Imagine for a moment that your colleague (in any business of any kind) approaches you and requests that you explicitly put non-truths in writing to support their convicted criminal son. In any reputable business (you can deduce that I'm about to incriminate academia) you would not obviously destroy your standing and reputation. As an example, I would not tell you that polyethylene is a good material for making heat shields on spacecraft; everyone knows that polyethylene melts over 110 degrees. It would not make a difference if I said "it makes a great heat shield as long as it is never exposed to elevated temperatures".
However, imagine in return for those comments I was offered enough money to retire and never again have to worry about my professional reputation. Or, even better, imagine I was offered a large sum of money and my reputation in my field meant nothing at all. That my colleagues will nod knowingly that I'm only saying it to advance or protect the politics of our common friends.
I can't say whether the professors in question were offered quid-pro-quo, but in their shoes, I'd demand it and say whatever it required knowing full well there was zero professional penalty.
This is honestly what's most pathetic here - I seriuosly doubt there was a quid pro quo. It's just tribalism, little different from the way corrupt cops defend each other. The implicit understanding is that someday YOU might be the one implicated in something heinous, and you need to go to bat so that, in the future, someone else will feel like doing the same for you.
Imagine for a moment that your colleague (in any business of any kind) approaches you and requests that you explicitly put non-truths in writing to support their convicted criminal son. In any reputable business (you can deduce that I'm about to incriminate academia) you would not obviously destroy your standing and reputation. As an example, I would not tell you that polyethylene is a good material for making heat shields on spacecraft; everyone knows that polyethylene melts over 110 degrees. It would not make a difference if I said "it makes a great heat shield as long as it is never exposed to elevated temperatures".
However, imagine in return for those comments I was offered enough money to retire and never again have to worry about my professional reputation. Or, even better, imagine I was offered a large sum of money and my reputation in my field meant nothing at all. That my colleagues will nod knowingly that I'm only saying it to advance or protect the politics of our common friends.
I can't say whether the professors in question were offered quid-pro-quo, but in their shoes, I'd demand it and say whatever it required knowing full well there was zero professional penalty.
This is honestly what's most pathetic here - I seriuosly doubt there was a quid pro quo. It's just tribalism, little different from the way corrupt cops defend each other. The implicit understanding is that someday YOU might be the one implicated in something heinous, and you need to go to bat so that, in the future, someone else will feel like doing the same for you.