Leaked documents related to the trans shooter of a Christian school show she used words like “white privilege” and “cracker” in referring to her victims. Truly a hate crime, but the truth was suppressed.
Right, and she identified as "trans" (a protected and lucrative class) so her manifesto doubly had to be suppressed. It was "Death Day" - also called "Trans Day of Vengeance".
She was angry with people in the very categories to which she belonged: white and well off (she used to attend that school),
How about we get people proper mental health exploration and stop just giving them all these SSRIs and Synthetic opposite sex hormones - which are harmful magic bullets? It only makes money for medicine and pharma and harms the individual and society.
“Just three days later, a counter-letter titled “A More Specific Letter on Justice and Open Debate” was published online with 150 signatures of its own, including anonymous journalists from the likes of NPR, The New York Times, and Politico. “
Why “anonymous journalists”? Are they afraid of something?
The timing for this book is perfect. Greg is a legend for growing FIRE over the past two decades. However, the Long March through the institutions has steamrolled with minimal resistance for over half a century. The concentration of cancel culture at "elite" universities is why we should call them the Demoralized DIEvy League. Only the trustees have the power to effect change, but do they have the courage? Have the endowments hoovered up enough of their cash to carry on without them? https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-get-into-harvard-open-letter-to-trustees
We have created a kind of perverse cultural currency that derives value from our ability to be offended and, in so doing, have become a nation of the aggrieved. We then use our self-declared victimhood to excuse our atrocious behavior. This isn’t a recent phenomenon, “Mein Kampf '' is literally 400 pages of whinging. True evil is, and always has been, a byproduct of righteous fury.
On a tangential topic related to endowments: Taxpayer Bailouts for Student Loan Debtors. With the $932 BILLION of endowments mentioned in the article (comprised of marketable securities not old campus bldgs.) why on earth wouldn’t the almost $1 TRILLION of endowment funds be used as the first tranche of debt forgiveness?
Think of it as a warranty of sorts. If you can’t pay back education loans, the ‘education’ you purchased must be a bit lacking right? It’s the sellers responsibility, not the Federal Govt, to deal with their flawed ‘product’. Of course, that’s completely ignoring any personal responsibility and blaming everything on external factors . . . .
The simple purpose of debt "cancellation", i.e. transference of the expense onto the poorer classes who didn't attend college, is to buy votes in the next election so the party can remain in power. As a byproduct, it helps the rich get richer by alleviating their debt, and it helps the poor get poorer by getting even less services for their tax dollars. So it has the exact long term impact of the one thing that liberals say they hate - giving tax breaks to the rich while screwing the poor. Ultimately, this magic trick reveals the one singular purpose of all political parties: to acquire power. Saying they support this or that cause is only their marketing program to attract "buyers".
I often say out loud that I am for FREE SPEECH. I invite people to have conversations with me in a respectful manner. But everyone is afraid. They think their ideas and opinions will create conflict and cause disruption. They aren't willing to take a chance. I continue to represent the far middle and charismatic, respectful, engaging, even charming conversation.
Thanks for this wonderful book. On my way to buy a copy.
I have done so also, quite a lot on social media and in daily life, only to be roundly attacked by those who engage with me. It seems that many have few skills in discourse other than lobbing ad hominems. One grows weary…but as always I still embrace free speech and observe others very carefully before engaging in intellectual discussion…
Good for you! This is our opportunity to practice. We need courage and fortitude. I've decided to be bold. I want to be proactive in starting the conversations and then modeling good behavior. At the same time, be strong and decisive about not letting anyone be rude or negative without setting boundaries. It's a work in progress!
I find myself wanting to shout from the rooftops: I am a proud right winger- and I am more tolerant, worldly and realistic then the drivel who are happy to see the death of free speech. These spoiled, ignorant minions truly have no idea the world they are ushering in.
