Re: College students and their safe space
Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2016 9:23 pm
I think you're giving them too much credit for cleverness. Subtlety hasn't been a hallmark of the Trump campaign or many of his supporters.
That is not dead which can eternal lie, and with strange aeons bring us some web forums whereupon we can gather
http://www.octopusoverlords.com/forum/
I think you underestimate the salesman in chief.Chaz wrote:I think you're giving them too much credit for cleverness. Subtlety hasn't been a hallmark of the Trump campaign or many of his supporters.
The crux of the debate centered around the conference theme: “Fighting Anti-Blackness.” Apparently it was not communicated to students that the conference would have a particular theme this year. At the event, held at UC Irvine, students of different minority groups began arguing when it became known that the conference would focus almost exclusively on discrimination against the African American community.
In one of the larger workshops, one of the students raised a question about why the only issues being discussed were those involving anti-blackness, prompting an African-American student to respond that black students are the most oppressed, to which a Muslim student made a comment about her people being bombed in the Middle East, according to Alvarez.
This exchange, and others like it, resulted in the cancellation of several sessions on the second day of the conference, Alvarez said. Above all, conference participants each wanted to focus on their own particular minority issue, she said.
Why would you smile at that?Moliere wrote:Students of Color Conference turns into ‘oppression Olympics,’ leads to fights, canceled sessions
The crux of the debate centered around the conference theme: “Fighting Anti-Blackness.” Apparently it was not communicated to students that the conference would have a particular theme this year. At the event, held at UC Irvine, students of different minority groups began arguing when it became known that the conference would focus almost exclusively on discrimination against the African American community.
In one of the larger workshops, one of the students raised a question about why the only issues being discussed were those involving anti-blackness, prompting an African-American student to respond that black students are the most oppressed, to which a Muslim student made a comment about her people being bombed in the Middle East, according to Alvarez.
This exchange, and others like it, resulted in the cancellation of several sessions on the second day of the conference, Alvarez said. Above all, conference participants each wanted to focus on their own particular minority issue, she said.
Because they're acting like toddlers.Combustible Lemur wrote:Why would you smile at that?
How so? Disparate groups with grievances have trouble turning themselves into a solid alliance? Sounds like large group of people I know. I would think that would be a negative thing . Unless someone has a vested interest in people who suffer not being able to improve their livesMoliere wrote:Because they're acting like toddlers.Combustible Lemur wrote:Why would you smile at that?
If I went to what was marketed as a general securities law conference, but then when I arrived I found out that it focused entirely on Investment Advisor regulations, I would be upset because that's not what I work on, even though regulating investment advisers is important. That's what it sounds like was the general problem.Moliere wrote:Because they're acting like toddlers.Combustible Lemur wrote:Why would you smile at that?
The New York Times Editorial Board wrote:How to begin an editorial about a violent free-speech debacle at Middlebury College in Vermont? Maybe with some words from John Stuart Mill about the importance of giving despised dissenters a chance to speak. “Truth would lose something by their silence,” Mill wrote, even if their views go against the entire world, and the entire world is right.
Persuasive words. But not last Thursday in an auditorium at Middlebury, where a student recited that very quotation in introducing the notorious social scientist Charles Murray. Moments later caterwauling erupted, and the event collapsed into a night of turned backs, shouted chants, pounding fists and one wrenched neck — belonging to a professor who was supposed to have provided a counterpoint to Mr. Murray’s remarks, and to lead the Q. and A., but instead was attacked while leaving with him.
***
Thought and persuasion, questions and answers, were eclipsed by intimidation.
True ideas need testing by false ones, lest they become mere prejudices and thoughtless slogans. Free speech is a sacred right, and it needs protecting, now more than ever.
There go my plans for my fingernails.Moliere wrote:White girls wearing hoop earrings is cultural appropriation.
During the incident, Figueroa allegedly walked up to members of the Central Maine Community College women's basketball team and demanded that they remove braids from their hair, calling "cultural appropriation."
