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If you ever read conservative posts about post-secondary institutions, you'd inevitably come to some usually old, usually white gently caress claiming that KIDS THESE DAYS are TOO SENSITIVE and take everything personally. They hate it when their ideas are challenged and apparently need "safe spaces" to stay away from badthoughts. Conviniently, most of these type of thoughts and opinions come from right-wing groups. The latest Tinsley excretion should elaborate the conservative viewpoint on the issue:  Okay so usually I try to do a thing where I make the other side seem at least somewhat on point, but I just can't here. This is a load of horseshit and the fact that the media is taking these histrionics as gospel annoys me to no loving end. What pisses me off is how consistent the entire belief across the populations is and how non-poo poo outlets are actually giving this point of view a degree of legitimacy: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/09/the-coddling-of-the-american-mind/399356/ http://www.vox.com/2015/6/3/8706323/college-professor-afraid (if a white person ever takes a picture of themselves with tape over their mouth, please shove their head into the nearest toilet and flush it repeatedly) http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/07/education/edlife/fire-first-amendment-on-campus-free-speech.html I know the ACLU says that we should fight hate speech with more speech (though they have also said this about the campus (non)issue) but this is an easy position to take in principle, but how about we talk about it in practice? To that end, I'm splitting this topic up into several smaller chunks. Conservative shitheads like to make this a monolithic issue but that's because they're trying to convince us we're the real racists.  The banning of conservative speakers is honestly something I agree with. Look, I'm sorry but I cannot see the value in inviting assholes like Milo Yiannoupoulis or David Horowitz to spread their hate into a campus. I understand I sound like every conservative's liberal stereotype made flesh, but hear me out. We're talking about students going to college. That's stressful as is. Do we really want to add this sort of abuse against them on top of that? What if you're a girl and Milo said that rape culture is a lie? That if you get wasted at a party and get violated, well sucks to be you shoulda been more careful? What if you're a Muslim and Horowitz comes peddling his rhetoric? Tensions are already high, the world is already against you and here comes a guy who will add fuel to the fire.I'm not going to talk about the First Amendment, that doesn't apply here. Let's just stick to campus-wide free speech policies. Are they right to do this, or do these shitheads have something to contribute to the court of ideas? Because my thesis is that they do not. They are just here to peddle hate, and by giving them a platform, the university is saying their bullshit actually has merit and has some degree of legitimacy. They may not do it overtly, but that's the message we receive EDIT: Alright I need to elaborate this point after all. I am not against conservative speakers on principle, but there is a divide between shitheels like Horowitz and conservative political veterans like John McCain. I'd gladly listen to the latter, but I would absolutely support banning the former. What's the difference between the two? Content, experience, overall motive and so on. Think that's too vague? Post your better ideas in the thread!  Trigger Warnings is probably the most misunderstood concept in all of internet history. This is simply a student asking their profs to have a content warning about what they'll read, and if the prof's nice, they'll give em something else if the content is too much. I'll let the usual naysayers chomp on this one: Are profs right to do so, or should these students just "man-up" and stop being so sensitive?And per Silver2195, should professors be forced to do this under the rules of the institution? Also, which subjects should have such warnings?  Oversensitive students will be the third chunk. Are students nowadays "too sensitive"? These articles can crop up some absurd examples sure, but are they outliers or is this a genuine mounting problem. Please answer with actual socioeconomic research I don't want journalistic hot takes no matter what side of the issue they're on! This is a keystone of the conservative argument so I want genuine research, something ironclad that I can really use to get an unbiased answer.Try to keep the slapfights to a minimum, I genuinely wonder if there is a point to be made here and I wanna find out before this thread gets gassed. anyway, tl;dr 
Seraphic Neoman fucked around with this message at 06:47 on Sep 5, 2016 |
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Sep 4, 2016 07:45
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EDIT: Oh sweet, thanks mods! Seraphic Neoman fucked around with this message at 07:53 on Sep 4, 2016 |
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Sep 4, 2016 07:50
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This is a difficult topic to discuss sensibly about because people (on multiple "sides") tend to conflate different issues. The OP pointed out how people like Tinsley like to do this but did some conflating himself. For example:SSNeoman posted:I'm not going to talk about the First Amendment, that doesn't apply here. At state schools, it very much does apply. quote:Trigger Warnings is probably the most misunderstood concept in all of internet history. This is simply a student asking their profs to have a content warning about what they'll read, and if the prof's nice, they'll give em something else if the content is too much. I'll let the usual naysayers chomp on this one: Are profs right to do so, or should these students just "man-up" and stop being so sensitive? I think almost all posters here will agree that professors are quite right to do so. This is a separate question from in what particular cases they should do so, and whether universities should require professors to do so. Silver2195 fucked around with this message at 08:06 on Sep 4, 2016 |
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Sep 4, 2016 08:00
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I'm of the mindset that the university doesn't need to be blowing absurd amounts of money bringing some right-wing hack to the campus to spew hate. My college in 2003 spent like 50 grand bringing some scrub-tier Fox analyst to rant about how the Iraq sanctions were good and cool. Part of critical thinking is learning that some beliefs are utter garbage and can be rejected wholeheartedly.
