To Think That Academia Should Encourage Freedom of Speech?

[SPOFS]

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/trans-goldsmiths-lecturer-natacha-kennedy-behind-smear-campaign-against-academics-f2zqbl222

(Behind Pay Wall)

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6145781/University-researcher-asked-Facebook-group-circulate-list-academics-disagreed-her.html

(Not behind pay wall, but Daily Mail)

Basically, an academic at Goldsmith's Uni has secretly compiled a list of professors who disagreed with her views. The list was made through a Facebook group. All of the academic listed were female. The members of the Facebook group were then encouraged to report the female academics for "hate crimes".

I am shocked by this. I thought that the whole point of academia was to generate and discover new ideas? How are people supposed to do that without the fear of being reported for "hate crimes"?

When I was at uni, I used to debate with the people I disagreed with. I wouldn't have dreamed of setting up a secret group against them!

But the millenials seem to be scared of debate and only eant to hear what they agree with. So called safe spaces and other attempts to block free speech in our university is a real worry. These precious little darlings would never have coped in my youth. The snowflake generation - our next leaders - give me great cause for concern

Hi, millennial here. Are you aware of how ridiculous this kind of thing sounds? All we hear is "When I was young, we got to spout our racist/sexist/transphobic views and nobody ever challenged it."

@eniledam

Hi millennial!
I think you need to work on your critical listening & reading skills if you think that offensive views were never challenged 'in the olden days'.
We just didn't feel the need to silence everyone who said things we didn't like. Having things out in the open makes it easier to challenge, refute and retort to offensive views, and it certainly makes it easier to understand who thinks what.
Know thine enemy, so to speak.

I just checked who counts as a millennial, fortunately I’m one year too old. I clearly had a very narrow escape from being completely devoid of critical thinking skills.

I’m sure a lot of the older generation spent their youth challenging sexism and racism which is why they continue to challenge the sexism, racism and assaults on free speech/thoughts hiding behind the accusations of ‘transphobia’.

Last time I looked ‘the older generation’ still are out there challenging woman hating views. Like Get the L Out and their lesbian-defending protest at Pride 2018.

O millennial. Really? Get a history book.

All we hear is "When I was young, we got to spout our racist/sexist/transphobic views and nobody ever challenged it."

I would challenge that as being untrue. Students in the 1980s fought for gay rights, women's rights, for political prisoners abroad and their rights to freedom of expression, for CND, for the Greenham Common Peace Camp, for miners' support networks, Reclaim the Night, Anti-Nazi League, and much more.

One of the weirdest things about all this is that 'Natacha Kennedy' is also listed as 'Mark Hellen' in the Goldsmiths directory, where Mark is referred to as 'he'. So this person only identifies as a transwoman part time, but presumably s/he thinks should be legally regarded as a woman (for the purpose of accessing sex-segregated spaces) even though s/he also identifies as a man called Mark.

One of the other weird things about this story is that apparently you can become a lecturer (not a TA, an actual lecturer) at Goldsmiths with no PhD, just a Masters. That is almost as concerning as his misogynistic bullying.

Natacha Kennedy signed up to Green Party by any chance? Poor Goldsmiths, was a reasonable educational institution once upon a time. Now just an Institution apparently.