...34 per cent increase in all causes of mortality...

During the 2014–15 school year, for instance, the deans and department chairs at the 10 University of California system schools were presented by administrators at faculty leader-training sessions with examples of microaggressions. The list of offensive statements included: “America is the land of opportunity” and “I believe the most qualified person should get the job.”

As I’ve written before, back in the 1960s I was surrounded by well-meaning people who tried very hard to reform the system and to make life better. And now, the very same problems they were devoted to solving are the problems de jour: war, poverty, welfare, racism, and police brutality – the very same list!

50 years of their efforts were fully wasted. Shall we really continue the waste? At some point, doesn’t patting ourselves on the back for accomplishing nothing become ridiculous?

"You can’t use logic on these people,” Geoff Keith told me over dinner at the Hilton, “or then they think you’re a dick.”