Did you know “love the sinner, hate the sin” is common faire in some circles, and to demean it as offensive speech could be thought of as anti-Christian?
Maybe someone is offended or frightened by a casual “allahu akhbar” uttered by a muslim, too; or, “Jesus is the only way” by a Christian. So what? We should respect peoples’ right to utter things that some find offensive on the college campus rather than peer-pressure them into silencing those expressions.
Speaking of Jeremy Lin…
http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/15062204/charlotte-hornets-hottest-team-eastern-conference
As has been pointed our repeatedly, these guidelines are not aimed at the general student population. They are for orientation leaders.
And no, when you are in the role of welcoming people to campus, you should not in any way be telling them that you think their behavior is sinful or that you hate it. Or that they should accept Jesus, or convert to Islam or anything else.
If you want to say any of those things to your acquaintances, or to random people you pass in the street, go for it.
First they came for the administrators and professors. Since I was not an administrator or professor, I did not speak out.
Then they came for the orientation leaders. Since I was not an orientation leader, I did not speak out.
Then they came for the general student population. Since I was not a student, I did not speak out.
Then they came for anonymous Internet posters, and there was no one left to speak for me.
BTW, different versions of that list have been circulated for years as general speech guidelines for professors, admins and students alike. While this specific incident involved orientation leaders, rest assured that these guidelines have been have been applied to the general student population in the past, and variations of the list will be applied to students in the future.
Here is an editorial from the LA Times about the issue from 2015.
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-ed-microaggression-what-not-to-say-at-uc-20150624-story.html
Some food for thought on the issue: http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/03/the-glaring-evidence-that-free-speech-is-threatened-on-campus/471825/
So if you say something that offends me, I should respect your right to say it, and not offend you by saying that it offends me?
Some people’s defensiveness over the right to offend someone always gets me.
*Why can’t I touch their hair?
They say that word so I will, too!
Well, I always say this to people…*
It’s as if the need to satisfy solely their inquiries and desires at that moment overrides the consideration of how they affect the people they interact with. The immature level of social interactions shocks me, especially with those who have been exposed to a variety of environments and can’t fein ignorance.
Very simply, the university is trying to help its orientation leaders do a better job. That is part of training. Leaders who unintentionally offend, insult or even just lose the respect of their charges are not going to be as successful as those who don’t. Add to that, freshman who feel bonded to the leaders they respect are going to have someone they can go to if they have a problem.
Those who don’t give a darn whether they are offending, insulting or losing the respect of those they are leading are probably not cut out for the job.
I don’t know exactly why “the same thing happens to me” is a sentence the peer leaders are asked to stay away from. But it sounds to me like another way of saying “enough about you, let’s talk about me”.
In my training to be a church deacon, they gave us phrases to avoid, and this type of wording was one of them. It belittles the speaker’s feelings by turning the focus to your own.
No, sylvan8798, you should respect my right to say it, and freely respond to what I said. It’s called dialogue. If we can’t handle this sort of exchange as a pluralistic society, we are doomed.
I agree with you, Zekesima, on how when offense is taken, dialogue should take place. However, in the context of your OP post, dialogue should be centered around welcoming, including, and empowering new students on campus and thusly list list was created. It was created so that the dialogue between “What you said offended me…” wouldn’t need to take place because there is a greater focus when communicating with these new students.
This also applies to men. How you take it depends on how large the slice of pie is you are receiving…
Not catching your drift, @gouf78.
@Niquii77 Yes, but we can’t all agree on what is offensive. To some, “all lives matter” is deeply offensive. To others, it is a beautiful, inclusive declaration. Should it be added to the college’s list for the sake of the first group?
I saw this cartoon recently: MLK stands on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, saying “I have a dream!” A white guy says, “I have a dream too!” The caption says something to the effect of "this is how you look when you say ‘All Lives Matter.’ "
I think that pretty much says it all.
Yes, everyone has a dream. Yes, all lives matter. But that’s not the point, and it is disingenuous to pretend that black lives have mattered as much as other lives over the last 400 hundred years or so in the US. (Nor have Native American lives, or women’s lives, or Asian lives, or any of a number of other kinds of lives, but right now we are talking about black lives and law enforcement, and it is about time.) Thanks to the existence of phone cameras and social media, what has been going on forever is now being filmed. Game changer.
ETA: I am strongly opposed to speech codes, and some of the things currently being labelled “microagressions,” such as having a fit if someone mispronounces your name and calling it racism, or objecting to the “melting pot” metaphor seem wildly overblown to me. But there is also basic civility.
We should protect free speech, but letting students know about common phrases that sometimes make people mad or uncomfortable it just helpful. I think a lot of students have no idea how some of those phrases sound to others. They don’t have to take the advice, but at least they were informed.
Also, free speech does not mean that people around you won’t be mad. It only means you won’t go to to jail. Some people seem to think that it is a license to say nasty things with impunity. That is a bad idea.
@zekesima
“To some, “all lives matter” is deeply offensive. To others, it is a beautiful, inclusive declaration.I haven’t seen “all lives matter” sincerely used as a beautiful, inclusive declaration.”
I think it should be a beautiful declaration, but I have only seen it used in real life to attempt to undermine “Black lives matter.”
Problem is, sometimes innocuous phrases or symbols get used so often by those intending to offend others that the that using such phrases or symbols in other ways risks causes others to believe that you are intending to offend others even if that is not your intention.
An example is the swastika since the 1930s, at least in the US and Europe.
@Much2learn I use it. And frankly there are some things that BLM has said and done that deeply offend me, but I am not saying it to undermine them.
Dos–just a joke and I guess a bad one.
I grew up with every waitress ever known calling everyone honey or sweetie pie.
My mom hated it ("I’m not their honey!) and my dad didn’t care–they always gave him an extra big slice of pie.
Hmm, that bears repeating…
So our dialogue is for me to mention to you that what you said is offensive or irritating to me because X. Wouldn’t it be more efficient if I mass produce a memo to lots of people mentioning that statement Y is irritating to me and to many others similar to me because X? It seems to carry a little more weight…