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vincentML -> RE: Maybe there's hope... (8/27/2016 11:50:41 AM)
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quote:
The University of Chicago, one of America’s most prestigious and selective universities, is warning incoming students starting this fall not to expect safe spaces and a trigger-free existence during their four-year journey through academia.
Maybe a good idea. However, does freedom of speech also include the right not to listen? For example, suppose a professor at the university scheduled a guest lecture by a prominent alt-right person who advocated for Hitler's anti-queer and anti-Jew ideology? Should students in his class not receive a trigger warning? Should all be compelled to attend?
Safe Space creates welcoming physical spaces on campus where LGBTQ students can have a conversation with students, staff and faculty knowing that they have a basic understanding of the challenges these students face in developing their identities. The visibility of the signs on the doors and in the offices of individuals who have participated in the trainings serves to increase the overall visibility of the ally community on campus, creating a welcoming environment for LGBTQ students. The presence of these signs indicates that the University is committed to supporting the LGBTQ community. Finally, the decals also serve to increase the number of LGBTQ students at an institution. Many prospective students look for the presence for a program like Safe Space to help them determine if an institution is welcoming of LGBTQ students.
source
Or in the case of rape victims on campus (apparently it does occur)
So when she heard last fall that a student group had organized a debate about campus sexual assault between Jessica Valenti, the founder of feministing.com, and Wendy McElroy, a libertarian, and that Ms. McElroy was likely to criticize the term “rape culture,” Ms. Byron was alarmed. “Bringing in a speaker like that could serve to invalidate people’s experiences,” she told me. It could be “damaging.”
[SNIP]
The safe space, Ms. Byron explained, was intended to give people who might find comments “troubling” or “triggering,” a place to recuperate. The room was equipped with cookies, coloring books, bubbles, Play-Doh, calming music, pillows, blankets and a video of frolicking puppies, as well as students and staff members trained to deal with trauma. Emma Hall, a junior, rape survivor and “sexual assault peer educator” who helped set up the room and worked in it during the debate, estimates that a couple of dozen people used it. At one point she went to the lecture hall — it was packed — but after a while, she had to return to the safe space. “I was feeling bombarded by a lot of viewpoints that really go against my dearly and closely held beliefs,” Ms. Hall said. source
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