That headline conflates a few things. The hashtag collects many individual tweets about thoughts and reports of incidents and perceived microaggressions and creates a picture that there is a big problem of racism on the UW–Madison campus.
Over a few days, messages using #TheRealUW were tweeted and retweeted thousands of times.That picture is a problem for the officials, quite aside from the real scope and depth of the racism here. The picture is real and alarming. The reality is something else, something harder to know about and easy to lose track of in the alarm about the picture the hashtag creates.
“#TheRealUW where the same kids who spend their entire college careers drunk, high, and failing will question if *you* ‘deserve’ to be there” posted @bradinn.
“No one on my floor would use the same toilet, sink, or shower stall I used #TheRealUW,” said @RuffinMcMuffin.
“#TheRealUW is wanting the same tuition from all students, yet expecting minorities to teach impromptu crash courses on racism free of charge,” said @betty_nen....
The real racism problem includes how the people who are using the hashtag actually feel, even if their perceptions are inaccurate. It's a big problem if some students feel they are hated, and the hashtag may cause or exacerbate that feeling even as it facilitates expression of the feeling and finding others who sympathize with you, which might make you feel better, either because you can see you are not alone or because you've vented or because you think those with some power might help you or at least have to feel bad about the way you feel bad.
What can the University do? It tries to use Twitter and, we're told, "is considered an adept user of Twitter":
As students of color told stories of discrimination on campus, UW-Madison used its Twitter accounts to express concern and willingness to listen. “We're listening to our students - please share your experiences with climate at UW-Madison to help us explore needed changes. #TheRealUW,” [Patrick Sims, UW-Madison chief diversity officer] posted on March 15....But, as one UW journalism student said:
“The way UW tweets really bothers me. One time they put on Twitter, ‘We hear you, we live this experience with you’... No you don’t. You’re lying to my face now. I live it.”...And:
Invoking UW-Madison’s mascot, Bucky Badger, as campus officials have done repeatedly, is a classic example of tailoring communications to boosters and legacy families, [said Karma Chavez, an associate professor in UW-Madison’s department of communication arts]. “That kind of rhetoric is scary to students of color,” because they know that the zeal of alcohol-fueled sports fans can set the stage for incidents of racial and sexual assault....There's no pat answer to any of this. Obviously, the school wants to preserve and improve its brand and anguishes over the harm done by the hashtag. This is life in social media, and it's part of life in the real world which is always only experienced subjectively by individuals inside their own minds where they try to understand what is happening to them and what other people are thinking about them and doing to them.
Posts
184 comments:
Class diversity. Progressive confusion. Perpetual confusion.
I think Wisconsin needs to raise the admission standards.
No Bullshit tag??
“No one on my floor would use the same toilet, sink, or shower stall I used #TheRealUW,” said @RuffinMcMuffin.
Really? How would he know I wonder, aside from the deranged implausibility of the claim in the first place. Someone has been watching movies about 1950s Augusta.
No one on my floor would use the same toilet, sink, or shower stall I used
That implies this person either actually hung around the bathroom for hours or polled everyone on his/her floor about their bathing and toilet habits. Not weird or creepy at all.
"The real racism problem includes how the people who are using the hashtag actually feel, even if their perceptions are inaccurate."
No. I would say that it's an UNreal racism problem if their perceptions are inaccurate. It would be a perception problem.
Ken B said...
Really?
If you think that's bad, wait until you see what Whole Foods wrote on his cake...
yet expecting minorities to teach impromptu crash courses on racism free of charge,” said @betty_nen
Dear, I'm pretty sure they'd all appreciate it if you shut up about racism. Most people don't want to be lectured by some know-nothing twenty-year-old.
It's all gone down hill since the school scrapped its men's baseball program 25 years ago.
If, and only if, UW (Who is that?) wishes to "Anguish", it (Who?) should do so about:
1. The lack of strict elimination of waste and fraud by its administrators as is so basic to the horrid costs of tuition;
2. The like waste through special programs for those NOT ready for university-level academic work;
3. The like departure from the basic purposes of any university by thrusting towards UW's place in "The Academic-Industrial Complex";
4. The lack of "due process of law" granted to those accused of sexual/political/other, allege, offenses;
5. The limits on free-speech and academic-freedom as infecting too many universities; And,
6. If UW is willing to go off-campus, the problem of Black thugs selecting-out, on a basis of race, White victims for their crimes.
Time to once again roll out the old saying (with widely varying attribution) that "politics on campus are so vicious because the stakes are so small."
It's a fun quote to research on your own.
In fact, there is a good case to be made that some campus politics are getting serious because they are no longer laughing matters. When law school "research" centers, environmental law clinics and school-sponsored civil rights clinics are filing lawsuits off campus.
It isn't about the truth, it's about SJW assertions of "racism" with the goal of gaining power over others in order to control them.
They are playing the race card on a massive scale.
“That kind of rhetoric is scary to students of color,” because they know that the zeal of alcohol-fueled sports fans can set the stage for incidents of racial and sexual assault....
lololol
Can someone find some black football players to approach for comment about how scary they find Bucky Badger?
And I find it so tiresome that these people think they get to speak for huge groups of people. Were I a "student of color," I'd tell Karma Chavez to fuck right off, personally.
Colleges are dealing with a major problem of poorly prepared "students of color" who are angry at their own failures and prefer to blame "whiteness privilege," also know as studying.
This will not end well as colleges are building huge edifices of administration and luxury housing that depend on tuition to survive.
Meanwhile, education is taking a distant second place.
And a fatigued nation lets out a collective "SIGH."
It's a big problem if some students feel they are hated
Why?
You can't take the professionally, perpetually, irrationally aggrieved seriously without becoming a complete clown show.
A black student who helps a white student will not feel there's any racism. Until then, blacks always feel like victims. Dignity is not being withheld from blacks by whites but by blacks.
The university helps it along because they're lefties and understand nothing.
You get moral uniqueness and dignity only by helping somebody else.
In the good old days , when faced with such deranged creatures as SJWs, people used to take them out back and beat the snot out of them.
Given present trends I think the Good Old Days will be making a comeback in the near future.
“No one on my floor would use the same toilet, sink, or shower stall I used #TheRealUW,” said @RuffinMcMuffin.
That sounds pretty awesome to me. Private facilities in a group setting. Lucky bastard.
You get moral uniqueness and dignity only by helping somebody else.
Another similar thing about human nature is asking someone for help. The person that is asked for help tends to view the person in a more positive way afterwards.
Bucky the Badger scares students of color?
Really?
Isn't there, now, a good set of arguments for re-segregation that would be universally acceptable?
Desegregation now seems like a rather romantic idea, in that hate was caused by ignorance and separation.
There seem to be plenty on both (or several) sides that would be on board, if for slightly different reasons. They do all boil down to people learning that true hate comes from intimate knowledge of the other.
It should probably begin with gender. Men's and women's colleges, though K-12 should be where that starts.
Michael K
I agree. But imagine the rage and confusion you would have if you had been a straight A student in a minority and underperforming school only to get Ds and Fs when you arrive at the major university. It would not occur that you had been cheated by all those As. Tragic actually.
UW-Madison could learn a thing or two from the administration at The Ohio State University:
Kasey: “You remember when you all made the rush down there and chanted to the folks outside the doors, a minute ago? That scared people. . . . If you’re here at 5 o’clock, our current philosophy is we are going to . . . escort you out of the building and arrest you. You will be discharged from school also, I’m fairly confident of that. . .”
Protester: “ ‘Discharged,’ as in?”
Kasey: “Expelled.”
