The amount of hypocrisy that comes with the claims that these students should "learn to cope with uncomfortable ideas" is staggering. Guess what: these students are presenting us with an "uncomfortable idea" and the response has been nothing but knee-jerk.
Well done, everyone.
University is for adults, not toddlers.
No one is arguing for this.
As soon as you claim they are, they scurry away claiming that's not what they mean, but as soon as you say "OK then" and move on, they turn right around and it's all about their feelings again. It is very much a part of the modern PC platform that if someone "feels" assaulted, they are, and you must believe them or you are blaming the victim. This is why accusations are as good as conviction in places where PC reigns supreme, because the fact of accusation is itself proof of feeling, and that's it, case closed.
Don't fall for this transparent rhetorical ploy. Arguments that only appear transiently to dismiss one point, then disappear into the ether immediately after, are not arguments, just rhetoric. (This is a general point that applies in many places, actually.)
Along with some NYT coverage on this general topic: http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2015/11/02/when-a-gener...
This issue of students complaining about trigger warnings and the need for safe spaces certainly seems to be increasingly prevalent, but that could just be due to the media giving it more attention.
Are you saying you believe that another person can only be near you because you give them implicit permission to? And that at any time, and for any reason, you could remove that permission?
Where did you get that idea?
"The Freedom of Speech," the legal right defined by the constitution only applies to the government because the constitution only applies to the government.
There's a whole world outside US: http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/
Stud 2: When it hurts me!
Stud 1: When it's offensive to me!
https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/3s5wz2/yale_adminis...
Oh really, so university students are able to consume alcohol, right?
edit:
noun: adult;
- a person who is fully grown or developed.
- a person who has reached the age of majority.
edit 2:
"Longitudinal neuroimaging studies demonstrate that the adolescent brain continues to mature well into the 20s. This has prompted intense interest in linking neuromaturation to maturity of judgment."
The dominant American culture is not one with a single consistently-applied rite of passage to adulthood. Over about a decade, people go though multiple transitions (age of majority, voting age, drinking age---heck, a lot of people even recognize the age at which rental car companies stop applying a "You're probably a dangerous driver" surcharge, at 25 years old).
Meant adult as a contrast to toddlers (whom feelings and sense of security we do care about, for good reasons) and as a status that you target, grow into and nurture, especially more at the university (and hopefully after as well).
Unless your post means to say we should probably drop the drinking age. I'd agree it's pinned higher than maturity curve of youths, and personally find the illegality to encourage a debauched form of underage drinking. But I don't really see how that's here or there.
re, your edit: Are you saying that by some developmental model 17 year olds should not be asked to rise to the standards of behaviour expected of adults? Please elaborate.
The article on age of majority makes it clear that it is a distinct concept from age of license, which can cover things like buying alcohol and running for elected office. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_majority
Honestly, your edit seems to put the nail into the coffin of your entire point.
This argument is basically "You belong to social group X. You cannot opt out." Then followed by "because to social group X, you have to behave in Y way. Because that's how X people behave."
Depending on the surrounding culture, with that argument you can justify: why men have to wear ties, why young men should be sent to war, why women should wear burkha, etc. Anything conservative goes.
I'm not disagreeing with your actual point. I'm just trying to point out that your argument is bad.
That said, these people are just as free to voice these small minded, selfish complaints as I am to ignore them.
No one is arguing for this.
Suicide dropped from sociology lessons: http://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/jun/15/suicide-dro...
(A-level students are 16 to 18 years old)
I agree that teaching suicide to children is going to be difficult, and that most of the reason is about actual harm, not feelings - the increased risk of death or harm to the students from the Wurther Effect or stigmatising views.
But all of that can be worked around. You provide a mix of comprehensive support of different types to students; you promote a culture of inclusion an sharing in that room.
Suicide is really important. It's the leading cause of death of men aged between 15 and 49 in the UK. Rates are increasing. NHS cuts mean it's harder to get good quality support. Appropriately talking about suicide probably doesn't raise risk, and may well lower risk.
So, it's a shame that this topic got cut from the syllabus.
There are other examples in this thread of law students not learning about rape law because it's too distressing to hear.
That shows a misunderstanding of what PTSD survivors want when they talk about trigger warnings. The point is not "I should be able to live my life and avoid every mention of this thing that causes me significant distress", but "I am currently vulnerable, but getting support, and I need a little bit of warning not so I can avoid the subject, but so that I can make sure I have the little bit of extra support I need to keep me safe".