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Sep 4, 2016 08:03
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There's two different problems here, one has to do with trigger warnings and people's personal ability to not be exposed to rhetoric or ideas they don't like. The other is a question of to what extent should civil society (not the state) tolerate the expression of views it considers unethical. I feel like the liberal mainstream has decided that the first case is acceptable, but the second case is not, ie that people have some sort of obligation to tolerate awful people being awful in public. I'll be contrarian and say the opposite, that outside of cases of genuine mental illness or distress it's bad for people to avoid exposing themselves to ideas they don't like, but that actors like universities can and should be condemned for supporting awful people saying awful things by giving them a public platform to do so
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Sep 4, 2016 08:23
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icantfindaname posted:that outside of cases of genuine mental illness or distress it's bad for people to avoid exposing themselves to ideas they don't like I think this is true as far as it goes, but "cases of genuine mental illness or distress" are a lot more common than they're often assumed to be.
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Sep 4, 2016 08:25
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Here's my indirect anecdote about trigger warnings. Around a decade ago, way before this was a meme, I was in a small discussion-based literature class, maybe a dozen people. The professor had been teaching at the college for a long time. I don't remember how it came up, but he told us a story about a similar class of similar size he had led years and years ago, about Oedipus Rex. An evening class. The students talk for an hour, then they go back to their dorms, and the next morning one of them doesn't show up to their class, because she's killed herself. Over the coming weeks, it comes out that she was the child of an incestuous relationship. So all the students in the class fall the gently caress apart and are excused from the rest of the semester and spend who knows how much combined time in individual and group therapy (I do know they all attended the funeral), because they can't stop trying to think back through everything they were saying in the discussion about how Oedipus is so unnatural, or how they can understand why Jocasta would kill herself. They can't stop feeling like they did it, and I can only imagine that feeling will never completely leave them until the day they die. I can understand why people get surprised and annoyed by the concept of trigger warnings. I might feel that way, if I had never heard that story, or met people with trauma. But as it is I'm not really sympathetic to broad arguments against them.
