mass murder occurred during WorldrnWar I, when there was much turmoilrnand chaos in Turkey; and because Turkeyrnhas not opened up its archives to externalrnscrutiny, to mv knowledge. We thereforerndo not have good statistics on the massacrernof Armenians in Turkey and havernnot had much debate about this genocidernin the scholarly literature. By contrast,rnyou can find a lively scholarly debaternon the deaths caused by Stalin asrnwell as by Mao and the Khmer Rouge.rnThat leaves us with the Jewish holocaust.rn1 have not been able to find anythingrnabout this in the statistical and demographicrnliteratures, where you wouldrnmost expect to find it. At the same time,rneverybody seems to know that six millionrnJews were killed by the National Socialistsrnof Germany before and during WorldrnWar II. Six million is a number like anyrnother number; you would expect to findrnan exhaustive analysis of it in the statisticalrnand demographic literatures, butrnyou don’t. The reason for this is that it isrna taboo subject in the West. If you try tornfind out about the number, your colleaguesrnwill shun you. Worse, you mightrnlose your job.rnLet me mention how I discovered thatrnthis was a taboo subject. I once proposedrnto an editor of a leading demographicrnjournal that 1 write a review ofrnmass murder in the 20th century. Massrnmurder, after all, is a leading cause ofrnmortality among some populations inrnsome countries, and therefore is a subjectrnof demography. He thought that wouldrnbe a good idea. Then, I mentioned thernJewish holocaust, which had to be treatedrnin any review of mass murder in thisrncentury. lie got very nervous and saidrnthat my research into that wouldn’t bernsuch a good idea.rnMv second example concerns the geneticrndifferences between individual humanrnbeings or groups of human beingsrn(for example, males and females, blacksrnand whites, whites and Asians, the richrnand the poor, the upper class and thernlower class, etc.). There has not beenrnmuch discussion of genetic differencesrnbetween human beings in the scholarlyrnliterature. In fact, if you delve into thesernmatters in print, you can be sure thatrnyour colleagues will shun you. A colleaguernof mine told me that if there werernsuch differences, then the social sciencesrnwould be finished. A professor at thernCity College of New York was actuallyrnformally censured by his colleagues forrnwriting something on group differencesrnin a scholarly journal, an incident, byrnthe way, which was not covered by thernNew York Times (though the Times didrncover it later on when the Jeffries casernrolled around). By contrast, the NewrnYork Times has always given extensiverncoverage to the Rushdie affair, and stillrndoes (Rushdie is still in hiding, and therndeath threat is still in force).rnSeveral officers of PEN, such as NormanrnMailer and Frances Fitzgerald, haverncome to this campus in the past decade.rnAs you know, PEN has been much involvedrnwith the Rushdie affair. Butrnwhen they come here, they ne’er inquirernabout censorship or self-censorship inrnacademe. I don’t think they would believernthis kind of censorship exists. Theyrnwouldn’t believe that there is a lack ofrnacademic freedom in America.rnThere probably are good reasons forrnnot saying or debating certain things inrnprint. The Muslims also probably haverngood reasons for not wanting to see certainrnthings in print. But until we have arnreal freedom of speech, that is, until werncan conduct research and debate freelyrnin the West without formal censure orrnostracism by our colleagues, only thenrncan we criticize the Muslims for theirrnreaction to Rushdie’s book, though wernshould criticize them for putting a pricernon his head.rnDaniel R. Vining, ]r., is an associaternprofessor of regional science at thernUniversity of Pennsylvania.rnOutcome-BasedrnEducationrnby Robert a HollandrnThe Chimera of ReformrnOutcome-Based Education, whichrnhas been around awhile underrnother names, has gradually become BigrnEducation’s main answer to the chorusrnof cries for “reform” that followed thernDepartment of Education’s publicationrnof the A Nation at Risk report ten yearsrnago. Its bland label is frightfully misleading.rnIf this were a product in the groceryrnstore, its manufacturer would bernsued for deceptive advertising. A morernaccurate title would be Emotions-BasedrnEducation.rnOBE is, unfortunately, a twin-trailerrnrig onto which has been loaded everyrncrackpot nostrum undermining governmentrneducation for the past 40 years:rnschooling as psychotherapy, self-esteem,rnmulticulturalism, homogeneous grouping,rnno-fail classes, group learning,rnmandatory enrollment of tots barely outrnof diapers, and, the latest dulcet-soundingrnconcept, global citizenship. (Asrnthough a World Citizen might bop intornPyongyang and demand a say in thernregime’s nuclear policy.)rnConservatives can recall how therncountry reached this sorry pass in governmentrnschools and weep: Ronald Reaganrncampaigned vigorously on a plank of dismantlingrnthe education ministry thatrnJimmy Carter had put in place as a sop tornthe National Education Association. Yetrndespite winning a landslide, Reagan neverrnwent to the mat for terminating thernDepartment of Education, So it wasrnthat through publication of A Nation atrnRisk, the DOE encouraged further centralizationrnof power over schooling at thernnational level, a trend robbing communitiesrnof their most civilizing institution.rnEducation czar William Bennett evenrnpublished a model curriculum. Certainlyrnhis “James Madison School” wasrnfar better than the multicultural mushrnnow being served up, but it encouragedrnthe notion that Washington holds thernkeys to learning. (The first big federalizingrnpush had come under LyndonrnBaines Johnson with passage in 1965 ofrnthe Elementary and Secondary EducationrnAct; school achievement beganrndropping in almost geometric proportionrnto the rise in federal spending andrncontrol.)rnMr. Reagan’s anointed successor, onetermsmanrnGeorge Bush, shared few ofrnhis compunctions about nationalized education.rnAnd so Bush’s “America 2000″rnprogram, launched with much fanfarernin cahoots with the nation’s governors,rnnow supplies the banner under whichrneducation consultants and foundationsrnpromote national tests and standards onrnthe OBE model. With Bill Clinton, therngovernor most responsible for selling thisrnapproach to Mr. Bush, and with majorrncorporate figures like the BusinessrnRoundtable on board, OBE looks as hardrnto stop as a runaway IS-wheeler. Thisrnseems particularly so when one adds thernweight of publishing and testing companiesrn(ever eager to throw solid instructionrnoverboard if the new slop is profitable)rnand well-endowed elite organizations likernSEPTEMBER 1993/47rnrnrn