341–350 of 444 posts
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Absolutely. But what he actually said was "we don't condone 'safe spaces'".
The charitable way of interpreting that is "The university as an organization will not lend their institutional support for enforcing 'safe spaces'. If you want one, make it and enforce it yourself"
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Absolutely. But what he actually said was "we don't condone 'safe spaces'".
The charitable way of interpreting that is "The university as an organization will not lend their institutional support for enforcing 'safe spaces'. If you want one, make it and enforce it yourself"
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> This tells me it's possible to be considerate of common triggers while still drawing the line somewhere I agree it is, but right now it's very difficult to have the discussions necessary to draw those lines—supporters of trigger warnings only want to discuss the cases where they're clearly justified (fireworks & veterans) and pretend all uses are similarly valid, and critics of trigger warnings only want to discuss…
I agree it is, but right now it's very difficult to have the discussions necessary to draw those lines When something is 1) subjective or very hard to measure and 2) used as an emotional bludgeon then then people are going to call "shenanigans" and even start to exhibit knee-jerk doubt about such things. Often, this is a tragedy, as the issues may well be both real and difficult to discuss. The quality of such debate…
It's important to acknowledge that the term "safe space" means different things to different people. To the Yale protestors (who were widely supported at UChicago) the entirety of university housing at Yale was meant to be a "safe space," so it was incumbent on the university to fire professors who voiced unwelcome opinions in that space. To many of the people who are angry about this letter, "safe space" means a sup…
Yeah, all these words mean different things to the Social Justice/Progressive left and the rest of us. It's one of the surest tells that a movement is wrong when they refuse to use the regular meanings of words and start redefining them in their own usage. People who are right never have to resort to such contrivances.
They almost certainly didn't learn it in high school, from their peers in high school, or from their parents. (Although that may be changing.)
They learned these things at the university, from professors, and from fellow students who learned from the same professors.
In other words, academia brought this situation upon itself by teaching these things to students -- -- so I'm rather leery of analyses which blame millennials for pushing a self-indulgent worldview on universities. If the same ideas had been taught to previous generations of students, they too would have advocated trigger warnings and safe spaces.
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> Universities ought to return to what they once were: free and open exchange of ideas. The problem with this is that's not why most people go to universities. The top reason is probably credentials for employment (most people stop taking classes after getting a degree), and below that is probably education for employment (if I see someone with a degree taking a class just for the education, it's usually related to s…
I would be fine with this if it were applied equitably. As it stands, centrist and conservative students have been expected to endure progressive indoctrination, and they've done so relatively quietly up until it their speech and activities began to be prohibited (I believe it was UIC where someone chalked "Trump 2016" on the sidewalks, and students tried to have it prosecuted as a hate crime).
Something my father once told me, that has served me well over the years.
There's a lot of money (read: clicks) to be made by manufacturing outrage, and there's far too much to be angry about in this world to be inventing any more of it. Maybe this is something you should be angry about, maybe it isn't. But unless you like being mad you owe it to yourself to think about those questions before making a decision.
For this thing in particular, it doesn't make any sense without context. I'm not at the University of Chicago, and nor is anybody I know. Are "sjw pc trigger-warningers" a problem there? Or is the university being ridiculous? We can argue back and forth forever whether "safe spaces" are good or not depending on your definition -- which definition is the one that is relevant at the University of Chicago? This letter may make perfect sense in the context of current issues going on at the university. Or it may be a load of bull. But, at least from where I'm sitting, I have no context. And whoever uploaded this didn't provide any. What was their purpose? Who knows. Definitely not enough justification for me to worsen my mood about it.
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> The problem with this is that's not why most people go to universities. The top reason is probably credentials for employment This is most certainly not the case at the University of Chicago. If you want a degree, even a prestigious one, there are far easier options (even in Chicago... See that school in Evanston ;) Students choose the U of C because they want to be challenged by ideas, they want to spend four mise…
Yep, UChicago alum here, too. It's a weak argument anywhere to claim we should limit free speech simply because most students attend universities for job training, not for intellectual enrichment. But it's an epic fail of an argument at Chicago. The school year opens with an address to the first years from a faculty member on "The Aims of Education." UC is not a lunch counter where students order things to their liki…
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Universities ought to return to what they once were: free and open exchange of ideas. Viewed in this light, the University of Chicago's rejection of political correctness is actually a softening of extremism: allowing for, rather than actively silencing, diverse political discourse. This is in stark contrast to neighbor Chicago school DePaul, who last month blocked[0] Jewish conservative minority voice Ben Shapiro fr…
> Universities ought to return to what they once were: free and open exchange of ideas. The problem with this is that's not why most people go to universities. The top reason is probably credentials for employment (most people stop taking classes after getting a degree), and below that is probably education for employment (if I see someone with a degree taking a class just for the education, it's usually related to s…
It is a clever metaphore, but I don't think degrees are like gallons of milk at all. It is more like Louis Vuitton bags.
There are USD$600 LV bags, and there are others that cost twice or even 3 times as much. But, as many people that would love to snatch a USD$100 bag as there might be, LV cannot sell to them; if they did, all the > USD$1k customers would never buy LV again. Then the Degrees are the same. Lots of people who only want a job want those. But the people who already have one like to believe that their degree says something about them; among other things, that they have the ability to dispasionately discuss subjects they find personally offensive. Every successful university has to stay in speaking terms with their alumni, if not for no other reason than to have then send their kids to the same university when the time comes.
At the end of day, University of Chicago is branding itself as "the place to study if you are an actual adult". Sometimes you want to sell regular milk, but sometimes you want to sell organic, grass-fed, free-range milk. And it is a good thing to have both options available.
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The idea of a safe space is exactly what you what you said was the problem with free speech though. Any given person's "safe space" will be a place where their opinions are the only ones, so they're not challenged or offended. Safe spaces only work if you set up a safe space for every possible viewpoint, or you ban any form of interaction within the safe space.
It can be, yes. But if you're trying to discuss native american problems and someone just keeps interjecting that focusing on native american problems is racist - then you're not really getting anywhere either - was sort of my point. I don't think they exist to stifle opposing viewpoints, but to at least attempt sane discussion on certain topics that would otherwise not get the opportunity to be discussed.
There's no need for safe spaces just a professor who can allow for ideas to be exchanged in class whether they are hurtful or not and keep the discussion civil and moving forward.
The students at the U of C will be fine.