I have to say, I'm not proud of being a liberal anymore, though I still am one. At least, what one was back when I was growing up in the 70's and 80's. One thing I've always felt very strongly about was the importance of free speech. Now that people I thought were on my side, so to speak, are gleefully fighting to end free speech, I don't really see many actual liberals anymore. Frankly, I have more in common with those on the right now than I did way back then, though I've always had friends on the right, who I was always able to have civil conversations and disagreements with. I can't really say that about my friends on the left anymore.
Can't wait to buy & read this book!! Excellent rebuke of cancel culture, but I'm looking forward to the "yet there is hope" part. These social justice warriors are so convinced of their righteousness and mesmerized by online propaganda. If letters from writers and editorials from the NYT and even Riley Gaines can't sway them, what can?
“Free speech” is a misused term. The First Amendment does not prohibit private citizens or nongovernmental actors from suppressing or punishing the words or opinions of others.
There is not, and has never been, a right to say what you like without any consequences. First, there was a time in this country when, if you said something somebody didn’t like, you might be challenged to a duel; Andrew Jackson is said to have fought nine duels, and Alexander Hamilton died in a duel with Aaron Burr. Even after dueling died off, it has long been possible to get fired from a job, or to be punched in the nose, for saying the wrong thing to the wrong person. The difference between then and now is that formerly one might antagonize only one person, whereas today, the social media mob summons its self-righteousness into a critical mass and descends on someone guilty of holding an opinion which is unacceptable to them and tries to rend him limb from limb.
Many people seem to have a compulsion to expose their mental processes to others. We don’t live in a civil society. Except in exceptional circumstances, making one’s thoughts public is not likely to affect the course of human events, but is more than likely to affect the course of one’s own life. Some philosopher once said “words are deeds.” So, as another philosopher said “shut up, she explained.”
It is ironic that the Hamas-supporting students are screaming that it's "not fair" for them to be outed and experience serious consequences for their future as a result of their choice to engage in free speech by signing anti-Israel letters. According to them, experiencing those consequences means that their free speech is being suppressed.
But these are the same students who have screamed time and time again that being Canceled for disagreeing with the Left is merely "consequences," not suppression of free speech. They don't want the rules they made to apply to themselves.
It is ironic because they don't understand that there is no such thing as "free speech." What's doubly ironic is that these boobs were reared in a Facebook society wherein they can spill their guts at will and --they assumed,-- without consequence; it apparently never sank into their little craniums that prospective employers, as well as police and intelligence agencies can locate and read their stupid bloviations later. And there could be consequences somewhere down the line, maybe completely unknown to them, such as denial of an employment opportunity or of a security clearance.
These young people never seem to have considered that anything they put online is probably going to be there forever, and people researching them will find it.
The weird thing is that, having grown up with the Internet, they should *theoretically* understand this better than us older people.
It would be interesting to do research into WHY they don't understand this.
I don't know the answer either, but I think part of it is that most undergraduates are between 18 and 22 years old. They really don't know much. Part of that is because they weren't taught much about history in high school. My own children went to a very good high school 20 years ago, but they were taught nothing about Hitler, Mao, Stalin. They know nothing about communism, fascism, socialism or capitalism. With no historical context, they don't know how these different political and economic systems worked for the people who lived under them. As to what is happening in colleges now, I think the deepest desire of kids is to "belong." By spouting the slogans and posturing with their signs, they can pretend to be "fighting" for something.
I meant to mention something else that might be part of the dynamic.
I went to college in the 1960's, which coincided with the genuine fight-in-the streets Civil Rights era, when people white and black were beaten and sometimes killed for trying to attain political equality and sometimes just for demonstrating. There were genuine heroes then: Martin Luther King and John Lewis being two of the best-known names. College students known as the Freedom Riders were involved in these protests and demonstrations. More or less simultaneously, the draft-age youth of America were demonstrating against the Vietnam War; many of these were college students. It was a heady time of sex, drugs, and rock'n'roll, and talk of Revolution.
Subsequent generations of students have a notion that in the 1960's there was a serious fight going on, that students were heroes (they weren't) and that they themselves missed something important by not being present to participate in this glorious uproar. So, every now and then a certain contingent of students likes to imagine themselves as similarly glorious "fighters" for some "oppressed" group. Right now, the "victims" of choice are the Palestinians.