However: the people on the other side are mostly fucking hateful cunts who scream "What about my freedom of speech?" while seeking to silence the people they're screaming at.
It's insisting that a declaration be given in advance to remove someone from the possibility of having to cope with something uncomfortable.
A safe space is an echo chamber.
If we really want to know the cause of these tendencies, we need only look to the internet. You used to need to find a group of people to hang out with in your area and in doing so you'd associate with the social norms of that group, whatever they may be.
Now you craft your friend's list on Facebook with people who agree with you and reinforce you. If you've ever clicked the "unfollow" button you're guilty of this. This reinforcement leads to an echo chamber.
As a culture, we're effectively putting canvasing over logic and reason in all areas. That's essentially what you get from a social feed that reinforces your views - constant news that agrees with you...which is just canvasing yourself.
Canvasing feeds on feelings and reaction over reason. You look at just about any socially convenient topic and you'll see this. Just as an example, let's look at diversity in tech since this is Hacker News.
We're more than willing to accost the entire industry for lack of diversity as if it's somehow their fault. Yet most of these companies are falling all over themselves to hire people and we aren't hearing stories about discrimination or people not getting jobs...we just see the numbers and assume something is wrong.
We're not allowed to consider that people might tend to just be wired a certain way. Men's brains work differently than women's. Certain problems might be interesting to certain types of people and not to other.
Instead we create a cause and a problem that must be fixed immediately. We look at it from an emotional perspective rather than looking at all of the factors involved to just see if it happens to just be a general tendency or a real problem.
A problem is more marketable...so we go with that instead.
Which is different...how?
That's a needlessly uncharitable portrayal of it. A trigger warning can be used just like a movie's rating is. I don't avoid R rated movies, but I appreciate knowing when I'm walking into one.
Notice the response to your comment was "No one is arguing for this" instead of saying what he/she is actually arguing for.
Your time will be better spent picking the fuzzies off your favorite blanket.
Who is saying this?
If this were naturally a world where all ideas were comfortable except for the influence of a few bad apples, it might not be a problem, but since the world does contain uncomfortable facts, opinions, and people in abundance, they're basically demanding that everybody else shoulder the burdens.
From 1 Corinthians 13:
When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me.
I'm a student at a top 4 year university, and I find the lack of student backbone nauseating. The current trends in university culture go entirely counter to the reasons that we have higher education. Instead of encouraging expression, our culture deafens it with its constant concern towards avoiding offence.
Maybe it is societal conditioning, but I think that is wrong and look back on older generations and think they must also have known.
I can not say the same thing for much of these PC causes. I find it iritating and bad for society, much like I am sure racists in the south found the gradual acceptance of interracial dating and increased equity irritating.
I find many of the causes championed, or at least incedents in the news, to be a mockery of a free society but I can't help wonder if I am the same as Jim Crow. I suspect he felt quite vindicated as well.
Women were thought to be naturally uninterested in politics, and to not have the head for it anyway. Dabbling in politics was seen as an unwomanly thing ladies should be spared from.
Not unlike how people today think that the scarcity of women in tech is due to them naturally having less interest in it. It's easy to ascribe the status quo to the natural order of things.
Of writing of that era I like "Are Women People?"[1] It's written from a suffragettes point of view, but it includes some cherry-picked quotes from anti-suffragists, such as:
"The grant of suffrage to women is repugnant to instincts that strike their roots deep in the order of nature. It runs counter to human reason, it flouts the teachings of experience and the admonitions of common sense."—N.Y. Times, Feb. 7, 1915."
That was the kind of thing you could write in a newspaper of the time and have people agree with you. That should tell us something about how blind we can be to contemporary societal problems, and how silly we will look in hindsight.
[1] http://www.gutenberg.org/files/11689/11689-h/11689-h.htm
No. I, or the world will not be taking a "charitable position". As any other human being living in society I'm often confronted with things that I'm not comfortable with. Would you like to know what I do about them? I step away because it's none of my business judging other people's beliefs and the integrity of my feelings is not their responsibility.
So, to reiterate: no, sir. I will not yield something that I do not ask for myself. I will also not be shamed into whatever you're trying to shame us for and I laugh at the notion that you believe you would be successful in that attempt.
Also known as "wishful thinking". There's no room for charity when reason is called upon. Be as charitable as you want when talking about the weather with your neighbor, but when you're debating something serious you can not look for imaginary excuses for your opponent's mistakes.