“I introduced it critically...It was in the spirit of the debate.”

November 27, 2017 9:40 AM

Laurier University Apologizes to TA For Jordan Peterson Censorship Drama [Vice News] “The brouhaha all started when Lindsay Shepherd, a graduate student at the university, played a clip from TVO’s The Agenda with Peterson, a U of T professor, debating against the use of gender-neutral pronouns—the subject that has garnered him significant fame and criticism globally. Shepherd played the video for a class of first-year communications students. Shepherd, the teaching assistant, was told by university officials that by showing the clip—which had been aired on public television—that she was creating a “toxic environment” for her students. The professor that conducted the meeting, Dr. Nathan Rambukkana, indicated that might have broken the law and, at one point, said the clip “is like neutrally playing a speech by Hitler.”[...] Shepherd secretly recorded the meeting and released it to media several days ago which led to the incident becoming talking point regarding freedom of speech on post-secondary campuses.”

• Here’s the full recording of Wilfrid Laurier reprimanding Lindsay Shepherd for showing a Jordan Peterson video [National Post]

“Nevertheless, after an anonymous student complained, Shepherd found herself reprimanded for violating the school’s Gendered and Sexual Violence policy. In a subsequent meeting with university officials, she was accused of creating a “toxic” and “problematic” environment that constituted violence against transgendered students. She was also falsely told that she had broken the law. Shepherd recorded the meeting. Audio and selected transcripts are below. The voices are of Shepherd, her supervising professor Nathan Rambukkana, another professor, Herbert Pimlott, as well as Adria Joel, manager of Gendered Violence Prevention and Support at the school.”

• Why Wilfrid Laurier University's president apologized to Lindsay Shepherd [CBC.ca]

“MacLatchy said the Waterloo, Ont. university regrets how the meeting between Shepherd and her professors were conducted. "The issue was how — the format of — the meeting [that] was held and the discussion that went on about a question that had happened in the tutorial," said MacLatchy. MacLatchy said she was "shocked" at how Shepherd was treated when she heard the recording of the meeting, which was publicly released by Shepherd on Tuesday. "It's not who we are as a university and it doesn't represent what we stand for at Laurier," MacLatchy said. Nathan Rambukkana, the professor who conducted the meeting with Shepherd, also apologized to her through an open letter. MacLatchy said she wants to apologize to Shepherd in person and said her office has reached out to set up a meeting. "We're waiting to hear back from her," she said.”

• Free speech protest at Wilfrid Laurier University caps turbulent week [Globe and Mail]

“A petition organized by several faculty members at Wilfrid Laurier has gathered almost a thousand signatures in the past two days. It demands that Laurier adopt the principles of free speech articulated by the University of Chicago that place free expression above all other values. "We wanted to bring to the fore a tried and true method that has been used at 30 universities in the United States," said David Millard Haskell, an associate professor in religion and culture at WLU who was one of the professors who began the petition. "What happened to Lindsay Shepherd would not have happened or at least she would have had a defence," he said. The incident is the latest in a string of controversies about free speech at Canadian universities this fall, which have included incidents at Dalhousie University and the University of British Columbia. They have highlighted a conflict between free expression and demands for protection from harassment. Such concerns are legitimate but they cannot be allowed to override the exchange of ideas, said James Turk, the director of Ryerson University's Centre for Free Expression.”

• Suppressing TVO video, stifling free speech, is making Wilfrid Laurier unsafe [Toronto Star]

“To her credit, during her inquisition Shepherd had the courage to suggest that it was not the duty of the university to make students comfortable but to make them think. Had she been given more chance to speak, she might have also noted that claiming certain ideas can make a classroom “unsafe” is, for the most part, an unscientific ruse used by many to simply rationalize censorship. I base that conclusion on psychologist Scott Lilienfeld’s recent groundbreaking study in the journal Perspectives on Psychological Science. He reviewed the existing scholarship on the effects of normal exposure to ideas one finds offensive and found there “are many claims about psychological harm done by such microaggressions” but “there is little to no empirical evidence to support such claims.” Other research shows that being exposed to opposing views makes the vast majority of students mentally more resilient, not fragile.”

• Jordan Peterson and the big mistake of university censors [Maclean's]

“I think it’s difficult for many straight, cisgendered people to deal with trans people because thinking about gender identity threatens their own identity in some way, and it’s lazy and selfish for them to refuse to deal with their own issues. Because gender is so emotional, young trans people face huge challenges being accepted, which is a matter of survival. Peterson is the very picture of white straight male privilege, griping about being told what to do by people that were once subordinate to people like him, ignoring the pressing needs of people who need to be accepted if they are to survive. For that reason, though, he is performing a valuable function. When society changes, as it is changing now, thankfully, in the way it treats trans people, we need to have a debate about it. To have a debate, someone has to be right and someone else—Peterson, in this case—has to be wrong. What is worrying is that universities are trying to stop the debate from taking place.”

posted by Fizz (4 comments total)

Is, uh...is a first-year communications class the place for this? What else can we present "neutrally" as a "controversial topic" to an unsuspecting class?

I know it's fun for people to say "lol snowflakes needing safe spaces" and all, but this is the equivalent of just casually dropping an anti-miscengenation video into a class in the 1970s.

Did she really expect it to be okay? I mean, I get that this is still "controversial" and not "settled" in some folks' eyes, but just dropping a turd like "your gender identity is still under debate" in a first-year communications class is a really shitty thing to do.
posted by explosion at 9:56 AM on November 27, 2017 [3 favorites]

"Hi there, university freshfolks! We're going to remind you that - if you're cisgender - other people's gender stuff is totally a great place to test out your nascent debating skills! If you're anything else, better keep that in the closet around here unless you want to be Speaker For All Non-Cis People! Remember that you'll need to do a damn good job because you'll be doing 101 for a bunch of people who've been shown/told that your identity is a fun topic for argument! Next up - we're going to debate whether women are capable of reason or are just vessels for semen - it's a valid question!"

Ugh, seriously, "is this free speech" isn't the issue; it's the usual politically-motivated trollery using non-cis/gender-non-conforming people as counters. If you want to debate free speech in a communications class, why not have, like, a debate about the limits of free speech? But no, it's always this covertly sadistic "let's make up an excuse to hurt actual students, because if we say 'we get our jollies out of messing with vulnerable students' that tends to have consequences".
posted by Frowner at 10:06 AM on November 27, 2017 [6 favorites]

Nine days ago.
posted by sylvanshine at 10:07 AM on November 27, 2017

Is she, as she says, a leftist victimised by oppression?

I invite folks to study her twitter feed and decide for yourself.
posted by CynicalKnight at 10:09 AM on November 27, 2017 [1 favorite]