When the girls did not do as Figueroa asked, she allegedly initiated a fight with one of them. At the same time, another Hampshire College student who has not been identified is said to have pulled the hair of one of the visiting players, which caused her to fall down.
Figueroa then allegedly stepped on the player who had fallen, which injured her, according to court documents.
One of the other players stepped in to attempt to protect her team mate, but Figueroa allegedly "grabbed her by the head and threw her to the ground"--which caused her to suffer scratches, say the court documents.
College apologizes to the rioters.AWS260 wrote:Charles Murray and the unsafe space.
I'm guessing the only groups that are voiceless on most college campuses are conservatives and Republicans. Any bet on how these "college-wide committees" will be represented by political demographics?Earlier this year I, as chair of the political science department, offered a symbolic departmental co-sponsorship to the Charles Murray event in the same way that I had done with other events in the past: on my own, without wider consultation. This was a mistake.
Last week, I apologized to my departmental colleagues for this closed decisionmaking process, and I apologize now to the broader Middlebury community. The short amount of time between when the event became public and when it occurred gave all of us scant opportunity to listen to and understand alternative points of view. Most importantly, and to my deep regret, it contributed to a feeling of voicelessness that many already experience on this campus, and it contributed to the very real pain that many people – particularly people of color – have felt as a result of this event.
As we debate what to do next, I look forward to hearing from the college-wide committee on invited speakers that is currently taking shape, as well as from my departmental colleagues and our department’s student advisory committee. I thank all of the members of the college community who have shared their views with me, with the department, and with the college administration over the past few months. I will continue to listen.
Apologized for the closed process, there's a difference.Moliere wrote:College apologizes to the rioters.AWS260 wrote:Charles Murray and the unsafe space.
I'm guessing the only groups that are voiceless on most college campuses are conservatives and Republicans. Any bet on how these "college-wide committees" will be represented by political demographics?Earlier this year I, as chair of the political science department, offered a symbolic departmental co-sponsorship to the Charles Murray event in the same way that I had done with other events in the past: on my own, without wider consultation. This was a mistake.
Last week, I apologized to my departmental colleagues for this closed decisionmaking process, and I apologize now to the broader Middlebury community. The short amount of time between when the event became public and when it occurred gave all of us scant opportunity to listen to and understand alternative points of view. Most importantly, and to my deep regret, it contributed to a feeling of voicelessness that many already experience on this campus, and it contributed to the very real pain that many people – particularly people of color – have felt as a result of this event.
As we debate what to do next, I look forward to hearing from the college-wide committee on invited speakers that is currently taking shape, as well as from my departmental colleagues and our department’s student advisory committee. I thank all of the members of the college community who have shared their views with me, with the department, and with the college administration over the past few months. I will continue to listen.
While I understand the point you're trying to make, the civil rights movement, suffrage movement, labor movement, and Marijuana movements might all suggest it's more complicated than that.Grifman wrote:All this crap would end if college administrations just said up front that free speech would be protected, law enforcement would be present at any controversial speaker's event, and any student caught breaking the law would be expelled from the university. Protest is fine, breaking the law isn't.
And how would they suggest so? These people aren't fighting for rights, they are fighting to suppress them. What is happening today and your examples from the past are not equivalent in any way.Combustible Lemur wrote:While I understand the point you're trying to make, the civil rights movement, suffrage movement, labor movement, and Marijuana movements might all suggest it's more complicated than that.Grifman wrote:All this crap would end if college administrations just said up front that free speech would be protected, law enforcement would be present at any controversial speaker's event, and any student caught breaking the law would be expelled from the university. Protest is fine, breaking the law isn't.
