You have to tap your card on a reader to get into the courtyards.
To answer a question from a few pages back, is Yale more isolated? No, I don’t think so. Dartmouth is in the middle of nowhere. Princeton is in an upper class town. Yale is in a small city with actual problems and it doesn’t take much time on campus to see them if you pay any attention at all. And New Haven, which I love, has much more going on, particularly with restaurants, in the “city” part a block further from campus. Shopping/retail around campus is scattered, with some near the Old Campus, some extending past TD, some going up Elm, some up Chapel, some don past the Green (past Admissions), etc.
But that said, one reason people would be trying to get into a frat party - see other threads about that “issue” - is there can at times be a dearth of party activity. That has been true since the drinking age was raised from 18.
I admit I haven’t watched the entire video, but as I understand it, the entirety of the “unacceptable behavior” is having a screaming argument. No violence, no underlying misbehavior, just someone losing their temper and screaming. So we have a screaming (on one side) argument, in the private courtyard of the house, among members of the household.
It’s not like the screaming argument sheds light on some malfeasance in the household. It’s just a screaming argument. This does not belong on YouTube; it’s a violation of the students’ privacy.
@exacademic: Thanks for the quote. I have read both the original Halloween email and the EC email. I thought both were perfectly reasonable.
EC did use the words “safe space,” I agree. It is clear from the context that she did not mean it as a term of art such as the students are using. For example, she says they should confront people about their beliefs, which is precisely what the students advocate against on the theory it makes some students feel unsafe. She means “safe space” not as a place where people are necessarily comfortable expressing every idea, but where the authority won’t prevent it.
What Hunt says is mostly right, but I do think the analogy between a RC courtyard and a dorm common room can only be pushed so far. But one small nuance that might be relevant … if memory serves, the courtyard is visible by observers standing on the street outside the gates, so it could e.g. be filmed by a TV crew (the gates to the courtyards were locked as a safety issue … Yale is in New Haven after all If the safety issue didn’t exist then I bet Yale would prefer these spaces to be public.)
Second, I would observe that many demonstrating students were also filming the incident. I am sure that if the video looked supportive to their “side” then they would be the ones posting the video and wouldn’t be making this criticism. I’m not really prepared to grant them the moral high ground with respect to this issue. The distinction between a student filming the incident and an invited guest doing the filming is too subtle for my limited faculties to comprehend Regardless, no matter who did the filming, what happened, happened.
@mom2and,
The costumes are all linked from the initial Pinterest page of recommended costumes. The way Pinterest works is that it’s a sort of aggregator. The Yale page is a collection of other people’s pages, with names like “10 Last Minute Costumes.” While I didn’t see anything inappropriate on the initial Yale page, no one would stop there because the majority of the costumes are on the individual pages. It’s when you click on any of those links that you come to the problematic costumes. I’m not sure I’m explaining this well, but as an analogy, it would be like a CNN home page where there’s nothing offensive on the initial page but something disturbing within the stories. One would have the option to stop at the headlines but no one does.
The mature woman will speak to the man about the photo PRIVATELY and DIRECTLY. He will explain the circumstances. If it is what you suggest–a person losing 200 lbs who is proud of their achievement–she will say “Isn’t that wonderful. Good for her (or you). I’m glad we talked. I didn’t think you were the kind of person who would have a pin-up in the office.” The person with the pin-up will then be able to consider whether it should be moved to a place where is is harder for passers-by to see it, or whether it should stay.
In other words, IMNSHO, the answer is yes, yes, and yes.
BTW, if the person in the photo is the poster post-transitioning, then that person is not a “man.” How can you be so insensitive. /sarcasm
I actually worked in an office where a woman had a newspaper clipping photo of herself and a friend, both bikini-clad, running out of the surf, prominently posted on the wall of her work area, which was a semi-reception position, so visible to everyone who came and went, including clients. She was very attractive, and proud of it. ( Her (female) boss encouraged this, and would make a point of introducing her to executives at company parties, at which she was always more scantily clad than the other women. It was a little weird, to tell you the truth.)
