I know this link looks weird but it’s safe. It’s a link to a New Yorker cartoon that sort of fits in here and might lighten things up a little. :))
https://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/14192675_1301973083161300_5061992074123408482_n.png?oh=f9dad029e3f2aa281b847d3f8798cf72&oe=584F234C
@NickFlynn: Your point is well taken regarding a commencement speaker. This may be a good time to bring this thread back to SS/TWs. If you’ll allow me to try to narrow your point so I can properly respond, how would you feel about the following scenarios (and feel free to modify the scenarios if you think I’m framing them improperly):
- Law school classroom discussion, in criminal law course, about sexual assault law. Student demands safe space from this topic and demands it either not be taught or the student not have to do it.
- Same as 1, except the student demands special notice (other than the syllabus) of when the topics will come up.
- Undergraduate classroom discussion, in literature course, about sexual assault. Student demands safe space from this topic and demands it either not be taught or the student not have to do it.
- Same as 3, except the student demands special notice (other than the syllabus) of when the topics will come up.
- Undergraduate institution, student demands a safe space from the topic of sexual assault in their single-occupancy dorm room.
- Same as 5, except the student has a roommate.
- Same as 5, except the student wants the entire building to be a safe space.
- Same as 5, except the student demands there be a separate space (like a lounge, or something).
- Undergraduate institution, student demands a safe space from the topic of sexual assault in that their university refuses to invite speakers the student finds objectionable. This is not a commencement or similar, but instead a lecture followed by a Q&A.
- Same as 9, except the student wants invitations rescinded.
- Same as 9, except the student protests in the speech, disrupting the speaker.
I think that covers all the situations we’ve discussed here, but let me know if I’ve missed any.
@danfer1 #680
My point is simply that the existence of disadvantaged white people has absolutely zero bearing on whether white privilege exists. That’s what you seemed to be implying in your previous post, and that’s why I responded to it. If your original post was meant to be a joke or whatever, maybe consider using a smiley?
“Your support for freedom of speech seems to end exactly at the point that someone expresses an opinion that you don’t agree with. That’s fine, but you need to find some other justification because it’s clearly not really about “freedom of speech” for you, or you would acknowledge that there is always a balance of competing interests.”
Pot, meet kettle! No one is arguing that students don’t have the right to protest Rice (or whatever speaker). But their rationale for disinviting her (or in making it so that she wants to pull out, or whatever) is precisely because they don’t want to hear opinions that they don’t agree with.
My professional job involves dealing with data. I specialize in finding instances where the “common wisdom” is wrong, and betting against the crowd. I have a pretty good track record at this, but certainly not 100% accurate. About 6 months I even performed a back-of-the-envelope calculation in another CC thread that predicted the same thing about black murder rates.
Why is the collective wisdom often wrong? It is because people create opinions based upon anecdotes. Consider that many people believe that kidnappings are more common in the US than in the past (it isn’t). Why does this myth take hold? It is because because our brain evolved to process events that we saw and heard locally. Even fifty years ago, we would rarely hear of a kidnapping outside of our local area, but now kidnappings can easily become regional or even national news. We hear of them more often and our brain interprets it as an out of control situation.
Then there is the issue of what people choose to see and read. If what they see and read is 100% bias free, then they would see reality. But what you see and read is not bias free. There are intentional and unintentional biases just about everywhere. If you read the NY Times, you are reading a biased paper. Likewise with the Wall Street Journal. Neither one represents the truth, but the truth is often between the two. And once you get into the realm of MSNBC, Fox, Daily Caller, Breitbart, Huffington Post, etc. you are drifting quite far from the truth. But these sources are also quite popular.
People often forget that a news source is first and foremost a business. If CNN has the choice between two stories, they will put up the one that gets the most interest. Once a particular type of story takes hold, other stories of the same type will appear because they will be watched more often and tweeted about. But whatever the type of story it is, it won’t be that hard to find another story matching it in a country with 320M people. So it is very easy to have a story appear often enough that it appears in viewers mind as a rampant situation, when in fact it is only a business feedback loop between the news source and its consumers.