Just because the first amendment only prevents government abridgement, doesn't mean it is not a generally useful principle in private, academic and commercial walks of life. Intimidation by the few (the far left) of the many (everyone else, see the Cato poll from 2020) is no better than the other forms of oppression these people rail against.
What I am talking about is cost--the cost of what people loosely assume is their "right of free speech." When we talk about (for example) solving an engineering or traffic or medical or legal problem, we aren't necessarily called upon to opine about some social value, such as transgender rights; so, our communication of opinion about how to solve the problem might be relatively cost-free. Where people get in trouble is in expressing opinions that fly in the face of some self-styled victim group; there may be little upside to expressing social opinions about the rights or behaviors of others, and there can be a substantial cost to doing so, including intimidation by a mob. All I am saying is that if someone is going to express an opinion, she'd better be prepared to own it, because there will be nobody to protect her from whatever consequences there might be. [See how I deftly preempted a social-mob hit by not using the male pronoun? ]
True. And I guess the existence of a mob, and those who are suppressed by it, is a historical norm. (Historically, a mob from which you could escape by moving to another town ...). But we can strive to encourage civil discourse and discourage mob condemnation (cancellation), right?
Yes, we can encourage civil discourse. As a former trial lawyer—not one of the rich ones, I hasten to add—it was part of my job to foster it. To have a civil discourse on any topic, unless everybody is already in agreement, requires a cooperative search for common ground, and an active attempt to find areas of agreement. This requires fostering a belief by each participant that the other is communicating in good faith.
The problem with creating this environment, as I see it, has two roots. First, people often use language sloppily: we let emotion leak into our attempts at communication, using emotionally loaded words, and quickly draw an antagonistic response. Second, we don’t listen closely to what the other guy is trying to say so naturally we aren’t going to respond appropriately to her concerns.
There is something else to understand: there are people who have no intention of engaging in civil discourse. The only way to find a common ground with them is to fully concede the correctness of their position. It used to be that such people relied on the tactic of subtle changes in the meaning of words. They use that tactic too, but it is rather old hat.
It has been joined to a new tactic, one that is evidently quite effective: name-calling. “If you don’t agree with me, you are racist, homo-or xenophobic, etc.” This tactic thus shifts the burden to me to prove that I am not a such- and- such-phobic, which I can only prove by agreeing with you. There is no such thing as a dialogue with such a person because the fact of your disagreement is all the proof needed to show that you are a very bad person indeed.
As to how to respond to people who operate like this, there is a tactic that will not change their way of thinking, but at least will confront them rather than capitulating to them: make them define their terms. “What is your definition of racism/sexism/etc?” “Am I required to date a 400-pound person to avoid fat-shaming him?” “Must I have sex with a transgender person to prove I am not transphobic?” Etc,etc,etc. But this line of inquiry must be couched in terms of expressing a genuine interest in what the other fellow thinks, or it will go off the rails quickly.
Hmm. Seems like this article should have been written years ago. But it's only coming out now that some in universities are criticizing Israel and supporting the Palestinian people. Hmm.
You do realize it takes time to write books and collect data and research, right? And that these folks have already been writing books like this for years.
Or do you think that Oct 7 happened and then the poor responses happened and these guys popped out a book in a couple of weeks?
I've been reading articles about this for over a decade. Immediately after 9/11, I heard the assertions being made that it was actually Mossad that blew up the WTC.
None of this has been a secret to anyone who was paying attention to the issue. It is only due to the Left's horrifying response to Oct7 that it is now "coming out" widely enough for everyone to see it.
This is nothing new. People have been criticizing Israel and supporting the Palestinian people for decades in the US, including at universities (this was happening when I was at college in the late 80's). It's also obvious that TFP have made clear their support for Israel and have been putting out articles about it since Oct 7. Also, articles like that were, in fact, written years go, as is pointed out in the article itself.
What these people don't understand is that when you shut down entire groups of people or entire ways of thought, those people still think and speak. They do it underground, with rage and contempt. That is dangerous.