GO. BUCKEYES.
As Rene' once said: I think I'm disadvantaged, therefore I am.
Which is true, so just stop it.
Unless you like being disadvantaged, which you obviously love.
Stop sucking up all the disadvantage. Some of the rest of us would like a little.
What about equality? Let's redistribute some of your disadvantage to the lesser disadvantaged. Fairness demands it!
Michael K: "...poorly prepared..." Sounds as if you've been reading "Mismatch." Careful, that's at least a microaggression.
I'll tell you what really scares me about UW. When one of the star running backs for the Badgers was attacked with a hammer one night on the street. The head injuries were serious and he missed several games. Who does that? Attack a football player?
It's a big problem if some students feel they are hated.
Even auto-aggrieved paranoids and self-anointed martyrs have enemies.
The Social Justice Ouroboros continues to consume to itself.
Good.
Invoking UW-Madison’s mascot, Bucky Badger, ... “That kind of rhetoric is scary to students of color,”
I, too, am scared of cartoon characters, especially Elmer Fudd, that racist caricature of white men.
Many students of color were reeling over the report of a race-tinged altercation at Sellery Hall targeting students who were part of the First Wave learning community of hip-hop and spoken word artists.
I gather "reeling" refers to old tape recorders:
"During our investigation, it was learned that a male student had gotten into a verbal argument with three female students about the volume of music and their loud talking in the hallway and den. ...
It was concluded that this was a dispute between four students – a dispute that had been ongoing for most of the school year."
Karma Chavez, an associate professor in UW-Madison’s department of communication arts
Referring to the science and technology of hip-hop spoken word communication art, Big O sez "To restore America's competitiveness, we must recruit a new generation of science and technology leaders by investing in diversity."
The obvious problem of encouraging people to express how they feel. Oh how nice. Acting like someone cares how they feel is not reality beyond the "grievance" industry.
The way to get "diversity" in science and technology is how Jaime Escalante was doing it. However, this is unacceptable to a bunch of white people who run teacher-training/education programs, some of them no doubt at UW Madison.
I realize that perception is important, but what you posted looks like absolute bullshit.
“No one on my floor would use the same toilet, sink, or shower stall I used #TheRealUW,” said @RuffinMcMuffin.
I just don't believe that. People don't act like that. Not in any University in the United States. Not these days. That someone thinks that people would act like that and that therefore people would believe that statement tells me something about how thoroughly indoctrinated these kids are.
Orwell was an optimist.
Why are these liberal-arts schools such cesspits of racism and bigotry?
Exactly how much "community organizing" does the black community think it can do before they get a lot of pushback? Sooner or later, the racism charges (that have been thrown around like confetti) will be brushed aside. It will be a great big, who cares, you wanted to get all racial, let's get racial.
Wait, does Wisconsin even have POC? Isn't most of Wisconsin just filled with cows and people of Northern European ancestry.
Andy Warhol got it wrong when he said, "In the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes." He should have said "In the future, everyone will be a victim for 15 minutes." And the 15-minutes limitation looks dicey too.
You know what you don't see a lot of? BLM activists going into biker bars and confronting Hell's Angels on their white privilege. I wonder why that is?
... is how Jaime Escalante was doing it.
Had a biology teacher who was just. like. him., down to the fast-foot "Orale!" wisecracks.
“No one on my floor would use the same toilet, sink, or shower stall I used #TheRealUW,” said @RuffinMcMuffin.
Maybe Ruffin is a pig who pees without lifting the lid, leaves globs of tooth paste in the sink and has near-terminal toe nail fungus.
Still..... RAY-CIST!
"yet expecting minorities to teach impromptu crash courses on racism free of charge,"
So now they want to be paid for whining about racism 24/7/365? Is this in addition to the slavery reparations?
I wonder what all the Indian and Chinese grad students/professors at the Engineering/Science departments have to say about this?
I mean, PETA activists confront bikers about their leathers all the time.
“No one on my floor would use the same toilet...
Then stop peeing on the seat and leaving floaters, snowflake.
"I wonder what all the Indian and Chinese grad students/professors at the Engineering/Science departments have to say about this?"
You mean the people who are keeping their heads down and studying hard and will someday rule the world?
I sure do wish the sarc font was working on those "whiner" messages from Ruffin McGuffin and others.
Michael said...
I agree. But imagine the rage and confusion you would have if you had been a straight A student in a minority and underperforming school only to get Ds and Fs when you arrive at the major university. It would not occur that you had been cheated by all those As. Tragic actually.
While this happens the issue isn't limited to minorities from poor schools. It's easy to get good grades in high school. My sister produced good grades without really understanding the material and moved on with unrealistic expectations. She's not stupid, she just wasn't motivated to go above and beyond. Then she chose chemical engineering as her major where she was competing against a different class of student.
After a change in majors and much effort to repair her GPA she graduated and has a good job. The biggest difference between her and minorities in the same circumstance is that she didn't have a crutch to blame her failure on some outside factor like institutional racism. These crutches give people an excuse to fail which a certain number of people will use rather than work harder.
Minorities who claim every hurdle, obstacle, or unfairness is driven by racism are setting themselves up to fail.
You know what you don't see a lot of? BLM activists going into biker bars and confronting Hell's Angels on their white privilege. I wonder why that is?
Because claiming victim status is really about power. As in the power to bring an institution like UW to its knees. There is little upside for them in gaining power over biker bars.
I think what we are seeing is the "flash mob attack" strategy being transferred to SJW social media tactics. These are social mob attacks by people who just want to cry havoc and let loose the dogs of racial hatred. I do not see any reason to take them more seriously than the screaming girl at Yale, or rapper Azealia Banks. Is this really helping black-white relations in this country? I think it has about the same impact as did the flash mob attack at the Wisconsin State fair a few years ago.
Don't use the same sink/shower/stall?
1) How does he know? Is he monitoring them 24/7?
2) If it does happen to be true, it's because of racism and not hygiene?
Some colleges have black-only dorms now, right?
I don't think it really matters if any of the actual nano aggressions occurred,
It only matters that students self identify as victims, and in today's world in which there is no difinitive truth on which we can place our hands we must simply embrace their reality as our own. We must acquiesce to any and all of their demands no matter how outrageous they may appear on the face of it.
They are victims hear them roar.
The advice is the same in every single book I've read about raising a dog: Don't reward unwarranted fear with coddling.
If you've ever seen a dog on a leash display classic fear aggression only to receive comfort, praise and treats from the owner, you get a feel for what they're talking about and why it should be avoided
I sometimes bump into this spinsterish lady on a walk who sees her pug's going stupid ape-shit as an opportunity to extract hugs and kisses and to feel all loved and important.
That's some pretty sick emotional dynamic going on there, but the lady appears to be getting what she really wants from the dog, so tough shit for him.
"There is little upside for them in gaining power over biker bars."
There is little chance of them gaining power over biker bars.
Rick
Understood. But it is not easy to get good grades in high schools with high standards and ironically those students are at a huge disadvantage in the college application process. Because they have been held to rigid standards their scores don't match with those of more lax schools that divvy out As pretty indiscriminately.
@Bushman of the Kohlrabi
True, but also because they know that the bikers would kick their asses.
Going to tony restaurants during brunch and college libraries where studious kids are actually studying allows them to be bullies while simultaneously feeling self-righteous and virtuous about it.
"There's no pat answer to any of this. Obviously, the school wants to preserve and improve its brand and anguishes over the harm done by the hashtag"
Actually there is. Stand up to those articulating this meme and tell them if they don't like the environment to leave and find a better college.
