I really hope. . .

. . . that I will never get so out of touch and so full of myself that I will start dispensing condescending advice to adjuncts, lecturers and instructors like Tenured Radical does in this nasty and offensive post. Of course, nobody wants to admit that here, for the grace of Lady Luck, go we all. It's easier to convince yourself that somebody as brilliant, productive, smart and unique as you could have never ended up stuck in a crappy adjuncting position. The sad reality is, though, that those of us who got tenure-track positions have been incredibly lucky. And that's all there is to it. You can hide from this simple truth behind a mountain of contemptuous advice you dispense to your colleagues, but it still remains the truth.

It is mind-boggling to me that people who position themselves as progressives would be so blinded by vanity as to disregard the glaring facts of reality. The system of higher education is being slowly destroyed by exploitative practices that are geared towards eroding the system of tenure and substituting tenure-track positions by an army of underpaid and overworked adjuncts, lecturers, and instructors. This system is exploitative and wrong. Instead of sneering at our colleagues, we need to join forces with them and struggle to take our academia back.

Here and here you can find  some really great posts from Anastasia, an adjunct, who responds to Tenured Radical's contemptuous rant.