MATT WELCH has a post about people afraid to speak their mind. He asks readers if they’ve had that problem. I should have that problem — I mean, I’m in the academic world and all, where most people don’t think like me. But I don’t.

Part of it is I grew up an academic brat, and I’ve heard profs spouting the bullshit-of-the-moment all my life, which provides a degree of immunity from groupthink. The guys who were free-love in 1970 were married and coaching soccer in the 1980s, while usually supporting dumb sex-harassment rules aimed at undergraduates, now that their circumstances had changed. I also find that if you act embarrassed about your opinions the sharks circle. If you don’t, they find easier prey.

One of the few crusty old guys left at Yale once got visited by some students who complained about something un-PC that he had said or done. He reflected for a moment and said “Well, that might bother me — if I cared what students thought!” They never bothered him again, but took off after the guilty liberals from then on.