If I was a college student there who wasn't a minority I'd be betting awfully tired of being scape goated and having the assumption that the entire college was a cess pool of racism when all I saw was people going to and from classes.
#TheRealUW is one where people are rude.
Rude people are going to be around you all of your life. You don't deal with them by complaining about them. You deal with them by ignoring them, or telling them to f*ck off.
Why are students expecting the Administration to do something about rude behavior? Learn yourself, student, how to deal with it and don't expect your parents (er, the administration) to protect you. That right there is a life lesson.
Look, Althouse, you are deeply immersed in Progressive reality mania world, where everything is, by postmodern progressive metaphysics, not what it is. It is some other, a dialectical alienation construct that must be critically analyzed to discover the reality of what you think is reality. Only then can you identify the contradictions in the system to develop a new synthesis with the dialectical opposites. Everything is racist because nothing is not racist, and the appearance of equality is the very certain evidence that everything about UW Madison is racist. Those of you who question these very serious facts are defenders of racism at UW-Madison, and that is so obvious from the reality you present that to deny that reveals a false consciousness that needs treatment, urgently.
Please submit yourself to a re-education/sensitivity counselor immediately. I am sure there's a Gulag Shuttle available on campus for the trip, right?
“No one on my floor would use the same toilet, sink, or shower stall I used #TheRealUW,” said @RuffinMcMuffin.
I can only think of something like that happening once when I was living in the dorm in college. There was a guy who was caught urinating in the sink and afterwards people didn’t want to use the sink for washing their hands or brushing their teeth. People complained enough and I think eventually they removed and replaced the sink.
The advice is the same in every single book I've read about raising a dog: Don't reward unwarranted fear with coddling.
I read a book on training dogs by a PhD in animal behavior who took on private clients.
One client came to her complaining that her dog was constantly growling at and menacing her. (Why she didn't get rid of the dog I have no idea.)
The books author asked her what she did when the dog behaved that way.
The owner told her that she would throw the dog food and why it consumed it she would escape to another room.
Why are students expecting the Administration to do something about rude behavior?
Because they can. Honestly, I think they are doing what any people would do when they learn that traditional rules of discourse don't apply to them.
Invoking UW-Madison’s mascot, Bucky Badger, as campus officials have done repeatedly
I think using mascots to talk down to racial whiners is hilarious.
The dean should invite them up to his office for milk and cookies. Later, pillow fights!
But be sure to be in bed before nine!
" I think the Good Old Days will be making a comeback in the near future."
I think we will see a horrendous backlash soon and Trump is the first glimmer of it.
The Democrat ruled cities, which is all of them, will become hellholes and refugees will find out where all those guns were purchased when they try to invade peaceful suburbs.
It's really a shame because there is still a right tail on the black IQ distribution but I think quite a number of them are already in white suburbs like mine. They are the coaches and parents in Little League teams around here. Some are on my grandson's teams.
When I went to college, I never once had the idea the university ever considered me anything more than a tuition check. And I never expected them to. In the end I think it was a good arrangement. I paid them money, they provided me with a degree and I learned that no one really cares about my problems (well, maybe my mom, but no one else.) I was on my own. I learned to stand on my own two feet and to accept responsibility for my successes and failures and to resolve my own conflicts. It was an important part of growing up. This process has now been undermined by the power of claiming victim status. The results for these people and society in general will not be pretty.
To paraphrase Twitter-god Iowahawkblog,
According to the left, colleges are hotbeds of racism and rape, and everyone should attend.
The real racism problem includes how the people who are using the hashtag actually feel, even if their perceptions are inaccurate.
?
The "racist incidents" retailed in that article sound as fake as a LoveWinsFag cake to me.
Is "perceiving inaccurately" the new euphemism on campus for "just making shit up"?
In any event, there is absolutely nothing the University's administration, faculty, or student body can do to satisfy these "students."
Giving into demands to reorder the universe to eliminate imaginary slights will only lead further demands; each more unreasonable than the next. That is the entire point of this exercise.
Pretty soon you will end up like Mizzou with declining enrollment as capable students decide to apply to a university where the Red Guard has less power.
I would suggest the OSU solution asap.
I had a friend in college (1990ish) who'd grown up in small-town Mississippi. He told stories of straight-out racial hatred to which my naive and sad reaction was, I didn't know that still happens. Yet he loved the South, and in response to some condescending remark about how much better it must be for him in New England, he remarked, "No, y'all are about the same - just sneakier."
When I read of these aggrieved students at the University of Wisconsin and elsewhere, I think of the time I overheard him arguing with some black friends: "You're HERE! Look at the roads that are open to you now! You can go anywhere and do anything from here, and you want to whine about THAT?"
How some campus activists hated him for seeing things this way! Their newspaper called him out by name, identifying him snidely as Our Resident Authentic Southern Black Man. I saw that and was furious. I asked if it bothered him. "Why should it? I am."
Once administrators figure out that catering to this sort of behavior leads to less revenue for the school, which means less money to pay administrators, its going to get interesting.
Obviously, the administrators with diversity and inclusion in their titles aren't going to want to curb this behavior. But, what about the administrators whose job titles don't have those descriptors?
Interestingly, the alien invaders are always in fear that the invaded host will wake up and defend itself.
This is a preemptive attack against any self defense force.
Look and you will find Soros is funding it.
Michael K said...
It's really a shame because there is still a right tail on the black IQ distribution but I think quite a number of them are already in white suburbs like mine.
This is not just describing the tail. Most blacks are middle class and go to reasonable schools. Activists obsess over the lower end because it drives sympathy and therefore money. But the overwhelming majority of education system AA beneficiaries are middle or upper class.
Similarly when activists discuss whites in contrast they are mostly discussing upper class whites. Reality is much more mixed.
Michael said...
But imagine the rage and confusion you would have if you had been a straight A student in a minority and underperforming school only to get Ds and Fs when you arrive at the major university.
They *don't* get D's and F's.
Grades from Karma Chavez's COM ARTS 262:
A: 24%
B: 53%
C: 08%
D: 01%
F: 00%
COM ARTS 100
Introduction to Speech Composition (all teacherettes):
A: 38%
B: 51%
C: 08%
D: 01%
F: 00%
Nuclear Engineering 520, Two-Phase Flow and Heat Transfer
A: 80%
B: 20%
Ron Winkelheimer posted: Pretty soon you will end up like Mizzou with declining enrollment as capable students decide to apply to a university where the Red Guard has less power.
And there are consequences.
...see how life treats you when you're no longer a paying customer. Good luck with those loans.
SOC 134 Problems of American Racial and Ethnic Minorities
A: 41%
B: 46%
C: 11%
D: 00%
F: 00%
“No one on my floor would use the same toilet, sink, or shower stall I used #TheRealUW,” said @RuffinMcMuffin.
I'm trying hard (and perhaps wasting my time) to figure this out. I took a gander at @RuffinMcMuffin's Twitter account, and she seems like a nice young woman. Is it possible she's also unusually paranoid, and watches everyone who enters the bathroom with such intensity that they steer clear of her (and the toilet, sink, and shower stall she just used)?
The imagination recoils . . .
Affirmative action literally victimizes the objects of its affections. Its whole premise is that they are victims deserving recompense, thus inviting them to consider themselves as such from application stage forward. The recompense is to be thrown into a competitive educational environment in which despite their greatest effort they see themselves fail or barely pass.
Is it any wonder most of them take refuge in their victim status, projecting their own sense of failure or inadequacy as hard racism in the minds of every white student and professor? Humans have to extract some dignity out of despair.