Back to a brief discussion about white privilege. The reason I say it doesn’t exist is because there are many real sources of discrimination, but they have far more to do with class, education, and family structure than it does with the color of one’s skin. These are the causal effects. Using the term white privilege confuses correlation with causation. This matters because without isolating the causal effects, we cannot put forth the effort where it belongs, and instead encourages a victimhood mentality.
@Pizzagirl #685
This was a commencement address including the bestowal of an honorary degree, not just an ordinary invitation to speak. The objection to Dr. Rice wasn’t to the content of her speech, it was to the idea that she was to be honored by their school. The basis for that objection was her past history (possibly including speech, but primarily regarding her actions as Secretary of State.) The core of the entire issue was about having their graduation day and their institution associated with Dr Rice - it wasn’t even really an issue about the content of her speech.
I don’t know how many commencement speeches you’ve suffered through in your life, but they are primarily offensive because of their droning banality.
Just want to note I find most of the argument with the exception of the 'victimhood mentality" quip to be one several radical Marxist/Maoists among older college classmates I knew at Oberlin have been making while denouncing racial factors/identity politics as “playing into the bourgeois mindset” or something along those lines.
All of them are either White or non-White who came of age as a member of the dominant racial/ethnic majority in their respective societies before starting college.
Found that to be quite ironic.
I am very certain that I have never written anything here which would support that statement. I have never once said that students and or faculty do not have the right to protest any particular speaker. What I have said is that an effort to silence opposing ideas is antiethical to the free exchange of view points that is in my opinion crucial to a real education.
I will also take issue with the proposition that saying people are wrong to shout down speakers, or barricade rooms where talks are supposed to be held, is somehow inconsistent with a belief in the principal of free speech. I am for the full throated expression of and robust opposition to all types of ideas. You can protest outside a presentation on the wonder that is the plain M&M, and make your poinit that peanut M&M’s are the one true candy. I have the right to tell you are crazy for doing so. That’s free speech, and the exchange of different viewpoints in the marketplace of ideas. What I dispute is your ability or attempt to stop the plain M&M folks from speaking on campus, or to disrupt the presentation, because you do not like what is being said. You know, kinda like that crazy french dude said, “I disagree with what you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it.” It seems a really clear point to me.
To bring this full circle, I have no desire to nor do I advocate removing trigger warnings or safe spaces from college campuses. I believe though that such things should be used sparingly, because each time you shield someone from an uncomfortable thought or idea you lose an opportunity to hone their intellect and add to their experience. I do not think that Brown did its students any favors by setting up or allowing a safe room for students who “didn’t want to be bombarded with ideas” that they didn’t like. I would not want my kids studying under the UCSB professor who believed she was justified in assaulting a peaceful protestor because she felt “triggered” by a poster showing an aborted fetus. The kids at Northwestern did not have their “safe space” violated when they didn’t get a solo in the Burlesque show.
I believe this over use of the terms safe space and trigger warnings is kith and kin to the idea that it is ok to disrupt speakers and seek disinvitations. It is at best an attempt to hide from things which are uncomfortable, and at worst a purte expression of power. I oppose all such efforts.
If you think about it, there are many “privileges” out there - thousands, perhaps millions, perhaps infinite numbers of privileges, big, small and even minute.
A gunshot wound victim is “privileged” to go to the front of the line in the ER…black, white, whatever. That victim will have that privilege over everyone else in the ER.
A concert pianist is “privileged” to play at Carnegie Hall. That’s a privilege I will never have, regardless of my color.
A poor Appalachain family is “privileged” to collect state and federal aid, something I can’t do.
African Americans enjoy the “privilege” of calling themselves the “n” word. Maybe this has no value to you or me, but it is their way of owning and devaluing the horror of the history, and it is within their sole privilege to do so.
Handicapped drivers enjoy the special privilege of parking in handicapped spots. Not a privilege I would ever want to exercise.
And yes, white people enjoy certain privileges too. So do wealthy people. So do beautiful people - of any race. These are big privileges.
I may have white privilege, and maybe even a modicum of wealth privilege, but I don’t have beauty (alas!). A black person may have wealth and the ability to call his buddies the “n” word, but perhaps he’s unattractive and he doesn’t get the white privilege either. There are Asians out there who might be concert pianists in a wheelchair.
