Monday, April 26, 2010
During a recent lecture my professor expressed her agreement with any type of sexual affiliation or relationships. Her desire was to create an "inclusive classroom" where no judgment was passed on anyone based on his or her sexual affiliation. Along with this statement my teacher told us about how one of her fellow professors didn't agree with her stand on sexuality. Therefore, he was hateful, bigoted, and ignorant. Needless to say, this shocked me. This refusal to accept her fellow professor's viewpoint as a legitimate perspective contradicts her desire to create an inclusive classroom. As a result she excludes all who didn't agree with her narrowly defined opinion of what is moral. The idea of an inclusive classroom is commendable, but my professor has failed to create this environment. I would be a member of this elusive "inclusive classroom" if I agreed with exactly what she says. Interestingly enough, I disagree with almost everything she says and my frustration grows with every class. I know I am not alone. My call to you, fellow students, is to think for yourselves. Professors don't hold all the knowledge. The privilege of being an educator doesn't allow the right to push an agenda on us and judge those who disagree. College is meant to be a place where we freely explore ideas and form our own views, not have them belittled by our professors when we think differently. The classroom will never be inclusive if students must listen to professors spout off their morally subjective ideals. I am paying for professors to teach, not tell me what they believe is right and wrong. I can decide that on my own.
— Joey Williams is a senior from Denver.
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Comments
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
The idea that students can openly express their ideas in class is a nice one (it should be this way), but any intelligent student can spot a professor who will nail them to the wall if they don't simply regurgitate their liberal nonsense.
Professors have a nice little thing called 'tenure' to protect them from reprisals, but students really don't have anything. I would advise students not to question gay marriage, gun ownership, abortion, socialism, Keynesianism, atheism, or the like if they value their grades. It doesn't matter how intellectually informed your work is, the professors hold all the power in the relationship and it is impossible to prove bias on their part. Be careful with your conservative beliefs out there, because there are a lot of professors who can't wait to punish you for them.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
Sickening, quite honestly. Liberalism is anything but.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
You all are bigots. :(
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
The classic fallacy that you are intolerant if you oppose intolerance. The last straw for the far right to grasp.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
No one is forcing you to attend KU, or any other school for that matter. If you wanted to attend a university where the professors share your bigoted worldview then you should look into a place like Oral Roberts.
And the whole premise of your article is whack. No, we do not have to be tolerant of your intolerant views. This is like saying that we should be accepting of white supremacists because they are just adding to our "inclusive classroom".
its 2010, bro. get with it.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
if there were no bigots, bible beaters, white supremacists, homophobes, scientologists, conservative nutjobs, and religious right loons, where would we derive our entertainment?
Look dude, all I'm saying is this- you don't have to agree with everything your professor states like it's the Bible. If you can come up with a really good reason why we shouldn't accept and include people of all sexual orientations that doesn't involve quotes from the Bible or bigoted hate speech, then maybe your professor would be willing to change her viewpoint. The way I see it, you probably can't really think of a good reason because there isn't one.
Morality isn't about who a person is attracted to, or what they do with their sexual/life partners on their own private time. Morality is about how people interact with other human beings, and how are actions may or may not affect someone else.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
Schlag...Why is the Bible excluded as a reference for anything moral? Can you name one book that has done as much to build Western morals/civilization than the Bible? Or even one that has had half the influence? Furthermore, what authority to you base your own morals from? Your own "feelings?" Are you really that nihilistic?
thatone/talib...You're reasoning is quite Orwellian...intolerance toward intolerance=tolerance, (?) "inclusive"=anything I agree with but nothing else, (?) hate speech is reserved for the "far right" and anything I say (i.e. call you a bigot) is in no way intolerant or hateful.
Newspeak indeed.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
It's good to know that objectors to college liberality is either one of two things - a complete intolerant bigot or a martyr for the crusade against elitism. Back at my southern Indiana high school, I had to listen to teachers blatantly express their views, which were typically incredibly conservative. Here, at Kansas University, I've learned to deal with the opposite. I myself am a centrist and question my teachers... within reason. If anything, Mr Williams, this will prove to be an interesting amendment to your education - how do you handle those with views opposing of your own? I'm guessing that expecting somebody in a position of authority to not fire back to your statements is probably not the right way to go about things. Just a thought from somebody who also deals with the college bias.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
how about Greek and Roman Philosophers? what about Plato? Virgil? Cicero?
Many of the morals and ethics that made their way into the Bible were derived from Roman and Greek ideas, which were prevalent at the time the New Testament was written. The rest of the book was probably a combo of ideas from Babylon, Egypt, etc. It's more of an amalgamation of ideals from different periods, with some "divine" influence thrown in there. So sure, you could say that the Bible has had a huge influence on Western Civilization and culture, but the writers of the Bible had a huge influence from Roman, Greek, Egyptian, Babylonian and Syrian cultures. Morals were not spouted out by a deity. They said that God commanded this and commanded that, but in reality it was more than likely some elder or priest writing it down because it sounded like a pretty good idea at the time.
Some morals have evolved too over time, like it's no longer moral to keep slaves, or have more than one wife.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
aqibtalib - Williams is pointing at the teacher not those of differing sexual preferences and who said anything about religion? You suggest segregation (go to another college)? Where is the inclusion in that? Is that how you handle disagreement? Saying one thing and doing another is, well, embarrassing. the teacher needs to re-assess if inclusiveness is worth it to her. Maybe she cannot handle a differing opinion. I get more hateful attitude from so-called liberals than any other group. Lighten up and relax guys. Live and let live.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
One good thing about liberal wack-job professors (like some at KU) is that they can force thoughtful students to do extra homework and extra research that they might not normally have performed if they weren't fired up by the kind of intolerant liberalism-on-crack that Joey Williams described in his article. That extra homework and study could result in a much stronger, better informed, more persuasive conservative and/or theistic voice in the marketplace of ideas....a voice that will help turn the tide against the kind of mess currently going on.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
Once again, we do not have to be tolerant of your intolerance. As sjschlag pointed out earlier, once you can justify your moral stance that it ok to discriminate against people of different sexual orientations, then maybe we can begin a discussion on "inclusiveness".
