Are Universities now just woke nurseries.

[Polite M135 driver]

By the way, and we can only credit this slightly, in so far as rankings of this sort are a total pile of ste, the UK has 5 of the top 20 universities in the world. https://www.topuniversities.com/university-ranking...

[Polite M135 driver]

brake fader said:

It's like Letting the local pub football team play for England because they deserve to have a go, but give up their beer tokens until they win something.

Oh dear, we’ve gone full Senior Bursar here.

[Pothole]

Type R Tom said:

I don't know if this is true or just right wing propaganda but I do have concerns about things like white supremacy / privilege, critical race theory, patriarchy, some transgender issues etc being taught as fact instead of debated as an opinion.

Best address those concerns by finding out whether it's true, don't you think? Silly to "have concerns" about possible fantasy.

[Gecko1978]

ATG said:

brake fader said:

It seems since Blair said Education x 3 we have had a watered down system producing nothing but snowkflakes and activists .

Back on planet Earth, our universities have also produced lots of engineers, teachers, nurses, lawyers, journos, accountants, etc, etc, and loads of research. So the answer to your question is no, they're not just woke nurseries, they're educational and research institutions just like they've always been.

This. I went to two universities one in Scotland and one in England 1997 to 2002. I did not protest, ask for a safe place, feel triggered or excluded. I was told in Scotland they hated "is english" (by a drunken ned), in Sheffield we heard lazy student tosser etc. (To be fair tosser is about right), but no 99% of students are focused on, getting a degree, going to the pub, finding a partner, video games, sports, mobile phones etc the rest of it is not relevant.

[Emeye]

Drumroll said:

Type R Tom said:

I don't know if this is true or just right wing propaganda but I do have concerns about things like white supremacy / privilege, critical race theory, patriarchy, some transgender issues etc being taught as fact instead of debated as an opinion.

Is that your opinion or is it a fact?

Unless you have actually been to all universities in the last few years.

From what my son and the children of my friends have experienced this is happening at secondary schools, so I suspect what we hear is happening at Universities is not just right-wing propaganda.

It's the usual I support free speech until I disagree with you and find it offensive, which we see all over social media - I doubt universities are free of it as it is coming into the work environment too.

[poo at Paul's]

bristolracer said:

Always been the same.
Universities and the students Union have always whinged about the grown up world

My brother went to Magdalen Oxford which has been in news this week, back in mid 80s. It was full of "wokes" then before "wokes" were a thing.
Easy to preach about the utopian world when you're there on Dad's trustfund. It is not quite the same crowd nowadays, but the utopian cuckooland leanings are still there.....as they are in every university, particualrly the "elite" ones.

Thankfully, most leave, get jobs and realise the world is what it is, and they really had very little idea about some things at Uni. ie, they grow out of it!

[bitchstewie]

I heard that apparently the number of students who voted to take down the photo of the Queen this week was 10.

All that fuss over what 10 people voted for.

[Type R Tom]

Pothole said:

Type R Tom said:

I don't know if this is true or just right wing propaganda but I do have concerns about things like white supremacy / privilege, critical race theory, patriarchy, some transgender issues etc being taught as fact instead of debated as an opinion.

Best address those concerns by finding out whether it's true, don't you think? Silly to "have concerns" about possible fantasy.

There are concerns on both sides of the fence

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/nov/13/...

[littlebasher]

Even in the mid 90's, university student unions were a bastion of ultra left wing views. One of the reasons I rarely bothered with them outside of freshers week.

In fact, I remember them being half empty most of the time, due to incumbent presidents ramming their views down everyone's throats.


As above, all it takes is a few with loud voices to spoil it for everyone else.

[Pothole]

Type R Tom said:

Pothole said:

Type R Tom said:

I don't know if this is true or just right wing propaganda but I do have concerns about things like white supremacy / privilege, critical race theory, patriarchy, some transgender issues etc being taught as fact instead of debated as an opinion.

Best address those concerns by finding out whether it's true, don't you think? Silly to "have concerns" about possible fantasy.

There are concerns on both sides of the fence

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/nov/13/...

Not my point. your post starts with "I don't know if this is true" Go find out.

[Electro1980]

Emeye said:

From what my son and the children of my friends have experienced this is happening at secondary schools, so I suspect what we hear is happening at Universities is not just right-wing propaganda.

It's the usual I support free speech until I disagree with you and find it offensive, which we see all over social media - I doubt universities are free of it as it is coming into the work environment too.

You mean people complaining they are not allowed to be racist.

[Supercilious Sid]

Polite M135 driver said:

The general view from people in the university sector, who funnily enough are probably the best informed people about the state of freedom of speech in the university sector, which i have gathered from talking to people in the university sector and reading interviews with informed people in the university and legal sectors, is that there is no issues with freedom of speech in universities,.

I have also read opposing views, so that I am properly informed. The general right wing view is that it is becoming too ‘uncomfortable’ for people to voice views that dissent from the (perceived?) ‘majority’. I do not think, in a country that does embrace freedom of speech, that you can legislate in any sensible way to prevent people from being made to feel uncomfortable. This is why I think the legislation that was introduced is not only unnecessary (because there is no real problem) but actually would be flawed even if there were a problem.

Furthermore, when chunks of the core evidence cited by the government to justify the new legislation are demonstrated to be false/incorrectly reported, I think it is as reasonable argument that legislation is unjustified.

