I agree that she had a point about promoting academics beyond their capabilities in a bid towards equality and inclusion but her actual words are problematic as written. It also seems she realised the need to explain further.
Stock might not have intended to say that nobody with dyslexia should be an academic, but I think it’s a stretch to deny that, as written, it reads that she’s implying that a) being dyslexic is an ‘intellectual disability’ and b) disqualifies one from scholarly life. It’s literally one sentence after the other. It’d have been better not to have included that second sentence at all. As we know, words matter.
There is currently some bafflement on social media about why Cambridge authorities are disclaiming the accusations about Arday with such aggressive, self-satisfied certainty. I have a possible explanation that is only secondarily connected to skin color. Namely: at some point, the university sector decided that intellectual disability was something that should be mitigated, rather than treated as disqualifying one from scholarly life. Conditions such as dyslexia and dyspraxia, autism, ADHD, speech delay (and so on) were now to be treated as unfair obstacles to a person’s dreams of pursuing an academic career, rather than constituting evidence they were unsuited. And since over-diagnosis of mental health conditions is rife in the sector, and everyone is frightened of being called discriminatory, the predictable upshot was that — at least in some cases — straightforward midwittery came to be treated like an excusable intellectual disability as well.
And looking just at the university sector, and I’m thinking as I type this, I’d argue that making allowances for SpLDs is not the slippery slope problem in relation to not knowing where you stop once you start making those allowances.
From my perspective, it’s not the reasonable adjustments themselves that have become problematic, it’s the poor judgement of the decision makers. Incontestably ‘intellectual’ decision makers I’d add who have allowed their own virtue signalling to prevent them from knowing where to stop. Instead, the virtue signallers have given in to the demands of some individual’s unreasonable allowances for their SpLDs (either real or perceived).
Similar to the slippery slope of Canada’s MAID. The idea of terminally ill people being able to end their lives has merit but it’s increasingly problematic misuse is the fault of the Canadian lawmakers who have given in to demands for the expansion of eligibility. When they could have said ‘no’.