This week I was invited to contribute to the evaluation process for the dean of the medical school where I work as an unnoticeable cog in an entanglement of bureaucratic machinations. There were more than 20 questions asking for a rating of very ineffective, ineffective, neutral, effective, or very effective. Because of the wide (and widening) gap between us and my inability to see results of his daily actions, I responded ‘neutral’ to all but 5 of the questions:

1. Encouraging a culture of excellence - very ineffective.
2. Improving opportunities for members of other underrepresented groups - ineffective.
3. Leading with integrity - very ineffective.
4. Treating staff with respect - very ineffective.
5. Promoting a discrimination- free environment and inclusive environment - very ineffective.

According to multiple accessible internet sources, the top 10% in U.S. income pull in upwards of $160,000. In this past year, the dean made $910,000 putting him in the top 1%. To my evaluation, I added the following comments:

“According to public records released in January 2024, in the Fall of 2023 I received a 3% pay increase. The dean of the medical school received a 4% increase. One might look and think that the increases are comparable, but if I would have received the dean’s dollars, my increase would have been 75.6%. The dean went from making 18.9 times more than me to making 19.1 times more, which again sounds close but again if I would have received the dean’s dollars (and he in turn mine) the dean would have gone from making 18.9 times more than me to making 10.8 times more than me. The issue of course is the growing income gap. To entertain the thought that the dean is 19 times more deserving or more capable or more entitled than I am would require a different conversation; a conversation about available opportunities and available to whom and who makes the rules and bias and bureaucracy and convention and certainty and division. This Fall (2024) I again received a 3% increase. I look forward to January when I will be able to again compare percentages and dollars and see how much the income gap has widened; not that it will come to anything.”

It is ludicrous to even ask the question, much less believe that excellence, opportunity, integrity, respect, or equity could come from or be brought about by one so mired in entitlement.

Entitlement:

1. If I have good things come my way, I deserve them.
2. If you have good things come your way, you are lucky.
3. If I have bad things come my way, it is due to circumstance beyond my control.
4. If you have bad things come your way, you made your bed - and you deserve your punishment.

In this country our system of justice in practice, is and always has been a system of entitlement, applying #3 to favored factions and #4 to those not like us. And the yardstick for those not like us has become wealth and/or power. Yet because we equate justice with entitlement, we are justified in our belief, our assertion that a wealthy, powerful overlord could bring about excellence, opportunity, integrity, respect, or equity.

It is not always (or even frequently) a bad thing to ask a ludicrous question. All questions (should) encourage thoughtful pause and lead to more considered, reasonable action. However, to ask a ludicrous question in a formal context that creates opportunity for statistical analysis is to believe in and/or work to assert its validity and to encourage status quo.

• Power cannot hear truthfulness.
• Power cannot see beyond their own blindered reality.
• Power cannot feel the pain of subservience.
• Power cannot taste or smell the zest, the spice, the tang, the piquancy of uncertainty.
• And though I strive and I work and I plead and I struggle, I cannot bring power to its senses.