6 ms·

When specifically did you gain the right to not be offended? As far as I'm aware, nobody has any such right. If you don't like what someone is saying, walk awa

When specifically did you gain the right to not be offended? As far as I'm aware, nobody has any such right. If you don't like what someone is saying, walk away.

kaonashi 11y ago
> When specifically did you gain the right to not be offended That's an unbelievably dismissive view. What makes you think these areas are merely about exclusion from offense?
- alextgordon 11y ago
  Universities exist for the benefit of society at large, not for the benefit of individuals. If people are afraid or forbidden to speak their minds, then the university won't be able to function as a place to advance our understanding of the world.
  - kaonashi 11y ago
    That would make sense to say if we were talking about the entire university; but we're not.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
derefr 11y ago
Not being offended, and not entering a dissociative fugue state and shaking and screaming and muttering for 30 minutes and quite disrupting the speech in the process, are very different things. PTSD is not Tumblr-fairy disease; it's the thing you get from being interned in a POW camp or locked in someone's sex dungeon for months/years. People do have a right to avoid reliving that sort of experience. Which, like I said, might mean that they'd have to avoid going to university altogether. It's probably nearly impossible to have an environment that both allows for a free-flowing exchange of ideas, and yet protects people with this sort of permanent mental disability. But making an allowance for rape survivors to leave the room when there's going to be a live screening of Salò isn't all that hard, is it?
- reality_czech 11y ago
  Yes, they are very different things, which is why you are arguing against a strawman. You know perfectly well that letting someone voice his conservative political opinions is not going to trigger PTSD. Pretending to be offended in order to stop the debate is the left's version of invoking terrorism in ridiculous contexts. The biggest irony, which you probably can't even see, is that your own comment is an example of the disturbing and vile speech you claim to hate ("sex dungeon", "POW camp", "Salo"). You didn't need to bring those up to make your point, but you did. Somehow disturbing and vile things like burning the flag and condoning drug abuse never seem to upset the left (and I could go on...), but talking about individual rights and respnsibilities does. Funny how that works.
  - derefr 11y ago
    I... didn't claim to hate anything? I was making an argument that some people will get sick from some speech. It's a medical issue, and there are several solutions. I'm not sure you read my comment charitably. Now, I'm not from the US, haven't been to a university for quite some years, and so am not personally experienced with what these "safe zones" are about in practice, the politics surrounding them, etc.—but I was trying to say that, if they had any justification at all as a theoretical construct, it was in giving people with PTSD a way to get away from "broadcast all over campus" things like graduation speeches, if and when a planned speech is found to have content that might trigger specific kinds of traumatic stress attacks. Not because it might offend someone. Not with voluntary ability to leave for any reason one might like. Just a medical excuse from attendance, like a person with acrophobia would get from a field trip to the roof of a skyscraper. And again, even then, it might be better for those people to just leave the university campus, or avoid coming in the first place.
  - 82xx 11y ago
    What is vile about burning a flag or condoning drug abuse? What does "condoning" mean to you?
- protomyth 11y ago
  If you cannot function in an environment without damaging yourself, then you need to deal with that first. If making accommodations for you is used to censor or affect the free speech of others then you are now the oppressor even if it not intentional on your part. Letting people use your condition to condemn or exile others is beyond wrong. I once worked inside a social program and the first lesson is to heal. Painfully, that often means scar tissue. If you have trama from words, you need to deal with it, not hope the world will.

When specifically did you gain the right to not be offended? As far as I'm aware, nobody has any such right. If you don't like what someone is saying, walk away.

kaonashi 11y ago

> When specifically did you gain the right to not be offended That's an unbelievably dismissive view. What makes you think these areas are merely about exclusion from offense?

alextgordon 11y ago
Universities exist for the benefit of society at large, not for the benefit of individuals. If people are afraid or forbidden to speak their minds, then the university won't be able to function as a place to advance our understanding of the world.
- kaonashi 11y ago
  That would make sense to say if we were talking about the entire university; but we're not.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

derefr 11y ago

Not being offended, and not entering a dissociative fugue state and shaking and screaming and muttering for 30 minutes and quite disrupting the speech in the process, are very different things. PTSD is not Tumblr-fairy disease; it's the thing you get from being interned in a POW camp or locked in someone's sex dungeon for months/years. People do have a right to avoid reliving that sort of experience. Which, like I said, might mean that they'd have to avoid going to university altogether. It's probably nearly impossible to have an environment that both allows for a free-flowing exchange of ideas, and yet protects people with this sort of permanent mental disability. But making an allowance for rape survivors to leave the room when there's going to be a live screening of Salò isn't all that hard, is it?

reality_czech 11y ago
Yes, they are very different things, which is why you are arguing against a strawman. You know perfectly well that letting someone voice his conservative political opinions is not going to trigger PTSD. Pretending to be offended in order to stop the debate is the left's version of invoking terrorism in ridiculous contexts. The biggest irony, which you probably can't even see, is that your own comment is an example of the disturbing and vile speech you claim to hate ("sex dungeon", "POW camp", "Salo"). You didn't need to bring those up to make your point, but you did. Somehow disturbing and vile things like burning the flag and condoning drug abuse never seem to upset the left (and I could go on...), but talking about individual rights and respnsibilities does. Funny how that works.
- derefr 11y ago
  I... didn't claim to hate anything? I was making an argument that some people will get sick from some speech. It's a medical issue, and there are several solutions. I'm not sure you read my comment charitably. Now, I'm not from the US, haven't been to a university for quite some years, and so am not personally experienced with what these "safe zones" are about in practice, the politics surrounding them, etc.—but I was trying to say that, if they had any justification at all as a theoretical construct, it was in giving people with PTSD a way to get away from "broadcast all over campus" things like graduation speeches, if and when a planned speech is found to have content that might trigger specific kinds of traumatic stress attacks. Not because it might offend someone. Not with voluntary ability to leave for any reason one might like. Just a medical excuse from attendance, like a person with acrophobia would get from a field trip to the roof of a skyscraper. And again, even then, it might be better for those people to just leave the university campus, or avoid coming in the first place.
- 82xx 11y ago
  What is vile about burning a flag or condoning drug abuse? What does "condoning" mean to you?
protomyth 11y ago
If you cannot function in an environment without damaging yourself, then you need to deal with that first. If making accommodations for you is used to censor or affect the free speech of others then you are now the oppressor even if it not intentional on your part. Letting people use your condition to condemn or exile others is beyond wrong. I once worked inside a social program and the first lesson is to heal. Painfully, that often means scar tissue. If you have trama from words, you need to deal with it, not hope the world will.