The drama unfolding on college and university campuses right now is a near-perfect microcosm of major trends in U.S. governance. https://www.wishtv.com/news/local-news/iu-to-identify-participants-and-hand-down-suspensions-after-large-gathering/?fbclid=IwAR2eoqHTIRT6zfx6mvIQZ0otjw98tCZfHO0gYimKV2B54Ew4XjO5MkBIkrM

1. A politically craven public health failure driven by shortsighted profit seeking and labor enforcement, self-defeating anti-scientism, white identity politics, and the race-class distribution of suffering;

2. the long-term neoliberal conversion of public universities into market operations deeply dependent on the "commodities" they sell to "consumers" students and families;

3. top-down, revenue-driven decisions to open up universities and bring students/consumers to campus;

4. cynical and willful ignorance of the realities and needs that are basic to the social lives of affected communities;

5. and finally the turn to criminalization (surveillance, policing, and punishment) to manage the fallout.

Really, it's all there in one big dumpster fire.