Monday 23 March 2015

Are we indulging students like grown up toddlers?

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No this isn't for five-year-olds:

The room was equipped with cookies, coloring books, bubbles, Play-Doh, calming music, pillows, blankets and a video of frolicking puppies, as well as students and staff members trained to deal with trauma.

This was needed because two women were holding a debate about 'campus sexual assault' and one of them was going (or so the creators of that room feared) to question the validity of the term 'rape culture'.  Now I'm sure any discussion of rape and sexual assault is sensitive and I've no doubt that talking about the subject can be traumatic for victims but the reason given by one suggest a child-like attitude:

At one point she went to the lecture hall — it was packed — but after a while, she had to return to the safe space. “I was feeling bombarded by a lot of viewpoints that really go against my dearly and closely held beliefs,” Ms. Hall said.

It really is time we stopped pretending we can protect people from the fact that some people hold views that we don't agree with and don't like. Imagine if I ran away every time I heard a socialist idiot challenge 'my dearly and closely held beliefs'!

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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Now you are being silly. Not only are you a man, which discounts your opinion in most of these discussions, but you are also a conservative, therefore an evil, right-winger who probably eats babies, so your viewpoint should never be allowed to be aired, and your “dearly and closely held beliefs” are just so evil, there should be a law preventing you from having them, let alone voicing them.

Radical Rodent

FrankC said...

"Imagine if I ran away every time I heard a socialist idiot challenge 'my dearly and closely held beliefs'!"

You would be a long way away and tired.

Anonymous said...

Though I consider myself a leftist, if an unreliable, irregular oneI can only nod in agreement. See also http://linkis.com/standpointmag.co.uk/GF7eq