Cancel Culture

[neverdie]

Is this the new home of the staunch free speech proponents, those who feel like SJWs are attacking their way of life?

Basically the new "PC gone mad" safe space?

Moves to cancel certain people is in fact political correctness gone mad.

that shitheaded Harper's letter doing just that:

That letter was just fine. I thought you were being ironic by saying "shit letter signed by a bunch of cnuts". The only cnuts I saw in that fiasco were the ones who backtracked when pressed about their support publically.

 

[JPRouve]

@neverdie No it has nothing to do with PC gone mad, it's about not wanting to be associated with someone's words or actions, it's not new and it has nothing to do politcal correctness and it's not specfic to a particular political philosophy.

While most of us benefit from free speech rights we also all benefit from freedom to choose who we want to be associated with. If you say something or act in a way that can be detrimental to someone else that person or organization will most likely take distance from you, it's an old ass phenomenon. There is a consequence to your actions.

 

[Solius]

I don't know what the general theme is that's been developing in this thread but my opinion is this.

Cancel culture isn't really a thing for the most part, it's called consequences. The world is always changing and we are adapting and certain things that used to be acceptable become unacceptable as we learn why they are harmful and grow. I'm sure people would've been up in arms about this kind of thing thousands of times throughout history. It wasn't too long ago on this very forum that the words faggot and spastic were used quite frequently.

Some of these people 100% deserve their careers to be over for what they've done and I can completely understand a company not wanting to be associated with some behaviour. The problem is a lot of people seem to want to double down on their original 'offence' (which may explain the mentality of doing it in the first place) and decrying a cancel culture where you cannot do anything right these days. If half of these people just straight up apologised and said they didn't know enough about the situation/topic and will make an effort to educate themselves in the future I'm sure it would come across a lot better. That guy who abused the Asian family the other day basically just wheeled out an apology template and everyone can see straight through it.

 

[dumbo]

Moves to cancel certain people is in fact political correctness gone mad.


That letter was just fine. I thought you were being ironic by saying "shit letter signed by a bunch of cnuts". The only cnuts I saw in that fiasco were the ones who backtracked when pressed about their support publically.

No I was being jokingly cantankerous. I actually really like some of the people who signed it, however, take off the signatures and it reads as a terribly self-serving, vague, and generally unhelpful pre-emptive strike against criticism (at least much of it does). That it was signed by some awful people who have strongly engaged in the silencing of even reasonable dissent, gives it a flavour of hypocrisy and elitism.

I mean feck your "dire professional consequences" when you yourself contribute to a climate of white supremacy, transphobia or other bigotry. These things have actual dire consequences.

 

[VP]

There are several reasons why cancel culture is a genuine menace:

• Angry internet mobs can get it horribly wrong (see this); mob justice is not social justice
• Cancel culture distracts from real, systemic issues by dumbing down discourse to trivial microaggressions
• It provides ripe fodder for the radical right while causing dissent within the left
• The movement seems to be captured humourless, obnoxious and (mostly) white pricks. They just don't seem to be pleasant humans - perhaps because they believe signalling virtue is more important than being virtuous.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

@neverdie No it has nothing to do with PC gone mad, it's about not wanting to be associated with someone's words or actions, it's not new and it has nothing to do politcal correctness and it's not specfic to a particular political philosophy.

While most of us benefit from free speech rights we also all benefit from freedom to choose who we want to be associate with. If you say something or act in a way that can be detrimental to someone else that person or organization will most likely take distance from you, it's an old ass phenomenon. There is a consequence to your actions.

I think that’s a fair summary. Although I definitely think people are more likely to get “cancelled” for expressing right wing opinions than left wing opinions. All the really nasty stuff anyone could come up with would always tend to skew right. I actually can’t think of a left wing opinion that would be problematic for an employer. We know how important the “woke dollar” is for big corporations by the way their marketing departments were desperate to show how much they cared about BLM.

 

[JPRouve]

I think that’s a fair summary. Although I definitely think people are more likely to get “cancelled” for expressing right wing opinions than left wing opinions. All the really nasty stuff anyone could come up with would always tend to skew right. I actually can’t think of a left wing opinion that would be problematic for an employer.

