5 ms·

UK universities face fines as part of 'twin assault' on cancel culture

blacktulip 6y ago
https://web.archive.org/web/20210214122852/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/02/13/exclusive-universities-face-fines-part-twin-assault-cancel-culture/ https://web.archive.org/web/20210214122852/https://www.teleg...
sand_castles 6y ago
cancel culture has always been a thing. If you are poor and have views that in some way threatens the current ruling class and it's narrative, you get cancelled. What they mean by "cancel culture" is when the poor and marginalized use new technologies of communication like twitter to put people in power in the spotlight. If the mob is angry, it's up to the government to find out why and resolve the issues.
- wilsocr88 6y ago
  This strikes me as an alarming defense of the most destructive parts of our current epoch. The culture in question usually does not take the form of speaking truth to power. More often it is unreasonable people destroying the lives and livelihoods of mostly innocent people because of an abstract and usually imaginary offense. A person can be smart but groups of people are not. Call-out culture is bullying disguised as benevolence and empathy. It is doing more lasting damage than any of us realize. The bullies from school now believe themselves to be the virtuous ones BECAUSE of the bullying they engage in. And the only way to be moral in their eyes is to hold onto power and exercise the maximum amount of control possible over others.
  - andrepd 6y ago
    Why do you think that people being uninvited from speaking at universities is "one of the most destructive parts of our current epoch"?
    - sand_castles 6y ago
      Exactly, I view homelessness and poverty as bigger act of violence then getting canned from some speaking event.
    - wilsocr88 6y ago
      Partially, but that's a very low-res version of what I mean. Drilling a resentment-based ideology into the minds of young people, and inundating universities with it, is the most destructive part of our epoch. Universities are either dead or dying, for all intents and purposes, and they are filled to the brim with extremist-leftist-manufacturing departments that teach students that the entire structure upon which they now stand is immoral, evil, hateful, bigoted, etc. Look at any grievance studies department's website, and maybe some sociology departments too. Chances are they'll say something about "dismantling systems of oppression". What's a system of oppression? Oh, that's all of Western Civilization. We're allowing the teaching of literal destructive revolution ("overthrow the state and seize the means of production," basically) in universities. That is NOT sustainable.
      - andrepd 6y ago
        You're overreaching something fierce. Universities dead or dying? Filled to the brim with extremists hell-bent on destroying Western civilization? People having different opinions than yourself doesn't mean civilization is about to collapse. EDIT: Perhaps this is your idea of a university nowadays (enable subtitles): https://youtu.be/watch?v=7C_qJnd5fT8 https://youtu.be/watch?v=7C_qJnd5fT8
        wilsocr88 6y ago
        Am I overreaching, or am I trying to warn the West against allowing resentment-based ideology to take hold? Read about Soviet dekulakization, and ponder how that could've happened. It started with "this whole society, the shoulders of which I now stand upon, is wholly bad and corrupt, irreversably, nose-to-tail, and we must destroy it all (so that nobody else can gain the influence over society that I have achieved)." When you believe that the only moral position is for "your side" to hold power, and to use it against the other side, you'll justify any atrocity.
andrepd 6y ago
Absolutely trash article, but then again what could you expect from the telegraph. Sadly I cannot find anything about this on a better news site.
- Yeap20210214 6y ago
  > Sadly I cannot find anything about this on a better news site. Congrats on having your informational/censorship bubble burst!
  - andrepd 6y ago
    ? I googled for a bit and could only find articles on $place_telegraph and other minor local newspapers. Is it a "bubble" to seek quality information?
intricatedetail 6y ago
Stalin was an effective politician and cancelling was his instrument. People just copy what works.
- wilsocr88 6y ago
  > Stalin was an effective politician The problem is, Stalin did at least ten holocausts, depending on how we're counting. Most people basically agree that Nazis and fascists are not okay, but there does not exist any such inoculation against extremism on the left, like there does on the right. People can freely call themselves communists or socialists, and few seem to have a problem. Those who bring it up are caricaturized as, "Oh, how many Communists are in the State Department, Mister McCarthy?"
  - etrautmann 6y ago
    This is a false equivalence. Socialists are not inherently the opposite of fascists, or equivalent in the degree of how extreme it is to hold some version of those views. I think your argument is that the Overton window skews left with a blind spot for the extreme left?
    - dogma1138 6y ago
      I think the argument would be correct if you use the Overton window as intended - freedom vs authoritarianism. It was never intended to be a left/right divide on purely social and economic policies. I think the “left” has an issue with authoritarianism on its edges, and by left I don’t mean the US left but mainly Europe. The concept of “solidarity” is also something that the left needs to take a look at because it means that you end up being friends and supporting individuals and groups that are despicable, and that is before you get into the problem of the “end justifies the means”. The issue I have with government enforced socialism is that it doesn’t have the right tools to deal with “that’s nice but I want to try my way” without violence. A socialist microcosm can exist in any open society even in a purely free market uber capitalist one, a free market cannot exist in a socialist society as it’s a clear threat. People also need to stop confusing social services with socialism, public healthcare isn’t a socialist policy it should be the perk of living in a developed society. Socialism at its core is about ownership and individualism not about what services you can get for “free”. This is why it’s so fucking hard to talk about actual issues, I believe that any developed nation should offer universal healthcare and education but I do not want to live in a society that tells me what my role in it should be, what I can own and what I should do with my money.
joemazerino 6y ago
While I appreciate the context of the article (cancel culture is a danger to a free society) the writing is quite poor. Segmented chunks of information put in one or two sentences per paragraph is an eyesore.
leephillips 6y ago
The UK has been home to several chilling episodes of police harassment triggered by tweets that were considered possible hate speech. The tweets in question were innocuous, simply repeating common knowledge that can be found in any introductory biology textbook. I hope this initiative (although it also smells like ideology itself) puts a stop to that.
- wilsocr88 6y ago
  Pattern recognition leads me to believe that this will not serve its intended purpose, but will instead be misused as a bludgeon.
- AndrewDucker 6y ago
  "Common knowledge that can be found in any basic biology textbook" That sounds like transphobes out harassing people again. The "but we were just stating some basic biology" is the first line of defence for what has been found to be unprotected abuse in the UK.
  - leephillips 6y ago
    I’m not quite sure what you’re saying, but it sounds eerily close to the claim that scientific facts can be hate speech.
  - insickness 6y ago
    Proof that science denialism is just as much a problem on the left as it is on the right.
    - andrepd 6y ago
      What science? The scientific consensus is that there is such a condition as gender dysphoria, that is, people who perceive themselves as a gender different from their biological sex. In my experience, the phrase "I was just stating basic biology" is a dogwhistle for transphobia.
    - happytoexplain 6y ago
AwaAwa 6y ago
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9258031/Government-appoint-woke-warden-powers-fine-universities-cancel-people.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9258031/Government-... Another article covering the same topic, if the paywall for the telegraph gets in your way.
- andrepd 6y ago
  Quality journalism only! Daily Mail and the Telegraph... Can anyone find a source from a proper news outlet?

