I suspect that the situations the author describes have more to do with office politics than personal politics, and have little or nothing to do with the studen

I suspect that the situations the author describes have more to do with office politics than personal politics, and have little or nothing to do with the students. Academia is a notoriously feudal environment; once someone has made enemies in their department, any transgression, however minor, is used as a tool to strip them of power or, in the extreme, get them fired. It's no different today than it has been historically, it's just that the particular choice of teapot for the tempest has changed through the years.