It's due to the nature of these right wing opinions, these right wing opinions are generally societal and target specific group of peoples which is a lot more problematic for a business that will generally target these same groups of people as potential clients, controversial left wing opinion are generally economic. People are rarely cancelled because they claimed that taxes should be banned or because they want a small government, they are cancelled because they claimed that black people are sub humans, gays are aberrations or women should focus on the kitchen and bed activities.

Edit: Also I'm pretty sure that there is significantly more right wing and far right commentators that are platformed on large media than there is far left or anarchists. We are so used to the former that we don't even notice it anymore.

 

[11101]

There are several reasons why cancel culture is a genuine menace:

• Angry internet mobs can get it horribly wrong (see this); mob justice is not social justice
• Cancel culture distracts from real, systemic issues by dumbing down discourse to trivial microaggressions
• It provides ripe fodder for the radical right while causing dissent within the left
• The movement seems to be captured humourless, obnoxious and (mostly) white pricks. They just don't seem to be pleasant humans - perhaps because they believe signalling virtue is more important than being virtuous.

These are the biggest issues as far as I'm concerned. I don't believe it's a coincidence that the emergence of cancel culture, SJWs etc has brought with it a rise in extreme viewpoints in society and even mainstream politics.

Trying to prevent open discussion and debate by simply shouting louder than the other side only serves to entrench people further in their existing views.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

It's due to the nature of these right wing opinions, these right wing opinions are generally societal and target specific group of peoples which is a lot more problematic for a business that will generally target these same groups of people as potential clients, controversial left wing opinion are generally economic. People are rarely cancelled because they claimed that taxes should be banned or because they want a small government, they are cancelled because they claimed that black people are sub humans, gays are aberrations or women should focus on the kitchen and bed activities.

Yeah, exactly. That’s basically what I said. Left leaning people don’t have problematic opinions, that would make their employers uncomfortable. Some right leaning people do. Although we both know that people have been cancelled for far less outrageous opinions than the examples you mention there.

Although, thinking about it, left leaning people may not get sacked but they definitely get “cancelled” in the sense of social media crucifixion. A lot of the more vicious twitter pile ons you see involve essentially left leaning people turning on each other. It’s very unusual for anyone to lose their job as a result but I’d say it’s still pretty unpleasant to be the bottom of the pile on.

 

[neverdie]

@neverdie No it has nothing to do with PC gone mad, it's about not wanting to be associated with someone's words or actions, it's not new and it has nothing to do politcal correctness and it's not specfic to a particular political philosophy.

While most of us benefit from free speech rights we also all benefit from freedom to choose who we want to be associated with. If you say something or act in a way that can be detrimental to someone else that person or organization will most likely take distance from you, it's an old ass phenomenon. There is a consequence to your actions.

I don't disagree with this except online mobs are inherently bad for everyone and everything.

 

[neverdie]

I actually can’t think of a left wing opinion that would be problematic for an employer. We know how important the “woke dollar” is for big corporations by the way their marketing departments were desperate to show how much they cared about BLM.

The BDS movement. Anything critical of Israel/Saudi in genereal in the US and UK. China, too, as the market is so large.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

The BDS movement. Anything critical of Israel/Saudi in genereal in the US and UK. China, too, as the market is so large.

Interesting. Don’t know much about any of that but will take your word for it.

EDIT: Actually, mentioning China makes me think of Mesut Ozil. He suffered real life consequences for expressing an essentially “left” opinion, didn’t he? So it does happen.

 

[JPRouve]

Yeah, exactly. That’s basically what I said. Left leaning people don’t have problematic opinions, that would make their employers uncomfortable. Some right leaning people do. Although we both know that people have been cancelled for far less outrageous opinions than the examples you mention there.

Although, thinking about it, left leaning people may not get sacked but they definitely get “cancelled” in the sense of social media crucifixion. A lot of the more vicious twitter pile ons you see involve essentially left leaning people turning on each other. It’s very unusual for anyone to loas their job as a result but I’d say it’s still pretty unpleasant to be the bottom of the pile on.

