Over at National Review, Charles Hilu is pissed:
Incoming University of Michigan Medical School students staged a walkout of the school’s White Coat Ceremony Sunday to protest the choice of a pro-life doctor as the ceremony’s keynote speaker.
....On its face, this collective decision by many of the incoming students is inappropriate for civil society and academia. Whenever one of these incidents occurs, we rightfully lament the damage it does to academic freedom.
Wait a second. It's one thing to heckle a speaker so ruthlessly that he or she is literally unable to deliver a scheduled address. Plenty of liberals oppose that kind of thing.
But are we no longer allowed to protest a speaker even by quietly walking out? That seems like something we all have a perfect right to do. And needless to say, it has no effect at all on academic freedom: Kristin Collier is a well-known pro-life Christian and I have no doubt she'll remain one.
Protesting is not the same as cancelling. Folks on the right need to get this straight.
They're sore winners, and whining about it. It's not enough that they won a major anti-choice victory with the Dobbs - they want to be respected and honored for it. They're not getting it, and that enrages them.
The GQP & KanYe have achieved singularity.
Maybe next Josh "The Running Man" Hawley will sic his death squads on Pete Davidson.
Hawleyn' Ass is the new conservative panic disorder.
Does he kiss his wife with that mouth?
No, really, I am asking...
Yeah I thought it was lame to moan about a walkout
It’s one thing if being pro life is a tangential part of your professional life. If it’s part of your image then wouldn’t blowback be sort of expected? I think that sort of protest has better optics than shouting at someone while they speak anyhow
Awfully thin skinned, they are. I could see them just losing their collective minds if a Congressman yelled out to the President at the State of Union address "You Lie"
Or wait, there people did that. Never mind.
Thin skinned little weasels.
The snowflakes are inside the hou--... GQP cloakroom.
I came here just to post "snowflakes"
Awfully thin skinned, they are. I could see them just losing their collective minds if a Congressman yelled out to the President at the State of Union address "You Lie"
Or wait, their people did that. Never mind.
Thin skinned little weasels.
It seems like a cancellation. This was not a guest speaker, but a member of the U. of Michigan faculty, and these were Michigan medical students rejecting her contribution to a school event, which, as far as I can tell, had no bearing on reproductive rights. Would these students accept instruction or any other academic guidance from Collier? If none of them would, can she really do her job?
the doctor in question was a keynote speaker, something of an honor. given the nature of the event, given the far-reaching impact of jackson on the quality of health care afforded women in this country, the upending of the doctor-patient relationship that it causes, i'd say walking out was an appropriate response.
You wrote "It seems like a cancellation" and then proceeded to write nothing that supported that thesis. Why don't you connect the dots for us? Or at the very least, give us a clear, precise definition of what you mean by the term 'cancellation'.
It's a kancellation under GQP rules: I tell you what to do, you don't tell me what to do.
Sigh. One of these days someone will ask how the charge of cancelling could possibly apply to their most recent post and the reply will be "Because a chicken doesn't have lips."
I think the idea of cancellation includes tactics to deprive a person of a reasonable chance to be successful in their present position.
Maybe it means something different to other people, but then there's a burden on anyone who says "this is not cancellation" to be clear about how they define "cancellation".
Uh, burden of proof goes to the one making the accusation. But you knew that already, didn't you?
A White Coat Ceremony is, ah, a ceremony. Not instruction.
I don't think of academic institutions as places where learning is merely parceled out as a commodity course by course, in specific halls and classrooms. Ceremonial events are also valuable for informing and encouraging students and for advancing a spirit of collegiality, and faculty members should have a respected role at these events. If a professor isn't deemed worthy of speaking at a ceremony, how effective can they be in teaching a course or being involved in any other educational interaction?
Too idealistic?
Trying force the implicit assumption that these people are actually worthy, are we? Trump loves you.
> It seems like a cancellation.
So if you're going to make this claim, you really need to state what you mean by "cancel". Because it seems like we have a range from "losing one's livelihood" to "someone doesn't want to hear your public performance", and if that's the case, I question the value of the verb, because we already have plenty covering the range that are far more specific, thus useful.
I think the one you're looking for in this case is "disagree".
I should re-emphasize the part where I wonder how a professor does her job if students are determined to dismiss anything she might say, on any topic, before she says it. And if a seeming majority of the students publicly demonstrate that they are dismissing it.
You're 'wondering', but you're unwilling to do hard work of finding out? Pull the other one; it's got bells on.
We mock "IOKIYAR" for a reason, but we all understand that conservatives cannot be shamed by their hypocrisy. After all, they really do believe that there are separate expectations of ethics, morals, and norms between the righteous and the other people.
IOACIADDI.
It's Only a Cancellaton If a Democrat Does It.
I don’t know if I would have walked out. But a doctor who refuses to provide health care to frightened innocent young people usually doesn’t get a lot of respect. A doctor who would base health care on her religion instead of science is, essentially, Theodoric of York, Medieval Barber (a wild and crazy guy).
I would think that a doctor who pays service to their religion rather than their patients would be in violation of the Hippocratic Oath they took as a precondition to join their profession.
+lol+
Why does anyone think some NR pundit would pass up an opportunity to stick it to some uppity college kids?