There is no issue with freedom of speech. I doubt there are many other sectors where the legal right of employees to say whatever they want is legally protected in their contract and in law. I could tomorrow go out and begin arguing that coronavirus makes you magnetic, and anyway it’s all made up isn’t it, here’s my proof. Or write a paper on my discovery that conservatives/socialism leads to premature ejaculation. I would not lose my job. My freedom to be a dick is contractually protected, of course so long as it isn’t discriminatory (and rightly so).

Edited by Polite M135 driver on Friday 11th June 11:34

In 2018–19, there were 439,955 staff (excluding atypical staff) employed at UK higher education institutions. How many of that figure have you spoken to in order to gain the 'general view'?
You also claim to be privy to the 'general right wing view'.
May I respectfully suggest that your interpretation is based on assumptions and underlying world-views rather than empirical evidence.

[Ronstein]

poo at Paul's said:

My brother went to Magdalen Oxford which has been in news this week, back in mid 80s. It was full of "wokes" then before "wokes" were a thing.
Easy to preach about the utopian world when you're there on Dad's trustfund. It is not quite the same crowd nowadays, but the utopian cuckooland leanings are still there.....as they are in every university, particualrly the "elite" ones.

Thankfully, most leave, get jobs and realise the world is what it is, and they really had very little idea about some things at Uni. ie, they grow out of it!

I think you're spot on. The majority move on and have a life and a career in the 'real' world. A small number choose to remain in that idealistic, theoretical world by going into academia or similar (Momentum?) and decry the real world, usually from a position of advantage and privilege.

[nikaiyo2]

Liokault said:

Indeed, let’s see a society set up in any English university to explore or push the boundaries of ideas such as: “Colonialism and its benefits”, or “Slavery, it was ok in the 1800s”. Let’s try “Gaza and why the Jewish should settle it”.

Let’s see how long until a safe space is required.

Left leaning ideas = ok, right leaning ideas = micro aggressions.

Hahah

We replaced all the windows (etc) in a big uni, almost all our fitters are from Romania or Czechia. A couple refused to do any work in rooms where there were pictures of Lenin and Marx likening it to asking a jew to work in a room with a picture of Hitler and Reinhard Heydrich. The uni were genuinely shocked that people would respond in that way.

[Misanthrope]

mrporsche said:

brake fader said:

It seems since Blair said Education x 3 we have had a watered down system producing nothing but snowkflakes and activists .

His push to have 50% university educated, came with no logic, it just sounded good to him.

It did however increase the amount of people going and most tend to leave with a left leaning slant so would increase the number of future labour voters.

There was some logic to it - if they went to university, that's 3 years they won't be on the dole.
Of course, having gone to university, they come out thinking they're approaching the intellectual level of Einstein and are disappointed when they end up being baristas instead of barristers.

[Polite M135 driver]

This is a good point actually, ‘go find out’.

How you become expert on some topic/issue, and work out what you think you think:

- find the best general/overall treatment of some point of view/area of thought, read and understand it. (I.e. read some book on epistemology)
- from that big picture treatment, pick specific (best/most important) primary sources works (i.e. go and read Plato’s Theatetus)
- then find the best works that take an/the opposing point of view, and then go and read and understand and consider them (ie. go and read the sceptics)

- at the end you probably have quite balanced opinion and are aware of nuance and uncertainty.

How you don’t become expert in some topic/issue:

- read online news articles and talk about it on pistonheads.

This is why I always read a few car reviews for any single car, and then of course ponder what the essential qualities of a ‘car’ are.

[105.4]

Exige77 said:

Until they grow up themselves and see what bks they where spouting.

I know an alarming number that even well into their 40’s still haven’t.

[ATG]

BabySharkDooDooDooDooDooDoo said:

Despite the loudest students giving the impression that they’re all useless tts, the reality is that it’s a gobby minority who attract media attention and promotion for some reason. The majority are there to get a piece of paper and/or have fun with friends.

I have fond memories of watching the Socialist Worker branch at my university try to reach out (comrades!) to a semi-radical anti-war group from the Islamic Society. Very entertaining to watch. Clash of the gobstes, not because of some fundamental incompatibility of principles or conclusions, but because gobstes.

[Polite M135 driver]

Supercilious Sid said:

In 2018–19, there were 439,955 staff (excluding atypical staff) employed at UK higher education institutions. How many of that figure have you spoken to in order to gain the 'general view'?
You also claim to be privy to the 'general right wing view'.
May I respectfully suggest that your interpretation is based on assumptions and underlying world-views rather than empirical evidence.

You could do all of that, but it’s a pointless argument because if you consider it a valid criticism of any attempt to work out what a general opinion on this is, then it also dismisses any counter argument you have about what that general view is.

I suggest that this isn’t really going to be a very good path to go down to work out if there really is a problem with freedom of speech with the university sector. You might be better off trying to find examples where lack of freedom of speech has been problematic.

[aizvara]

Misanthrope said:

There was some logic to it - if they went to university, that's 3 years they won't be on the dole.
Of course, having gone to university, they come out thinking they're approaching the intellectual level of Einstein and are disappointed when they end up being baristas instead of barristers.

How many people come out like that? Where are you seeing this?
I left university feeling optimistic, but not particularly confident a bit more than two decades ago. I got a good job without too much effort. These days, I don't think it is the same at all - graduates know they have fairly heavy duty recruitment processes to get through, and in my experience, they are good at it, and subsequently good at their jobs (when they can get them).

At no point did I feel like I knew everything. In fact, throughout my life, the more I have learnt about anything, the more I felt uncertain - that started with university.
Talking to friends and colleagues, undergrads and graduates, I haven't met anyone who felt like Einstein on graduated or subsequently, even people who really were exceptionally talented still were plagued with imposter syndrome.