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Educator abuse- "a new sense of self"

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Twoapenny:
I was reading that some students are setting up 'Free Speech' societies here, to push back against  the rising tide of being told what to think.  I do find it worrying.  We were taught all sorts of different critical theories at Uni but they were just different ways of reading a text.  They weren't instructions on how to think or part of who we were, it just meant you could read a book and then analyse it using Marxist theory, feminist theory, post modernist theory or whatever.  Interestingly I took a course in Dystopian fiction and the common theme in each book was always that you could only achieve 'Utopia' if everyone thought the same, which meant having to use force or brainwashing techniques to ensure that happens.  Seems to be becoming a real thing which is a worry.  I feel it's what happened when I had my set to with the conspiracy theory lady - she's entitled to think/believe what she wants but she doesn't have a right to decide what I think, or that her 'truth' is something that I have to listen to.  She seemed to want me to recant, which feels somewhat medieval.  It's a bizarre head space to be in just now.

Hopalong:
I don't fully understand how much fear seems to be generated by some liberal arts education. When I was in school people were studying everything (in no particular order) from Chomsky to Marx to Ghandi to Abraham Lincoln to MLK Jr to the Tao or Einstein or Gertrude Stein or Jesus/Buddha/Hegel--whatever there was an individual felt like learning something about. What drove curriculae was curiosity, which is what makes people want to learn.

It'd be a shame if intellectual curiosity was replaced by fear of knowledge or suspicion of the theoretical. And if coercive teaching styles are triggering that in some places, that's disappointing. Theories are just how ideas are tried, get their tires kicked. I think it's as true in the humanities as in science. Critical thinking is...critical.

In my own experience higher education was about thinking, not brainwashing. I know about PC language because it's even happened at my church but I also embrace WHY people are using new jargon to explain how systemic racism developed and is sustained, for example. Read a few books and most of the terms  make sense to me even when I don't enjoy using them; I'm pretty confident I still have a brain. (Though lately...LOL.)

At any rate, these days I'm scholared out. My tired old mind long since learned that intuition, sense-knowledge and the planets of emotion are my sources, rather than abstractions or philosophies. I'm just not that good at it. Brains differ and mine is more like a free-associating dreamscape. Maybe that's partly the ADD, who knows. Philosophy literally gave me migraines--it was like math in words and I simply couldn't follow. Once I was released to fiction and poetry I was grounded again.

But I enjoyed having my mind crunched while I was at my intellectual peak. (Which would be the bottom of somebody else's ocean.) Except for the Golden Rule, I don't feel particularly driven by any philosophy, but that one never seems to wear out.

In society, I'm more interested in humanity cooperating in doing what's kind than fighting over why one path to kindness and cooperation is the right one. Not because "proving" isn't important but because I'm not methodical or logical enough to do that. Thank god for the brilliant people who are.

hugs
Hops

Meh:
Yep, Two, Most classes provide an array of ideas for students to mull over. I have no problem with that at all, I've had some Marxist writings presented to look at. What I've experienced is the opposite, it's one instructor trying to mess with student's identities.

I've recently contacted a group for student freedom and it's located off campus, it's at a different school which makes me feel better. Right now I think organizing is an odd proposition for students because of distance learning there isn't a "free forum" outside the structure of classroom graded conversations. I will have to think about this a bit more.

I'm glad that people ARE STARTING to get STRONG about FREEDOM to be oneself and think for oneself.

Meh:


HOPS:   "It'd be a shame if intellectual curiosity was replaced by fear of knowledge or suspicion of the theoretical."


Hops it's gone far beyond normal. Think Chinese style political education.

Meh:
My University has had grading criteria in the past that was found to be unconstitutional.

Right now I'm going to chill and collect my evidence. I will stew in my indignities for a while until I figure out my best plan of dissident reprisal. Perhaps I will contact a newspaper eventually. At least news reports tend to be searchable for future students.

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