On your second paragraph, they often don't even get cancelled since they are not platformed because their ideas go against media moguls interests. You really see them around elections but they disappear after that.

 

[neverdie]

EDIT: Actually, mentioning China makes me think of Mesut Ozil. He suffered real life consequences for expressing an essentially “left” opinion, didn’t he? So it does happen.

Yep, also I'll add unionizing to the list in the US.

 

[FlawlessThaw]

Interesting. Don’t know much about any of that but will take your word for it.

EDIT: Actually, mentioning China makes me think of Mesut Ozil. He suffered real life consequences for expressing an essentially “left” opinion, didn’t he? So it does happen.

Same with Daryl Morey from NBA who had to delete his tweet:

 

[Solius]

Interesting. Don’t know much about any of that but will take your word for it.

EDIT: Actually, mentioning China makes me think of Mesut Ozil. He suffered real life consequences for expressing an essentially “left” opinion, didn’t he? So it does happen.

Kaepernick's career was basically ended too.

 

[Synco]

That's probably the key. Germany is much much better in that aspect, people have still collectively not lost their brain. I lived in Germany last year (though it was in Munich and did not even see this madness.

Differences always exist. But I very much doubt that what's the ideological accompaniment of an anti-liberal pushback over here is the truth elsewhere.

Anyway, we've reached the limits of what anecdotal evidence can bring to a discussion. I said above why the ideological framework you put your account in makes me mistrust its accuracy and the conclusions drawn from it, little more to say.

Try to live in Silicon Valley for a few months and you'll start questioning your own sanity.

That would be this Silicon Valley (six years on)?

In 2014, tech companies Google, Yahoo!, Facebook, Apple, and others, released corporate transparency reports that offered detailed employee breakdowns. In May, Google said 17% of its tech employees worldwide were women, and, in the U.S., 1% of its tech workers were black and 2% were Hispanic.[102] June 2014 brought reports from Yahoo! and Facebook. Yahoo! said that 15% of its tech jobs were held by women, 2% of its tech employees were black and 4% Hispanic.[103] Facebook reported that 15% of its tech workforce was female, and 3% was Hispanic and 1% was black.[104] In August, Apple reported that 80% of its global tech staff was male and that, in the U.S., 54% of its tech jobs were staffed by Caucasians and 23% by Asians.[105] Soon after, USA Today published an article about Silicon Valley's lack of tech-industry diversity, pointing out that it is largely white or Asian, and male. "Blacks and Hispanics are largely absent," it reported, "and women are underrepresented in Silicon Valley—from giant companies to start-ups to venture capital firms."[106]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicon_Valley

 

[Pogue Mahone]

Kaepernick's career was basically ended too.

Great example! Yeah, I think I’ll take back the idea that only right wing people get cancelled. They’re definitely more likely to but that’s also because they’re more likely to have genuinely problematic opinions.

 

[JPRouve]

I don't disagree with this except online mobs are inherently bad for everyone and everything.

Online mobs are mainly irrelevant, particularly since people are generally thinking about Facebook and Twitter because when you do you are basically focusing on throwaway comments that are never reasoned and can't be contextualized. Your point would for example not work for Redcafe or thousands of other discussion forums where people will discuss things ad nauseum and try to give as much context and proof to what they are saying and you will also notice that people are rarely "cancelled" based on reasonable opinions shared on these forums.

Personally my observation is that a certain amount of people will go on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram and make controversial statements that they didn't bother contextualized. In my opinion when you do that you are in the wrong because you purposely used that format to reach an extremely large amount of people and made a statement that you can't support on that platform even if you added the intellectual capacity to do so, some things require depth while Twitter and Facebook are shallow medias.

 

[Gehrman]

Same with Daryl Morey from NBA who had to delete his tweet:

https://www.spiked-online.com/2020/07/03/where-is-the-solidarity-with-hong-kong/

 

[Icemav]

Speaking of demanding apologies (coupled with legal threats) and generally threatening others' ability to speak freely, here is a one of the signatories of that shitheaded Harper's letter doing just that:

Put in context: Mcgarry had suggested J.K Rowling "defends abusive misogynist trolls". J.K Rowling had tweeted that an account named "Brian Spanner" was a "good man". "Brian Spanner" has a long history of abusive misogynist tweets.

