Anyone up to speed with the Lindsay Shepherd case (the Canadian TA)?

Well if you are right and the university is so corrupt that the people running it think that senior staff lying to people by claiming that they’ve been the subject of official complaints when they haven’t, and then forcing staff to attend upsetting meetings based on these lies, isn’t a clear case of gross misconduct then the university is completely rotten. But more worrying than that it means that these so called ‘far right activists’ who complain that ‘cultural Marxism’ has taken over the educational establishment aren’t far wrong either. So these so called far right are actually correct then? At least about higher education?

Thanks nauticant. I wonder what Joel's thoughts on the matter now are. It will be interesting to see what comes out in the court case. I wish Shepherd success.

My thoughts on Peterson are evolving as I watch some of his videos. I'm rather shocked at how the media has misrepresented him. I disagree with him on many points but he seems to be just a standard professor with an interest in resisting compelled speech. He and Shepherd have experienced similar treatment from the woke. I'm not surprised that she is gravitating towards him.

.' I honestly don’t understand why the university didn’t just sack them all for gross misconduct for that alone.'

Because they're higher up the hierarchy, will have socialised more with the people at the top, because to do so would be to admit to a massive failing in university culture and recruitment. Much easier to ignore how appallingly they have behaved and hope nobody notices.
But you're right, any organisation with a shred of ethics would have done.

It's been a while since I heard the recording but I do think Adria Joel might have made a comment or two. However, she would have known that the meeting was for men to punish the disobedient woman and keeping mostly quiet was prudent.

Out of curiosity I had a quick look at Shepherd's twitter account. Some of her tweets are unpleasant and she is firmly aligned to Jordan Peterson in follower mode. It might be that with her career chances severely compromised, she views this as the best chance of building another career.

Even though I think she is doing herself some disfavours, I would really like to see her have success with the court case, especially as a result of going to trial instead of being settled confidentially beforehand. It would be terrific if her interrogators could be taken line by line through the recording by a skilled and forensic lawyer.

I think they would have spoken to any male TA in the university setting that way. I doubt they would talk to a young male on the street that way outside the university setting though, but that would be out of fear of getting punched more than anything else. Men like this don’t tend to respect other men outside their cult either, but they do often fear them in a way that they don’t fear women and I think that is where a lot of this behaviour comes from, a lack of fear rather than a lack of respect for all women because they are women. They went far beyond condescending behaviour, they were bullying her and lying to her in order to attempt to force her to go along with their totalitarian ideology and adopt their cult like thinking and become part of a brainwashing machine to indoctrinate the students they were supposed to be educating. The fact they were prepared to lie to her about having received complaints is especially telling, it shows they believe the end justified the means. I honestly don’t understand why the university didn’t just sack them all for gross misconduct for that alone.

Does Adria Joel speak in the recording? I can't remember and don't have time to listen again. Shepherd's court case states that Joel was present.

Bamc, I've listened to the whole thing and my take is the same as Confession. The men speak to Lindsay in a really breathtakingly condescending way. The sexism is overpowering. If you have ever experienced it, it's unmistakable.

“For those who understandably don't have time to listen to the full recording, at one point, Pimlott asks her, his voice dripping in disdain, "My research in that subject is subject to peer review - you know what peer review is, right?" - he is literally asking a university teaching assistant if she knows what peer review is. He would never have asked a man that. He also says later: “

I’m afraid you’re just making as assertion with zero evidence. We have no way of knowing if he’d have asked a man that question or not. We cannot simply say I know this is what he would have done or wouldn’t so he’s guilty. For what it’s worth I think he would probably have patronised almost anyone, but I can’t know that. Neither can you.

Now that's interesting. For the longest time, I was vocally anti-feminism because I was part of a group that depicted 'Feminism' as the belief that biology was irrelevant, men and women were interchangeable, women could choose to do whatever they wanted, including prostitution and porn etc.

It's only since I have discovered that is not what feminism is that I have been happy to align myself with Feminists. Very much because of the tribalism mentioned in Offred's post.

What countered my misconception was an actual exposure to ideas - as opposed to a supercilious refusal to listen to what people had to say because of the stable they came from or whether I could sign up to every belief they did hold.

@FloralBunting. I’m not a feminist either. I don’t believe it’s true that men and women are so similar that all the differences in outcome must be the result of anti female discrimination which seems to be feminism 101 these days. I’ve also heard some feminists say that if you couldn’t tell who was a male who was s female by looking at them men and women would (on average) always achieve the same results. I think this biology doesn’t matter and all differences are caused by discrimination thinking is probably why so many people seem to think that they can change gender simply by declaring it to be so and that anyone who disagrees can’t be anything other than a hateful bigot. I’ve no time for feminism any more but still believe passionately in defending women’s rights. I just don’t like western feminism. Western feminists don’t seem very good at standing with their Iranian ‘sisters’ being persecuted in countries like Iran for refusing to wear veils and such like. And males who call themselves feminists often seem to turn out to be Harvey Weinstein type characters.