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Sep 4, 2016 08:36
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Doc Hawkins posted:Here's my indirect anecdote about trigger warnings. Wow. That's hosed up. (Maybe not a case for trigger warnings in the conventional sense, though -- it's pretty well-known that Oedipus Rex involves incest. Maybe a strongly worded request that students be sensitive when discussing such issues? Or maybe an argument against teaching certain texts altogether, although there'd be even more of a backlash against that idea than against trigger warnings.) Silver2195 fucked around with this message at 08:48 on Sep 4, 2016 |
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Sep 4, 2016 08:45
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Determining what ideas are valid or worth exposing students to is literally the job of professors. Even if you believe in a more democratic education, this filter on the curriculum still exists; students do not possess accredited academic authority. This is the issue that's ultimately being contested here. Obviously, universities shouldn't waste time and resources inviting hate mongers like Yiannopoulos to speak, but the question of who draws the line and under what criteria still remains. Condoleezza Rice is a former Secretary of State, her viewpoint and opinion are invaluable, especially if you disagree with her politics and consider her a war criminal. Debate is possible, and learning how to confront neoconservative arguments head-on instead of merely taking prescribed viewpoints from the people you're already ideologically aligned with is an improvement in the quality of your education.Silver2195 posted:I think this is true as far as it goes, but "cases of genuine mental illness or distress" are a lot more common than they're often assumed to be. This is also important to consider. We should be accommodating to mental illness and disability as much as possible, but I think it's fair to say that at a certain point, students have a responsibility to self-select out of environments and discussion of subjects that inadvertently cause them stress. I would say that no number of sincere attempts to protect a vulnerable person can shield them from, for an extreme example, a thorough education on feminist theory if they are distressed by discussion of rape. We can't simply pretend it's unimportant or doesn't exist and give them a free pass. Academia has a duty to help them through it as best it can, but it also has a duty to teach the truth to every student.
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Sep 4, 2016 08:48
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Silver2195 posted:Or maybe an argument against teaching certain texts altogether, although there'd be even more of a backlash against that idea than against trigger warnings. Come to think of it, professors already make decisions along these lines without much controversy, and rightly so. There's a lot of books that are considered to have historical or literary significance that are wisely not taught to undergrads (e.g., Lolita, as far as I know). I suspect extending this principle as far as Oedipus Rex would be farther than most English professors would be willing to go, though.
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Sep 4, 2016 08:55
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hmm OP you've made a really good argument and perhaps speech on campus should be censohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y69tkCbeC5o (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Sep 4, 2016 09:11
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Ormi posted:This is also important to consider. We should be accommodating to mental illness and disability as much as possible, but I think it's fair to say that at a certain point, students have a responsibility to self-select out of environments and discussion of subjects that inadvertently cause them stress. I would say that no number of sincere attempts to protect a vulnerable person can shield them from, for an extreme example, a thorough education on feminist theory if they are distressed by discussion of rape. We can't simply pretend it's unimportant or doesn't exist and give them a free pass. Academia has a duty to help them through it as best it can, but it also has a duty to teach the truth to every student. I agree but in general, I feel professors have enough discretion in choosing whether or not they'll offer alternate assignments (and of what nature) that this actually does happen as it should. The student who faints at the sight of blood, for example, should probably give up on their dream of becoming a surgeon if, even after being given the warning, they can't complete the work. But maybe they'll get an Incomplete/Withdraw instead of an F. There's a lot of conflation between "the professor gives a trigger warning for upcoming content" and "the professor allows the student to actually avoid important (relative to the course) parts of the upcoming content". I haven't actually heard of very many (if any?) cases of a professor allowing a student to do an alternate assignment in a way that actually hurt the point of the course, assuming they even provide an alternate assignment. Most of the time it's something like "We're studying a time period or region in film/literature, and if you don't want to watch this film with a graphic rape scene, you can watch one that doesn't have that but still has the themes/content that we're covering in class and write an essay about that one instead".
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Sep 4, 2016 09:13
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Silver2195 posted:it's pretty well-known that Oedipus Rex involves incest. I said almost the same thing during that initial discussion. No one called me on it then, but I realize now I was making an enormous assumptions: well-known to who? Well-known among which kinds of groups? Even if we're talking about the most famous of all ancient greek tragedies, is it really that unusual for a freshman college student to not have heard of it? Is it really universal for graduating high school students to know what an Oedipus complex is? And even if so, do those who happen not to know deserve to be ambushed for it? But that's all a separate point, right. She had read the play before the class. She knew what it was about. She knew what the conversation would be about. What a trigger warning would have given her is not a signal to endure what was coming, but a signal that the teacher, and the class, would understand if she couldn't participate. Though even that is hard to imagine. It would invite questions, right? How do you get out of something like that without people either thinking you were being oversensitive, or getting close to a horrific secret you didn't want anyone to know about you? quote:Maybe a strongly worded request that students be sensitive when discussing such issues? That's another reason why all this poo poo-stirring seems stupid to me: advocates claim that college is for "challenging" the students with "new ideas", but of course the whole thing is a back-lash against being challenged by the new idea that we might be unconsciously making GBS threads on the more vulnerable, and maybe we should (*gasp*) think about how we act and even possibly change it.