The authors speak of the Harper letter raising concerns about suppression of free speech and an almost immediate letter published in counter-response...
"In the face of backlash, historian and Tufts University professor Kerri Greenidge even asked for her name to be removed from the original letter and tweeted, “I do not endorse this @harpers letter,” before adding her name to the counter-letter.""
Of course I had never heard of Ms. Greenidge and attempted to look up her X/Twitter account to get a sense of her because - frankly - it made no sense that a professor should have such a change of position in so short a period of time (three days between the first letter and the counter-response). Did she not read the first letter? Does she have a habit of signing public statements without giving any due consideration? How could she have agree on Day 1 but reject and indeed take on an opposite opinion on Day 3?
Hmmmm. How odd. Her X/Twitter account is locked down with only "approved followers" having access to her wit and wisdom. I would like to think that Tufts University is embarrassed by this, but I suspect not.
The inventors of Critical Bullshit, The Frankfurt School, arrived at the same time as Marcuse. Those "Red Scares" got their numbers well wrong and well short. The Civil Rights Movement was knee-deep in Communist subversives from Parks to MLK and all around them. Fascism and Nazism were recognised as flavours of Left-Wing Socialist Revolution (They always declared themselves such; Molotov-Ribbentrop was hardly an accident) along with Marxist-Leninist Bolshevism until FDR, administration seemingly overun with folk adjecent, run by, or actually operating out of, the USSR's embassy, switched the script. China was lost when the US strongarmed the ROC into calling off the Battle of Harbin; the US Army shrank to something like 4 divisions combat-ready; Korea was an implausible draw. In retrospect Harry Truman was making East and South East Asia "Safe for Communism". The UN was a Communist creation and Stalin wangled 2 seats for himself. The history of the 20th century makes a lot more sense when the President is for all intents and purposes Stalin's bitch. J. Edgar turned out to be a very Queer fellow when very Queer stood you in all sorts of danger of compromise. In all probability you had a red fox guarding the hen-house for fifty-odd years.
President Trump better be channeling Herakles - he has rather an Augean Stables on steroids to clean.
No, Steven, tell us what you really think!" But- yes this is making sense to me. I don't know about the Frankfurt School, but I have dealt w/ lefty Germans -who warned my apolitical German friends to be careful of hanging to w/ me, because of "wrong-think"! That was back in 2002-- and I have seen that same mind set take over here !
This excerpt purports to be about the problem in universities, but much of the action seems to take place on social media. When people in academia take a stand on free expression, it's a Twitter mob that slaps them down.
My daughter is in STEM and just applied to a university listed on FIRE’s top five list for free speech. We are taking the tack of change-from-within.
Sidebar: the application didn’t ask for SAT or letter of reference. Her present counselor (and I’ve heard other high school counselors doing same) are all pressing the importance of the essay portion that asks for a student to describe/share themselves.
Nothing seems merit based and the acceptance rate is extremely high. Gone are the days where a student is nervously waiting to see if their hard work paid off in an acceptance letter from their dream college.
I've seen just the opposite impact -- students anxiety-stricken because fewer and fewer credentials are considered, giving the essay outsized importance and rendering rejections devastatingly personal. The damage is compounded because they're so fragile, having never been criticized or forced to endure 'violent' speech. It is soooo important to alert your adolescent children when they say something moronic. Here are two responses you can try: "That is the dumbest thing I've ever heard." "When you say things like that, it makes me think you're stupid." Also, I've found laughing to be very effective.
Leaked documents related to the trans shooter of a Christian school show she used words like “white privilege” and “cracker” in referring to her victims. Truly a hate crime, but the truth was suppressed.
Right, and she identified as "trans" (a protected and lucrative class) so her manifesto doubly had to be suppressed. It was "Death Day" - also called "Trans Day of Vengeance".
She was angry with people in the very categories to which she belonged: white and well off (she used to attend that school),
How about we get people proper mental health exploration and stop just giving them all these SSRIs and Synthetic opposite sex hormones - which are harmful magic bullets? It only makes money for medicine and pharma and harms the individual and society.
