A discussion of the state of higher education

I'm a liberal professor, and my liberal students terrify me - Vox

The editorial is fairly lengthy and there is a lot of fluff in it but the author brings up one particularly insightful point -

The current student-teacher dynamic has been shaped by a large confluence of factors, and perhaps the most important of these is the manner in which cultural studies and social justice writers have comported themselves in popular media. I have a great deal of respect for both of these fields, but their manifestations online, their desire to democratize complex fields of study by making them as digestible as a TGIF sitcom, has led to adoption of a totalizing, simplistic, unworkable, and ultimately stifling conception of social justice. The simplicity and absolutism of this conception has combined with the precarity of academic jobs to create higher ed's current climate of fear, a heavily policed discourse of semantic sensitivity in which safety and comfort have become the ends and the means of the college experience.

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At the very least, there's debate to be had in these areas. Ideally, pro-choice students would be comfortable enough in the strength of their arguments to subject them to discussion, and a conversation about a band's supposed cultural appropriation could take place alongside a performance. But these cancellations and disinvitations are framed in terms of feelings, not issues. The abortion debate was canceled because it would have imperiled the "welfare and safety of our students." The Afrofunk band's presence would not have been "safe and healthy." No one can rebut feelings, and so the only thing left to do is shut down the things that cause distress — no argument, no discussion, just hit the mute button and pretend eliminating discomfort is the same as effecting actual change.

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I highlighted one of the points I find most salient.

While the author is a bit more long winded than I think is necessary and doesn't really expand the discussion I think he does make some good points.

If a person goes through life in an academic system that is based on avoiding conflicting opinions because they might be "disturbing" and at the same time live in a social construct where diversity of opinion is frowned upon at the street level is it any wonder that they lose perspective? When this artificially limited narrative can be readily reinforced by the ability to filter dissent from one's feedback loop (social media) the end result is pretty much guaranteed to be a core conviction that on one hand they are a victim and on the other that they are entitled to recourse against the victimizers.

If this author is correct in his assessment of academia at large then it's no wonder that we are seeing social stratification and ideological segregation of unprecedented proportions.

To some extent it's a recitation of the events of the early to mid 1960s where a group of young radicals attempted to redefine free speech in a manner which had shut out open arguments and debate in favor of counterculturism as the de facto accepted speech.

Now, however, the debate has shifted from something being labeled "imperialist" "fascist" or "racist" (and thus not acceptable for view or discussion) to something being a "trigger" to emotional distress (and thus not acceptable for view or discussion). It kept the 1960s proclivity to avoid anything deemed right-wing, but now has emotional security to stamp out the rest.

Higher education is continually finding itself not the place where one can have a dalliance with difficult and challenging ideas, but rather a place where it is somehow becoming necessary to engage in the stifling of intellectual discourse and personal growth in order to satisfy the need to be self-absorbed in one's own worldview.

Higher education, has in effect, started to embrace the culture of the left-wing blogosphere, while retaining its intellectual pedigree. Subscribe to ideas, enjoy some writers (these writers tend to be better than your average blogger), but please don't read anything else that may challenge your preconceived notions because it may offend and it may be an emotional trigger.

The best university professor I ever had had once asked the class "Why are we allowed to speak well of the historical Communists yet not the Nazis when Communists killed more?" (a great question) to which the class sorta just couldn't believe he had said that. (I'm sure he got no less than 15 reports to the Dean for that).


That said I do think there's logic to why American higher education is Left. Everything beneath it educationally in America is Right if not Far Right. Elementary schools, Middle Schools, High Schools all are run by sycophantic social club Esq social conservatives of varying fanaticism. It's not rare at all to go into an American public elementary, middle or high school and see Christian bible verses on the walls and the like. So it's no wonder in higher education there exists a rebellion against the greater society and its norms.

Ryan5 raises an interesting point. There seems to be more people who are confrontational to authority and are always trying to pull rank. It is the "You can't tell me what to do. You're not my mommy" syndrome in adults. My best teachers and professors have always tried to foster debate and disagreement in a somewhat structured fashion. Some examples were group exercises where we had to as a group come up with and write a law and then present it to the class, respond to other class member concerns, and then vote of these laws. Debating slavery was always a good one. My favorite college professors have been heavy into Socratic learning. I pity department heads and deans. They surely get flooded with complaints every time a professor opens his or her mouth these days. I have known many fellow students who filed complaints over nonsense that they saw as "discrimination". Even had one prof who had to drive a student out of the classroom because they were having a temper tantrum about nothing

Is the Tide Turning Against PC? - Charles Cooke, National Review

". . . That so-called liberal students are the problem here should come as no great surprise. And yet, for all the unconfined joy that conservatives will take from such clear and unadulterated admissions of this fact, the important part of Schloss’s essay in fact lies in the first clause of its headline, not the second. We already knew that our present discontent is the fault of the lunatic Left and its many young acolytes. What we did not know, however, is that their nominal allies within the academic and journalistic establishments would have such an early breaking point. If you want to take something crucial away from this story, notice who is doing the mourning: “I’m a liberal professor . . . ”. . . . "

Maybe there would be less of a problem if he wasn't part of the self-destructive culture labelling everyone and every thing as either "left" or "right" and teaching (preaching?) that anything or anyone with the opposite label is your ideological enemy. You guys really don't see how bad this all looks from the outside.

