a hook for a thoughtful piece on an important issue. In retribution for that politically inadmissible choice, he’s now a non-person—at least in the eyes of Northwestern University.
    In Defense of Joseph Epstein on Dr Jill Biden | City Journal
    The analysis is by someone called Kyle Smith (not Epstein). A casual read showed that it has quite a few facts in it. I also think blowing it up was a bad move by Jill Biden. I can't understand how the WSJ opinion is misogynistic.

    I think any statement about a minority or an under-represented section of society that is not wholesomely positive and warm/fuzzy/encouraging will be shouted down in the seconds it takes to type a #tag. Larry Summers paid the price in 2005 for suggesting that maybe science sees fewer women in top positions due to issues of intrinsic aptitude. He was suggesting a theory, not a definitive conclusion.

    A few months ago, the Wells Fargo CEO had to issue an apology because in a Zoom meeting he said, “While it might sound like an excuse, the unfortunate reality is that there is a very limited pool of black talent to recruit from." Ask any hiring manager off the record and you'll hear similar observations. As an aside: there are online venues meant exclusively for black candidates to post their resumes and network. Our enterprising fellow desis upload their resumes there too with suitably modified names. You realize only in a face to face interview that the person being interviewed is dark skinned alright, but not black. : )

    Coming back to the Jill Biden controversy: can't we have a discussion about who can or should call themselves Dr? Even expressing such an idea will result in what that Epstein guy is facing? Wiped out from the university's webpages and so on? The example he used happens to be female, so we bring in the misogynistic card. Sigh. We conveniently forget or ignore that men in politics also have been mocked for insisting that they be addressed as Dr.
     
    Last edited: Dec 21, 2020
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  4. Hopikrishnan

    Hopikrishnan Platinum IL'ite

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    Hehehehe.... When Dr. Kissinger was called Doctor Kissinger, nobody paid much attention (raised eyebrows or rolled eyes), but when called Herr Doctor Kissinger, especially in AmeriKa, he knew that was a different thing. Sebastian Gorka's hangup is typical of europeans. Even in France (with their liberte, egalite, and fraternite) they call out all the degrees. And have their calling-cards spell it all out in small print, like a pharmaceutical insert advising side effects.

    Poor Jill. From here on out, whenever someone insists on calling her Doctor, she has to wonder if it was misogyny or not. Political life is tough.
     
  5. MalStrom

    MalStrom IL Hall of Fame

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    If Epstein wanted to make a fair point he should have written in general terms about who gets to call themselves Dr. Even to that anyone could ask him who died and made him God. He however chose to single out a prominent non-conservative woman. It’s funny how we didn’t see this dude squawking at “Dr”. Sebastian Gorka.
    This same Epstein also wrote a homophobic essay sprinkled with the N-word back in the day. Hard to take such a sexist, racist piece of trash seriously.
     
  6. Rihana

    Rihana Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    Epstein's timing and choice of example were not smart. He most likely knew what was coming. Might have even written it for the publicity.

    But the other analysis that Hopi has linked, seems to be a fair enough analysis of Jill Biden's dissertation. It is at times sarcastic but if it is mostly an accurate examination of her dissertation, it even more shows that Dr. Biden shouldn't have drawn so much attention to her title.
     
  7. Hopikrishnan

    Hopikrishnan Platinum IL'ite

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    I suspected as much. Getting noticed (viewers, subscribers) is getting tougher all the time. WSJ doesn't put out OpEd without considering the various possibilities of fall out. Paul Gigot (the Editorial page editor) in later press releases said as much, and promised to pursue their mode of fearless critique of whomever.
    Jill Jacobs-Biden dissertation would be grist only until the next distraction comes along. However, late night comics are showing ample deference to the contents of the dissertation by an English Writing teacher, although it is topical and so current. Obviously the rightwing does not have any comics or good writers of "material".
     
  8. Laks09

    Laks09 Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    In 30 days my worry will be Dr Biden’s doctory, Hunter’s whatever it is with Burisma and Joe’s sleepy status. I don’t have to worry about Donny pushing that button anymore. Hallelujah!!!!!!!!
     
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  9. Rihana

    Rihana Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    The nightmare of the last four years and its after-effects won't go away so soon. The cleansing and sending back racists to their closets will take long.

    People and the media became immune to Trump's unbelievable tweets and actions after a while. It was sometimes due to him being compared to his own worse behavior. Or, a feeling of at least he didn't do this/that.

    After he becomes the former president, even as we heave deep sighs of collective relief, we would do well to not compare his successor or other future presidents with that abysmal benchmark. Let's resolve to hold our first families and presidents, from whichever party, to higher standards. America can do better, much better.
     
  10. nuss

    nuss Platinum IL'ite

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    What do I think?

    When a person earns a degree (not an honorary degree, a hard-earned real degree), they have every right to use the title. People who have not earned a PhD should not be telling the ones who have whether the subject of the dissertation was important or not.
    Dr. Biden has every right to use her title that she has earned. I would never use Mrs or Ms., it is Dr. A well earned doctorate!

    Everyone is ready for the Covid vaccine, a vaccine developed mostly by non MDs, the scientists with a PhD.
     
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