Excellent related PITT today by the way:
"Legislation Protecting Minors From Medical Transition Could Have Unintended Consequences:
Society Must Also Become Aware of the Truth about Transition!"
https://pitt.substack.com/p/legislation-protecting-minors-from
Amazing how quickly this was memory-holed.
“Just three days later, a counter-letter titled “A More Specific Letter on Justice and Open Debate” was published online with 150 signatures of its own, including anonymous journalists from the likes of NPR, The New York Times, and Politico. “
Why “anonymous journalists”? Are they afraid of something?
You betcha!
The timing for this book is perfect. Greg is a legend for growing FIRE over the past two decades. However, the Long March through the institutions has steamrolled with minimal resistance for over half a century. The concentration of cancel culture at "elite" universities is why we should call them the Demoralized DIEvy League. Only the trustees have the power to effect change, but do they have the courage? Have the endowments hoovered up enough of their cash to carry on without them? https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-get-into-harvard-open-letter-to-trustees
We have created a kind of perverse cultural currency that derives value from our ability to be offended and, in so doing, have become a nation of the aggrieved. We then use our self-declared victimhood to excuse our atrocious behavior. This isn’t a recent phenomenon, “Mein Kampf '' is literally 400 pages of whinging. True evil is, and always has been, a byproduct of righteous fury.
I think "righteous fury" should be "self-righteous fury".
On a tangential topic related to endowments: Taxpayer Bailouts for Student Loan Debtors. With the $932 BILLION of endowments mentioned in the article (comprised of marketable securities not old campus bldgs.) why on earth wouldn’t the almost $1 TRILLION of endowment funds be used as the first tranche of debt forgiveness?
Think of it as a warranty of sorts. If you can’t pay back education loans, the ‘education’ you purchased must be a bit lacking right? It’s the sellers responsibility, not the Federal Govt, to deal with their flawed ‘product’. Of course, that’s completely ignoring any personal responsibility and blaming everything on external factors . . . .
The simple purpose of debt "cancellation", i.e. transference of the expense onto the poorer classes who didn't attend college, is to buy votes in the next election so the party can remain in power. As a byproduct, it helps the rich get richer by alleviating their debt, and it helps the poor get poorer by getting even less services for their tax dollars. So it has the exact long term impact of the one thing that liberals say they hate - giving tax breaks to the rich while screwing the poor. Ultimately, this magic trick reveals the one singular purpose of all political parties: to acquire power. Saying they support this or that cause is only their marketing program to attract "buyers".
🪒🛎️🔨
I often say out loud that I am for FREE SPEECH. I invite people to have conversations with me in a respectful manner. But everyone is afraid. They think their ideas and opinions will create conflict and cause disruption. They aren't willing to take a chance. I continue to represent the far middle and charismatic, respectful, engaging, even charming conversation.
Thanks for this wonderful book. On my way to buy a copy.
I have done so also, quite a lot on social media and in daily life, only to be roundly attacked by those who engage with me. It seems that many have few skills in discourse other than lobbing ad hominems. One grows weary…but as always I still embrace free speech and observe others very carefully before engaging in intellectual discussion…
Good for you! This is our opportunity to practice. We need courage and fortitude. I've decided to be bold. I want to be proactive in starting the conversations and then modeling good behavior. At the same time, be strong and decisive about not letting anyone be rude or negative without setting boundaries. It's a work in progress!
I find myself wanting to shout from the rooftops: I am a proud right winger- and I am more tolerant, worldly and realistic then the drivel who are happy to see the death of free speech. These spoiled, ignorant minions truly have no idea the world they are ushering in.
I have to say, I'm not proud of being a liberal anymore, though I still am one. At least, what one was back when I was growing up in the 70's and 80's. One thing I've always felt very strongly about was the importance of free speech. Now that people I thought were on my side, so to speak, are gleefully fighting to end free speech, I don't really see many actual liberals anymore. Frankly, I have more in common with those on the right now than I did way back then, though I've always had friends on the right, who I was always able to have civil conversations and disagreements with. I can't really say that about my friends on the left anymore.