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Sep 4, 2016 09:21
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One part of me wants to think that disclaimers and preview summaries of assigned reading would be the nice thing for professors to do, but I'm kind of leaning against trigger warnings and the like. Students can already self-select out of certain classes based on the course topic alone; giving them more ability to do that based on the potential readings in a class just strikes me as enabling more alienation for potentially sensitive students ("Oh no, there's nowhere at this school that I can fit in at all!"), and also keeps them in a shell that stifles their growth and future potential. Let's consider someone who studying for a major in a field like social work, psychology, counseling, sociology, or some other "people focused" discipline. It might all well and good for them to ignore topics like rape, incest, sexual abuse, domestic violence and so on in their academic career. But in the professional world, outside of school, there's a significant chance that they will have to confront those topics, real life and in the flesh (or statistics). For certain majors, avoiding exposure to ugly topics is doing one's self a disservice, and even strikes me as being kind of selfish and self-serving if a student is going to be doing anything that might involve dealing with other people who have mental and emotional problems of their own that arise from abuse and dysfunction. If students are sensitive, schools should encourage students to seek counseling and mental health services, and ensure that those resources are available on or very close to campus. I know that I'm benefiting from them right now, even though I recently graduated, and wish I had taken advantage of them much sooner. But letting students shy away from reality because they have traumas or queasiness that they aren't working through is not helping anyone, least of all the students. That said, in my years at a community college and university, I can't recall meeting or seeing anyone who remotely resembled the over-sensitive special snowflake stereotype, so I wouldn't put much stock in news stories and opinion pieces that present it as a national epidemic in academia.
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Sep 4, 2016 09:23
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Kthulhu5000 posted:One part of me wants to think that disclaimers and preview summaries of assigned reading would be the nice thing for professors to do, but I'm kind of leaning against trigger warnings and the like. Of course people studying to become social workers should be familiar with issues like that, but that's a separate issue from warning students about content in random English classes that might not be expected for the general course topic. quote:That said, in my years at a community college and university, I can't recall meeting or seeing anyone who remotely resembled the over-sensitive special snowflake stereotype, so I wouldn't put much stock in news stories and opinion pieces that present it as a national epidemic in academia. One think that's easy to overlook in campus culture wars discussion is how much of it is only relevant to a handful of elite colleges.
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Sep 4, 2016 09:41
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Oh, I probably should have said, my college has a single curriculum for all students. Oedipus Rex was not optional for the woman in question.
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Sep 4, 2016 09:41
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-Troika- posted:hmm OP you've made a really good argument and perhaps speech on campus should be censohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y69tkCbeC5o Gonna chime in and say while I know what you're getting at, this is a bit of a dishonest comparison. Yes, we can censor out the right wing when they come to a place with anecdotes like 'Them niggers is all comin' for our sweet Betsy's, lynch them coons' and we probably should. But there's a fair disconnection between that and shutting up anyone who comes in with a suggestion like "Y'know, maybe we shouldn't treat our centres of higher learning like a glorified daycare".