Look what happened to some poor rapper recently! They threw junk at him!
https://www.cnn.com/videos/entertainment/2022/07/24/kid-cudi-rolling-loud-festival-orig-jc.cnn
Kids these days!
I remember when the Warped Tour emopunks did this to Eminem in 1999.
Twenty years later, those kids turned into suburban moms & dads storming the Capitol at the March on Washington.
Seems like a near-perfect way to protest while preserving free speech. The walkout conveys the message of the protesters, but those who want to hear the speaker still can.
The only caveat is that if there are only limited seats, and a sizeable portion of those are occupied by protesters planning to walk out from the beginning, it does limit the number of people who the speaker can address. To prevent abuse, it ought to be possible for anyone waiting in overflow to move into the auditorium or conference room or whatever.
Simply flouncing out is just melodramatics, and often boomerangs. The better way to walk out is to wait until the speaker says something you actually disagree with, as that gives the appearance of at least giving the speaker a chance.
Did you say this about Mike Pence's stunt at the Indianapolis Colts game?
The National Review specializes in bad faith arguments.
Hmmm. I suspect one of their mission goals is to muddy the waters in an attempt to make the difference between a clear argument and a mere assertion of opinion indistinguishable, at least for some of their audience.
If those medical students want conservative support, they should show up to ceremonies with AR-15s.
what is with the insistence on engaging with the national review as though it’s a serious outlet with actual ideas?
Yeah, that's up there with treating, say Tyler Cowan as a serious thinker with actual ideas instead of the hack that he is. Or Matt Yglesias, or any of a plethora of subpar 'public intellectuals' posting their screeds on Substack.
Kevin agrees with them.
It's not engagement. It's agreement.
NR is quite frequently wrong, but they are generally anti-Trump and mostly sane (for Republicans). We ought to be engaging and discussing issues with the non-crazy Republicans so that the GOP doesn't continue to get more radical and out of touch with reality.
let’s talk as soon as Kevin and the rest of the online liberals show a willingness to engage in substance with people to the *left* of them.
Well, here's the thing: It's not so much that they occasionally publish something aligned with reality. Oh no. The problem is that I can't trust them as a source of info/analysis, which means I have to check every point in every article that I read. Did you know that there were people gainfully employed as fact checkers for all the respectable newsies? No? Well, see, I'm not getting paid to fact check them. Which means I ain't gonna read them.
Some more info:
https://www.michigandaily.com/news/340-umich-medical-students-sign-petition-opposing-selection-of-anti-abortion-speaker-at-upcoming-white-coat-ceremony/
Apparently she is also in charge of (some aspect of) training medical students at U of Mich. (?)--via blurbs that popped up doing google search
Don't have details, but wouldn't be surprised if invite went out before ruling overturning Roe was released (or pre-released). Sure, they may have taken up the case, but they'd never just overturn Roe....
Seems impossible to comment at NationalReview.com without buying a subscription. Is that correct?
"Protesting is not the same as cancelling."
I'm not sure whether protesting is the same as that useless neologism "cancelling" but both of them are fine. If you don't like criticism don't do controversial things.
Welp! This week is starting off oddly.
Oranqe Qounty Republiqan Kevin Drum isn't standing in the Corner agreeing that Shitlib Radicals kancelled Kristin Collier.
Don't anyone tell Conor Friedersdorf that Kevin is getting squishy.
Also in campus free speech news: FIRE, a group unequivocally committed to ensuring the free exchange of ideas in university settings, has remained mum in the wake of Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita targeting IU-Bloomington faculty member Caitlin Bernard for opportunistic prosecution & the school not saying anything in her defense. But I think this can be explained in Sulzberger Advertiser Trump Country tour style:
"In this Seymour, IN, diner, Bernard still means Crystal, the portrayer of the lunch counter operator at the Nantucket airport on the hit NBC television comedy Wings, not Caitlin, the Hoosier State abortionist who irreparably shattered the already damaged vessel of a 10 year old Ohio rape victim by performing the pregnancy termination she sought, but they do know this: an employer is under no obligation to defend their employee, even from malicious criminal investigation by a law enforcement zealot".
I have no idea what 'cancelling' is even supposed to mean.
Anyone disagreeing with a crank psychopath is my impression.
You know that "I got a right to say my opinion" as if that phrase was a trump card? The reply should be "You have the right to express your opinion. You don't have the right to demand that others give just as much weight to your opinion as they would, say, the opinion of ninety percent of all practicing medical professionals."
Because that's _exactly_ what they mean whenever they quote that little ditty.
Cancelling means forcefully preventing someone from speaking. As, a few years ago, when some progressive student activists took a dislike to a professor and brought air horns to all his classes so he was unable to teach. Or the many, many times when student activists have forced the cancellation of a speaking engagement because of political disagreement.
Jon Stewart famously scolded the hosts of Crossfire on CNN for hurting the country. On a recent podcast, he said that people have always taken the wrong lesson from that. He said it was about civility. It was about how everyone should be willing to speak and listen too all points of view without flying into a rage. Because that is the only way this country is going to hang together. You cannot have a democracy founded on rage and polarization. We'll either drift apart into two countries or one side will force its views on the other at the point of a gun.
It is no longer allowed if the speaker is conservative. Their first amendment right to free speech includes the right to force you to listen to their speech.
But feel free to walk out on all the liberals you want.