Dr. Vasile Brinzanescu, former Director of the Institute of the Romanian Academy, has a right-wing itch that he cannot scratch often enough. Scratching that itch usually means sharing right wing opinion pieces, sometimes accompanied by his comments to the effect that “yes, I agree with that”, being at the same time careful with his image, so that he will not give the impression of right wing nut (so that if the shared opinion piece is too extreme, he would only say “they have a point” or "I'm just saying"...). But don’t take my word for it. Instead let’s listen to him…
• Arguing against what he calls the “Stupid protests of the anti-racists” that “have no reason” yet have “grave consequences against humanity” [!]:
• Finding (June 23, 2020) mitigating circumstances for a controversial project in the Romanian Senate that bars all references to gender identity in Romanian schools and universities (on the account that the movement for gender equality is “exaggerated”):
• Arguing (June 28, 2021) against the personal right to express the gender identity: “we don’t care how they see themselves; the problem is that they go public and boast with their options and with their unjustified requests, and then we are aggressed. They better mind their business and cease aggressing others” :
Coming from a university professor, the extremism is surreal. Who will drop a tear for the poor homophobes that “feel aggressed” (?!)
Last but not least, there is always Princeton’s Sergiu Klainerman, a sacred cow for many in the Romanian right. His politically charged opinion pieces (or, shall we say, strawmen) are often shared by Brinzanescu, who carefully never forgets to emphasize the mathematical prestige of Klainerman as an additional “weight”, just for good measure. Of course, any discussion on a topic of equity/equality/justice in/around Mathematics is dismissed summarily. For example, the mere reference to the book “Mathematics for Human Flourishing” by Harvey Mudd’s Francis Su (past President of the MAA), is furiously dismissed by a Jack-in-the-box Brinzanescu, who claims, just for good measure, “mathematical privilege” for the ICM invited speaker Klainerman, which would somehow “weaken” Su’s book (even if no mathematical comparison between Klainerman and Su was attempted!). In the end Brinzanescu would pompously and ceremoniously conclude: “There is no place for justice in Mathematics”. Intentionally missing Su’s point that Mathematics, being a human activity, is (and should be) used, with all its internal rules notwithstanding, to produce a multitude of resources FOR human flourishing (that’s too much for right-wing armchair ideologues, though). One can only wonder that, maybe, the same person who is afraid of and antagonistic towards, the “liberal” idea of mathematics for social justice would also be afraid of, say, the emergence of mathematical models and quantitative tools that quantify and fight gerrymandering (see “Republicans poised to rig the next election by gerrymandering electoral maps”)
God forbid that somebody like yours truly, who works at a small undergraduate college would criticize Brinzanescu’s views on his own Facebook page. In that case, if Brinzanescu’s bullying attempts (such that, “you are working at a seventh-rate school”, or “why aren’t you doing something else than Fibonacci numbers” – that is, sort of “yuck” coming from a furious Springer author) are unsuccessful, all messages of Brinzanescu’s opponent will be deleted (tell me more about cancel culture, Director!). Of course, Brinzanescu would also delete, in this context, his own aggressive (potentially self-damaging) messages. Like I said, he is a very careful propaganda guy - keeping his prestige intact requires him being a good manager of his sh#t. To their credit, some Romanian math professors working in the West at R1 Universities dared to argue (all too politely) against Vasile Brinzanescu’s views, occasionally schooling him free of charge.