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Sep 4, 2016 09:53
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-Troika- posted:hmm OP you've made a really good argument and perhaps speech on campus should be censohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y69tkCbeC5o "children of odin" Ormi posted:Determining what ideas are valid or worth exposing students to is literally the job of professors. Even if you believe in a more democratic education, this filter on the curriculum still exists; students do not possess accredited academic authority. This is the issue that's ultimately being contested here. Obviously, universities shouldn't waste time and resources inviting hate mongers like Yiannopoulos to speak, but the question of who draws the line and under what criteria still remains. Condoleezza Rice is a former Secretary of State, her viewpoint and opinion are invaluable, especially if you disagree with her politics and consider her a war criminal. Debate is possible, and learning how to confront neoconservative arguments head-on instead of merely taking prescribed viewpoints from the people you're already ideologically aligned with is an improvement in the quality of your education. Oh I absolutely agree. Like I don't mind having conservative speakers on campus, I'd totally listen to Bush give a seminar on whatever bullshit he's on (if for no other reason than I can say "holy poo poo guys listen to what that chode said") but Milo and his sort are genuinely dangerous because their hate IS damaging. And I dunno where the line between those two starts and ends. Like what kind of criteria should we have? Political experience? I know Milo is just a hatemonger, but is there a way we can define it? The best I can do is say that he's just there to "start poo poo".
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Sep 4, 2016 10:45
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Kthulhu5000 posted:Students can already self-select out of certain classes based on the course topic alone; giving them more ability to do that based on the potential readings in a class just strikes me as enabling more alienation for potentially sensitive students ("Oh no, there's nowhere at this school that I can fit in at all!"), and also keeps them in a shell that stifles their growth and future potential. WarpedNaba posted:Gonna chime in and say while I know what you're getting at, this is a bit of a dishonest comparison. These seem kinda unsupported to me. Is there really an issue with students feeling alienated by trigger warnings and alternative assignments? Are universities actually coddling students? I doubt it. My (UK-based) understanding is that a) PTSD, ED and other mental health difficulties are disabilities b) centres of education have a legal responsibility to make "reasonable adjustments" to accommodate students with disabilities c) trigger warnings etc. for course content are reasonable adjustments d) therefore they must be implemented under the Equality Act. In my experience when I told students with mental health difficulties that I could talk to their lecturers and make arrangements like "if this student gets up and leaves in the middle of class, don't question them", they were really grateful. I don't think they often made use of the arrangements, but simply knowing the option was there helped them manage their mental health much better than they would otherwise. Regarding controversial speakers: I think something that should be considered is if it's necessary to bring in an outside speaker at such an expense, and if there are actually opportunities to challenge and debate the ideas. You don't need to bring in a neo-Nazi for students to discuss Nazism, and if you did I would expect some arena for actual discussion rather than simply giving the neo-Nazi an open platform.
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Sep 4, 2016 10:54
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Ormi posted:Determining what ideas are valid or worth exposing students to is literally the job of professors. Even if you believe in a more democratic education, this filter on the curriculum still exists; students do not possess accredited academic authority. This is the issue that's ultimately being contested here. Obviously, universities shouldn't waste time and resources inviting hate mongers like Yiannopoulos to speak, but the question of who draws the line and under what criteria still remains. Condoleezza Rice is a former Secretary of State, her viewpoint and opinion are invaluable, especially if you disagree with her politics and consider her a war criminal. Debate is possible, and learning how to confront neoconservative arguments head-on instead of merely taking prescribed viewpoints from the people you're already ideologically aligned with is an improvement in the quality of your education. You don't have to give a person a platform to speak in order to investigate their ideas. And the idea that once a person has achieved a certain level of public prominence you're no longer allowed to contest the legitimacy of their ideas is hilarious icantfindaname fucked around with this message at 12:35 on Sep 4, 2016 |
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Sep 4, 2016 11:05