The obvious solution is to end affirmative action, but the Left's sense of moral superiority will never let them see the damage their own policy is doing to African-Americans or the institutions they control.
I'm not surprised at Ruffin's claim.
I mean, I wouldn't use a toilet if someone else was already using it. I'm not that agile.
Does anybody at the University of Wisconsin ever talk about Shakespeare?
Can't these bogus complaints be considered microagressions against students of pallor?...........Isn't there any countervailing force for sanity and balance in the black community? I have never heard of the black community criticizing another black for bad behavior directed against whites. Can you name one black celebrity who has criticized Mugabe?
Does anybody at the University of Wisconsin ever talk about Shakespeare?
English majors in the Literature track are not required to take a class on Shakespeare.
English. Majors. Literature.
http://www.english.wisc.edu/undergraduate-tracks.htm
Anglelyne said...
Is "perceiving inaccurately" the new euphemism on campus for "just making shit up"?
If they self-identify as oppressed they can pee wherever they want.
Shadenfreude'?
If there are several available stalls, and one is the one that somebody just exited, don't you pick one of the other ones? This student might see every time he's the stall exiter, the new enterer picks a different stall. He may interpret that as happening because of his race, because he's always of a particular race and making the observation, and he may not realize that it it might not be personal to him, just a standard avoidance of the just-used stall, if that's in fact what's happening. He may think about the other possibilities, but he doesn't know and we don't know.
It's sad that he is seeing it that way, feeling that he is hated. Why has he come to see things that way? To some extent, perhaps, UW is teaching him that. But however he got there, it's a terrible position to be in, feeling hated.
It's good to talk about these feelings, I think, but I'm also worried that the talk is confirming suspicions and entrenching the feeling of being hated. That's a tremendous amount of suffering and how can you escape from it? You don't know that you are wrong. You may be partially right. You have no way to know how wrong or right you are. That's part of the burden.
Quite aside from race, many people suffer from feelings like this -- that they don't belong, that they are excluded, that they are unloved.
I'm just an IT guy with technical degrees, but I can't see how you can be an English major, especially one in the Literature track, and not be required to take a course on Shakespeare.
In fact, in addition to Shakespeare, I would think exposure to the King James Version of the Bible (as a literary text) would be necessary since Shakespeare's work and the King James Bible pretty much created modern English as spoken today.
It's as if someone majored in Italian Literature, but wasn't required to read Dante.
I do not see any reason to take them more seriously than the screaming girl at Yale, or rapper Azealia Banks.
The "screaming girl at Yale" writ large poisons every social moment -- classroom, dormitory, deeply private and horny moments -- with fear and loathing. It can cost people their jobs (the Yale professor's wife) and stain innocent students' permanent records (Mattress Girl's hook-up guy). It'll embolden other embedded lunatics (Melissa Click at Mizzou) to join the melee. It'll suck the life out of classroom instruction and intimidate any decent leadership from trying to re-assert adult control.
It puts screeching little harridans like the Yale Girl in charge of the institution. Visualize the future -- Yale Girl, screaming into a human face, forever.
The only upside is it depresses enrollment and causes alumni to sit on their checkbooks. At State schools sensible legislators will re-open funding requests and demand chancellors' heads. In the absence of institutional courage, stepping on the institutional air-hose might help focus administrations' minds on their duties as trustees and fiduciaries instead of their current schtick as enablers.
What was extra-sickening about Yale Girl was that not one person in that crowd of student rubberneckers stood up for the professor. But they got killer video of his humiliation.
Let me guess...proof of ANY of these claims is in short supply.
“No one on my floor would use the same toilet, sink, or shower stall I used #TheRealUW,” said @RuffinMcMuffin.
Nobody wanted to be near a stalker. Color me amazed.
“#TheRealUW is wanting the same tuition from all students, yet expecting minorities to teach impromptu crash courses on racism free of charge,” said @betty_nen
They want white students to take all of the blame for things occurring long before they were born and to be told how awful they are.
Yeah, your problem is SO much worse...
This is life in social media, and it's part of life in the real world which is always only experienced subjectively by individuals inside their own minds where they try to understand what is happening to them and what other people are thinking about them and doing to them.
Social media is kinda shit.
Fire the entire diversity office. They have clearly failed in their job.
Prof. A: "If there are several available stalls, and one is the one that somebody just exited, don't you pick one of the other ones?"
Yes, every time! Excellent point!
You know, if a school hated me so much I had to cry about it every time, I'd probably look to transfer.
But that's just me.
LeCraig, Sensitive White Student says:
If a black self-identified male and a white self-identified male use two adjoining bathroom stalls I will always choose the stall previously occupied by the black man as a message of Equality.
I will do so even if the black man used up all of the available toilet paper.
Toilet paper is a conceit of the White Patriarchy.
I am GLAD that the black man used all of the toilet paper: Reparations start in small experiences. I let the black man eat the last piece of fried chicken, too, but that is for another discussion.
Sometimes there will be a pubic hair left on the toilet seat: I respect this sign of Ownership of the Self against Oppression. That solitary hair says 'I was here and the White Man can't stop me, even with my pants around my ankles.'
A single pubic hair can Change the World.
Bathrooms for Social Justice, People.
I keep it reals.
I am Laslo.
In fact, in addition to Shakespeare, I would think exposure to the King James Version of the Bible (as a literary text) would be necessary since Shakespeare's work and the King James Bible pretty much created modern English as spoken today.
Today's abomidable inability to conjugate old-timey verbs comes from not reading the KJV in school.
It's nothing taught but just picked up as a youth.
Ron Winkleheimer said...
It's as if someone majored in Italian Literature, but wasn't required to read Dante.
Note that Not required to take a course on Shakespeare is not the same as Not required to read Shakespeare. You could be exposed to Shakespeare one or two plays at a time as parts of other courses. ( I'm not saying students are, nor am I saying that is the ideal way to study Shakespeare. Only that we shouldn't assume too much. )
Why has he come to see things that way?
Why has he come to see things that way?
Because everyone tells him things are that way? And he is a doofus?
Quite aside from race, many people suffer from feelings like this -- that they don't belong, that they are excluded, that they are unloved.
I would think that the vast majority of people feel that way at some time or another. A great deal of literature is about just that. Sometimes those people are correct. Quite a lot of literature about that too.
Unless they are clinically depressed the most compassionate response is to tell those people that nobody cares about their existential angst and the should get over themselves and stop being doofuses.
I would suggest they read "The Count of Monte Cristo" and "King Lear." Those people had problems.
Why not go back to what worked before?
Link
they know that the zeal of alcohol-fueled sports fans can set the stage for incidents of racial and sexual assault....
You know what's funny (in a sad way)? The Left loves to make fun of stupid knuckledragging Righties who are so afraid of terrorists, so scared of ISIS, etc, even though you're more likely to die in a bathroom fall than you are of a terrorist attack. The President even makes sure to make this point (less insultingly). Ok, fine--the rule is that it's ok to question the validity of someone's feelings (of fear) when those feelings appear to be unsupported by the empirical (objective, statistical) facts. Good.
But wait! When people, er, People of Color that is, at UW and elsewhere express their fear of being attacked by drunk, fired-up Badger fans, or feel unsafe because someone wrote an innocuous pro-Trump slogan on a sidewalk (in chalk), suddenly it's MEAN and WRONG to say those feelings aren't valid or aren't supported by the facts--suddenly the only thing that matters is that those feelings exist (and are being expressed, shared, etc)! What the hell?
It's privilege, I tell you--irrational fear respect privilege. The irrational fears of some groups are respected while the irrational fears of other groups are mocked. Check your privilege!
