Even if we could agree on how to avoid offense - and I’ll note that no one around campus seems overly concerned about the offense taken by religiously conservative folks to skin-revealing costumes - I wonder, and I am not trying to be provocative: Is there no room anymore for a child or young person to be a little bit obnoxious… a little bit inappropriate or provocative or, yes, offensive? American universities were once a safe space not only for maturation but also for a certain regressive, or even transgressive, experience; increasingly, it seems, they have become places of censure and prohibition. And the censure and prohibition come from above, not from yourselves! Are we all okay with this transfer of power? Have we lost faith in young people’s capacity - in your capacity - to exercise self-censure, through social norming, and also in your capacity to ignore or reject things that trouble you? We tend to view this shift from individual to institutional agency as a tradeoff between libertarian vs. liberal values (“liberal” in the American, not European sense of the word).
Nicholas says, if you don’t like a costume someone is wearing, look away, or tell them you are offended. Talk to each other. Free speech and the ability to tolerate offence are the hallmarks of a free and open society.
There’s little doubt but that we live in a world far different from the one I went to college in thirty-something years ago. For one thing, it’s a much smaller place. The internet and modern communication technology means news can travel from the steppes of Siberia to the sands of the Kalahari Desert to the jungles of Myanmar to your iPhone in an instant. The easy availability of cell phones with video cameras mean that virtually everything can be seen or made visible by a worldwide audience in no time flat. It’s exposed all of humanity to greater degrees of diversity and conflict, things not all have managed to handle with any appreciable degree of alacrity.
Today’s world is home to what I like to call The Butthurt Generation ©- college-age humanoids who seem to require ever-increasing amounts of righteous outrage in order to function and feel relevant. Too often, people default to taking offense where none exists or is even implied. Even worse, they’ve convinced themselves that their taking offense ipso facto makes them an aggrieved party whose demands must be addressed post haste…or all Hell will bust loose. It’s a mindset that places their tender sensibilities above any and all other considerations…and failure to fall into lockstep with that conviction makes you a member of the oppressing class. I’m not certain it gets more childish and self-absorbed than that.
Granted, I haven’t delved into the situations at Yale or the University of Missouri enough to truly grasp and understand the minutiae of student grievances, but it does seem part of a bigger trend I find disturbing. The Butthurt Generation © seems to honestly believe their taking offense means there’s a problem they must be insulated from. Immediately. No questions asked. No room for anything but accepting that the sensibilities of precious snowflakes must be protected above any and all other considerations.
The problem with this new emphasis on political correctness is that it stifles free speech. Anything deemed not to dovetail with prevailing groupthink is interpreted as hurtful and hateful speech intended to oppress a powerless class- The Butthurt Generation ©. Speech that doesn’t fit within the narrow confines of the accepted narrative is deemed to be oppressive, hateful, insensitive speech that must be regulated if not prohibited altogether.
Does this mean that racism, homophobia, and other forms of hate speech must be tolerated regardless of the source or intent of the speaker? Of course not…but neither should anyone be examining speech from a perspective in which one is predisposed to taking offense. Sometimes free speech can be and very often is offensive speech. Put on your big boy (or girl) pants, Cupcake…and welcome to the real world.
[B]efore Halloween, some students complained to them that Yale administrators were offering heavy-handed advice on what Halloween costumes to avoid.
Erika Christakis reflected on the frustrations of the students, drew on her scholarship and career experience, and composed an email inviting the community to think about the controversy through an intellectual lens that few if any had considered. Her message was a model of relevant, thoughtful, civil engagement.
For her trouble, a faction of students are now trying to get the couple removed from their residential positions, which is to say, censured and ousted from their home on campus. Hundreds of Yale students are attacking them, some with hateful insults, shouted epithets, and a campaign of public shaming. In doing so, they have shown an illiberal streak that flows from flaws in their well-intentioned ideology.
Erika Christakis’ email was a perfectly reasonable attempt to present a well-spoken and valid viewpoint. Her reward for asking the wider Yale community to talk to one another in an attempt to understand different perspectives on a controversial subject? She was confronted by students angry that she had DARED to stray outside the accepted narrative. For that transgression, students deemed her a heretic who MUST. PAY. FOR. HER. APOSTASY.
“Her message was a model of relevant, thoughtful, civil engagement.” Indeed. In fact, Ms. Christakis’ email is the very model of a request composed with almost excruciating care and deliberation, as if she had pondered every single word and evaluated them for any conceivable potential for offense or misinterpretation. Not that her careful, cautious approach did her any good, because students from The Butthurt Generation © angrily and aggressively demanded the Christakis’ be terminated.
The clip I’ve repeatedly heard of students confronting the Christakis’ is distressing in its clear lack of respect for another’s point of view and its in-your-face confrontational approach. They were demanding that their “right” to not feel “offended” or “oppressed” even as they were perfectly will to deny Ms. Christakis her free speech rights. That’s not to say they have to like what she had to say; far from it. They can revile her opinion from here to St. Patrick’s Day if they so choose…but they had no right to confront and harrass her in the way they did. That they felt within their rights to attempt to intimidate her into mute submission can and should be taken as indication that they’re all about their rights…but not so much about those of others who dare to voice opinions that diverge from the accepted groupthink.
When WE do it, it’s free speech and expression. When YOU do it, it’s the worst sort of hurtful hate speech imaginable…and it must not be allowed to stand.
The problem with The Butthurt Generation © is that college is not a place where one should expect to have their tender sensibilities coddled and enabled. The true nature and purpose of higher education is to challenge students, to force them out of their comfort zone and expose them to ideas they may not have previously considered.
It’s one thing to feel you have the right to be treated with respect and dignity. Implicit in that equation is that rights carry corresponding responsibilities: ergo, if you want to be treated with respect, you must be willing to also treat others with that same respect. You don’t get to turn your devotion to your tender, ironclad sensibilities into a one-way expectation that your free speech rights be considered primary and inviolable.
Today’s college students have legitimate grievances which deserve to be addressed. That said, when The Butthurt Generation © aggressively places concern for their “rights” over their responsibility to participate in civil, mutually respectful discourse, it’s hard to feel much in the way of sympathy for their cause.
If I could offer one piece of advice to The Butthurt Generation ©, it would be as follows: In the real world, you don’t get to where you want to be by ignoring the concerns and priorities of others. Your rights to free speech and expression are no more or less important than those not of your generation. Progress is never achieved by endeavoring to scream over your adversary so as to drown them out and thus neutralize their point of view.
Grow up, learn to listen, state your case with clarity and moderate volume…and stop taking yourself so seriously. Put on your adult pants and recognize that the world is not yours to do with as you will. Yours is not the only consideration, nor likely even the most important one. If you want a world that runs on chaos and righteous outrage, you want a world in which little functions effectively. Anger can be a productive emotion if properly and maturely channeled.
Yes, the moral of this story is to GROW UP! My generation will listen to you, but if you insist on engaging in screaming fits and attempts at intimidation, you’ll get the cold shoulder you deserve. Work with us…or go your own way. You choose…but consider your choice wisely, because it will go a long way toward determining what your future looks like.