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The banning of speakers, trigger warnings, and over-sensitivity to specific subject matters are each different problems with entirely different and standalone solutions. The only thing that is linking them together is that the political right-wing seems to have this odd fixation upon them. I was just finishing up my own undergrad when the first wave of this round came about. Until that point in about five years of study, I had a professor actually use a trigger warning in class exactly once; it just never came up often enough in order to even classify as a problem. And yet, this crazy new phenomenon had run rampant and apparently was the very thing corrupting higher education. Something didn't quite add up. The article (linked in the OP) called "The Coddling of the American Mind" was more or less the thing that sparked all of thus off and gave things most of the vocabulary which we currently use. As far as I can tell, the article was commissioned by FIRE, the "Foundation for Individual Rights in Education." It's an astroturfing project from some of the more establishment voices in American conservatism -- or at least funded by such. The stuff on their About Page is this weird mix of libertarian and authoritarian babble, talking about the right to have a "marketplace of ideas" on one hand, but also the need to protect "religious liberty" and "freedom of conscience" from accusations of "hate speech" with the other. Other than that, it operates under the guise of nonpartisan policy research in order to cover for their true aims, like most think tanks do. Another article, helpfully titled "Straw Freshmen: Why the War on Campus PC Culture is Bullshit," says that FIRE was a member of the “intellectual diversity” movement, "which seeks to erase a perceived liberal bias in academia and teaching." Common culture war bullshit. As I understand it, for the longest time it was right wing professors/intellectuals versus other left wing professors/intellectuals. Eventually, the "marketplace of ideas" decided that left wing fared better within an academic setting. (I think there are very specific structural reasons for why this is the case, and it is stuff that academia shouldn't necessarily be proud of, but it's not germane to this discussion.) Of course, conservatism cannot fail and can only be failed, so the right wring necessarily cried foul. The culture war waged on for some losing battles, but then they had an epiphany... Change of tactics: instead of going after the other professors, go after the students instead. It's a brilliant strategy in a few ways. The battleground in this case is the external media, since right wing commentators have advantages there which they lack inside the academy. But, this only goes so far because the professors also have enough resources to use external media as well, and even other allies and connections. Students, on the other hand, don't have anything. They don't have any media relations training, or any access to mass audiences, or any powerful allies that could vouch for them as a group, or any capital to spare in producing other media for competition. All they have is a lot of unfinished schoolwork and a minimum wage job. If you challenge other professors and intellectuals in the media, they have the wherewithal to fight back. If you challenge a bunch of 19 year olds in the media, they can't even defend themselves. They're the perfect target. The article worked for mostly the same reasons the new dearth of clickbait blaming Millennials for everything are so popular now. It's bullying a group that doesn't even have the ability to fight back, so that makes it an easy victory; and victories in the culture wars are hard to come by. The weird thing about the firestorm it made on my end was that it was often linked to me by others within my own age group who either didn't get to go university themselves or didn't go to North American universities specifically. Most of them assumed the information in the article was true, only because they had no direct experience that would've told them otherwise. Even though it was written with false intentions, it definitely achieved the result it wanted. While I think the overall (monetary) value in education has gone down for the most part, there still is a level prestige it carries in the larger population who were told throughout their life that they were stupid, or couldn't get good enough grades in school, or simply couldn't even afford to go to a for-profit school. Articles like this, for them, is a way of justifying a sour grapes attitude: "well, if it is really like that, then I didn't need that education anyway." Morroque fucked around with this message at 12:23 on Sep 4, 2016 |
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Sep 4, 2016 12:18
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It is in my opinion especially devious that FIRE has supported a socialist woman writing about the sexual abuses suffered by Native Alaskans, a student protesting against parking garages and car culture, a professor with a Nietzsche quote above his door, etc. This obfuscatory tactic of supporting civil liberties in all cases is so effective that now few are aware of their true and more sinister aims: supporting the civil liberties of people I don't like.