HonestJoe said:

Maybe there would be less of a problem if he wasn't part of the self-destructive culture labelling everyone and every thing as either "left" or "right" and teaching (preaching?) that anything or anyone with the opposite label is your ideological enemy. You guys really don't see how bad this all looks from the outside.

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The labeling isn't bad, and it's often helpful. But the refusal to engage with the ideas is intellectually harmful.

I was in an area where American small government, religious conservatism was immensely strong. The campus faculty generally were much more to the Left of McGovern. We were expected to be able to read Marx, Foucault, Said, and various feminist theorists. It was a wonderful education, but it *was* awfully one-sided. We didn't really spend time with Burke, Kirk, Malthus, and so on. The Left just has so much of a presence in academia that you spend all of your time getting exposed to their work and theories at the expense of looking at other angles with anywhere near the same intensity.

I don't exactly fault the faculty for delivering a quality education on Leftist thought, because it was genuinely great. But it wasn't as if you felt that anyone at the undergraduate or graduate level were faced with exploring right-wing thought seriously. We were always trying to poke holes in it rather than question our presumptions. My venturing into right-wing thought was largely on my own time or as a project. We didn't even have a rambunctious student body in the school, but I would presume if we did, we would really have done our students a disservice.

In addition to creating a closed-minded atmosphere, this emergent ultra-sensitive identity politics just ends up dulling a quality left-wing analysis. It's the same reason why I think any good right-wing imperialist should read Edward Said in order to not only be challenged in moral authority, but to also better understand the dynamics of colonialism. Even if you end up disagreeing with the author, you're probably going to pick up something that was not acknowledged or adequately discussed in your supporting materials.

Jack Hays said:

Is the Tide Turning Against PC? - Charles Cooke, National Review

". . . That so-called liberal students are the problem here should come as no great surprise. And yet, for all the unconfined joy that conservatives will take from such clear and unadulterated admissions of this fact, the important part of Schloss’s essay in fact lies in the first clause of its headline, not the second. We already knew that our present discontent is the fault of the lunatic Left and its many young acolytes. What we did not know, however, is that their nominal allies within the academic and journalistic establishments would have such an early breaking point. If you want to take something crucial away from this story, notice who is doing the mourning: “I’m a liberal professor . . . ”. . . . "

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We might be doing his writing a bit of a disservice. The overwhelming tendency of the emotional trigger is left-wing in orientation, but it is worth noting that his first experiences with this sort of "political correctness" were at the hands of conservatives offended at being presented with a so-called "communistic" orientation.

We have come to expect of our students that they can bitch and moan at their teacher's lecture materials and potential biases instead of taking it as a learning experience.

The university system *should* be a place that challenges fragile egos. Should it be isolated to one ideology? Absolutely not. But should conservatives keep trying to play Internet police like their equally-foolish left-wing counterparts? No.

Right now the Left is making an already biased institution afraid of exposing students to anything sensitive or controversial. But make no mistake, the Right sometimes loves to copy the intellectual failures of the Left.

Fiddytree said:

We might be doing his writing a bit of a disservice. The overwhelming tendency of the emotional trigger is left-wing in orientation, but it is worth noting that his first experiences with this sort of "political correctness" were at the hands of conservatives offended at being presented with a so-called "communistic" orientation.

We have come to expect of our students that they can bitch and moan at their teacher's lecture materials and potential biases instead of taking it as a learning experience.

The university system *should* be a place that challenges fragile egos. Should it be isolated to one ideology? Absolutely not. But should conservatives keep trying to play Internet police like their equally-foolish left-wing counterparts? No.

Right now the Left is making an already biased institution afraid of exposing students to anything sensitive or controversial. But make no mistake, the Right sometimes loves to copy the intellectual failures of the Left.

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I'm not a fan of zealotry from either end of the spectrum.

Jack Hays said:

I'm not a fan of zealotry from either end of the spectrum.

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Neither am I but I noticed that your piece as well as my own writing completely skipped over the first portion of the referenced essay.

Fiddytree said:

Neither am I but I noticed that your piece as well as my own writing completely skipped over the first portion of the referenced essay.

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The current threat is from the Left.

Jack Hays said:

The current threat is from the Left.

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I don't disagree with the emergence of trigger warnings and emotional protectionism. That's been a left-wing development that adds onto the already heavily leftist orientation of university life.

However, I do recall a number of conversations across the country and in our own department where conservative undergraduates started pitching a fit with every basic presentation of materials that conflict with their own viewpoints.

Fiddytree said:

I don't disagree with the emergence of trigger warnings and emotional protectionism. That's been a left-wing development that adds onto the already heavily leftist orientation of university life.

However, I do recall a number of conversations across the country and in our own department where conservative undergraduates started pitching a fit with every basic presentation of materials that conflict with their own viewpoints.

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No doubt, but I don't recall speakers being disinvited because of conservative protests.