Left-wing student censured by university, and told she is a Nazi, for broadcasting debate between opposing viewpoints on transgender in communications class

[pisacake]

torontosun.com/opinion/columnists/furey-laurier-university-tapes-signal-a-much-wider-problem

"Lindsay Shepherd, a Master’s student in Communications studies, was put through the wringer by Nathan Rambukkana, an assistant professor in the department and her supervisor.

Her offence? Shepherd, in an undergrad tutorial she taught, played a few minutes from the TV Ontario public affairs program The Agenda, featuring an exchange between now famous professor Jordan Peterson and a lesser known instructor Nicholas Matte."

"Rambukkana told her that playing the exchange in class was equivalent to presenting Adolf Hitler’s theories in a neutral light. Going forward, her lessons would need approval. This left Shepherd – a self-described leftist – in tears, fearing for her future at the school after being victim to such a bullying session."

Rambukkana refused to own up to his actions, but fortunately Shepherd had covertly recorded the exchange, where she was told she was entitled to her opinions, just not to discuss them with students, and that having said opinions was a breach of the Canadian Human Rights Code.

nationalpost.com/news/canada/heres-the-full-recording-of-wilfrid-laurier-reprimanding-lindsay-shepherd-for-showing-a-jordan-peterson-video

Spanish Inquisition " So you weren’t, like, one of Jordan Peterson’s students?"
Shepherd " No"

it should be noted that upon encountering a teaching assistant who had mentioned an unpopular idea, one of Laurier’s first assumptions was that she was somehow an agent of those ideas. Several times during the meeting, Shepherd will reiterate that her beliefs about gender had no bearing on her decision to screen the video. “I disagree with Jordan Peterson, but you people seem to think I’m pro-Jordan Peterson,” she says at one point.

Shepherd: It’s taking sides for me to be like “oh, look at this guy, like everything that comes out of his mouth is B.S. but we’re going to watch anyway.”

Rambukkana: I understand the position that you’re coming from and your positionality, but the reality is that it has created a toxic climate for some of the students, you know, it’s great —

Rambukkana: Do you see how this is something that is not intellectually neutral, that is kind of “up for debate,” I mean this is the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Shepherd: What I have a problem with is, I didn’t target anybody. Who did I target?

Joel: Trans folks.

Shepherd: By telling them ideas that are really out there? Telling them that? By telling them? Really?

Rambukkana: It’s not just telling them. In legitimizing this as a valid perspective—

Shepherd: In a university all perspectives are valid.

Rambukkana: That’s not necessarily true, Lindsay.

Rambukkana: Do you understand how what happened was contrary to, sorry Adria, what was the policy?

Joel: Gendered and Sexual Violence.

Rambukkana: — Gendered and Sexual Violence Policy. Do you understand how —

Shepherd: Sorry, what did I violate in that policy.

Joel: Um, so, gender-based violence, transphobia, in that policy. Causing harm, um, to trans students by, uh, bringing their identity as invalid. Their pronouns as invalid — potentially invalid.

Shepherd: I know in my heart, and I expressed to the class, that I’m not transphobic and if any of them — again, I don’t know what they said — but I don’t think I gave away any kind of political position of mine. I remained very neutral, and uh—

Rambukkana: —that’s kind of the problem.

Rambukkana: These are very young students, and something of that nature is not appropriate to that age of student, because they don’t have …

Shepherd: 18?

Rambukkana: Yes.

Shepherd: They’re adults.

Rambukkana: Yes, but they’re very young adults. they don’t have the critical toolkit to be able to pick it apart yet. This is one of the things we’re teaching them, so this is why it becomes something that has to be done with a bit more care.

He said it takes a while to properly challenge “the faith-based, family and other types of structures in society that they’ve been inculcated with for years.” The meeting concludes, by the way, with a note that Shepherd must now run her seminar notes past Rambukkana and obtain specific approval for any future media she intends to show. “I’ll ask you not to play any more Jordan Peterson videos, or anything of the like,” Rambukkana said.

I'm not sure what being left wing has to do with it unless it's a comparison to the nazis who were 'self professed' socialists? But then again the whole thing is so ridiculous that being a 'leftist' may very well be relevant. I never understood why sone people are so threatened by mere words.

She wants to emphasise that she is not right-wing. Because I don't think that's acceptable in many parts of higher education.

I listened to a fascinating and worrying documentary on Canadian radio recently about the stifling of right wing views on campuses. This is a big story in Canada right now and I have SJW friends online who are convinced the student must be an alt right acolyte of Peterson because she is "familiar with his talking points" in interviews she has done this week. I think it's just as likely that she's a radfem.

Today the university and professor involved have been forced to offer grovelling written apologies to the TA.

This is very frightening. Canada is nuts.

I should say Canadian universities sound nuts. Especially after that nappy man story too.

Lindsay Shepherd tweeted this concise and wholly apt summary:

twitter.com/NewWorldHominin/status/933057922875166720

Someone posted this on twitter (can't remember exact words):

Trans activists: children as young as 5 can be certain about the gender they REALLY are, and at 10 can be totally confident enough to take life-altering drugs and go on the road to sterilisation!

Also trans activists: adults of 18 are very young adults. they don’t have the critical toolkit to be able to pick it apart yet.

Bue wrote - "I have SJW friends online who are convinced the student must be an alt right acolyte of Peterson because she is "familiar with his talking points""

Awareness is not necessarily endorsement.

Or if it were then it would be necessary for all good people to avoid awareness of bad things. I'm not sure that would be desirable in, say, the Police or the Judiciary.

I saw on Feminist Current (which is based in Canada) that in fact the university has apologised to the woman in this incident.
www.thestar.com/news/canada/2017/11/21/laurier-apologizes-to-teaching-assistant-who-aired-clip-of-gender-pronoun-debate.html

Lindsay Shepherd said she appreciated the apology, but added, “Let’s not forget that this was their only option. They were basically forced to do it out of public and media shaming.” Well, at least the pressure from outside the university was in the right direction.

Joel: Um, so, gender-based violence, transphobia, in that policy. Causing harm, um, to trans students by, uh, bringing their identity as invalid. Their pronouns as invalid — potentially invalid.

This is a level of deliberate bullshit that I can't compute.

It is clearly an utterly shit university.

This issue makes for strange bedfellows. The law to make misgendering a hate crime was opposed in parliament by Jordan Peterson (right-wing conservative blowhard), Meghan Murphy ( Feminist Current ), and Theryn Meyer (libertarian transwoman)! The misgendering covers any pronouns--not just he or she, but any pronoun you want to invent and identify as, e.g. ze, sie, hir, co, ey ....