(np) The Neurodiversity Case for Free Speech

Wed Jul 26 03:20:31 CDT 2017

Not my country.
But there are similar tendencies in Europe.
I simply don't think that sharp societal splits like this will be productive in the mid and long run.
If it's not too late, one should start looking for common ground.

Nicholas Kristof:

> ... Universities are the bedrock of progressive values, but the one kind of diversity that universities disregard is ideological and religious. We’re fine with people who don’t look like us, as long as they think like us.

O.K., that’s a little harsh. But consider George Yancey, a sociologist who is black and evangelical.

“Outside of academia I faced more problems as a black,” he told me. “But inside academia I face more problems as a Christian, and it is not even close.” (...)

The stakes involve not just fairness to conservatives or evangelical Christians, not just whether progressives will be true to their own values, not just the benefits that come from diversity (and diversity of thought is arguably among the most important kinds), but also the quality of education itself. When perspectives are unrepresented in discussions, when some kinds of thinkers aren’t at the table, classrooms become echo chambers rather than sounding boards — and we all lose.

Four studies found that the proportion of professors in the humanities who are Republicans ranges between 6 and 11 percent, and in the social sciences between 7 and 9 percent.

Conservatives can be spotted in the sciences and in economics, but they are virtually an endangered species in fields like anthropology, sociology, history and literature. One study found that only 2 percent of English professors are Republicans (although a large share are independents).

In contrast, some 18 percent of social scientists say they are Marxist. So it’s easier to find a Marxist in some disciplines than a Republican.

The scarcity of conservatives seems driven in part by discrimination. One peer-reviewed study found   that one-third of social psychologists admitted that if choosing between two equally qualified job candidates, they would be inclined to discriminate against the more conservative candidate.

Yancey, the black sociologist, who now teaches at the University of North Texas, conducted a survey in which up to 30 percent of academics said that they would be less likely to support a job seeker if they knew that the person was a Republican.

The discrimination becomes worse if the applicant is an evangelical Christian. According to Yancey’s study, 59 percent of anthropologists and 53 percent of English professors would be less likely to hire someone they found out was an evangelical.

“Of course there are biases against evangelicals on campuses,” notes Jonathan L. Walton, the Plummer Professor of Christian Morals at Harvard. Walton, a black evangelical, adds that the condescension toward evangelicals echoes the patronizing attitude toward racial minorities: “The same arguments I hear people make about evangelicals sound so familiar to the ways people often describe folk of color, i.e. politically unsophisticated, lacking education, angry, bitter, emotional, poor.”

A study published in The American Journal of Political Science underscored how powerful political bias can be. In an experiment, Democrats and Republicans were asked to choose a scholarship winner from among (fictitious) finalists, with the experiment tweaked so that applicants sometimes included the president of the Democratic or Republican club, while varying the credentials and race of each. Four-fifths of Democrats and Republicans alike chose a student of their own party to win a scholarship, and discrimination against people of the other party was much greater than discrimination based on race.

“I am the equivalent of someone who was gay in Mississippi in 1950,” a conservative professor is quoted as saying in “Passing on the Right,” a new book about right-wing faculty members by Jon A. Shields and Joshua M. Dunn Sr. That’s a metaphor that conservative scholars often use, with talk of remaining in the closet early in one’s career and then “coming out” after receiving tenure.

This bias on campuses creates liberal privilege. A friend is studying for the Law School Admission Test, and the test preparation company she is using offers test-takers a tip: Reading comprehension questions will typically have a liberal slant and a liberal answer.

Some liberals think that right-wingers self-select away from academic paths in part because they are money-grubbers who prefer more lucrative professions. But that doesn’t explain why there are conservative math professors but not many right-wing anthropologists. (...)

" Universities are unlike other institutions in that they absolutely require that people challenge each other so that the truth can emerge from limited, biased, flawed individuals,” he [= Jonathan Haidt] says. “If they lose intellectual diversity, or if they develop norms of ‘safety’ that trump challenge, they die. And this is what has been happening since the 1990s.” (...)

Universities should be a hubbub of the full range of political perspectives from A to Z, not just from V to Z ... <

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/08/opinion/sunday/a-confession-of-liberal-intolerance.html?module=ArrowsNav&contentCollection=Opinion&action=keypress&region=FixedLeft&pgtype=article

Am 26.07.2017 um 08:45 schrieb L E Bryan:
Republicans in academia are “oppressed” like creationists are “oppressed” in biology departments. At least the bulk of the current crop of religious neo-facists.

On Jul 25, 2017, at 9:23 AM, Laura Kelber <laurakelber at gmail.com<mailto:laurakelber at gmail.com>> wrote:

I think the writer creates a fallacy that men on the Autism/Aspergers scale (however loosely that's defined) are likely to be right-wing and/or Republican, leading to him to argue that right-wing men are an "oppressed" group in academia, and deserve the protections of other marginalized groups. Given the loose definition he uses (apparently any man who's a little crusty or socially awkward), I'd have to argue that almost 100% of the men I know who fall into that category are politically progressive and/or Democrats. So basically, he's just whining about how badly Republicans are treated in academia. The poor, oppressed, marginalized little dears.

I agree with him that the current cultural obsession with micro-aggressions and triggers, amplified by crowd-shaming and the taking of statements and pictures out of context, is a serious threat to free expression. As a feminist, I find the sniveling about the need to protect women from even modest innuendo (I'm not talking about sexual assaults or serious threats or hazing campaigns) a throwback to Victorian times, with the emphasis on women as weaklings who need to be sheltered and protected, lest they ... faint. And I can't imagine that any psychologist would instruct someone suffering from PTSD to spend the rest of their life hiding from anything that triggers distressing memories.

LK

On Mon, Jul 24, 2017 at 3:53 AM, Kai Frederik Lorentzen <lorentzen at hotmail.de<mailto:lorentzen at hotmail.de>> wrote:

Having a daughter who's not only studying history and English but also
politically active in the fields of LGBT and migration, I'm often
shocked how little Free Speech counts among the young.

http://quillette.com/2017/07/18/neurodiversity-case-free-speech/

-
Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?listpynchon-l

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