It's not just woke, liberal-lefty, marxist-millennial, echo-Corbyn-chambers that are trying to stifle this shit. The nasty bigoted fecks with Billions of money, who sign letters demanding to be heard are also doing this shit. In fact everyone is doing this shit - you shout your horrible views and tell others to shut up about their own horrible views. Social media has only ever been a tool of amplification don't mistake it for a logic detector.

Agree. Don't get me wrong I am not in support of people being able to speak freely without consequences. Just that if you want to post publically you need to have thick skin and its not always necesary to engage in a dialogue.

But I agree people of every disposition try to shut down and bully. Trump is a classic example and a poster boy for spouting veiled racism and all manner of false and bigoted things and still getting away with it, horrifying and being celebrated in equal measure. But he certainly goes by the mantra that the bigger the lie the easier it is to fool people. He also has so many millions who love his right wing non-PC contrarian standing up to the liberal establisment (all bullshit) tough guy persona.... its essentially neo-facism but many people are too distracted by the culture war crap. He has normalized this nasty stuff.

Essentially if you know your audience and have the power of numbers its rocknroll time. Just be careful to pick the right side if you want or need to make you position heard. If you are just a small fish with a bit of a wishy washy position you might be slaughtered.

I personally steer clear of all this public personal branding. There are real issues crucial to the world.... Trump for instance is persuing a strategy of collapsing a burning house (the American Dream) for personal power. Le Pen also came within inches of winning the election in France. This is terrifying and real. The sociopathy of social media clouds this reality for many people. Whilst Rowling is battling with shrill SJWs she risks missing the wood from the trees. Thats what is the most frustrating thing about all this.

 

[berbatrick]

 

[FlawlessThaw]

https://www.spiked-online.com/2020/07/03/where-is-the-solidarity-with-hong-kong/

Good points but the comparison to BLM protests was unnecessary.

Here's the Times memoralising all those we have lost to "Cancel Culture":

 

[SteveJ]

Rest In PC.

 

[JPRouve]

I wouldn't want to die on the R Kelly hill, too many chances of being pissed on.

 

[Gehrman]

Good points but the comparison to BLM protests was unnecessary.

Here's the Times memoralising all those we have lost to "Cancel Culture":

Anyway to get a look at the whole article without subscribing? I do agree that the references to the BLM protests were somewhat unecssary.

 

[BobbyManc]

How remarkable that I managed to spend four years at university without ever meeting a Marxist academic. I didn't even know any students who identified as Marxists. There is a strange myth that universities are extreme left-wing institutions full of socialist professors indoctrinating students with the poison of Marx, Engels, Lenin and co. Universities, like pretty much all major institutions, are most certainly not left-wing.

 

[JPRouve]

How remarkable that I managed to spend four years at university without ever meeting a Marxist academic. I didn't even know any students who identified as Marxists. There is a strange myth that universities are extreme left-wing institutions full of socialist professors indoctrinating students with the poison of Marx, Engels, Lenin and co. Universities, like pretty much all major institutions, are most certainly not left-wing.

I had one and he wasn't liked by his peers.

 

[Icemav]

What a load of absolute hogwash. Another sad victim of the culture war mirage.

I would reckon populist far right and neo-facist leaders around globe represents a very real and present danger. This is the existential threat.

I wonder if we will see Mr Lawrence doing a Jordan Perterson - sobbing on stage with Victor Orban talking about young men struggling with PC culture.

These guys need to wake up quickly and pick a side.

