Yield not to bullying

I read James Fallows' article, Harvard vs Trump vs the Media: An Update. with interest, not least becuase as Fallows points out, "What Harvard ultimately does—defy, comply, work out something quietly—obviously matters more than mere news stories about that choice. Harvard’s actions and example matter not just because of Harvard’s scale but also because they will have ramifications for thousands of other American institutions that are deciding, right now, how much they dare stand up to Trump demands."

How the media frames the story has implications, and from the evidence presented by Fallows, it appears that the New York Times has been pushing for Havard to capitulate. Nevertheless, this has not shielded them from Trump's wrath. The publication is now facing a $15 billion defamation law suit.

In an article appearing in The Ringer, Brian Phillips supplies a timely injunction: The Age of Corporate Capitulation Won't Work. Before Phillips enumerates the various corporations that have genuflected to the administration in fear of reprisals since Trump's second presidency (has it only been 9 months?!), Phillips launches with this droll opening:

Let history record that when the battle began, Disney CEO Bob Iger did not surrender at once. Oh, no. Iger is one of the most powerful media executives on earth, the ruler of an empire with almost unimaginable cultural influence; he’s dizzyingly rich, phenomenally well-connected, the head of a vast army of lawyers and lobbyists, a man for whom doors are opened, a man for whom umbrellas are held, a man nobody pushes around. Of course he didn’t surrender immediately. He surrendered after waiting one afternoon and part of an evening. Among the leaders of American institutions in 2025, that’s what you call self-respect.

Phillips is responding to how Disney "folded like a cotton picnic blanket" in response to the Jimmy Kimmel suspension saga. "What’s so maddening about Disney’s capitulation on Kimmel isn’t that it’s cowardly and unjust in itself—though it’s both—but that it’s part of a growing chain of similar capitulations, one domino after another, powerful institutions yielding with barely the hint of a fight. And what’s maddening about that isn’t just that it’s revealing many of our leaders to be craven cynics—though it is—but that even by the cynical standards of those leaders, capitulation is a bad tactic. It doesn’t work."

Phillips continues, "In almost none of these cases is it clear that caving to pressure from the White House left the individual organizations better off, and in all of these cases it’s clear that caving harmed their broader industries. Newspapers are now afraid to endorse candidates, something they’ve been doing for more than a century; law firms are afraid to take on cases that might rub the administration the wrong way. The logic of capitulation seems to be that doing what the bully wants will make him leave you alone, either because he knows it would be unreasonable to press for more or because he wants to move on to another victim. The logic of bullying, however, is that weak people make for the best victims, and the people who capitulate are weak."

Phillips points out that pushing back is worth the risk. "Each individual act of capitulation has emboldened Trump to press for more. It has also created a precedent that makes both the president’s assault on free institutions and those institutions’ relinquishing of their freedom seem normal. It says to the government, You have our permission to do this to us. Which is why every law firm that rolled over made things worse for the next law firm, every university that rolled over made things worse for the next university, and every media organization that rolled over made things worse for every writer, artist, reporter, comedian, and broadcaster who wishes to work without serving the MAGA propaganda machine."

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