I was a liberal many years ago. Until I had children and started a business...
Can't wait to buy & read this book!! Excellent rebuke of cancel culture, but I'm looking forward to the "yet there is hope" part. These social justice warriors are so convinced of their righteousness and mesmerized by online propaganda. If letters from writers and editorials from the NYT and even Riley Gaines can't sway them, what can?
Anything that makes you angry deserves a closer look in the mirror.
“Free speech” is a misused term. The First Amendment does not prohibit private citizens or nongovernmental actors from suppressing or punishing the words or opinions of others.
There is not, and has never been, a right to say what you like without any consequences. First, there was a time in this country when, if you said something somebody didn’t like, you might be challenged to a duel; Andrew Jackson is said to have fought nine duels, and Alexander Hamilton died in a duel with Aaron Burr. Even after dueling died off, it has long been possible to get fired from a job, or to be punched in the nose, for saying the wrong thing to the wrong person. The difference between then and now is that formerly one might antagonize only one person, whereas today, the social media mob summons its self-righteousness into a critical mass and descends on someone guilty of holding an opinion which is unacceptable to them and tries to rend him limb from limb.
Many people seem to have a compulsion to expose their mental processes to others. We don’t live in a civil society. Except in exceptional circumstances, making one’s thoughts public is not likely to affect the course of human events, but is more than likely to affect the course of one’s own life. Some philosopher once said “words are deeds.” So, as another philosopher said “shut up, she explained.”
It is ironic that the Hamas-supporting students are screaming that it's "not fair" for them to be outed and experience serious consequences for their future as a result of their choice to engage in free speech by signing anti-Israel letters. According to them, experiencing those consequences means that their free speech is being suppressed.
But these are the same students who have screamed time and time again that being Canceled for disagreeing with the Left is merely "consequences," not suppression of free speech. They don't want the rules they made to apply to themselves.
It is ironic because they don't understand that there is no such thing as "free speech." What's doubly ironic is that these boobs were reared in a Facebook society wherein they can spill their guts at will and --they assumed,-- without consequence; it apparently never sank into their little craniums that prospective employers, as well as police and intelligence agencies can locate and read their stupid bloviations later. And there could be consequences somewhere down the line, maybe completely unknown to them, such as denial of an employment opportunity or of a security clearance.
These young people never seem to have considered that anything they put online is probably going to be there forever, and people researching them will find it.
The weird thing is that, having grown up with the Internet, they should *theoretically* understand this better than us older people.
It would be interesting to do research into WHY they don't understand this.
I don't know the answer either, but I think part of it is that most undergraduates are between 18 and 22 years old. They really don't know much. Part of that is because they weren't taught much about history in high school. My own children went to a very good high school 20 years ago, but they were taught nothing about Hitler, Mao, Stalin. They know nothing about communism, fascism, socialism or capitalism. With no historical context, they don't know how these different political and economic systems worked for the people who lived under them. As to what is happening in colleges now, I think the deepest desire of kids is to "belong." By spouting the slogans and posturing with their signs, they can pretend to be "fighting" for something.
I meant to mention something else that might be part of the dynamic.
I went to college in the 1960's, which coincided with the genuine fight-in-the streets Civil Rights era, when people white and black were beaten and sometimes killed for trying to attain political equality and sometimes just for demonstrating. There were genuine heroes then: Martin Luther King and John Lewis being two of the best-known names. College students known as the Freedom Riders were involved in these protests and demonstrations. More or less simultaneously, the draft-age youth of America were demonstrating against the Vietnam War; many of these were college students. It was a heady time of sex, drugs, and rock'n'roll, and talk of Revolution.
Subsequent generations of students have a notion that in the 1960's there was a serious fight going on, that students were heroes (they weren't) and that they themselves missed something important by not being present to participate in this glorious uproar. So, every now and then a certain contingent of students likes to imagine themselves as similarly glorious "fighters" for some "oppressed" group. Right now, the "victims" of choice are the Palestinians.