 

[oneniltothearsenal]

No, she was not. She said that 'she is tired of her work not getting the credit it deserves', 'that her paper has only 5 citations', and 'would that have happened if the author was a white dude' (hint: yes, it would have happened. Mine and another few thousand papers with white dude authors did not make that lecture. In fact more than 90% of accepted papers in top venues (mine included) did not make that lecture, and more than 99% of arxiv-only papers - to the category that paper belongs considering that it is not peer-reviewed yet did not make that lecture). She literally said that thing would not have happened to white men, and put the #CiteBlackWomen hashtag. Google's head of AI liked the post, S.B. wrote a lengthy post on Facebook about it, N.L. literally wanked over the paper, as did many other prominent dove scholars (who * ironically, did not cite that work too, cause you know, it is an okay unpublished work in a sea of dozens of great works, hundreds of okay published works and thousands of unpublished okay works). It was totally accusing M.R. and J.D. of racism and sexism. Whom obviously had to apologize for a crime that they never did.

When I politely suggested that the paper is not peer-reviewed, and that could have been a reason (I didn't say the frequentist thingy that probability wise, her paper had less 0.1% chance of being cited by virtue of being one of a few thousand unpublished papers in that topic), I got attacked from T.G. for gaslighting, and why I cannot accept that it is racism and #CiteBlackWoman. Her posts got a few hundred likes if I am not mistaken. By the way, did I mentioned that this mistreated black woman is supervised from D.B. (white dude, who was in the paper), one of the most recognizable names in ML. If there was some bias for that paper, it is only positive considering that for 99%+ of people, that is the only recognizable name from the authors. And as everyone knows, people put papers in ArXiv primarily to influence the reviewers (who do not know the names of the authors, but can search the title in google and find if the paper is on ArXiv). There is enough data to suggest that papers in ArXiv do better than those who are not in the reviewing process, precisely cause most of those papers come from big groups with big names, so in this way, the reviewers get a positive bias. She is a privileged person, not discriminated.

Blatant lies and politicization of science.

* One of them I work with (very high in a top-company). She has not answered on the project chat despite specifically tagging her two times for a couple of ideas. Who knows why? Of course, she did not cite that paper on her own two works in GANs, but you know, it is cool being woke.

Oh, this incident would have looked one-off, if it did not came only a couple days after Y.L. essentially had to leave twitter, for the crime of having a different scientific opinion to T.G. about 'the bias in machine learning systems'. We are talking for Y.L whom literally invented the main tool in deep learning. On the other side we have T.G., whom without her Black on AI, would have been a literal nobody (like me), considering that she has only a couple of technical papers published on big venues. But hey, she is apparently one of leading scholars in AI and even made in John Oliver's show.

Here's your problem. What you put in quotes is literally a question that, to me, is referencing implicit bias.

Then you go off the rails and insist it's "literally calling them racist" when it's literally not as you describe. There is no attempt to "cancel" anyone, nothing remotely like "ruining someone's career" or anything like whatever you seem so outraged about.

Whether or not someone agrees it's a fair OP because there has been a history of discrediting and white washing particularly women and people of color accomplishments in science from Rosalind Franklin to many more hidden examples.

It's fair to suggest you might be gaslighting because
1) you keep misrepresenting the actual post
2) you keep prescribing motives you can't know but just feel
3) you aren't allowing for any opinion to be possible other than your own (that the OP was on implicit bias not specific calls of racism)
4) you really sound angry that Google AI head liked a post which comes off as pretty and rather weak on your part

 

[Maticmaker]

"Publish and be dammed"...seems to be appropriate here!

When people commit their thoughts or actions to spoken words or for them to be published in newspapers, the media generally and increasingly social media, then its almost certain someone somewhere will get upset and disagree, 'call them out' or 'cancel them', or call 'for their head'.

The concept of 'Free speech' is great, but it never really existed and even if it did, it is now in danger of being totally regaled. Nowadays with mobile phones that can make videos, everyone must be very careful in what they say, and if they do use language which others will see as racist, or homophobic, or other sorts of hatred, then they must expect that it will be recorded and exposed, somehow, somewhere.

If Henry II's ( apparently) unguarded remark about "will no one rid me of this turbulent/troublesome priest.." which History attributes as the motivation for Thomas Becketts death, was an outcome of not thinking before engaging your brain in 1170, then what chance someone these days losing their head, job, income, reputation, good name, etc., for similar actions.
Perhaps David Starkey has a view on this?

'Silence is golden', 'mum's the word' 'keep your trap shut', is a world we can look forward to!