And if you are dead set on citing the bible for your moral code, that is fine....but you will also need to defend its inclusion genocide, religious persecution and mass murder of innocent children as acceptable actions.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
Interesting, the the comments slamming Mr. Williams don't address the issue he raised. I am not sure they read the same letter that I did. The more positive comments come from people who appear to have actually have read the letter.
I can't help but wonder when you have no morality regarding sexual orientation, how does that make you morally superior. My God Mr. Williams is a bigot! Let's really be really sexually inclusive. My name is Fred and I really...really like horses. Sick no doubt but really inclusive.
Winston Churchill said "The truth is incontrovertible, malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but in the end; there it is."
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
Aqib:Once again, we do not have to be tolerant of your intolerance
So then we don't have to be tolerant of your intolerance toward our "intolerance". By your own logic, your intolerance toward us allows us to be intolerant of your intolerance. So you really are just as intolerant and bigoted as those you claim to despise! "Tolerance" is not dependent on what others believe. Everyone "tolerates" views they agree with. Tolerance means allowing disagreeable opinions, but you have changed the definition of the word "tolerance" to fit your need. Is this Wonderland? Humpty Dumpty told Alice, "When I use a word ... it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less." Intolerance=tolerance indeed.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
By definition, all of you are flying the bigot flag from opposite sides of the fence.
Bigot = "A person who is utterly intolerant of any differing creed, belief, or opinion."
Intolerant of homosexuality...bigot. Intolerant of the bigots...bigot. Just the truth.
Until we can learn to let other people live their own lives instead of forcing our own political, religious and social rhetoric on each other, we will waste our time and resources on cyclical arguments like the one you see above.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
"Should be fired... for believing in a silly book of stories." Uh, that last part, I'm pretty sure, is an ILLEGAL reason to fire people. VERY ILLEGAL.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
One of the fundamentally divisive problems in America today is the fear of totalitarianism at the hands of fellow citizens.
People on the left side of things fear a religious theocracy. People on the right side of things fear a communist take over.
Only one is possible. The beauty of Christian theocracies is that they are unsound. Their tenets are questioned by EVERY OTHER CHRISTIAN denomination. That is why Europe was embroiled in religious war for so long. No one sect can hold power for long.
The only hope against communist revolution is that there is infighting amongst the Trotskists and Bolsheviks/pure marxists vs whatever else there are. The National Socialist versus Leninist fighting killed off a LOT of communists. Millions of them. But it wasn't enough. Oh, and being a good shot. Being a good shot is a great defense against communists. Ask the North Koreans and Chinese who tried to overwhelm us through sheer numbers. Our accurate rifles and trained soldiers decimated their waves - to the extent that we didn't even have to use nukes.
Tolerance would be a much easier task if we didn't have existential threats to contemplate. ps: I used to fear the theocracy. I feel your pain, leftists. Then I realized that no republicans sicked the DEA/FBI/Army on American citizens and firebombed children. They never used nunchucks to break the arms of protesters. I stopped fearing conservatives (which sometimes include christians, but not always) when George Bush Jr didn't throw anyone into gulags.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
I actually agree that Conservatives and Liberals both live in fear of totalitarianism. Thing is, both types of totalitarianism are unlikely in this country. But they make lovely fear-mongering.
Thing is, a truly religious or socialist state (and the two aren't even mutually exclusive concepts) is generally impossible to achieve. So the ideology terms are used to justify your run-of-the-mill authoritarian regimes. The USSR wasn't communist, and Iran and Pakistan do a crap job following the will of Allah. I'd say we need both parties to balance out the tendencies towards authoritarianism, but the reality is, both parties are the same side of the coin. We need a third party - BOOM, Tea Party. But what if you're the opposite of a Tea Partier? A fourth party, a fifth party... the dissolution of parties.
Letter to the Editor: Question of ethics and morality
Joey, I am confused by a couple things you have said. You feel upset that your beliefs on sexual orientation are "excluded" from the teacher's classroom. From what you described though, it sounded as if her definition of "inclusive" meant that she was including everyone no matter their sexual orientation, not no matter their belief set. She wanted you to know that no matter who you may feel attracted to or fall in love with that you will be included. That sounded like the extent of her statement to me. She never made any claims that everyone's beliefs about sexual orientation will be treated equally, but just your actual orientations will be. Do you see the distinction?
Secondly, whatever your opinions about her moral stance, you certainly cannot claim that they are "narrow" if her exact statement was that whatever your sexual background is, you are an equal in my classroom no matter what. That seems pretty broad to me. As broad as possible, as a matter of fact.
Part of the college experience is learning that you will probably never find yourself in a room full of people who all completely agree with you on your personal moral/political opinions, and we must learn how to handle these situations with maturity. You and your teacher both have an opportunity to learn from each other if you can both manage to control your emotional reactions to such sensitive issues to keep a clear, respectful dialogue going in a constant quest to understand each other.
Her intentions were to make sure that the the LGBT students in the room understood that they had a safe place to participate as equals. But perhaps you should investigate why this struck such a nerve in making you feel threatened.
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