PC oppression begins in High School, says Jonathan Haidt

[Renzy]

Jonathan Haidt posted a follow up to his original article. Apparently, the original article generated nearly 300 comments, many of which were from the high school students themselves.

He also issued an apology for part of his original article:

The only other preface I want to add is to repeat here the apology I added to the last post, a few days after publishing it:

My original draft of this post said that the boys were “bullied into submission by the girls with the blessing of the teachers.” But this was unfair and I regret it. The Centerville teachers I met were all very friendly to me, even after my talk. I think they could do more to counter the intimidation felt by students with minority viewpoints, but I have no reason to think that the teachers at Centerville are anything other than caring professionals who try to curate class discussions without inserting their own views. Indeed, the comments from “Centerville” students below, in the comment threads, indicate that the intimidation comes primarily from other students, not from the teachers. This is a pattern I have seen at universities as well.

His apology makes it sounds as if the teachers are well-meaning, but somehow their hands are tied and they are helpless "to counter the intimidation felt by students with minority (ie conservative) viewpoints." I'm kind of surprised he'd be more willing to lay the blame on teenage kids than the adults in charge of supervising and moderating these debates, but it is what it is...

Anyway, he's highlighted some of the comments from the "Centerville" high school students he received. I was honestly surprised at some of them. A lot of ink gets spilled on how colleges are becoming liberal indoctrination centers, but from some of the comments I'm starting to think that K-12 public school must be just as bad.

From a student named Carter:

I have most certainly been aggressively verbally confronted by classmates and teachers when I say an opinion that is not the norm, and I will note that it is not usually male classmates doing this. The issue is not that female students have a strong voice. All students should have a strong voice, it is essential to the learning process. The issue is when students use their voice to attack others in a harmful way and prevent a safe learning environment from forming. It is not an issue that points of view are challenged, and we agree on this, it is that they are attacked. The difference in our opinion is that in my experience, different opinions are attacked, and often.

As a conservative male the difference between when I express my opinions, and when a liberal does is stark.

And the reply to his comment from Courtenay:

I believe the majority of those confrontations happen in instances where others have more of a stake in the conversation than you. By this I mean that the conversation is one concerning, for example, women. Lets say its a discussion on abortion. Obviously the women will have very strong opinions because it is concerning their own bodily rights, and if your comment or opinion compromises that in any way, they may understandably be verbally aggressive. In that instances, you are entitled to your own opinion, however it is marginally less valid than that of a woman who the issue actually affects.

Haidt makes note of her comment: Note again how the social category of a speaker is used to augment or discount the value of the speaker’s ideas. Note also that the exchange rate for valuing identities is determined by one political faction.

I was a 14-year-old female student at “Centerville” in 9th grade. It was an election year. When voicing my support for a conservative candidate, an aggressive classmate called me an idiot. Another called me a racist for not supporting Obama, even though my rationale centered on economic policies.

Teachers were openly and uniformly liberal (you could tell by the posters hanging in their rooms and the stickers on their cars). Their clear support of a single viewpoint seemed to fuel the righteousness that came at me from my fellow students. One student pulled me aside and said she worried I was being bullied and suggested I keep my views to myself. I didn’t want to (or couldn’t resist) and found myself in a constant state of conflict. After seeing a political sticker on my binder, a student in biology shoved my books to the ground and called me stupid. I don’t blame him – he was only 14 too. The climate at “Centerville” fueled his thinking. There were students with conservative views, but only the boldest spoke up.

The student who asked Haidt, "So you think rape is OK?” chimes in:

My original opinion on your presentation has not changed. I think that you as a white male shouldn’t be responsible for making the rules on how we must discuss topics like race and gender. I do not mean that you are not allowed to and I am not trying to silence your free speech.

You don't get to have a say in how we discuss these topics, but that doesn't mean I'm trying to silence your free speech.

The double-think. It hurts.

Your ideas come from a point of privilege, and biases are inevitably attached to your ideas. These biases also come from a point of privilege. No matter how many articles, books, or journals you read you will never be able to fully understand the struggles of those of us who are not privileged. This means your ideas, frankly, don’t matter as much as those who have lived a life as an underprivileged person. In my opinion, from your point of view you cannot see the whole picture.