Nobody ever claimed that campus protesters understand what they're doing.
The campus protesters would argue that they know exactly what they are doing: standing on what they think is "the right side of history."
Just because the first amendment only prevents government abridgement, doesn't mean it is not a generally useful principle in private, academic and commercial walks of life. Intimidation by the few (the far left) of the many (everyone else, see the Cato poll from 2020) is no better than the other forms of oppression these people rail against.
What I am talking about is cost--the cost of what people loosely assume is their "right of free speech." When we talk about (for example) solving an engineering or traffic or medical or legal problem, we aren't necessarily called upon to opine about some social value, such as transgender rights; so, our communication of opinion about how to solve the problem might be relatively cost-free. Where people get in trouble is in expressing opinions that fly in the face of some self-styled victim group; there may be little upside to expressing social opinions about the rights or behaviors of others, and there can be a substantial cost to doing so, including intimidation by a mob. All I am saying is that if someone is going to express an opinion, she'd better be prepared to own it, because there will be nobody to protect her from whatever consequences there might be. [See how I deftly preempted a social-mob hit by not using the male pronoun? ]
True. And I guess the existence of a mob, and those who are suppressed by it, is a historical norm. (Historically, a mob from which you could escape by moving to another town ...). But we can strive to encourage civil discourse and discourage mob condemnation (cancellation), right?
Yes, we can encourage civil discourse. As a former trial lawyer—not one of the rich ones, I hasten to add—it was part of my job to foster it. To have a civil discourse on any topic, unless everybody is already in agreement, requires a cooperative search for common ground, and an active attempt to find areas of agreement. This requires fostering a belief by each participant that the other is communicating in good faith.
The problem with creating this environment, as I see it, has two roots. First, people often use language sloppily: we let emotion leak into our attempts at communication, using emotionally loaded words, and quickly draw an antagonistic response. Second, we don’t listen closely to what the other guy is trying to say so naturally we aren’t going to respond appropriately to her concerns.
There is something else to understand: there are people who have no intention of engaging in civil discourse. The only way to find a common ground with them is to fully concede the correctness of their position. It used to be that such people relied on the tactic of subtle changes in the meaning of words. They use that tactic too, but it is rather old hat.
It has been joined to a new tactic, one that is evidently quite effective: name-calling. “If you don’t agree with me, you are racist, homo-or xenophobic, etc.” This tactic thus shifts the burden to me to prove that I am not a such- and- such-phobic, which I can only prove by agreeing with you. There is no such thing as a dialogue with such a person because the fact of your disagreement is all the proof needed to show that you are a very bad person indeed.
As to how to respond to people who operate like this, there is a tactic that will not change their way of thinking, but at least will confront them rather than capitulating to them: make them define their terms. “What is your definition of racism/sexism/etc?” “Am I required to date a 400-pound person to avoid fat-shaming him?” “Must I have sex with a transgender person to prove I am not transphobic?” Etc,etc,etc. But this line of inquiry must be couched in terms of expressing a genuine interest in what the other fellow thinks, or it will go off the rails quickly.
Hmm. Seems like this article should have been written years ago. But it's only coming out now that some in universities are criticizing Israel and supporting the Palestinian people. Hmm.
You do realize it takes time to write books and collect data and research, right? And that these folks have already been writing books like this for years.
Or do you think that Oct 7 happened and then the poor responses happened and these guys popped out a book in a couple of weeks?
Just pointing out coincidental timing.
I've been reading articles about this for over a decade. Immediately after 9/11, I heard the assertions being made that it was actually Mossad that blew up the WTC.
None of this has been a secret to anyone who was paying attention to the issue. It is only due to the Left's horrifying response to Oct7 that it is now "coming out" widely enough for everyone to see it.
Your spelling of "Butthole" is atrocious.
Yay! Childish games! Guess what? There are only two things the C can stand for.
Hysterical, although you clearly committed the unconscionable sin of being funny.