Lots and lots of “privileges.” Some we all want, others fall more in the category of small silver linings to less desirable situations. We all are cloaked with various privileges and various problems…regardless of our race. But to deny that whiteness is one of these privileges is just not honest.
@hebegebe #686
In the immortal words of The Dude, “That’s just like your opinion, man!”
I have a vanishingly small interest in whether or not you personally believe in white privilege. You’re entitled to your opinion, and you are free to express it. I suppose you think you are presenting a compelling argument, and maybe someone else finds it so, but I just see a bunch of assertions of your personal beliefs. Whatever connection it once had to the topic of thread seems to have been lost a while back, and frankly, I’m done.
Have a nice day.
I would suggest that in any sufficiently large community (which, in my more cynical moments, I figure likely means any community that numbers greater than one), there will be disagreement about what should be done by, for, and in behalf of that community.
So at core, I would suggest that a university community that didn’t contain anyone who objected to inviting Condoleezza Rice as a commencement speaker and honorary degree recipient would worry me, because it would suggest a problematic level of groupthink. (Similarly, if there was nobody in the community who objected to a similar invitation extended to, to pick someone of similar stature as generally beloved by the center-left as Rice is by the center-right, Robert Reich.) Of course, it’s usually difficult to gauge from the outside whether there is or is not such a level of groupthink or not, because such debates usually stay internal to the community—and often even within smaller subcommunities of the community itself—and so aren’t the sort of thing that makes the evening news except in rare instances, you know?
So, to directly answer your question: It tells me that the university community is made up of humans.
I have to call you out on this. That’s really the conclusion you draw? Yes, the more vacuous the statement the more likely it is to not be wrong. But I am sure you are astute enough to know this.
Look, what does the fact that North Carolina passed an anti-transgender bathroom law tell you? That North Carolina is “made of humans”? That’s all?
@dfbdfb, you then draw no distinction between saying “this University should not honor Condi Rice (or Robert Reich)”, which I agree is perfectly acceptable and people actively disrupting speeches by say Milo Yianopplois? You don’t find such behavior anti intellectual? That is somewhat hard to believe.
@Al2simon, I don’t care about the researcher’s credentials. The people questioned in the study are self reporting. That’s a problem.
If you ask me how much chocolate I eat a day, you may get a different answer than if I was actually observed. 
This is obvious. Fryer looked at this issue and attempted to address it.
@Ohiodad51 #689
First of all, apologies if you feel my response to post #676 unfairly characterized your position - I guess I understand what you were trying to say a little better after reading this.
Essentially, your position is that ANY protest or complaint demanding the cancellation of an appearance of a scheduled speaker is illegitimate, because it is an attack on intellectual freedom? I am pretty confident that is what you are saying - apology in advance if I’m misrepresenting you again, I honestly am trying to understand your viewpoint.
This is a coherent position, and it actually largely mirrors the line that the U of C Dean was trying to draw (hey, back on topic!), but also problematic in some ways as well. I’m not going to get into those issues right away, because I will look a right ass if I’ve misrepresented your position again.
(Oh, yeah, and in the interest of good faith agreement, I pretty much agree with you that actively disrupting a speech while it is actually underway is a reasonable line for a college to draw.)
So, being a white, poor, and handicapped person would be a privilege, just because of the white color of the person’s skin? Is a black, wealthy, athletic person less privileged than the white, poor, handicapped, just because he is black? I feel privileged to have my health, family, education, house, and some money in the bank, but I would think that a black person with that good fortune is equally privileged? Why is a skin color a privilege? Why is skin color such an issue still???
Since many people are now mixed races and caucasians will soon be a minority in the US, I sure hope citizens will start worrying less about skin color and more about the things that matter, like character, contributions to society, kindness, etc.
Please go read a little bit about privilege before you post something that essentially relies on the dictionary definition of the word. There are all kinds of short explanatory guides you can google easily.
@al2simon, it’s a flaw. 
There is the issue about Houston being a good representative of the rest of the country.
Fryer acknowledges problems…so I don’t get your problem with me saying there are problems.
@patsmom Post #682. Great comic! I could have used a trigger warning when looking at the Cornell bill for the first time this summer! “Warning: Reading this invoice has been known to cause panic attacks and sometimes heart attacks in parents over 50. Be sure to sit down when opening it.”