This is life in social media, and it's part of life in the real world which is always only experienced subjectively by individuals inside their own minds where they try to understand what is happening to them and what other people are thinking about them and doing to them.
Umm, this is life in Junior High School.
Anyone who uses the term "alcohol-fueled" needs to relax and have a drink or four. Temperance may be at the heart of these tightly wound sphincters known as SJWs.
It may not get as bad as Missouri, since they went first, and likely have a much larger Black population in the state. Still, the Administration is going to be put between a rock and a hard place here, as they try to appease their people of color, while not alienating most everyone else. Still, they should be afraid, really afraid. Part of the upcoming problem (and seen by Missouri) is that schools are hiring all sorts of administrators full time, and converting full time academic positions to contract positions to pay for those administrators. But they can't really fire the administrators, so class sizes get bigger, and the academics have less security and are pressured to work harder and teach larger classes, etc. But, the more that this happens, the worse the school is, and ultimately, enrollment and/or quality declines. They really should be doing what Ohio State did, but most schools don't seem to have the stomach for that, esp. since their administrations tend to be filled with SJWs who cannot say no to people with more victim status than they have.
You know, I think there is an outsourcing opportunity here.
Just like US students who couldn't get into US medical schools would go to schools abroad - famously in Grenada, when they got caught up in the invasion in the 80's.
There are a bunch of Caribbean Medical Schools mainly oriented to foreign students.
Anyway, tuition abroad, even for foreigners, is generally a fraction of US tuition. Even with room&board these tend to be much lower than costs anywhere in the US. There are some great deals in the Philippines, for instance. I know there has been a trickle of US students going to Manila for medical, vet and dental degrees for quite a long time. There are many English-language programs around the world in non-Western, non-"white" countries.
I suggest a standing offer to transfer complainers to such a school with a transfer of funding packages. This should address complaints about discrimination, and should, moreover, be quite educational.
@Ignorance is Bliss
I had that thought also, that they might be exposed to Shakespeare in other classes. But Shakespeare is important enough to the development of English literature that there needs to be a class focusing on him and his works.
It's time for white students to hijack the hashtag.
"#TheRealUW It kinda sucks to have to fund a department that seems obsessed with discussing how horrible you are because of skin color"
"#TheRealUW Simple disagreements with a black student makes one a racist, no matter what"
because they know that the zeal of alcohol-fueled sports fans can set the stage for incidents of racial and sexual assault
Apparently, black sports fans don't act badly. Never would've guessed. Only white frat boys need be feared.
“We're listening to our students - please share your experiences with climate at UW-Madison to help us explore needed changes. #TheRealUW,” [Patrick Sims, UW-Madison chief diversity officer] posted on March 15....
Fire this planet-hater immediately. Climate change must be stopped at all costs.
Ann Althouse said... It's a big problem if some students feel they are hated, and the hashtag may cause or exacerbate that feeling even as it facilitates expression of the feeling and finding others who sympathize with you,
Is it a big problem? For all groups? I seem to remember reading about surveys that showed that Right-leaning/Republicans on many liberal arts campuses felt like they weren't exactly welcome. Hell, the latest story you linked was about FACULTY who said they hid their Right-ness, so imagine what it must be like for students.
If someone circulated a #RealUW4TheRight and complained about being treated with scorn and contempt for their political views would it get any notice, or any respect?
Yeah, that's right, I made another comment that boils down to "the Right doesn't get treated with respect!" But really, though, the University is reacting (and you're characterizing that reaction) based on a professed belief in equality of treatment. That is to say, you're identifying the problem as members of this group feeling less than welcome, and expressing that feeling publicly. Their feelings are being treated with care and respect, and I have no doubt the Uni will throw together a working group and get on the problem right away. Not all feelings, nor groups, are created equal, though, and so grounding the Uni attitude & response in quest to uphold the ideals of equality is an obvious, and ironic, failure.
"It's a big problem if some students feel they are hated."
Um, no it isn't. JR565 has it right:
"...tell them if they don't like the environment to leave and find a better college."
Fun fact, UC Berkeley (of the $15/hr Minimum Wage Rah Rah BS) now says it'll have to eliminate a whole bunch of the low end (mostly student) campus jobs.
http://tinyurl.com/CalJobCuts
Laslo Spatula said...
Toilet paper is a conceit of the White Patriarchy.
Everyone should pitch in and help change toilet paper from white to brown, and, especially for the ladies, yellow.
It may not get as bad as Missouri, since they went first, and likely have a much larger Black population in the state. Still, the Administration is going to be put between a rock and a hard place here, as they try to appease their people of color, while not alienating most everyone else.
It'll be a problem because the complaints aren't even rational. They have to appease crazy people by FURTHER annoying the nice people who don't want to cause trouble. If "avoiding trouble" becomes impossible, then they will stop trying to avoid it.
Part of the upcoming problem (and seen by Missouri) is that schools are hiring all sorts of administrators full time, and converting full time academic positions to contract positions to pay for those administrators. But they can't really fire the administrators, so class sizes get bigger, and the academics have less security and are pressured to work harder and teach larger classes, etc.
The curse of an occupation where a staggeringly large number of the employees couldn't get any job whatsoever outside of this field. Most have no concept of the real world any longer.
It's one of the many reason I want a President to suspend enforcement of all laws except for the most clear cut basic manner possible and demand Congressional detail in the law. If Congress opposes the date rape kangaroo courts, then make them fix it. Or else there will be NO Title IX enforcement at any level.
With that, the administration becomes superfluous. I also think some activists would be wise to send to ALL parents of college kids how much of the tuition is going to pay pointless admins. Include names and salaries.
They really should be doing what Ohio State did, but most schools don't seem to have the stomach for that, esp. since their administrations tend to be filled with SJWs who cannot say no to people with more victim status than they have.
They learned from the spineless napkins who ran colleges in the 1960's. OSU should be grateful it has a President that does something. But, odds are, the faculty hates his guts.
Those hash-holes are making a lot of unfounded assumptions.
“#TheRealUW where the same kids who spend their entire college careers drunk, high, and failing will question if *you* ‘deserve’ to be there” posted @bradinn.
Don't minority students also get drunk, high, and fail?
“No one on my floor would use the same toilet, sink, or shower stall I used #TheRealUW,” said @RuffinMcMuffin.
There's no need to prove this one, if indeed Ruffin McMuffin is a genuine dindu nuffin. Believing such nonsense is the latest in virtue signaling. Accept her word unquestionably, or be branded a racist
“#TheRealUW is wanting the same tuition from all students, yet expecting minorities to teach impromptu crash courses on racism free of charge,” said @betty_nen....
It seems they take it upon themselves to lecture unwilling audiences. Sometimes being a shitshoe is its own reward.
Fun fact, UC Berkeley (of the $15/hr Minimum Wage Rah Rah BS) now says it'll have to eliminate a whole bunch of the low end (mostly student) campus jobs.
The poor always seem to be forced to learn the lessons that the rich never do.
After eight years of Obama, it has come to this. One follows the other. But is there causation?
This episode and analysis exposes the fundamental problem with American Universities; they cost too damn much for the value they deliver because they are doing things they shouldn't.
Administrators view/treat their students like children, not like adults. By extension, the role of the University as "parent" is to "care for" the well being of their children. This evidently involves a fair amount of angst that someone's feeling may be hurt.
If Universities were to focus on teaching useful knowledge to their students and let the students figure out how to get along with others on their own, the current 5 year program could be reduced to three years. For those that can't figure out how to get along, expel them. A little consequence goes a long way in shaping behavior.