RM9 was correct in his take. And while I sort of agree with you, zero tolerance policies generally don't work.Grifman wrote:And how would they suggest so? These people aren't fighting for rights, they are fighting to suppress them. What is happening today and your examples from the past are not equivalent in any way.Combustible Lemur wrote:While I understand the point you're trying to make, the civil rights movement, suffrage movement, labor movement, and Marijuana movements might all suggest it's more complicated than that.Grifman wrote:All this crap would end if college administrations just said up front that free speech would be protected, law enforcement would be present at any controversial speaker's event, and any student caught breaking the law would be expelled from the university. Protest is fine, breaking the law isn't.
He shouldn't have issued an apology because, in this context, it certainly has the appearance that he's apologizing for offering a symbolic political science department co-sponsorship to the Murray event. I don't think that is what he's actually doing - he's apologizing for the closed decision making process he's always used in determining who the poli sci dept sponsors to speak at Middlebury. But to offer an apology now certainly appears to validate the grievances of those who sought to shut down the event.malchior wrote:I don't get why he shouldn't have apologized. He seems to believe he made an incredibly divisive decision in a vacuum. And it blew up. So he said he won't do that again. It doesn't excuse the violence. He is just taking some responsibility for creating the conditions. Sounds reasonable to me. Some might take that as validation but that'd be IMO a flawed interpretation.
I personally agree with this statement. I guess my only concern is that a policy of this sort opens the doors for lawyers to argue inconsistent application of policy, which can turn into its own nightmare.Kurth wrote:Case by case analysis. Tailor the consequences to the circumstances. In this circumstance, the consequences should be severe.
I agree and disagree here. I share your concern about the message it sends. At the same time, if there are actions that the professor took that he felt contributed to the situation getting out of hand, and he wants to apologize, I can live with that. If he was compelled to apologize though, that's puppies in my book.Kurth wrote:And, going back to one of the earlier posts, should in no way involve an apology from the poli sci professor that co-sponsored the event. That sends exactly the wrong message. Terrible.
Whereas despite the clarity of the applicable legal precedent
and the vital importance of protecting our Nation’s public
colleges as true ‘‘marketplaces of ideas,’’ the Foundation
for Individual Rights in Education has found that roughly
1 in 10 of America’s top colleges and universities quarantine
student expression to so-called ‘‘free speech
zones,’’ that more than 20 speakers were disinvited from
speaking on campuses in 2016, and survey of 449 schools
found that almost 40 percent maintain severely restrictive
speech codes that clearly and substantially prohibit
constitutionally protected speech;
Whereas according to the American Civil Liberties Union,
‘‘Speech codes adopted by government-financed state colleges
and universities amount to government censorship,
in violation of the Constitution. And the ACLU believes
that all campuses should adhere to First Amendment
principles because academic freedom is a bedrock of education
in a free society.’’;
The latter is not shocking at all. The ACLU has always defended conservative civil liberties (as well as liberal civil liberties).em2nought wrote:Who would have ever thought that conservatives might need the help of the ACLU, or even more shocking that the ACLU might wish to help conservatives.
Can it be fitted nasally?Isgrimnur wrote:Imagine what he doesn't know about the FIRE.
Joe Rogan Experience #958 - Jordan PetersonMoliere wrote:Cross posting this to R&P because the podcast is so damn good.
Joe Rogan Experience #877 - Jordan Peterson
"Jordan B. Peterson is a clinical psychologist and tenured professor of psychology at the University of Toronto."
Almost three hours of goodness.
Lawrence University will not recognize a student group that promotes free speech a week after the group’s screening of Can We Take a Joke, a comedy documentary, descended into mayhem.
Two days before a student government committee issued its recommendation against recognizing Students for Free Thought, the administration suggested the group could be rejected because of its views.
That led a civil-liberties group that helped produce Can We Take a Joke to warn the private university it was undermining its contractual promises to students, and may be legally liable for the student government’s action.
Student critics of the documentary at last week’s screening said it was intentionally “triggering” and offensive. The school said it’s reviewing several bias incident reports that were related to the screening.