These are my thoughts, and in no way am I saying that I’m right.

Your ideas matter less than mine because you're a straight, white male. But "in no way am I saying that I’m right."

Read through the comments these students posted...

This is the next generation coming up through the pipeline and it makes me think things are going to get worse before they get better.

 

[Parzival]

I could have sworn it started in Elementary school.

There was a report about the lack of male teachers at schools. So for a pilot project they send some male teacher to the elementary school. Even teachers with full beard get called Miss by the pupils because they are not used to a man any more. Happen in Germany.
What positive role model is out there for boys these days?

 

[demolition]

Thanks for the follow up Renzy. It's astounding how lacking in self-awareness some of the students who wrote in criticizing Haidt are. At once good and bad news. Good because the true nature of these people will become more apparent, bad because it will get worse before getting better (and it might take a long time to get better).

 

[eljeffster]

Your ideas come from a point of privilege, and biases are inevitably attached to your ideas. These biases also come from a point of privilege. No matter how many articles, books, or journals you read you will never be able to fully understand the struggles of those of us who are not privileged. This means your ideas, frankly, don’t matter as much as those who have lived a life as an underprivileged person. In my opinion, from your point of view you cannot see the whole picture.

These are my thoughts, and in no way am I saying that I’m right.

Your ideas matter less than mine because you're a straight, white male. But "in no way am I saying that I’m right."

Read through the comments these students posted...

This is the next generation coming up through the pipeline and it makes me think things are going to get worse before they get better.

It is interesting how the next generation coming up appears to lack empathy- the ability to see things from other peoples perspectives without necessarily agreeing with their point of view. I also find the comment that no matter how many books etc. Haidt reads, the student believes he will never be able to gain any insight into the perspective of the "non-privileged" to be ridiculous.

The whole point of, and greatest thing about literature, is that it puts the reader into the different perspectives of the characters. In reading I have been the conflicted man in "Crime in Punishment", I have been the poor Chinese peasant in the "Good Earth". I have been the subject of prejudice in "To Kill a Mockingbird." I have been creatures from other galaxies and dimensions with completely alien thought patterns. Even stranger I have been a woman (character- don't get ideas!)

In other words, great literature gives a person empathy by allowing them to see through the eyes of others.

It isn't Haidt who has the problem, its the little fuckers who don't read literature.

 

[Fast Eddie]

Nope.

 

[Parzival]

I believe the majority of those confrontations happen in instances where others have more of a stake in the conversation than you. By this I mean that the conversation is one concerning, for example, women. Lets say its a discussion on abortion. Obviously the women will have very strong opinions because it is concerning their own bodily rights, and if your comment or opinion compromises that in any way, they may understandably be verbally aggressive. In that instances, you are entitled to your own opinion, however it is marginally less valid than that of a woman who the issue actually affects.

Haidt makes note of her comment: Note again how the social category of a speaker is used to augment or discount the value of the speaker’s ideas. Note also that the exchange rate for valuing identities is determined by one political faction.

My original opinion on your presentation has not changed. I think that you as a white male shouldn’t be responsible for making the rules on how we must discuss topics like race and gender. I do not mean that you are not allowed to and I am not trying to silence your free speech.

You don't get to have a say in how we discuss these topics, but that doesn't mean I'm trying to silence your free speech.

The double-think. It hurts.

The whole PC stuff is strange. So the value of an opinion is not related to facts and argument. No its related if you are in or not. The abortion topic for example. The opinion of a man is less worth because he is a man. Same for other gender or race topics.
But with this logic you say, any opinion can be lower when you are not in the right gender or race. From this is just a small step to say, the opinion of a white male is in general less worth.
Its racism. Nothing less. Its like the same when I say the opinion of a black or turkish person is lower just because it's a black or turkish person.

By this there is a clear proof that the PC is not about justice. Equality means only equality to the own group. And in this case SJW. A clear connection to the communist viewpoints of silence the others in the sake of their new utopia. It's driven by anger and fear. Inferior feelings and hyper sensitive people. And for what? For the sake of their dream of a new brave world.

The things they fight are the things they are.