Population of Madison Wisconsin: 244,000
Demographics - 79% white, 7% black, 7% Asian, 7% Hispanic.
Clearly, the racial imbalance of MADISON shows deep-seated racial prejudice and animus towards several minority groups. The white majority of MADISON has, in essence, turned back the clock on racial progress. To a large extent, MADISON has adopted a de facto policy of "ghettoizing" its minority population, and stifling their ability to work and thrive and succeed, without the stigma of being an aggrieved minority.
The racial make-up the United States is 63% white, 12% black, 5% Asian, and 16% Hispanic.
This disparate impact of MADISON's population, is prima facie evidence that its housing and employment policies discriminate against blacks and hispanics, in favor of whites and Asians.
Ann Althouse said...Quite aside from race, many people suffer from feelings like this -- that they don't belong, that they are excluded, that they are unloved
Are there? Are such people "the backbone of society," though? I mean...why should we care anything about 'em if they aren't?
"Don't minority students also get drunk, high, and fail?"
Just the first two. Nobody dares give a minority an F.
“No one on my floor would use the same toilet, sink, or shower stall I used #TheRealUW,” said @RuffinMcMuffin.
Maybe a little McRoughage would help.
"Why has he come to see things that way?"
Because our society keeps telling blacks that they are routinely, significantly discriminated against. A lot of them believe that - it's a very effective disinformation campaign.
"“No one on my floor would use the same toilet, sink, or shower stall I used #TheRealUW,” said @RuffinMcMuffin."
What would be reasonable would be for UW to do what scholars are supposed to do: apply a deep skepticism toward assertions of fact made with little or no supporting evidence. A basic principle of a liberal university should be that no persons or assertions are protected from free inquiry and criticism. Instead we get mush declaring that sometimes truth doesn't really matter when strong feelings are involved.
Thus creating an environment in which everyone is obligated to hear increasingly extreme and improbable assertions made in an atmosphere in which it is impermissible to even question whether some of these assertions might be exaggerated (let alone fabricated from whole cloth).
At a minimum, one result will be that at least some minority students will feel increasingly threatened, for if the assertions can't be questioned then how is anyone to know if, perhaps, no matter how over-the-top they sound, they might actually be true?
But ultimately declaring that some assertions may not be questioned, and some persons making assertions are beyond criticism, threatens the entire enterprise of the university as an environment in which knowledge is advanced through a process in which all assertions are questioned so that those found wanting can be discarded.
(And, yes, this seems not all that different from the "you-have-no-right-to-question-my-story" declarations made at "Take Back the Night" rallies.)
OSU should be grateful it has a President that does something. But, odds are, the faculty hates his guts.
On the contrary, like the little old Lady in "Blazing Saddles" who brings Cleavon Little the pie I think they're secretly, privately thrilled since the little Brownshirts are now coming for THEM.
Whoa, the sign those protesters are holding has Bucky in a Klan robe and hood!
Dang, Professor, how can you stand to work at a place like that, or live in such a troubled town?
From the article, talking about the faculty reaction to the student being asked to leave a classroom to speak w/police (he was arrested shortly thereafter):
“UWPD did not recognize Dr. Almiron’s authority in the classroom, nor did they even acknowledge her as the professor when she tried to intervene. This is The Real UW.”
The open letter protesting the university police's actions was signed by "800 faculty, staff, and graduate students." Did you sign on, Professor Althouse?
I like the sentiment, though. I have authority in my office, so if some cops show up and ask one of my employees to step outside to speak with them (and effect an arrest) I ought to be able to tell the cops to shoo and they should have to listen. That is 100% how things work in the "real world," absolutely.
Karma Chavez, an associate professor in UW-Madison’s department of communication arts: Chavez, who studies rhetoric, said the tone of communications from university officials on issues of race has been troubling.“There is a sense among faculty and students of color that responses from top administrators have been made with white parents and donors in mind,” she said. “The goal has been to keep them happy and keep a moderate level of peace on campus.”
Yeah, fuck those Uni administrators for trying to "keep a moderate level of peace on campus," they're the real problem. Revolution ain't gonna come until those bourgeious oppressors are overthrown--their work to keep the peace is just civility bullshit. Burn this bitch down!
UW ought to go all Whole Foods on 'em. Take it to court, make the owner prove assertions that are libelous (slanderous?) and damage the school's reputation that is so necessary to attracting quality students of color.
Teach responsibility.
Yeah, fuck those Uni administrators for trying to "keep a moderate level of peace on campus," they're the real problem. Revolution ain't gonna come until those bourgeious oppressors are overthrown--their work to keep the peace is just civility bullshit. Burn this bitch down!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9L4UrVm8Cg
And yes, that is Eve Plumb.
and this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ytOXXqHVQk
damikesc said...
Apparently, black sports fans don't act badly. Never would've guessed. Only white frat boys need be feared.
A few days ago Joe Biden was reported as commenting the prevalence of campus rape justifies heightened scrutiny of fraternities. In fact most sexual assaults happen in dorms.
Activists and politicians who rely on them simply cannot understand reality.
Assuring the safety of students of color is important given the backlash to #TheRealUW hashtag, where posters have dismissed students as whiners or worse, say faculty allied with their cause.
Oh ok, you feel unsafe because people put up posters causing you whiners. Hey, didn't you carry a banner calling the UW community racists and in fact depicting their mascot in a Klan uniform? Do you think, maybe, that made some people feel unsafe or unwelcome? Oh right, right, right, you were just speaking truth to power, you were just standing up for yourself.
Isn't it weird how some people and groups can say an do pretty much anything (after all, some of these professors are, let's say, not too interested in condemning the criminal graffiti itself) while other people and groups aren't allowed to respond even just to call the other side whiners? It's almost like the double standard has nothing at all to do with safety concerns (or any neutrally-applied standard/rule) but instead is just an expression of power. Weird.
Unknown said...
UW ought to go all Whole Foods on 'em. Take it to court, make the owner prove assertions that are libelous...
That's not where the burden of proof would lie. Whole Foods should win, because they can show evidence that the cake was doctored after the fact: writing style, icing color, testimony of the decorator, etc. In the UW case the allegations are not specific enough for there to be evidence one way or the other.
"Quite aside from race, many people suffer from feelings like this -- that they don't belong, that they are excluded, that they are unloved."
This is how a frat boy ends up getting accused of rape, because he tries to make a lonely student feel like she belongs and is included and loved.
Social anxiety is a very real disorder and many people suffer from it but I can't imagine how it's the job of everyone else to try and diagnose and fix that. As if we could.
Here's an open letter from UW vice provost for student life & Dean of Students Lori Berquam:
https://campusclimate.wisc.edu/news/a-message-from-dean-of-students-lori-berquam/
Did you catch that? It's addressed "Dear Students of Color and Allies". Does that not seem remarkable? How frequently do people in her position write open letters addressed only to some group within the student body (as opposed to the whole student body itself)? Seems a little odd...
Largely because of efforts by you and other committed members of our campus community, I also have seen progress – our campus is leaning into challenging conversations like we never have before. But let’s be honest, there are times that we will take a step backward. Thursday’s entry by a police officer into a class that was in session is just that – something that should not have happened.
Late yesterday, I spoke with a number of our faculty members of color. These faculty care about you and they have advocated for you. From them, I learned there are students who were hesitant to go to class on Friday because of the incident on Thursday.
So, if I'm reading that correctly, there are UW Students of Color who were hesitant to go to class (out of fear, maybe) the day after police escorted an accused criminal from a different class (and later arrested him). But...why? Why would that inspire hesitation? Of what would they be afraid? It's probably insensitive to ask.