https://web.archive.org/web/20210214122852/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/02/13/exclusive-universities-face-fines-part-twin-assault-cancel-culture/ https://web.archive.org/web/20210214122852/https://www.teleg...

sand_castles 6y ago

cancel culture has always been a thing. If you are poor and have views that in some way threatens the current ruling class and it's narrative, you get cancelled. What they mean by "cancel culture" is when the poor and marginalized use new technologies of communication like twitter to put people in power in the spotlight. If the mob is angry, it's up to the government to find out why and resolve the issues.

wilsocr88 6y ago
This strikes me as an alarming defense of the most destructive parts of our current epoch. The culture in question usually does not take the form of speaking truth to power. More often it is unreasonable people destroying the lives and livelihoods of mostly innocent people because of an abstract and usually imaginary offense. A person can be smart but groups of people are not. Call-out culture is bullying disguised as benevolence and empathy. It is doing more lasting damage than any of us realize. The bullies from school now believe themselves to be the virtuous ones BECAUSE of the bullying they engage in. And the only way to be moral in their eyes is to hold onto power and exercise the maximum amount of control possible over others.
- andrepd 6y ago
  Why do you think that people being uninvited from speaking at universities is "one of the most destructive parts of our current epoch"?
  - sand_castles 6y ago
    Exactly, I view homelessness and poverty as bigger act of violence then getting canned from some speaking event.
  - wilsocr88 6y ago
    Partially, but that's a very low-res version of what I mean. Drilling a resentment-based ideology into the minds of young people, and inundating universities with it, is the most destructive part of our epoch. Universities are either dead or dying, for all intents and purposes, and they are filled to the brim with extremist-leftist-manufacturing departments that teach students that the entire structure upon which they now stand is immoral, evil, hateful, bigoted, etc. Look at any grievance studies department's website, and maybe some sociology departments too. Chances are they'll say something about "dismantling systems of oppression". What's a system of oppression? Oh, that's all of Western Civilization. We're allowing the teaching of literal destructive revolution ("overthrow the state and seize the means of production," basically) in universities. That is NOT sustainable.
    - andrepd 6y ago
      You're overreaching something fierce. Universities dead or dying? Filled to the brim with extremists hell-bent on destroying Western civilization? People having different opinions than yourself doesn't mean civilization is about to collapse. EDIT: Perhaps this is your idea of a university nowadays (enable subtitles): https://youtu.be/watch?v=7C_qJnd5fT8 https://youtu.be/watch?v=7C_qJnd5fT8
      - wilsocr88 6y ago
        Am I overreaching, or am I trying to warn the West against allowing resentment-based ideology to take hold? Read about Soviet dekulakization, and ponder how that could've happened. It started with "this whole society, the shoulders of which I now stand upon, is wholly bad and corrupt, irreversably, nose-to-tail, and we must destroy it all (so that nobody else can gain the influence over society that I have achieved)." When you believe that the only moral position is for "your side" to hold power, and to use it against the other side, you'll justify any atrocity.