One day I saw a piece on the TV about sexual harassment in the work place, and with a voice over that talked about “displaying porn” the camera panned over that very picture, in another workplace! I made the mistake of telling her about it the next morning. (In our office the photo was taken as one of those eyeroll things.) She immediately burst into tears, and ran to her boss, who picked up the phone and called the tv station, trying to get them to edit the photo out, saying it was innocent fun, not porn, etc, etc.
An interesting situation.
BTW, it would appear that the Christakises may not be ideally suited to the role of Master at Yale. Unfortunately, if they step down from that now, it will be seen as kowtowing to students having a tantrum against free speech.
Wonder how many colleges/universities have updated their filming policy with the availability of smartphones, as this line is now out of date and would essentially prevent the use of such devices, even by students:
OK, so it seems the video should be taken down because that it not a space in which permission was given to film. Is this much different from the frat boys on the bus? The discussion is really a moot point, since the video is out there and widely viewed.
I am very sympathetic to the young woman who screamed, even though her behavior was wrong. I hope she can be welcomed back to campus to complete her education. Being driven off campus is a high price to pay for an angry outburst.
It’s a good thing athletic coaches don’t routinely get fired over angry outbursts. There would be no sports left.
My view of this situation has evolved, somewhat. I still think the students overreacted to the e-mail, and to the SAE accusation, and that some of their overreaction threatens free speech–but I no longer think their reaction is totally crazy, given the overall context. The way I would put it is that some students made some pretty bad mistakes in responding to concerns that are real. You can’t spit on people, period.
Well, one could argue that EC supports a place where you are safe TO hurt rather than FROM hurt and that’s where she and the students part company. And NC seems to be taking the same stance in the courtyard when the kid says you want to protect speech even when it hurts me and his response is especially when it hurts you. Personally, judging from what I’ve seen/read about this episode, my impression EC is that a sloppy thinker and writer and NC loves a good argument and is socially tone deaf and that each has done a poor job of representing a more defensible position, but I can certainly see how the students would read/experience what has happened in the way I’ve suggested.
Here is an OPED published today from Lukianoff regarding the Yale controversy. In it, he says he was invited to speak at Silliman, and just happened to be there when the confrontation on the quad occurred.
"I was visiting to give a long-planned lecture on campus free speech. When I showed up, students were in an uproar over an email sent by one of the heads of the very dormitory where I was scheduled to speak.
I managed to record some of the confrontation, knowing that the easiest way for Nicholas to be fired would be for a student to claim that he flew off the handle. But he didn’t. Instead, Nicholas addressed the crowd for more than an hour, even after it became clear that nothing short of begging for forgiveness would satisfy them. As Nicholas vigorously but respectfully defended the principles of free expression, students cried, shouted, and cursed at him. One even demanded his resignation.
In today’s campus climate, when professors find themselves on the “wrong” side of the culture war, even those with tenure can find their jobs in jeopardy. I have seen time and again university administrations press faculty to resign for their controversial expression. The university usually tries to make the resignation look like it was the professor’s own decision. If this were to happen at Yale, it would be a chilling warning to future faculty and students that if you even mildly question the prevailing orthodoxy on campus, you will have hell to pay.
Yale students, alumni, and members of the public must demand that the Christakises face no threat of punishment, and if either professor steps down now or in the coming months, it must be understood to represent Yale’s glaring failure to live up to its own glowing promises to protect and honor freedom of speech on campus."
Actually, there is as customers hiring out a car or a bus do not have a reasonable expectation of privacy as the car/bus company can and do legally reserve the right to film customers for accountability/safety reasons in case the customers attempt to abscond without paying or act rowdy and violent to the point of damaging the bus or hurting the driver. Even when the customer hires out the car/bus…the vehicle and control of it still remains the domain of the driver or car/bus company…not the customers.
This is one reason the ex-Taco Bell Communications executive whose assault of the uber driver was videoed by the driver is extremely unlikely to be taken seriously if he attempts to sue the uber driver for “violating his privacy”.
If the safety issue didn’t exist then I bet Yale would prefer these spaces to be public.)