They struggle, the University, struggle with tweets and hashtags. Think of that sentence, let it just settle in. Tweets and hashtags. What would John Henry Cardinal Newman think about this struggle? Or Hegel or Heidegger?
#Growthefuckup
" Burn this bitch down!"
This no longer works, as universities are no longer low cost or "free".
This was a popular thing (well, among a few) in universities where the consequences of such attitudes and behavior were trivial. These days most of the kids have a heavy investment in the game, maybe a bad investment, but its too much to risk. Those that do act badly for political reasons are those who don't have anything to fear. That tells you where the real power is.
This will gloriously solve itself, a win-win for Making America Great Again.\
1. Wisconsin will go 'Whole Foods' on them, and we will get to enjoy the spectacle of SJWs in court being destroyed and sued.
2. Wisconsin will go 'Missouri', ... and we will enjoy the spectacle of (another) University destroying itself for the benefit of the misfits.
The institution either hardens against the progs (kicking and screaming, but it does), or it is destroyed by them. Either way, fine by me.
Maybe this is all actually a brilliant operation by Illinois, to destroy competing regional school systems? That's a nice university system you've got there... be a shame if someone tweeted about it.
How somebody feels about their misperceptions of reality should be completely unimportant. Anybody who treats that dumb shit as important is doing a great disservice to the objects of their attention.
Althouse and her fellow travelers are doing a disservice to the students.
But she won't pay the tab she is running.
They aren't whiners. They are political activists seeing just how much they can get away with. As HoodlumDoodlum noted, this is an expression of power, nothing more, nothing less.
You will be made to care. You will denounce yourself.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaz8sVaK8s4
mtrobertslaw said...
After eight years of Obama, it has come to this. One follows the other. But is there causation?
Ask the Merovingian.
The City of Madison and UW-Madison talk about race constantly. They're obsessed with it. It's no surprise then that race "problems" are found everywhere.
Some people look at a cloud and think it's shaped like a bunny. Old white and young black Madisonians think it spells out KKK.
I lived in the South until a few years ago, but I have not heard the "N" word used in at least 10 years , I have interacted with numerous mixed race couples and children and have never heard a single slur or negative comment uttered by anyone within my ear shot, my grandchildren in Georgia have several black and mixed race playmates and my own children socialize with their parents, and I deal amicably and respectfully with black and gay colleagues on a daily basis. To get to point, I have not seen venom directed at any blacks, gays or any other minorities for that matter. This racism phenomenun has to be strictly limited to college campi, just like the rape phenomena, and the only proper way to deal with it is to prevent the opportunity for its occurance by shutting down these hotbeds of racism, sexism and homophobia and moving to online degree programs where these kids cannot be subjected to this kind of nastiness. Plus, were that done Bernie might actually be able to deliver on his promise for free college for everyone.
go all Whole Foods on 'em.
Another sign that the World is spinning out of control when "Whole Foods" is synonymous with "Bad-Ass".
They didn't even blink, and they're counter-suing the Gay Pastor's lawyer, as well.
I recall going to elementary, middle, & high school in the 1960s & 1970s in North Carolina, during forced school desegregation by busing across town, with less racial problems than exhibited by these wilting flowers. Maybe the solution is to stop tweeting and to stay off social media and, oh, I don't know, live a real life.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_v1PH-cs94s
Why would an English major want to avoid Shakespeare? That's like a salt free culinary arts institute. I could understand the physics department wanting to get rid of a DWEM lke Newton, but Shakespeare is English literature.
"struggle with tweets and hashtags"
They're just following the lead of the Obama administration.
"Why has he come to see things that way?"
"Because everyone tells him things are that way? And he is a doofus?"
"Quite aside from race, many people suffer from feelings like this -- that they don't belong, that they are excluded, that they are unloved."
Because once parents, community, and/or current culture do one the disservice of taking away your uniqueness and your intrinsic value as an individual and teach you from preschool on to view everything through the lens of race and/or gender ID, your capacity to view and interpret the world in any other reasoned fashion is gone.
When I first heard Michelle Obama say she "didn't feel like she fit in" at whatever Ivy it was she attended, and attributed it to her race, I remember thinking how closed-minded (or brainwashed) and ignorant of her peers she was--who the hell feels like they "fit in"--anywhere, but especially in an environment where it's likely that these are more "bookish" students rather than welcome wagon types.
Michelle Obama say she "didn't feel like she fit in" at whatever Ivy it was she attended
And as we all know, nothing is more important than feeling like you "fit in" in any and all situations. Fitting is is the rai·son d'ê·tre. All important innovations and advancements were only possible because their originators felt that they "fit in" and had the total support from everyone in their communities.
That's a true historical fact.
Oh, but you should never have to make any changes in your behavior or attitudes to fit in. Everyone else should have to change to accommodate you. If nothing else, John Hughes has taught us that.
Because you are the center of the universe. Everyone else is just supporting characters.
I wonder -
All those foreign kids that fill the universities, and their budgets, are after something thats outside their comfort zone, because they do willingly come into a very foreign place - and until you live where they come from you cant have an idea about how foreign the US is.
There are some (foreign students) that sequester themselves in their own ghettos, but most don't.
Perhaps the correct message is something along those lines - if you have anxieties about university culture, the fix is to get further into it - i.e., 'white" culture - join a swing-dance club (quite popular I understand, daughter was running one), join a metal band, a miniatures-wargame (thats for the real geeks) club, hiking, mountain-climbing, shooting, horses, eliminate segregated dorms, etc.
There's so many ways out of the "box", you have to wonder about the state of peoples imaginations.
Michelle Obama say she "didn't feel like she fit in" at whatever Ivy it was she attended
Should've told more people about how she and Han Solo had the Kessel Run in 12 parsecs.
And she shouldn't have torn off the arms of people who beat her in chess.
Didn't want to misquote or misrepresent the First Lady of the United States, so here's info from an article on Politico 2/23/2008:
"Michelle Obama's senior year thesis at Princeton University, obtained from the campaign by Politico, shows a document written by a young woman grappling with a society in which a black Princeton alumnus might only be allowed to remain "on the periphery." ...
"My experiences at Princeton have made me far more aware of my 'blackness' than ever before," ... "I have found that at Princeton, no matter how liberal and open-minded some of my white professors and classmates try to be toward me, I sometimes feel like a visitor on campus; as if I really don't belong.
Regardless of the circumstances underwhich I interact with whites at Princeton, it often seems as if, to them, I will always be black first and a student second."
The thesis ... has been "temporarily withdrawn" from Princeton's library until after this year's presidential election in November.
Obama writes that the path she chose by attending Princeton would likely lead to her "further integration and/or assimilation into a white cultural and social structure that will only allow me to remain on the periphery of society; never becoming a full participant."
During a presidential contest in which the term "transparency" has been frequently bandied about, candidates have buried a number of potentially revealing documents and papers. In Hillary Rodham Clinton's case, there's been a clamoring for tax records, White House memos and other material the candidate's team has chosen to keep from release. ..."
Through the course of the school year wouldn't a person use every stall, every shower and every sink in the dorm's bathroom? Where would the racists go to do their business?
And Karma Chavez? Was this written by The Onion?
Within two hours of arriving on campus as a freshman, the Dean of White Privilege stopped by with some freshly-baked muffins and also gave me a foot massage.
And Karma Chavez? Was this written by The Onion?
The Onion has been assimilated. A Hillary Clinton supporter has bought it.