This is nothing new. People have been criticizing Israel and supporting the Palestinian people for decades in the US, including at universities (this was happening when I was at college in the late 80's). It's also obvious that TFP have made clear their support for Israel and have been putting out articles about it since Oct 7. Also, articles like that were, in fact, written years go, as is pointed out in the article itself.
What these people don't understand is that when you shut down entire groups of people or entire ways of thought, those people still think and speak. They do it underground, with rage and contempt. That is dangerous.
And some people do it literally underground, as we have tragically seen recently. But that's a whole different motivational dynamic.
True. Very true.
The authors speak of the Harper letter raising concerns about suppression of free speech and an almost immediate letter published in counter-response...
"In the face of backlash, historian and Tufts University professor Kerri Greenidge even asked for her name to be removed from the original letter and tweeted, “I do not endorse this @harpers letter,” before adding her name to the counter-letter.""
Of course I had never heard of Ms. Greenidge and attempted to look up her X/Twitter account to get a sense of her because - frankly - it made no sense that a professor should have such a change of position in so short a period of time (three days between the first letter and the counter-response). Did she not read the first letter? Does she have a habit of signing public statements without giving any due consideration? How could she have agree on Day 1 but reject and indeed take on an opposite opinion on Day 3?
Hmmmm. How odd. Her X/Twitter account is locked down with only "approved followers" having access to her wit and wisdom. I would like to think that Tufts University is embarrassed by this, but I suspect not.
I wondered about Greenidge also. I’m going to google her and see what comes up. 😁
The inventors of Critical Bullshit, The Frankfurt School, arrived at the same time as Marcuse. Those "Red Scares" got their numbers well wrong and well short. The Civil Rights Movement was knee-deep in Communist subversives from Parks to MLK and all around them. Fascism and Nazism were recognised as flavours of Left-Wing Socialist Revolution (They always declared themselves such; Molotov-Ribbentrop was hardly an accident) along with Marxist-Leninist Bolshevism until FDR, administration seemingly overun with folk adjecent, run by, or actually operating out of, the USSR's embassy, switched the script. China was lost when the US strongarmed the ROC into calling off the Battle of Harbin; the US Army shrank to something like 4 divisions combat-ready; Korea was an implausible draw. In retrospect Harry Truman was making East and South East Asia "Safe for Communism". The UN was a Communist creation and Stalin wangled 2 seats for himself. The history of the 20th century makes a lot more sense when the President is for all intents and purposes Stalin's bitch. J. Edgar turned out to be a very Queer fellow when very Queer stood you in all sorts of danger of compromise. In all probability you had a red fox guarding the hen-house for fifty-odd years.
President Trump better be channeling Herakles - he has rather an Augean Stables on steroids to clean.
No, Steven, tell us what you really think!" But- yes this is making sense to me. I don't know about the Frankfurt School, but I have dealt w/ lefty Germans -who warned my apolitical German friends to be careful of hanging to w/ me, because of "wrong-think"! That was back in 2002-- and I have seen that same mind set take over here !
This excerpt purports to be about the problem in universities, but much of the action seems to take place on social media. When people in academia take a stand on free expression, it's a Twitter mob that slaps them down.
My daughter is in STEM and just applied to a university listed on FIRE’s top five list for free speech. We are taking the tack of change-from-within.
Sidebar: the application didn’t ask for SAT or letter of reference. Her present counselor (and I’ve heard other high school counselors doing same) are all pressing the importance of the essay portion that asks for a student to describe/share themselves.
Nothing seems merit based and the acceptance rate is extremely high. Gone are the days where a student is nervously waiting to see if their hard work paid off in an acceptance letter from their dream college.
I've seen just the opposite impact -- students anxiety-stricken because fewer and fewer credentials are considered, giving the essay outsized importance and rendering rejections devastatingly personal. The damage is compounded because they're so fragile, having never been criticized or forced to endure 'violent' speech. It is soooo important to alert your adolescent children when they say something moronic. Here are two responses you can try: "That is the dumbest thing I've ever heard." "When you say things like that, it makes me think you're stupid." Also, I've found laughing to be very effective.