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Eton Teacher sacked for teaching Jordan Peterson/ Sexist Science to the Kiddies

Started by Retinend, December 01, 2020, 09:30:16 AM

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Retinend

DISCLAIMER: I used JP in the title as a sort of clickbait: sorry, but he doesn't actually name JP in the video lesson in question. Second inaccuracy: he didn't actually teach this lesson because he was fired before he had a chance, but the lesson went online and it is therefore more than likely that most of his class eventually watched it.

PERSONAL DISCLAIMER: I am on record on these forums as giving JP genuine credence for certain parts of his doctrine, but it's exactly on this issue that I find JP blinkered and oddly sour for a married man with 3 children, and that is why I was motivated to summarize this fringe controversy in the form of this thread. The emojis are added for my own amusement but I am honestly quite shocked that a teacher at Eton could have slipped through the net like this before it came to a head (he has been dismissed).

Telegraph:  Eton insists master's dismissal was 'not an issue of free speech' [notice the odd way that "master" is used - R.]

QuoteEton College has intervened for the first time in the row over a master's dismissal, insisting that it was "not an issue of free speech".

A spokesman for the £42,500-a-year school said the Head Master was left with "no choice" but to fire Will Knowland after he "persistently refused" to remove a ▶️video▶️ of his lecture from the internet.

Last week The Telegraph revealed that Mr Knowland was dismissed for ⚖️gross misconduct⚖️ after recording a lecture which questioned "current radical feminist orthodoxy".

The lecture was part of the Perspectives course taken by older students to encourage them to "think 🤨critically🤨 about subjects of public debate".

But Mr Knowland alleged that he was banned from delivering the lecture to pupils and then dismissed after he refused to remove a video of the lecture from his personal ▶️YouTube channel▶️.

YouTube video: "The Patriarchy Paradox" by Will Knowland (AKA "KnowlandKnows")
33mins, uploaded Sep 19 2020 (52k views, 3.3k likes)
▶️ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTHgMxQEoPI

Quote
What follows is MY impartial summary (but DO listen to the ▶️video▶️ to pick up on its tone and "humour")

✔️"Patriarchy" is the theory that all gender differences are socially constructed, and that men dominate women in society at large.

✔️(according to the male-feminist activist group "Good Lads Initiative") feminism seeks to righteously "reimagine masculinity".

✔️(according to Doris Lessing) masculinity is "rubbished" without this even being noticed.

✔️No one wants to look up to a non-binary superhero: superheroes are by definition hyper masculine - see the marvel universe. ✔️These are quasi-biological archetypes and not mutable.

✔️Though women are freer to choose careers, they are not, in fact, more likely to close gender gaps in professions where gender gaps are prevalent. This is the titular "patriarchy paradox".

✔️There is no paradox because patriarchy is based in women's self-interested choices.


The tone of the thing is way off by the start. The guy can barely suppress his rage when he says the name of Judith BUTLER as if she was a war criminal.

The choice of visuals is propagandistic: the notion is that movements like the "Good Lads Initiative" are trying to shame little boys into being something they are not (appropriating a narrative from transgender activism).

The example of the marvel heroes seems circular to me: someone not already convinced that they are quasi-biological archetypes of immutable characteristics of masculinity would not find they existence convincing arguments for the immutable nature of masculine archetypes. So yeah. Poor start imo.

Quote
my summary continues

✔️"Procreate" "Protect" and "Provide" are the pillars of "Manhood", and "protect" above all. This is evidenced by sex differences in lion prides, and exemplified in a human context by Thor from Norse mythology. Through history, men have been naturals at making war.

✔️Judith Butler argues "sex" is socially constructed from the POV of non-binary people. Knowland counters this with another quote.

✔️If you take the logic of transgenderism you must accept its validity for some being lizard-people (reductio ad absurdum). The strong version of Butler's argument must fall.

✔️Hormones affect muscle development, and this shows that masculine strength is a biological fact. Again, the strong version of Butler's argument must fall.

Butler's maxim that "sex is socially constructed" is very trivial to dismiss so long as you subscribe to a very brittle and unwavering version of it. I won't belabour the point, because it's clear that "softer" versions of the maxim would not be so trivial to dismiss.


Quote
(again, please listen to the video to pick up on the tone of argument, however).

✔️Quotes a male-to-female transgender MMA fighter as saying "I am an abnormally strong woman", and argues that it is unfair that a person with natural hormonal advantages can attain victory in a female-only competition

✔️Thought experiment: what if all men were killed? Mining and other heavy industry (forestry, deep sea fishing etc) and the women would revert to hut-dwelling and die at age 40 on average. Women would accuse one another of witchcraft or similarly hurt one another regardless of the presence of men.

✔️What if men had never existed? There would be no useful inventions. Women lack the "Sisyphean" urge to create.

✔️Men have had it as bad or worse than women: male on female rape is insignificant compared to male on male rape in prisons. Men have had the vote longer than women, but men have had the obligation to be conscripted for longer than women (in fact that has never been the case).

✔️The science of "male expendability" intimates that men are more oppressed than women: when asked, people generally agree that (sourced studies) people prefer to spare the lives of women over men, that people are less willing to harm women than men, that women's aggression is more acceptable than men's aggression, and several sourced studies besides.

This is some deep ideological territory: every individual study must be addressed and the sweeping generalizations must be matched with equally sweeping generalizations. Or you can just back away and get on with your life. This is how this sort of stuff spreads: it insulates itself against intelligent response by making an adequate response book-length.

