I have to admit it never occurred
to me that I would agree with pundit, George Will on anything; but a column he
authored just before Christmas (I read him, I just don’t agree with him) caused
me to take a second look. Will’s column
focused on the current hot-button issue raging across college and university
campuses: whether to define (or not) the limits of free speech.
In it he
applauded the leadership of Purdue
University FIRE ) which opposes
campus restrictions on speech. This is a particularly thorny issue, in part,
because understandable concerns about how to handle hate speech in the Academy have
evolved to include “micro-aggressions” (conversational messages that -
intentionally or not - denigrate a member of a minority group) and “trigger
warnings” (alerting students that an upcoming classroom discussion topic could
“trigger” in them painful memories of previously experienced trauma).
In support of
his frustration with this galloping trend, Will cites Emerita University of
Chicago President Hanna Holburn Gray, who summarized the “Chicago Principle”
(supporting free speech on campus) this way:
"Education should not be intended to
make people comfortable, it is meant to make them think.”
What caused me to give Will’s column a second
look was his reference to an amazing turn of events that took place on Yale’s
campus last Halloween. Erika Christakis
and her husband, Nicholas, are faculty members and “Masters” of one of Yale’s
residential colleges. In response to some student concerns regarding a series
of instructions by Yale’s Intercultural Affairs Committee encouraging students
to be culturally sensitive in their selection of Halloween costumes (think Prince
Harry and the swastika debacle), Christakis sent an email to her students
encouraging them to question the rationale for these instructions - largely
along the lines of this notion: shouldn’t college-age students be allowed to
make their own mistakes? The final sentence of her email summarized her
position:
“Whose business is it to control the forms
of costumes of young¨ people? It’s not mine, I know that.”
That rather
innocuous statement set off a fire-storm of protest by students who were
outraged at Christakis’ “insensitivity” to their felt victimization at the
hands of “oppressive” attitudes seemingly prevalent throughout the University
Now, if you have
hung in with me this long, I want to assure you that this isn’t an academic
version of “inside baseball.” What alarmed me - and what caused me to agree
with George Will - was what happened next.
In an attempt to mediate the firestorm of protest, Christakis’ husband -
and co-Master - Nicholas, a tenured Sociologist and Physician, voluntarily met
with concerned students on a nearby quad. It should not be surprising that,
given the emotionally charged atmosphere, nothing Dr. Christakis said was going
to make a dent in the students’ anger (ignoring whether their anger was, in
fact, righteous). What was surprising - indeed astonishing - was the debased
quality of their interaction with him. (Check out this link for a brief view of
the outrageous interchange: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tsgc0k594Js).
I will just quote a few statements made by one student - who persistently shouted
at Professor Christakis throughout her interaction with him:
“Be quiet! … “Why the f… did you accept the position”… “It is not about
creating an intellectual space here” … “You are disgusting.”
After which, she stormed off,
leaving the professor without an opportunity to respond…a professor with quite
a pedigree - here is a snippet of his Yale Curriculum Vitae:
Nicholas A. Christakis, MD, PhD, MPH, is co-author of Connected: The Surprising
Power of Our Social Networks and How They Shape Our Lives, which has been
translated into nearly twenty foreign languages. He is a sociologist and
physician who conducts research in the area of biosocial science, investigating
the biological predicates and consequences of social phenomena. He directs the
Human Nature Lab at Yale
University, where he is
appointed as the Sol Goldman Family Professor of Social and Natural Science,
and he is the Co-Director of the Yale Institute for Network Science.
So - here’s my issue - assuming
that these students (and the one quoted here) have a righteous complaint - how
did it come to pass that young people eligible to vote, intellectually gifted
college students, individuals attending one of the most elite universities in
the United States - found it acceptable to shout, curse and disrespect an
accomplished, renowned professor who took the time to engage in a conversation
about their concerns regarding an email sent by his wife? As I watched the video
of this young woman shouting at Professor Christakis, I wondered what her
parents’ reaction was (the video went viral, so I assume they saw it). I know what my parents’ reaction would have
been - get on the next plane home - we’re not paying tuition for you to allow
people to think we didn’t raise you to speak respectfully to your elders.
I
worry about trends like this playing out at colleges and universities across
the nation (University of Missouri, Wesleyan, University of Illinois, Claremont
McKenna College and the University of Michigan, to name a few) which lead to
shouting matches self-censorship and forced resignations - and here’s why - because we here at La Salle devote a great
deal of time and energy shaping an intellectual environment in which students
not only feel safe to articulate opposing, controversial and even unpopular
positions, but - as importantly - to do so with respect for those engaged in
the conversation, regardless of their placement on the ideological spectrum.
I
don’t know where this trend of anger-fueled political discourse will take the
Academy, but I do know this: we expect our students - and our graduates - to
anchor their intellectual debates in the Lasallian values of respect for the
individual and a commitment to nurturing a community atmosphere in which no one
has the right to shout at another simply because they disagree.
In
support of that principle, George Will and I are on the same page.
