Tips for College Students, New Professors
Are you (or do you have) a college-aged teen or young person heading off to college or are you maybe heading off yourself to teach at a college? If you thought all you needed was smarts and enthusiasm--think again.
Following is an implicit mainstream campus credo you may need to know, particularly if you are heading off to an elite school. In an interesting article a reader pointed out to me from The Washington Post entitled, "The Echo Chamber on Liberal Campuses," I found the following principal tenets that you'd best memorize unless you have tenure:
· Diversity, particularly linguistic and theological diversity, binds and unites a culture.
· Proportionate representation of races within a student body justifies corrective discrimination by race.
· All cultures are morally equivalent.
· Social justice may require unequal application of equal protection laws.
· The dearth of women in science screams gender bias; the dearth of men in nursing does not.
· Diversity promotes classroom learning -- except in English composition, for which foreign-born students must have their own section.
· Hate speech (racial, sexual and religious slurs) has no place on college campuses. Some words should never be spoken.
· No one should ever have to pay for health care -- or condoms.
I assume there are more but the above should be a start towards mastering the campus atmosphere at a majority of schools, especially the elite ones.
Following is an implicit mainstream campus credo you may need to know, particularly if you are heading off to an elite school. In an interesting article a reader pointed out to me from The Washington Post entitled, "The Echo Chamber on Liberal Campuses," I found the following principal tenets that you'd best memorize unless you have tenure:
· Diversity, particularly linguistic and theological diversity, binds and unites a culture.
· Proportionate representation of races within a student body justifies corrective discrimination by race.
· All cultures are morally equivalent.
· Social justice may require unequal application of equal protection laws.
· The dearth of women in science screams gender bias; the dearth of men in nursing does not.
· Diversity promotes classroom learning -- except in English composition, for which foreign-born students must have their own section.
· Hate speech (racial, sexual and religious slurs) has no place on college campuses. Some words should never be spoken.
· No one should ever have to pay for health care -- or condoms.
I assume there are more but the above should be a start towards mastering the campus atmosphere at a majority of schools, especially the elite ones.
posted by Helen at 8:09 PM
17 Comments:
I'll have to go along with JW. The hate speech rule needs clarification. Hate speech directed towards certain groups, so far males (preferably white) and corporations, is not hate speech. Also, some groups are incapable of uttering hate speech, i.e. groups not mentioned above.
Ronin1516 has it right. Animal Farm is alive and well on the vast majority of colleges and universities in these United States.
Animal farm? I was thinking more along the lines of 1984.
It is like the liberal worl in the US became intoxicated on Watergate and has never recovered. So far as I know, President Nixon deserved what he got, but it was apparently like crack cocaine. They spend the rest of their lives chasing that high never to actually catch it.
When I think of people like Ward Churchill, John Kerry, Ariana Huffington, etc, they seem to ratchet up the rhetoric and outlandish looking for that big payoff. But the high is over, it is gone, it is lost. So their pursuit of the unabtainable is sad.
Does this idea have merit?
Trey
Particularly important: *Never* express an opinion, or a reaction to someone else's opinion, without carefully thinking through the consequences to your grades and your future career.
1.) If you're a black male, you need to understand that your moral status on campus is ultimately determined by the most hysterical White Female Feminist (WFF) present. No one will make this clear to you until you've somehow insulted said WFF, at which point you become a 'threatening' black male. After this occurs you'll be treated like a mental patient and should probably transfer to another institution.
* the above can be mitigated by the presence of a high percentage of black females on campus. Black women can be your best allies because they recognize that white liberal women are among the most bigotted people on the face of the earth.
2.) Generally avoid schools w/ a reputation for social activism and progressive politics. Blacks have no accomplishments that white liberals need respect. You will always be their brave little Sambo, your folks will be assumed to be modern day share croppers, and you will be subject to unrelenting condescension by your sensitive white peers.
3.) Don't bother trying to familiarize yourself with the issues of the day. These are ultimately intended to enable white liberals to humiliate middle and lower class whites. It's an inside fight that you're better off ignoring.
For sake of argument, let's look at how you might rephrase these to be more palatable for the general readers of this site:
x Racial composition of the student body at a college should never be questioned, examined, or measured. If there aren't many ethnic minorities here, they must not be qualified to enter.
x White European-American male culture is morally superior to every other culture. Deeper examination will only show the backwards nature of non Judeo-Christian traditions, if we bother to examine other cultures at all. Why should we when we have nothing to learn from them?
x Social justice requires the poor to get off their lazy asses and find a job. The middle-class, wealthy, and those with political power have no obligation to bring about social justice.
x The dearth of women in science is because they just aren't interested and can't work the long hours in the lab. The dearth of men in nursing is because of a deep female gender bias in favor of careers that are vastly underpaid and overworked.
x English-immersion classrooms are already mandatory for K-12 in many places, and with the current visa laws, who cares if the grad students can't publish in English?
x Racial, sexual, and religious slurs are protected free speech under the first amendment.
x Everyone should have to pay for their own health care, and there are too many women in college anyway so if they have to pay for their own birth control maybe more of them will get pregnant and stay home so men can have their spots.
