Tuesday, November 12, 2019

What would Alfred Hurley do?

So it's now well-recognized that the University of North Texas has capitulated to political correctness and group-think by accepting (after perhaps requesting) the resignation of an assistant legal counsel. The staffer, participating in a campus forum on hate speech, was giving examples of offensive speech, and delineating what is or is not protected under the U.S. First Amendment.

In what was clearly an example, not of 'good' speech, but of distasteful rhetoric that would nonetheless fall under First Amendment protection, she used the n-word, uncensored.

Oh my stars!

Despite the clear caveat that it was being used as an example, and that the word is pervasive in the film and audio media that the target student audience ravenously consumes, there was immediate outrage in the lecture hall. The legal staffer apologized to the attendees whose tender sensibilities and psyches were traumatized. Not long after, the woman resigned - possibly forced - despite the strong likelihood that, as a 2010 Baylor Law School graduate (Texas Tech undergrad), and practitioner in the legal field for a state university system, she probably was more involved in diversity issues than any of her audience.

But, credentials and abilities notwithstanding, apparently she wasn't 'woke' enough for the current UNT student body, and its nitwit Administration.

Having cleared most of my English/Literature credits by AP testing, and classes at a prior university, I only had to take one English class at NTSU for my degree plan. Professor Baird was a very good instructor who welcomed wide ranging discussion on works of Ralph Ellison, Bob Dylan, Ray Charles, and Albert Camus.

In the interest of political correctness and inclusiom, would the University today rewrite Steinbeck to Of Mice and Mxn?

1 comment:

TommyBoy said...

It's a mixed-up world, eh? Students are no longer educated; rather, they're programmed. I remember Baird as a faculty hippie. I never took one of his classes but we knew one another in passing because I was a teaching assistant and an English Fellow. We hung out in the same circles. I can imagine the collective gasp in that auditorium as the offending word was uttered and am not surprised to hear certain words have been banned from the mouths of white devils on the UNT campus. Free speech? Not much.