 

[Vidyoyo]

How remarkable that I managed to spend four years at university without ever meeting a Marxist academic. I didn't even know any students who identified as Marxists. There is a strange myth that universities are extreme left-wing institutions full of socialist professors indoctrinating students with the poison of Marx, Engels, Lenin and co. Universities, like pretty much all major institutions, are most certainly not left-wing.

I've seen it both ways. A lot of academics are left-wing and I think that goes with the territory, especially in humanities. Those who run universities aren't particularly left wing, although I don't know if I'd place them politically as the ones I met, including the Vice Chancellor, were mostly pragmatic.

At the end of the day, I believe cancel culture is all about ensuring good branding and nobody wants bad branding. It tends to ruin the brand.

 

[BobbyManc]

I've seen it both ways. A lot of academics are left-wing and I think that goes with the territory, especially in humanities. Those who run universities aren't particularly left wing, although I don't know if I'd place them politically as the ones I met, including the Vice Chancellor, were mostly pragmatic.

At the end of the day, I believe cancel culture is all about ensuring good branding and nobody wants bad branding. It tends to ruin the brand.

There's a huge distinction between identifying as left-wing and a Marxist though. Most people on here who claim to identify as left-wing always seem appalled by the mere thought of actual socialism. Take the Labour party, for instance, which seems as disgusted at the idea of Marxism as it does about any other ideology. And as you say, the people who actually wield power in these institutions are most certainly not Marxists.

 

[Vidyoyo]

There's a huge distinction between identifying as left-wing and a Marxist though. Most people on here who claim to identify as left-wing always seem appalled by the mere thought of actual socialism. Take the Labour party, for instance, which seems as disgusted at the idea of Marxism as it does about any other ideology. And as you say, the people who actually wield power in these institutions are most certainly not Marxists.

You're right - big distinction that.

 

[NotThatSoph]

There's a huge distinction between identifying as left-wing and a Marxist though. Most people on here who claim to identify as left-wing always seem appalled by the mere thought of actual socialism. Take the Labour party, for instance, which seems as disgusted at the idea of Marxism as it does about any other ideology. And as you say, the people who actually wield power in these institutions are most certainly not Marxists.

There's also the fact that rabid culture warriors conflate academics who are influenced by Marxism as a method in their academic careers with being Marxists who want to eat the rich of whatever.

 

[Revan]

Here's your problem. What you put in quotes is literally a question that, to me, is referencing implicit bias.

Then you go off the rails and insist it's "literally calling them racist" when it's literally not as you describe. There is no attempt to "cancel" anyone, nothing remotely like "ruining someone's career" or anything like whatever you seem so outraged about.

Her exact quote:

You give a lecture about GANs and do not include PresGAN, which was developed at DeepMind. Is it because the lead author (moi) is a Black woman? Cite me. I’m tired of the dismissal and erasure of my contributions.

Had PresGAN been led/developed by a White male, things would have been very different. It would not be at 4 citations (1 being a citation from my PhD thesis) ~9 months after being released. I am tired of this. #CiteBlackWomen

Nah, she is not really calling racism and sexism here. Not at all, nothing to see!

Whether or not someone agrees it's a fair OP because there has been a history of discrediting and white washing particularly women and people of color accomplishments in science from Rosalind Franklin to many more hidden examples.

Hey, Rosalind Franklin got discriminated 70 years ago, so it is only fair why my unpublished paper is not getting mentioned in a lecture that talks about GANs and that cited 35 papers. Of course, it did not cite another hundred published (only top venue) papers, and another few thousands (probably more than 10k+) unpublished (or published on second-tier venue) papers. You know, like mine, which is not yet published.

It's fair to suggest you might be gaslighting because
1) you keep misrepresenting the actual post

No, I am not. I am saying that the paper had no business on being on that lecture (only this year there have been 100+ GAN papers which have been accepted on top venues, so only this year there have been 100+ better papers than hers). Crying racism and sexism in this card is clearly using racism and sexist cards.