Thus you have this:
http://www.theonion.com/article/woman-leaving-meeting-worried-she-came-too-compete-52771
Ron Winkelheimer wrote: And as we all know, nothing is more important than feeling like you "fit in" in any and all situations. Fitting is is the rai·son d'ê·tre.
And here all along I've been thinking rai·son d'ê·tre was a breakfast cereal for existentialists.
Althouse wrote: You don't know that you are wrong. You may be partially right. You have no way to know how wrong or right you are. That's part of the burden.
To bring two strains of comments together here, a deep and thorough study of Shakespeare's plays -- Hamlet, Othello, A Winter's Tale, say -- would go a tremendous way in helping a young person think through all of these questions fruitfully.
Art allows us to do this -- that's what it's for and the only thing that makes a degree in the humanities worthwhile and perhaps a prelude to a life that seeks out wisdom. Beauty, truth, etc.
But my colleagues grew ashamed of this purpose decades ago, whatever the official department websites say.
Now it's just agitprop, invective, and the implication of bad motives.
As we see here, you can reasonably replace "implication" in the last sentence with "confident assertion."
Laslo said,"... A single pubic hair can Change the World. Bathrooms for Social Justice, People. I keep it reals."
Pubic hair was a key item in the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings.
"In fact, in addition to Shakespeare, I would think exposure to the King James Version of the Bible (as a literary text) would be necessary since Shakespeare's work and the King James Bible pretty much created modern English as spoken today.
It's as if someone majored in Italian Literature, but wasn't required to read Dante."
An office mate many years ago who taught Af-Am Lit used to lament the amount of Biblical literacy one needed to begin to understand African American literature.
I note again that her lament was not that the students did not know it, but that the literature required knowing it.
Fabi @2:44 Wins:
"Within two hours of arriving on campus as a freshman, the Dean of White Privilege stopped by with some freshly-baked muffins and also gave me a foot massage."
Why doesn't UW change its mascot to the "Rainbow Snowflakes" ?
"And here all along I've been thinking rai·son d'ê·tre was a breakfast cereal for existentialists."
You've probably seen this -
Sartre's cookbook
http://pvspade.com/Sartre/cookbook.html
To bring two strains of comments together here, a deep and thorough study of Shakespeare's plays -- Hamlet, Othello, A Winter's Tale, say -- would go a tremendous way in helping a young person think through all of these questions fruitfully.
Exactly. I know our host has stated in the past that she is not an aficionado of fiction, but fiction (at least the good stuff) allows us to explore the human condition. It distills philosophy and psychology, metaphysics and history, emotion and reason, into a form that humans can more easily imbibe.
I note again that her lament was not that the students did not know it, but that the literature required knowing it.
The fact that MLK Jr was a Christian Minister and that the Civil Rights Movement leadership was mostly Christian Ministers is a fact that many seek to elide today.
See. There is justice in the world.
@buwaya
That was hilarious.
Can a badger hear a dog whistle?
Can a Badger BE a dog whistle?
"it's a terrible position to be in, feeling hated."
True. And especially if the person who hates you is yourself. Even worse if you don't realize it.
We have hordes of confused people with unfulfillable expectations running around our country. They have more time to think about it in academic institutions but it's everywhere. Black and white, left and right, people are looking for external solutions to what is largely an existential internal problem.
"Fitting in" seems to mean being free from threat. But we aren't and never will be. Even if we all carry guns and weed is legal everywhere.
Maybe someone can invent an app to fix the problem. There's your gold mine, Bucky.
"Maybe someone can invent an app to fix the problem. There's your gold mine, Bucky."
Done and done. Religion, fixing the problem for (guessing here) 5000+ years.
And lets talk about gold mines.
"In the UW case the allegations are not specific enough for there to be evidence one way or the other."
How to plan a Hoax, in other words.
@ Ron Winkleheimer:
http://goodticklebrain.com/home/2016/4/18/which-shakespeare-play-should-i-see-an-illustrated-flowchart
Can a badger hear a dog whistle?
Can a Badger BE a dog whistle?
If you hear the dog whistle, that makes YOU the dog.
HoodlumDoodlum said...
Can a badger hear a dog whistle?
"The ultrasonic repeller emits a high frequency sound that Foxes, Dogs & Badgers want to get away from."
Is BS not obvious?
School can be hard.
Activism is much, much easier.
Besides, what professor is going to ignore a "racism problem" when grading students who are "activists"?
It's sad they're getting nothing out of all the possibilities of a university - no Shakespeare but also no football. For them there is a DWM and an alcohol crazed crowd. There doesn't seem to be a lot of diversity in their lives.
They should come to Utah, where, despite extraordinary efforts to spin yarns, narratives face a premature death.
buwaya:
The Christian religion. The right religion. No silly pro-choice avoidance to reconcile moral principles with natural imperatives.
All accusations of racism are fake until proven otherwise. With evidence, not feelings. Deal with it crybullies.
Victimhood is a status symbol. That's the problem. How do we fix it?
This is all just a sub rosa effort by the University of Phoenix to boost enrollment. I hear they can pay their provocateurs now, everything is going so well.
If you read his sonnets, it becomes pretty clear that Bill Shakespeare was gay, and he wasn't racist it seems, and he was antisemitic. So you would think he would be in pretty good stead. Trouble is, he is hard to read, and sometimes you have to read him twice and three times to get some meaning out of his work. That's the real problem with Shakespeare.
An office mate many years ago who taught Af-Am Lit used to lament the amount of Biblical literacy one needed to begin to understand African American literature.
I note again that her lament was not that the students did not know it, but that the literature required knowing it.
People who despise Christians despise a very large portion of African Americans by inference, unless they only despise "white" Christians, then I guess they are just racists.
I don't understand why, if you are not hated, the non-haters are to blame if the frisson of victimhood leads you to imagine you are. And the bathroom stall thing is pure imagination.
Nobody has the moral authority anymore to refer a kid to therapy.
Why is UW Madison such a hotbed of hate, bigotry and racism?
@Theranter
Thanks for the link.
The most interesting takeawy: it never occurs to Althouse that the real problem is these people do not know how to *think*. Ruffin has been roundly mocked here, and it's easy to do so, since the claims he or she makes are so absurd. How can he possibly know, toe-fungus etc. If Ruffin could but *think even one step clearly* the tweet would never have gone out (at least not in good faith.)
"How somebody feels about their misperceptions of reality should be completely unimportant."
Incumbent upon society is the recognition misperceptions of reality are dna/soul deep. This starts from birth and ends only at death for all of us as that Great Democrat Will Roger's knew and internalized and was ergo able to quip about. We all ignent; 'bout dif. things tho bro.
The time will come again when man concludes the only accurate perception of reality regarding governmental structures concludes kings have a divine right; Saddam stopping ISIS until Bush killed the King Saddam is an argument of this vein.
Of the Sauds the Bushes make the argument for the right of Kings to do as they see fit.
Yet any misperceptions after WWII allowing for the creation of such greatness as Buckley described would seem to me to be having been worth something, if only to me and my misperceptions.
http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/02/24/heart-head/
So some great starting points to consider/discuss:
1. Is ignorance a potential form of misperception of reality?
From here, all I could do would be start listing different forms of ignorance (busy-work labeling according to others' labels and others' arguments when they all get paid to argue this minutia and my anguish as to what-it-all-means lessons (opposite of increases pantswise excepted) as I know now aged what previously was my nature to deny) and apply them to the standard of the accurate or not?/precise or not? conceit.
At what point does willful ignorance, i.e. they are paid to act this way--or Satanized--come into play?
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