andrepd 6y ago

Absolutely trash article, but then again what could you expect from the telegraph. Sadly I cannot find anything about this on a better news site.

Yeap20210214 6y ago
> Sadly I cannot find anything about this on a better news site. Congrats on having your informational/censorship bubble burst!
- andrepd 6y ago
  ? I googled for a bit and could only find articles on $place_telegraph and other minor local newspapers. Is it a "bubble" to seek quality information?

intricatedetail 6y ago

Stalin was an effective politician and cancelling was his instrument. People just copy what works.

wilsocr88 6y ago
> Stalin was an effective politician The problem is, Stalin did at least ten holocausts, depending on how we're counting. Most people basically agree that Nazis and fascists are not okay, but there does not exist any such inoculation against extremism on the left, like there does on the right. People can freely call themselves communists or socialists, and few seem to have a problem. Those who bring it up are caricaturized as, "Oh, how many Communists are in the State Department, Mister McCarthy?"
- etrautmann 6y ago
  This is a false equivalence. Socialists are not inherently the opposite of fascists, or equivalent in the degree of how extreme it is to hold some version of those views. I think your argument is that the Overton window skews left with a blind spot for the extreme left?
  - dogma1138 6y ago
    I think the argument would be correct if you use the Overton window as intended - freedom vs authoritarianism. It was never intended to be a left/right divide on purely social and economic policies. I think the “left” has an issue with authoritarianism on its edges, and by left I don’t mean the US left but mainly Europe. The concept of “solidarity” is also something that the left needs to take a look at because it means that you end up being friends and supporting individuals and groups that are despicable, and that is before you get into the problem of the “end justifies the means”. The issue I have with government enforced socialism is that it doesn’t have the right tools to deal with “that’s nice but I want to try my way” without violence. A socialist microcosm can exist in any open society even in a purely free market uber capitalist one, a free market cannot exist in a socialist society as it’s a clear threat. People also need to stop confusing social services with socialism, public healthcare isn’t a socialist policy it should be the perk of living in a developed society. Socialism at its core is about ownership and individualism not about what services you can get for “free”. This is why it’s so fucking hard to talk about actual issues, I believe that any developed nation should offer universal healthcare and education but I do not want to live in a society that tells me what my role in it should be, what I can own and what I should do with my money.

joemazerino 6y ago

While I appreciate the context of the article (cancel culture is a danger to a free society) the writing is quite poor. Segmented chunks of information put in one or two sentences per paragraph is an eyesore.

leephillips 6y ago

The UK has been home to several chilling episodes of police harassment triggered by tweets that were considered possible hate speech. The tweets in question were innocuous, simply repeating common knowledge that can be found in any introductory biology textbook. I hope this initiative (although it also smells like ideology itself) puts a stop to that.

wilsocr88 6y ago
Pattern recognition leads me to believe that this will not serve its intended purpose, but will instead be misused as a bludgeon.
AndrewDucker 6y ago
"Common knowledge that can be found in any basic biology textbook" That sounds like transphobes out harassing people again. The "but we were just stating some basic biology" is the first line of defence for what has been found to be unprotected abuse in the UK.
- leephillips 6y ago
  I’m not quite sure what you’re saying, but it sounds eerily close to the claim that scientific facts can be hate speech.
- insickness 6y ago
  Proof that science denialism is just as much a problem on the left as it is on the right.
  - andrepd 6y ago
    What science? The scientific consensus is that there is such a condition as gender dysphoria, that is, people who perceive themselves as a gender different from their biological sex. In my experience, the phrase "I was just stating basic biology" is a dogwhistle for transphobia.
  - happytoexplain 6y ago

AwaAwa 6y ago

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9258031/Government-appoint-woke-warden-powers-fine-universities-cancel-people.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9258031/Government-... Another article covering the same topic, if the paywall for the telegraph gets in your way.

andrepd 6y ago
Quality journalism only! Daily Mail and the Telegraph... Can anyone find a source from a proper news outlet?