In a guest post, social-work professors Jane Fenton and Mark Smith discuss their research on how students and lecturers bite their tongues for fear of causing offence.
I find that in general society it is actually quite difficult to have open discussions. People around me often start with a statement, such as ‘isn’t Trump crazy!’, and other main stream narratives.
It got particularly bad during Covid and if you went against the tide, you were met with silence and eyes glazed over.
I still have not found a good way of dealing with these conversations. Do you challenge? Or ask questions?
Do people experience the same thing? How do you deal with it?
Basically the 'do not harm' = 'do not offend' principle is a complete con. The snowflakes are usually underneath nasty inquisitors. The 'do not offend' principle is a short cut to complete control over the expression of viewpoints and the aim is to intimidate. If you can't express a view, can you hold it? It becomes more and more difficult; the ideal for these people is to prevent people even thinking unacceptable thoughts. Unacceptable to who? To the dominant intellectual self-styled elite which was once the Catholic Church or, in Russia, Stalin's CP, but in the West is now the loose lib-lab bigoted confederation of busybodies. As Bertrand Russell wrote, "If the only way to create a more just society economically is by extinguishing the spirit of free enquiry, the price is too high". When a movement does not even produce a 'more just society economically' on top of that there is even less reason to be in favour of the expression of free thought. But the fear is always there, and will be while universities behave as they do currently.
I think the problem runs deeper.
I find that in general society it is actually quite difficult to have open discussions. People around me often start with a statement, such as ‘isn’t Trump crazy!’, and other main stream narratives.
It got particularly bad during Covid and if you went against the tide, you were met with silence and eyes glazed over.
I still have not found a good way of dealing with these conversations. Do you challenge? Or ask questions?
Do people experience the same thing? How do you deal with it?
Basically the 'do not harm' = 'do not offend' principle is a complete con. The snowflakes are usually underneath nasty inquisitors. The 'do not offend' principle is a short cut to complete control over the expression of viewpoints and the aim is to intimidate. If you can't express a view, can you hold it? It becomes more and more difficult; the ideal for these people is to prevent people even thinking unacceptable thoughts. Unacceptable to who? To the dominant intellectual self-styled elite which was once the Catholic Church or, in Russia, Stalin's CP, but in the West is now the loose lib-lab bigoted confederation of busybodies. As Bertrand Russell wrote, "If the only way to create a more just society economically is by extinguishing the spirit of free enquiry, the price is too high". When a movement does not even produce a 'more just society economically' on top of that there is even less reason to be in favour of the expression of free thought. But the fear is always there, and will be while universities behave as they do currently.