The latest campus cancellation is different • Hacker News Board

Re: The latest campus cancellation is different

#411

Post by zeckalpha » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 6:27 PM UTC

milesvp wrote: post #343

throwaway984393 wrote: post #270

Actually it's not different. University lecturers have been protested or cancelled for decades for reasons unrelated to their topic, usually due to political beliefs or corporate interests that clashed with students' ideals. "Cancel culture" is specifically about "personal" societal reforms, which is what makes it different than the older complaints about general politics. Back in the day it was "edgy" to protest or…

I’m not sure you’re correct that nothing is different. I saw a lecture recently by someone whose organization does mediation between student groups and universities with regards to free speech. He was saying that a few years ago for the first time his organization was starting to mediate in the opposite direction. Was a very interesting talk. The speaker had tried to commit suicide and in the process of recovering fr…

Mediation with a “direction” isn’t good mediation.

Re: The latest campus cancellation is different

#412

Post by OJFord » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 6:27 PM UTC

JimmyAxod wrote: post #42

OJFord wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not really an echo chamber though, or at least it's leaky as hell. For example, visit from the UK during the Conservative party conference, and you get 'Trending in the UK - #ToryScum' even without logging in, or logging in to a profile that leans right (i.e. that trending 'hashtag' is the opposite of reinforcing an echo chamber for me if I have one) and there's not even anything particular going on that I'm awa…

Maybe you missed it: At the Labour conference a week or so ago, an MP referred to Tories as “scum”. Yup, that’s the majority of the voting population, and the ones they are trying to win over, are ‘scum’. I agree twitter is a hateful place, but so is the political left. But the vast majority of twitter are also very left wing.

Oh. Well I don't have to look it up to guess who that would be, but I think my point stands - it's not 'people are talking about that she said that', but a 'hashtag' used presumably to echo the sentiment. I wish it were confined to its chamber.

(And fwiw I don't want to see '#LabourScum' either.)

Re: The latest campus cancellation is different

#413

Post by angelzen » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #377

asdfasgasdgasdg wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hard to imagine a legal approach that does not impermissibly infringe on the free association rights of all the various participants. The question is whether any other mechanism would be sufficient. If Twitter were interested, they could do something to inhibit the flow of the outrage mechanism, but there are strong free speech arguments against doing this. Also it is of course not in Twitter's own best interest. If…

It's Twitter. Free speech does not apply. Get this out of your heads. If you're in Twitters house you play by their rules.

Dorian Abbot's crime was writing an op-ed in Newsweek. He did not enter Twitter's house, Twitter went after him.

https://bariweiss.substack.com/p/mit-abandons-its-mission-an...

https://www.newsweek.com/diversity-problem-campus-opinion-16...

Re: The latest campus cancellation is different

#414

Post by jmnicolas » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 6:31 PM UTC

throwaway984393 wrote: post #270

Actually it's not different. University lecturers have been protested or cancelled for decades for reasons unrelated to their topic, usually due to political beliefs or corporate interests that clashed with students' ideals. "Cancel culture" is specifically about "personal" societal reforms, which is what makes it different than the older complaints about general politics. Back in the day it was "edgy" to protest or…

So you think there's nothing different between advocating for war and criticizing how universities admit students?

Re: The latest campus cancellation is different

#415

Post by milesvp » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 6:35 PM UTC

zeckalpha wrote: post #411

milesvp wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure you’re correct that nothing is different. I saw a lecture recently by someone whose organization does mediation between student groups and universities with regards to free speech. He was saying that a few years ago for the first time his organization was starting to mediate in the opposite direction. Was a very interesting talk. The speaker had tried to commit suicide and in the process of recovering fr…

Mediation with a “direction” isn’t good mediation.

Absolutely. Apologies for poor paraphrasing. I think it was something like instead of students suing to be heard, they were suing to exclude.

Mediation should really be neutral, but the organization is dedicated to free speech. It’s very possible that such an organization, or any organization with an agenda, does not make for good mediators. Would be an interesting topic next time I see my friend who acts as a mediator.