It’s not just the left though is it? It’s just a common theme with tribal groups at the moment as far as I can see.

I feel like this stuff re ‘who said it’ has become divorced from the idea of improving understanding of the idea by offering context and is now entirely about censorship/blind faith.

It is useful to look at the things a particular person has said in order to understand their ideas better but this is becoming very difficult because looking at the things someone says has become repurposed as a means of blind acceptance or censorship so certain people we are expected to boycott, others we are expected to uncritically promote... this is entirely based on their identity now... no thinking and no ideas. Understanding the ideas, the arguments they make and what they are based on has now become bigotry or simply unnecessary!

I don’t think the right excommunicates people as easily as the left but it has always been thus, however they both use the language of identity politics. I have not really seen critical thinking evidenced in the mainstream of either TBH.

‘Who said it?’ Now also becomes ‘what it says about me’ it’s all about individual politics, how you are seen based on how others are seen and some people being the right people and others the wrong people.

It’s all very vacuous but honestly the social sanctions for not conforming to this model of thought have often been absolutely appalling such that it is difficult to have a public life of any kind without conceding to it.

I despair every time I see someone saying ‘sorry for the fail link’ or ‘I’m slightly shocked to find myself agreeing with x person/group’ and that often becomes a type of ‘I now identify as part of x group’ or an existential crisis regarding what it means to be a person who linked to the fail, which I think is also wrong really.

It is not mandatory to identify with any group, in fact I think it should be mostly resisted and instead people should consider the ideas which inform their values and the level/form of support they are prepared to give based on those values. That’s where being an individual is relevant IMO, not this weird enforced collective individualism...

So if this young woman finds acceptance and the ideas right of centre appealing, the left really needs to ask themselves if calling everyone who isn't mainlining Marxism a Nazi is really the way forward.

I totally agree with you. As someone who has always considered herself a leftist.

Well, although I'm posting here, I don't call myself a Feminist, largely because I don't subscribe to every tenet that most feminists do - but I do share common cause in terms of keeping women and children safe, and freeing them from the boxes society shoves them into.
I think feminism has done a lot of good, but I don't use the term of myself out of courtesy to people who do, because I think words have meanings and not all my positions on things are feminist.
However, I do think this is important - there are many of us who hover round the centre ground; a little further right on this, a bit further left on that. The incessant extremist 'Both feet in my political camp or not at all!' is so incredibly fundamentalist I am always surprised when rational people adopt it.
Because, put simply, some people will hear the ultimatum and say, "Ok, not at all then." and push their boat out as far as it will go.
My dad was a union man, knew Alan Johnson back in the day, hated Thatcher's guts with some vehemence. But he is an intelligent, well read man who taught me critical thinking, and finds himself in the peculiar position of liking a lot of what Jacob Rees Mogg says, and because of that kind of open listening without prejudice, he has found himself castigated by people who claim doctrinal purity must be maintained, most often on the left.
Honestly, I think there would be more open minded free thought among a trad-catholic sect than most of the left these days.
So if this young woman finds acceptance and the ideas right of centre appealing, the left really needs to ask themselves if calling everyone who isn't mainlining Marxism a Nazi is really the way forward.

Indeed Bamc.

I'm only slightly familiar with Hands across the Aisle but like what I've seen.

What do mns think of the Hands across the Aisles initiative?

I suspect when people say another’s opinion makes them feel “unsafe” when they are not being threatened but rather just disagreed with what they are really trying to do is stop thought and shutdown debate with a thought stopping guilt inducing buzzword in order to impose their will and get their way without being challenged or debated. No reasonable person feels unsafe because someone respectfully disagrees with them or refuses to buy into their dogma.

I understand that Lindsay told her mother of the meeting with Rambukkana, Pimlott and Joel; her mother told her to record it. Yeh Mom!

We know that is a familiar reason given for deplatforming feminist speakers, among others.

This article, also by David Miller Haskell references the situation I was referring to with the LGBT group saying they were "unsafe" due to Lindsay Shepherd's presence:

quillette.com/2017/12/13/words-lose-meaning-wilfrid-laurier-university/

Offered. I was on the moderate centre left, a labour member but no fan of Blair. I still pretty much am centre left in many ways and haven’t changed all that much. But the left have become everything I despise in politics. They divided people into groups based on arbitrary characteristics and pit one group against another. They are anti free speech and censorious. They don’t believe in objective truth and ignore reality when it doesn’t suit their ideology. They are as dogmatic as any cult I know of. They think the individual doesn’t matter and seek power to control others. So yeah, I joined UKIP. Funny old world. I listened to how Lindsey shepherd was treated (it was appalling) and searched her and her speech on leaving the left just rang true for me.

Thanks for that article nauticant!

What was utterly batshit was the response of the LGBT soc at Laurier claiming "epistemic violence".