Another case showing that conservatives aren't the only ones who denounce and suppress science that challenges ideological orthodoxies.
Academic Activists Send a Published Paper Down the Memory Hole
tldr:
- Researchers produce study on the possible mathematical underpinnings of the Greater Male Variability Hypothesis.
- Experts in the field praise the study. Editor of journal, though aware of the controversial nature of studies into intelligence and gender, offers to publish the article to encourage a robust debate on the subject.
- When interest groups in academia find out, they denounce the paper. One of the authors is encouraged to remove his name from it.
- Under pressure from diversity professionals, the National Science Foundation requests that the authors remove mention of their funding for the research.
- The editor withdraws her support and rejects the article, citing the possibility that it could be used as political ammunition by the right.*
- One of the researchers buckles under the attack and withdraws his name from the paper.
- Another journal offers to publish revised article, after assessment by referee. Conditions met, publication is confirmed.
- This journal is attacked in turn, and half the board threaten to resign if the paper is published. It's pulled from the journal.
* This is the same argument that religious authorities use to suppress the teaching of evolution - its scientific merits matter less than the threat it poses to social values.