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Sep 4, 2016 13:09
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Morroque posted:If you challenge a bunch of 19 year olds in the media, they can't even defend themselves. They're the perfect target. I find this is not restricted to the right-wing, figures on the left such as Peter Tatchell have done the same in the UK. An LGBT representative took herself off a panel he was attending for a slew of reasons, whether they're right or not, but what he did next is take this to the media, which, being a prominent activist and media presence, largely sympathised with his complaints over free speech. Even though his free speech was in no way impeded. Like in any way at all. It's not exactly a fair match. (And yeah, there was also an article where he appeared in a photo with tape over his mouth)
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Sep 4, 2016 13:20
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Ormi posted:It is in my opinion especially devious that FIRE has supported a socialist woman writing about the sexual abuses suffered by Native Alaskans, a student protesting against parking garages and car culture, a professor with a Nietzsche quote above his door, etc. This obfuscatory tactic of supporting civil liberties in all cases is so effective that now few are aware of their true and more sinister aims: supporting the civil liberties of people I don't like. People actually don't have the right to have their speech taken seriously by other private actors in civil society. Sorry you're mad about war criminals being booed off stage
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Sep 4, 2016 13:57
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quote:Trigger Warnings is probably the most misunderstood concept in all of internet history. This is simply a student asking their profs to have a content warning about what they'll read, and if the prof's nice, they'll give em something else if the content is too much. I'll let the usual naysayers chomp on this one: Are profs right to do so, or should these students just "man-up" and stop being so sensitive? It's basic human empathy. Even before I knew the phrase existed, I've always warned students that we're about to delve into pictures and content that's pretty grim. There's absolutely no pedagogical evidence that throwing shocking material at students without any warning helps them learn. And I don't think anyone's ever opted out either, but it's not like that means they don't have to do the work -- I've always got extra material ready to go that I had to cut because for some reason making students read a 1000 pages a week for one course in second year is asking too much. Sheesh. Honestly this really doesn't strike me as a societal issue. Universities and campuses are their own little world governed by an academic institution where power is constantly in flux. The struggle between administration, professors, and students to shape learning and teaching has been going on since at least the 50s when students had very little power compared to their professors and the administration was effectively the assumed guardian of the students. As it turns out, involving students in their learning, letting them lead classes with questions, challenging each other and taking the content in new directions improves knowledge retention and intellectual development. My job is to ensure that no one person hijacks the class and disrupts the group's ability to learn. If that means I'm running an "intellectual safe space," well so be it. Universities that come out for or against these terms aren't really interested in debating the merits but making a sales-pitch to like-minded individuals, pretending it's anything beyond that is taking this debate far more seriously than it deserves. I think you'll find with this debate profs will balk at the notion of safe spaces and trigger warnings if student groups are trying to pressure any teachers into employing them. At the same time when a university administration comes out against them, you'll also find profs railing against any notion that they can't present the content in their courses however they wish. All this comes down to academic freedom, and while many people - including those outside academia - are very invested in the idea, academic freedom is becoming increasingly tenuous with the dwindling of tenure track positions and the growth of sessional teaching positions.
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Sep 4, 2016 14:02
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SSNeoman posted:Oh I absolutely agree. Like I don't mind having conservative speakers on campus, I'd totally listen to Bush give a seminar on whatever bullshit he's on (if for no other reason than I can say "holy poo poo guys listen to what that chode said") but Milo and his sort are genuinely dangerous because their hate IS damaging. And I dunno where the line between those two starts and ends. Like what kind of criteria should we have? Political experience? I know Milo is just a hatemonger, but is there a way we can define it? The best I can do is say that he's just there to "start poo poo". I don't know either. It comes down to the tacit and specific knowledge of the professors in determining what is relevant and what is not. I don't think this means they're always right, but they are, as a group, the only people who can authoritatively draw up these lists of names. That said, the most simple criteria can probably be applied universally: some position of authority or notability on a given subject, and no black marks against them in the form of unrepentant hate speech or a predilection for unprofessional conduct. The willingness of the students themselves to listen is also important, as long as they at least form a sizable enough minority to make it worth the effort.
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Sep 4, 2016 14:21
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Those criteria are entirely subjective. How can you possibly say that they are simple?
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Sep 4, 2016 14:43
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icantfindaname posted:You don't have to give a person a platform to speak in order to investigate their ideas. And the idea that once a person has achieved a certain level of public prominence you're no longer allowed to contest the legitimacy of their ideas is hilarious Who gets to determine what ideas are legitimate? And why are you so confident that they are always going to agree with you?
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Sep 4, 2016 14:44
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-Troika- posted:Those criteria are entirely subjective. How can you possibly say that they are simple? Of course they're subjective, but subjective doesn't mean complicated. They remain relatively (this is what the superlative "most" implies in that sentence, btw) simple criteria from the perspective of the people making these judgments, because they all have somewhat codified definitions behind them that have to be observed in their line of work. This is how how large organizations get anything done, ever.