 

[Earplugs]

It's been weird for me because I've been in the generation of the transition.
Going to high school, not many people had cell phones. By the end, most people had a basic phones and iphones/androids were popping up. There wasn't much PC back in 2010.

Onward to 2010-Present day in university. They have a social justice club space where it's required to take "sensitivity training" for 2 hours to be able to host club meetings. I attended the training and learnt about "gender identities & gender attractions, as well as privilege." I attended because I had to in order to host meetings for the 2 student groups I had created and was running.

I clashed heads repeatedly in this "pride space" and ignored any SJW that tried to bother us. Same old guilt tatics, shaming, appealing to emotions, logically fallacies gallore, incorrect feminist "facts."

Since then I've withdrawn from social groups and just stuck to attending class and taken a position in the universities executive council in the accounting society. Can't risk "offending someone" on campus with my ability to attend university. Shitty that it's coming to this. And more people are becoming conscious of these trends.

 

[Paracelsus]

It is interesting how the next generation coming up appears to lack empathy- the ability to see things from other peoples perspectives without necessarily agreeing with their point of view. I also find the comment that no matter how many books etc. Haidt reads, the student believes he will never be able to gain any insight into the perspective of the "non-privileged" to be ridiculous.

The whole point of, and greatest thing about literature, is that it puts the reader into the different perspectives of the characters. In reading I have been the conflicted man in "Crime in Punishment", I have been the poor Chinese peasant in the "Good Earth". I have been the subject of prejudice in "To Kill a Mockingbird." I have been creatures from other galaxies and dimensions with completely alien thought patterns. Even stranger I have been a woman (character- don't get ideas!)

In other words, great literature gives a person empathy by allowing them to see through the eyes of others.

It isn't Haidt who has the problem, its the little fuckers who don't read literature.

Want to troll a SJW, expand if not possibly break their cosseted little minds? Have them read Nabokov's Lolita.

There's a Lit professor-cum-shitty-author with the hilariously appropriate name of Francine Prose who mentions something in passing about this in her book ... or it might be Sven Birkerts, I can't remember ... but she/he observes much the same thing. Her literature students are so conditioned to look for buzzwords -- privilege, politics, gender, etc, etc -- they have almost lost the ability to actually slow down, visualise, empathise and actually read the great books they're assigned to.

Robert McKee, basically one of the best writing teachers on the planet, troublingly observes much the same thing in writers themselves: when he was young, creative writing was taught by looking at what he called the 'big muscle movements' of story: conflict, character, rising action, and so on -- looking at stories from the inside out. But as fashion in literature changed, the way of teaching story analysis and writing stories also changed to focus on external factors and the author's biases in writing the story: gender, race, society, feminism, political commentary -- looking at stories from the outside in. Consequently, McKee observes that a writer emerging from a Fine Arts course often has a very good grounding in the writer's place in society but knows practically nothing about how to write a good story.

Jumping to another text, David Farland (pen name for Dave Wolverton - he's had his hand in everything from Star Wars to his own Runelords series to some part in writing big computer games franchises) basically sums it up like this: prior to roughly 1900 or so, all stories were basically told from the standard Aristotlean model: inciting incident --> rising action --> climax --> denouement. But in many genres the mould apparently got so rigid that it invited a counterculture, and a bunch of fuckheads like Virginia Woolf who began to bray that a story could be anything the writer said it was, and began to write (beautifully-prosed) vignettes and slice-of-lifes and what have you, which might have excited some neurons in the back of the brain but did fuck all for your heart and soul.

That post-modernist infection remains in present literature, so much so that you actually have to get away from literature studies and into "how to" books on writing from (supposedly inferior) authors to actually learn the basics of how to actually write a story. Add to that the really fucking annoying elitist mindset that some writers have towards fiction as "ahhht, dahhhling" and there's no wonder why we get shitpiles like If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love winning the Hugo and traditional publishing houses slowly going down the tubes.

I respect good classics, certainly -- some older classics are to the mind as the deadlift is to the body -- but I respect a good story that gets me excited, that makes me feel something, just as much if not more.

 

[RatInTheWoods]

This was a brilliant read/listen.

Thanks for sharing