Re: The latest campus cancellation is different

#416

Post by kjkjadksj » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 6:37 PM UTC

chmod600 wrote: post #385

The Atlantic is an interesting publication. I subscribed and appreciated it for years as an independent-minded outlet, even though it is usually far left of my perspectives. In 2016, I unsubscribed because, well, the whole media went haywire and The Atlantic went down with them. I thought it was unrecoverable. But it's nice to see a nuanced piece here that is capable of criticizing an idea while also criticizing the…

Now with Trump out of office journalism as a whole has certainly gotten better imo. That man took the air out of the room from any other topic worthy of ink.

Re: The latest campus cancellation is different

#417

Post by angelzen » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 6:40 PM UTC

peterangular wrote: post #361

FiberBundle wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand the argument of people who partly justify affirmative action in college admissions with the lack of a perfect meritocracy. So just because the ideal of a perfect meritocracy is illusive, decisions shouldn't primarily be based on merit anymore?

This all is in good faith, just sharing my ever-evolving thoughts on the topic to answer the question: For better or worse meritocracies are exclusive in nature when you take systemic societal issues into consideration like wealth gaps. In America, we've historically done so much to hurt minorities I believe we've arguably held religions/ethnicities/classes/genders back from the same opportunities that I have as a st…

> we've historically done so much to hurt minorities

Please speak for yourself. I haven't done anything to hurt anyone.

Re: The latest campus cancellation is different

#418

Post by kjkjadksj » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 6:42 PM UTC

Ekaros wrote: post #260

gambiting wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to be clear - I blame "Twitter" the platform not "Twitter" the corporation. The platform gave voice to people who want to cause outrage, whether the corporation wanted or intended that is only secondary. Maybe it's a distinction without a meaning, but it makes sense in my head.

Blame could be extended to the corporation. If they swiftly banned permanently anyone engaging in these sort of activities it wouldn't be a problem.

Their choice of algorithms also maximizes the reach of these people, since they use the same mechanisms that maximize the reach of advertisers (twitters actual client, users are the product).

Re: The latest campus cancellation is different

#419

Post by kjkjadksj » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 6:46 PM UTC

JaimeThompson wrote: post #263

Before Twitter conservative religious groups in the United States had and used such power to get those ideas and people they didn't like censored. This isn't a new thing brought about by Twitter, it is just more noticeable these days.

Which opens the question, is it a good thing that a tool like twitter is able to make these groups voices much more noticably amplified? It was one thing when this stuff was limited to the AM bands of radio or tabloids that everyone knew were nuts. Now we have given these people the equivalent platform of anyone else and there’s no learned cultural knowledge to ignore these voices like we’ve learned to do with AM radio crazies, since its being amplified on the same platform used by even the POTUS and all sorts of official sources of communication which acts as a signal of legitimacy for a lot of people buying into this crap.

With platforms like twitter we’ve in effect removed editors from the paper of record and let anyone contribute articles, which has turned it into a tabloid rag at best and outright propaganda at worst, but guised as where legitimate truths are found since officials and legitimate businesses and professionals have sanctified the platform with their own use.

Re: The latest campus cancellation is different

#420

Post by spamizbad » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 6:46 PM UTC

creata wrote: post #196

mawise wrote: post #118

Seems like there were two things Abbot did "wrong", one was to argue against affirmative action, and the other was to use a nazi reference to make his point. Does anyone have first-hand knowledge of what the mob said on Twitter? I'm curious if they differentiated between the two. For anyone who hasn't seen it, Netflix's fiction THE CHAIR satires cancel culture in liberal institutions and their story includes someone…

> Does anyone have first-hand knowledge of what the mob said on Twitter? The article contains links to a few Twitter posts.[0][1] Keep in mind that they might not be representative. Edit: also consider that your use of the word "mob" (which isn't used in the Atlantic article) might be unfair, and that the word might apply to us uninvested, nameless faces better than it does to those students and professors putting th…

This seems pretty tame. Not even 200 likes between the two. Not much of a "mob"