40 Oxford dons sign letter in support of Kathleen Stock

[ArabeIIaScott]

This seems pretty significant.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/05/16/free-speech-oxford-university-trans-row-kathleen-stock/

'Oxford dons have warned students that freedom of speech is at risk as a trans row engulfs the university.
More than 40 academics - including Prof Richard Dawkins, the evolutionary biologist, and Prof Nigel Biggar, the theologian - have intervened in support of a planned appearance at the Oxford Union by Prof Kathleen Stock, a leading feminist, in a letter to The Telegraph.'

...

Letter includes:

'“Professor Stock believes that biological sex in humans is real and socially salient, a view which until recently would have been so commonplace as to hardly merit asserting.
“Whether or not one agrees with Professor Stock’s views, there is no plausible and attractive ideal of academic freedom, or of free speech more generally, which would condemn their expression as outside the bounds of permissible discourse.”'

Here's an archived copy: https://archive.ph/LGjLx

I have started using Moonpig to send personalised thank you cards to those brave enough to speak out. Obviously too expensive to do this to all 40 signatories, so I have send them to those who have signed from my Old College. That has likely saved them from losing my modest annual donation, as I was very irritated at all the PRIDE flags flying over Oxford Colleges last summer.

Yes she cannot fail to support it. Her predicament first made me realise how bad it was in academia.

My fave has got to be: Professor Carl Heneghan, Professor of Evidence-Based Medicine

There's also someone from the Biology Faculty lol.

I hope this gives academics more confidence. What a time to live, eh?

Also:

Kathryn Webb, Oxford Institute of Clinical Psychology Training and Research and Harris Manchester College

Good

Everything stands or falls with the act of speaking out,” Desmet says. The dedicated totalitarians will surely remain unmoved, but the “go along to get along” types may just decide the leap is worth it"

The bloody flags, stressed my daughter out seeing those everywhere.

And Yuan Yi Zhu, Research Fellow, Harris Manchester College, and Nuffield College who wrote that hilarious review of Jolyon Maugham's new book: https://archive.ph/yAxSD

(A character oddly similar to Maugham appears in Simon Edge's latest excellent satire In the Beginning, too!)

Is there another faculty that's 'Medecine based on astrology, LSD fantasies and brainfarts'?

That'll be GIDS, the Tavistock et al, won't it? (I know they're not faculties at Oxford)

Good for them, though I would have preferred the phrase “ whether or not one agrees with Professor Stocks views” to be tippexed out. She is saying sex is biological, do other academics really have a problem with that concept truth?

Professor Stock believes that biological sex in humans is real and socially salient, a view which until recently would have been so commonplace as to hardly merit asserting.
“Whether or not one agrees with Professor Stock’s views, there is no plausible and attractive ideal of academic freedom, or of free speech more generally, which would condemn their expression as outside the bounds of permissible discourse

This is an absolutely brilliant quote that cuts sharply through all the absurd hyperbolic rhetoric from the gender ideology lobby.

Sorry, I could not get it to stop linking to that article.

Anyway, can anyone cut and paste more of the letter?

Oh no, that sentence is brilliant. Because of the sentence above it, it shows exactly how sensible and commonplace the view is that TRAs are so vehemently objecting to ( in fact, I think many of them will be surprised to learn that this is all they are objecting to, rather the worldwide imposition of genocidal fourth Reich that they so fondly imagine they bravely combating by screaming abuse at women). That sentence really highlights how ridiculous their position is.

I loved that bit, it’s like a challenge to the other academics, as if it’s saying ‘seriously? You are really pretending to disagree with this?’

Good. Interesting to see some signatories from Sociology and Nuffield College as well. Well done that 40

excellent

*evenoxfordneedssaving · Today 11:55
potniatheron"

My fave has got to be: Professor Carl Heneghan, Professor of Evidence-Based Medicine ... There's also someone from the Biology Faculty lol.*

You can just imagine it, can't you?

"You don't understand! The science and biology says you're wrong!"

Well, actually....

"Oh yeah! NOW you claim to be a biologist, how VERY convenient..."

Text of the letter:
'Sir,
We are academics at the University of Oxford, possessed of a range of different political beliefs, Left and Right. We wholeheartedly condemn the decision of the Oxford University Student Union (Oxford SU) to sever its ties with the Oxford Union (the Union) after the latter’s refusal to rescind an invitation to the philosopher and gender-critical feminist Kathleen Stock.
Professor Stock believes that biological sex in humans is real and socially salient, a view which until recently would have been so commonplace as to hardly merit asserting. Whether or not one agrees with Professor Stock’s views, there is no plausible and attractive ideal of academic freedom, or of free speech more generally, which would condemn their expression as outside the bounds of permissible discourse. Unfortunately, the position of her opponents seems to be that Professor Stock’s views are so illicit that they cannot be safely discussed in front of an audience of consenting and intelligent adults at the main debating society at the University of Oxford. If this were the case, it is doubtful that they could be safely expressed anywhere – a result that, as her opponents are no doubt satisfied to find, would amount to their effective prohibition.
Fortunately, it has become clear that the Union’s capitulation cannot be secured by the usual methods of moralistic browbeating and social censure. However, Oxford SU is now threatening its financial model by seeking to prevent the Union from having a stall at future freshers’ fairs. This is dangerous territory. Universities exist, among other things, to promote free inquiry and the disinterested pursuit of the truth by means of reasoned argument. To resort to coercion and financial threats when unable to secure one’s preferred outcome in debate would represent a profound failure to live up to these ideals.
Universities must remain places where contentious views can be openly discussed. The salient alternative to this, one apparently favoured by many of Professor Stock’s opponents, is simply unacceptable: a state of affairs in which the institutions of a university collude to suppress the expression of controversial, but potentially true, viewpoints in an effort to prevent them from becoming more widely known."

That is a hilarious review, thanks for linking.

Going to be covered on The World at One on R4

BBC Radio 4's World at One is just about to have an Oxford academic and a student talking about this issue from different sides.