One of my pet peeves is the person who insists on using the honorific title “Dr” after receiving an honorary PhD. But even more galling is the person who insists on using this title after buying one from a diploma mill. Most galling of all, however, is the person who insists on using this title after doing nothing more than including a PhD as an academic achievement on his embellished resume.
I know of far too many putatively distinguished people who dared to do the latter. And, ironically, having spent so much time perfecting the art of intellectual deceit, these academic fraudsters often give the impression of being far more intelligent than anyone with an earned PhD.
Perhaps this is why, even after one is exposed, people are more inclined to continue hailing him as “brilliant,” instead of acknowledging that they were taken for fools. This appears to the be case among South Africa’s elites, who once took national pride in the academic achievements of acclaimed parliamentarian “Dr” Pallo Jordan.
A ‘humiliated’ Pallo Jordan has resigned from Parliament and the ANC’s national executive committee to avoid further ‘deceit’, following revelations that he misrepresented his academic qualifications…
No evidence could be found that Jordan, who goes by the title ‘Dr,’ had received an honorary doctorate…
On Monday, the ANC in Parliament was first to break the silence on Jordan’s mysterious PhD and other qualifications, which he claimed were bestowed on him by the University of Wisconsin-Madison, among others, saying it fully supported the ‘intellectual giant’.
‘Jordan was one of the ANC’s greatest products, a public intellectual par excellence and a consummate historian…,’ said [ANC caucus spokesman Moloto Mothapo].
(IOL News South Africa, August 12, 2014)
“A public intellectual par excellence” is probably an unwitting way of acknowledging that Jordan wanted the instantaneous acclaim that comes with having a PhD, without having to endure the laborious study required to actually earn one. Which is why, as skilled as he and other intellectual fraudsters become at appearing highly educated, there’s usually no there there (with apologies to Gertrude Stein).
For example, most of them thrive on holding forth on any subject – even presuming to lecture holders of real PhDs on their areas of expertise. But if you had the presence of mind, as well as the knowledge, to examine any of them on their assertions, you’d see an “intellectual giant” morph into a two-year-old trying to explain why that wasn’t his hand you caught in the cookie jar.
I see no point in commenting on what motivates academic fraudsters; except to note that it takes a ballsy form of psychopathology to claim unearned PhDs these days, when technology puts verifying such claims at anyone’s fingertips.
But, when they’re exposed the way Jordan has been, the very least they can do is have the decency to “go to ground” … to be heard from nevermore. That, however, should only be the beginning of their comeuppance. Their misrepresentations constitute a fraud upon their employers and the public, after all. Therefore, they should face criminal charges as well.
This is why, instead of allowing Jordan to slink away in shame, South African authorities should punish him, the way Norwegian authorities punished politician Liv Løberg two years ago for embellishing her resume with claims about being a registered nurse and having two advanced degrees. They sentenced her to 14 months in prison and fined her 1 million NOK.