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Sep 4, 2016 14:52
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SSNeoman posted:
It's hard to take anything you say seriously after you start off saying to ban speakers/speeches you don't like. Protesting is fine, you have every right to do so. But going to the extreme does nothing but put in the public eye the perception of students who can't handle opinions other than their own and colleges coddling them.
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Sep 4, 2016 15:07
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Protesting is fine, but administrators agreeing with protestors and actually cancelling the event is not?
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Sep 4, 2016 15:12
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BetterToRuleInHell posted:It's hard to take anything you say seriously after you start off saying to ban speakers/speeches you don't like. getting the speakers cancelled is actually a very effective way of handling opinions!
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Sep 4, 2016 15:20
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BetterToRuleInHell posted:It's hard to take anything you say seriously after you start off saying to ban speakers/speeches you don't like. Okay, I have something to say about this, having worked in bringing people to campuses to speak (comedians, technically, but I know what I'm talking about.) It's not that Milo is being denied the ability to speak. If he wanted to, he could still show up on the campus, find somewhere to stand, and speak to his heart's content. He is being denied an auditorium, a microphone, and most importantly, money. And that money to pay for speakers comes from the students. At our school, each student paid a campus activities fee that would go into our budget to bring various speakers/comedians/concerts to our campus. If the students want to protest how their money is being used, they are more than right to do so. So, yea, if the students want to say "Hey, don't pay that rear end in a top hat tens of thousands of dollars of our money to come and speak here" and then the activities board or administration agrees, then where exactly did the violation of free speech take place?
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Sep 4, 2016 15:23
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At least in the specific case of Milo's speeches at Umass Amherst, the speech wasn't paid for from the university's general funds for that sorta thing, but rather privately out of the funds of that university's chapter of College Republicans. This has been the case at a number of other colleges on his tour as well. So, Wampalord, your arguments there kinda fall flat.
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Sep 4, 2016 15:34
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-Troika- posted:At least in the specific case of Milo's speeches at Umass Amherst, the speech wasn't paid for from the university's general funds for that sorta thing, but rather privately out of the funds of that university's chapter of College Republicans. This has been the case at a number of other colleges on his tour as well. So, Wampalord, your arguments there kinda fall flat. Did the College Republicans also offer him a venue to speak, or were they counting on the college to provide it? If they paid for the venue as well, then yea, that's a bit more hosed.
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Sep 4, 2016 15:38
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-Troika- posted:At least in the specific case of Milo's speeches at Umass Amherst, the speech wasn't paid for from the university's general funds for that sorta thing, but rather privately out of the funds of that university's chapter of College Republicans. This has been the case at a number of other colleges on his tour as well. So, Wampalord, your arguments there kinda fall flat. I thought those speeches took place though, so they're not an example of him being banned.
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Sep 4, 2016 16:12
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This talk of large speaker's fees seems odd to me. I've been involved in student societies organising speakers, and the going rate was generally their train fare, dinner and a few glasses of fortified wine. (Paid for out of the society's pocket, naturally.)
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Sep 4, 2016 16:58
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WampaLord posted:Did the College Republicans also offer him a venue to speak, or were they counting on the college to provide it? If they paid for the venue as well, then yea, that's a bit more hosed. The rooms they have the speeches in are typically (but not always) provided free by the university out of the useable function space and the people who bring the speaker in also have to pay for any security guards that are working the event, the number of which are set by the university.
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Sep 4, 2016 17:02
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So wait, protests count as no-platforming now? Isn't that itself a form of censorship, demanding that protests against people be crushed so that grunting subhumans like Steven Crowder can feel free from dissent?
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Sep 4, 2016 17:05
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-Troika- posted:The rooms they have the speeches in are typically (but not always) provided free by the university out of the useable function space and the people who bring the speaker in also have to pay for any security guards that are working the event, the number of which are set by the university. Okay, so answer this: botany posted:I thought those speeches took place though, so they're not an example of him being banned.
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Sep 4, 2016 17:06
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