All of these viewpoints exist on the college campus where I work, side-by-side with the ones you list. People who keep whining about how liberal colleges are should try surveying actual college students regarding these issues. Most are sick to death of blather about diversity, gender bias, and hate speech, and they're not afraid to express their own opinions. Don't underestimate the abilities of young people to think for themselves and challenge authority; it's condescending.
Hey anonymous, thanks for your perspective about being a black man in college. Cool post. Scarry, but cool.
Trey
Anon. 11.56
Great comments. I especially like this: Black women can be your best allies because they recognize that white liberal women are among the most bigotted people on the face of the earth.
Finally, it's not white males, though I'm sure we have our share of bigots. To a degree your points fit a Southern Bubba white guy who goes up north or out west. When they hear the accent they assume I a dumb hillbilly. No, I don't like bluegrass music. Yes, I wear shoes. Yes, we have toilets, electricity, TV, running water, etc. I've actually been asked this stuff by people who lived in much more backward places than where I grew up (the suburbs).
Ronin1516 put it best---"more equal than others." I would add that lazy 60s credo: "do your own thing" but I would add "so long as it is MY kind of thing you do."
I am a college professor, and I have seen what is happening first hand. The current crop of academic "leaders" are just as monolithic and insensitive as their grandparents...just in a different way.
ANIMAL FARM and 1984 actually do a good job of explaining how groupthink (a term from 1984, in fact) works. And noplace is more monolithic and unaccepting of different opinions as academia.
Now you know why I chose the pseudonym "Eric Blair," which was George Orwell's birth name.
Great posts, folks.
"Eric Blair":
Actually, the word "groupthink" never appears in 1984.
Changing the subject slightly, as an undergraduate I read a wonderful statement that summed up at least half my classwork: "In college I learned that biology is really chemistry, chemistry is really physics, physics is really math, and math is really hard."
Dear Anonymous 3:09:
Guilty as charged. However, I'm sure you agree that "groupthink" is not only Orwellian, but absolutely describes academic intellectual thought today.
"eric blair":
Actually, no, I would not agree that the term absolutely describes academic intellectual thought today. At least, that hasn't been my experience and I question whether most of the people who allege this have actually had that experience or they've just heard about it third hand from a friend of a friend of a friend who reads Dr. Helen's blog.
Dear Anonymous 3:26:
You are welcome to your opinion, and I am delighted that you have never had a problem with differing from campus groupthink. But like our friend Greg Kuperberg, who insists that politics never ever has a role in academic appointments and promotions, I would suggest a thought experiment:
If you are a professor, try wearing a "I SUPPORT THE WAR IN IRAQ" button for a month. Wear it to all classes, and all faculty and committee meetings. Record the responses that people have to it, and you...both then and in the future.
Then wear a button that says "NO BLOOD FOR OIL" for a month. Ditto the above business.
The same thing holds true for students. Try wearing a "ABORTION IS MURDER" button versus a "I BELIEVE IN WOMEN'S CHOICE" button.
I don't know you, but generally speaking, folks who say what you did above are usually left of center types would agree with the "group politics" on campus. Greg Kuperberg was certainly like that; his politics were reliably "progressive" and left of center. He wasn't going to be disagreeing with left of center sentiment in the faculty lunchroom.
Of course, it is easy for a person who shares that groupthink to claim that the group is fair and supportive and nonjudgemental.
Try wearing the shoe on the other foot....since freedom of expression is so very accepted and respected on campus.
Mind you, you may have found a place where people are supportive and nonjudgemental. I have not. In fact, I have suffered mightily because I do not agree with the groupthink on campus. My experiences have been very personal and damaging to me and my family, not a matter of "a friend telling a friend."
Again, I say this with respect for you: put the shoe on the other foot, please.
Academia is not a place for free expression. I wish to God Almighty that it could be.
And if you hold conservative / libertarian viewpoints learn quickly that anything you can (and possibly will) be used against you.
You'll learn fast which professors will be overly subjective when grading you if you dare espouse certain "evil" viewpoints in their classrooms. Clam up in those classes if you want to pass.
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