2) you keep prescribing motives you can't know but just feel

I admit that she might have been simply frustrated, and she is overrating her papers on delusional levels. It happens, true. A paper that I thought would be an oral of mine got rejected, and on resubmission got barely accepted. I thought it was awesome as did my supervisor. I accepted the criticism though, and improved the paper for resubmission instead of saying 'is this just because I have a Muslim name' in twitter. For sure it would have given me more likes though, maybe a strategy for next time around (just kidding).

3) you aren't allowing for any opinion to be possible other than your own (that the OP was on implicit bias not specific calls of racism)

I am using the fact that her paper had less than 0.1% chance of being on that lecture from a frequentist point of view.

4) you really sound angry that Google AI head liked a post which comes off as pretty and rather weak on your part

I am angry that some powerful members of the community are actively encouraging this type of behavior. I don't care too much about the OP, she might just be frustrated or might actually deliberately trying to take advantage of the current anti-racism wave in order to get undeserved fame for herself. In the first case, she would be misguided, in the second she is trying to advance her career by politics (and potentially ruining that of others). On the other hand, I am angry that powerful people are encouraging this and are politicizing science. In many ways, it has been going for years.

 

[entropy]

I've seen it both ways. A lot of academics are left-wing and I think that goes with the territory, especially in humanities. Those who run universities aren't particularly left wing, although I don't know if I'd place them politically as the ones I met, including the Vice Chancellor, were mostly pragmatic.

Academics are pretty conservative tbh. Especially in the US. The racism that you witness in every line of work doesn't magically disappear when it comes to academia. People tend to think academics are somewhat left-wing when their opinions are contrasted with tech bros like some in this thread. Academia is rife with racism and idiots who take it upon themselves to be gatekeepers of their field. Surprised to see that no one mentioned Chomsky in this thread. He has been feck' ed over his entire career because of his leftist views. I don't necessarily agree with him but he is the most well-known academic who has been shunned by his own field because of his views.

 

[Revan]

Academics are pretty conservative tbh. Especially in the US. The racism that you witness in every line of work doesn't magically disappear when it comes to academia. People tend to think academics are somewhat left-wing when their opinions are contrasted with tech bros like some in this thread. Academia is rife with racism and idiots who take it upon themselves to be gatekeepers of their field. Surprised to see that no one mentioned Chomsky so far in this thread. He has been feck' ed over his entire career because of his leftist views. I don't necessarily agree with him but he is the most well-known academic who has been shunned by his own field because of his views.

Interestingly that you mentioned Chomsky. He signed two days ago a letter about open-debate with regard to the current cancel culture: https://harpers.org/a-letter-on-justice-and-open-debate/

Whom you are referring as tech bro in this thread and what do you mean by that?

 

[BobbyManc]

Interestingly that you mentioned Chomsky. He signed two days ago a letter about open-debate with regard to the current cancel culture: https://harpers.org/a-letter-on-justice-and-open-debate/

Whom you are referring as tech bro in this thread and what do you mean by that?

Yes but it’s essential to remember Chomsky is the only signatory who is absolutely opposed to ‘cancelling’ people and he is an extreme defender of free speech. Notably, he defended the right of a Holocaust denier to say what he wanted. There are signatories on that list like J K Rowling who wanted Labour figures ‘cancelled’ for far less than Holocaust denial. Which exposes the hypocrisy of the letter. A lot of its advocates have their own very public history of trying to ‘cancel’ people.

 

[Revan]

Yes but it’s essential to remember Chomsky is the only signatory who is absolutely opposed to ‘cancelling’ people and he is an extreme defender of free speech. Notably, he defended the right of a Holocaust denier to say what he wanted. There are signatories on that list like J K Rowling who wanted Labour figures ‘cancelled’ for far less than Holocaust denial. Which exposes the hypocrisy of the letter. A lot of its advocates have their own very public history of trying to ‘cancel’ people.

A right thing to do IMO.

No idea if he is the only one in that letter who thinks so, the vast majority of people there I have no idea whom they are.

I support the right of free speech in all harmful discussions* (denial of Holocaust) or harmless discussions (flat Earth theory). No reason for the government (or angry mobs on Twitter) to decide what can be said and what cannot be said.

* Of course, not in, I have a bomb in the airplane type of scenario.