Quote✔️Karl Popper's theory of "unfalsifiability" implicates feminism, since those women who disagree that they are oppressed are turned into examples of oppressed women (living in bad faith). It is a "closed system" in technical language.

This might be the only thing I agree with. Some people do have an "oppression narrative" and they try to accuse everyone who disagrees with them of acting in "bad faith". But I suppose that Knowland might accuse me of acting in bad faith if I, a male, should say that I think there are damaging cultural presumptions about masculinity that run back to chivalric times.

I don't like his use of Popper to single out feminist academia as unscientific, when I know that academic trends are generally "closed systems" that sustain themselves on hype rather than absolute, galilean principles of capital-S science (this kind of scientism is in fact the dubious legacy of Popper, imo).

Having dropped this name, he proceeds to his confident summary:

Quote✔️The protector role is universal - whether among lion or humans. This is allied to the fact that women are more prone to fear (as studies prove).

✔️Men are universally socialized into conquering fear in the face of violent onslaught. They are told "man up", which the "Good Lads Initiative" proscribe as "meaningless". In fact, the process of "manning up" is necessary in order to achieve the aforementioned pillars of manhood: "Procreate" "Protect" and "Provide" (which, do not forget, are what prevent women from living in mud huts). The virtues of "manning up" are illustrated by the example of the Spartans at Thermopylae. What would king Leonidis have thought of the notion that "manning up" is "meaningless"?

✔️Women's honour is tied to ancient codes of propriety. Women use gossip rather than direct confrontation (i.e. a throwdown) which is the preserve of men. Women instigate competition between men in order to praise/mate with the highest sporting achievers. Men do not exert power over women because women manipulate men in this way.

✔️It is facile to imagine a world without violence: for one thing, it is a taboo fact that women are attracted to violence when it is righteous violence. Male aggression is a biological fact and it is facile to imagine it will dissipate.

Again, we get back to these nobodies the "Good Lads Initiative". I think he relies way too much on them because he has decided that they are a significant emblem of modern feminist attitudes to masculinity. But he hasn't worked to establish that.

I found this section difficult to summarise - it's about war and aggression, but also about indirect confrontation such as gossip. Maybe I'm not seeing the obvious but my impression is of a laundry listen of "men are good" and "women are bad" talking points.

I also think that, if it weren't for the aggrieved tone of the video, these points could be made in a way that would be agreed upon by open-minded people: sure, women are more indirect in how they confront one another - there will probably always be some form of war - armies will probably always be mostly composed of men. I think Knowland fails to problematize these issues.

This is the final formulation:

Quote
I stress - these are my summations of a somewhat meandering video that ought to be watched in tandem

✔️"Machismo" is true "toxic masculinity", since it forgets the virtuous goal of true "masculinity": "chivalry". But "toxic masculinity" in its 21st century inception is nothing new, and adds nothing valuable to the notion of "machismo" vs "chivalry" in history.

✔️Women who like guys with muscles and money are normal and are unfairly discriminated against by ignorant researchers of "patriarchy".

✔️What's more, even feminists are not satisfied with sub-masculine husbands, as evidenced by an article in Marie Claire titled "Why I Left My Beta Husband": "I wanted to be overwhelmed by the power of his masculinity but I wasn't"

✔️ "Smash the Patriarchy" amounts to "Smash Human Nature". We need more chivalry and fewer calls for men to disavow masculinty.



This final summary is somewhat convincing, because it is a much weaker version of his actual summary. Who can complain about certain women's taste in men? Who can argue with a women who personally felt as if her man wasn't "man enough" for her in her marriage? I think modern feminism is completely at home with the notion that, especially in matters of sex, the notions of dominance and submission are essential for understanding oneself and the sex drives of your SO. In fact it is mostly from liberal, feminist types that I hear the most talk about embracing one's kinks and being authentic about one's preferred sexual persona. The problem with Knowland here is that he thinks that these are "gotchas" rather than mere complications.



Retinend

er... I probably should have written "at least in matters of sex", and not "especially",  there...

Bernice

I'm somewhat surprised that you'd bother to give this such a detailed rebuttal (and I don't really understand why it's in Shelf Abuse). I also find the summary s entirely unconvincing as the rest. For one thing this:

Quote"Machismo" is true "toxic masculinity", since it forgets the virtuous goal of true "masculinity": "chivalry". But "toxic masculinity" in its 21st century inception is nothing new, and adds nothing valuable to the notion of "machismo" vs "chivalry" in history.
[...]
"Smash the Patriarchy" amounts to "Smash Human Nature". We need more chivalry and fewer calls for men to disavow masculinty.

Doesn't seem to follow on from the rest. Where did 'chivalry' come from? What is the chivalry vs machismo paradigm that he's suddenly introducing here? Why is chivalry the inherent essence of masculinity?

I'll cop to not watching the video but I mean, it's 33 minutes and it very much sounds like the exact same shit that's smeared across thousands of hours of redpill youtube. I'm not really sure why I should bother?

Retinend


Rizla

Is this one of those cunts that read Iron John in the 90s and never got over it? Miss me with that shit bro.

Bernice

Quote from: Retinend on December 01, 2020, 04:28:17 PM
Lots of people think this way, or are starting to think this way.

Sure but I mean, this specifically. I'm fairly savvy to the arguments of redpillers, LOGICbois and Jordan Breakdown Peterson himself. himself.

Not trying to have a pop or anything, just curious as to what drew you in about this - clearly something did.

Famous Mortimer


Retinend


Retinend

Quote from: Bernice on December 01, 2020, 04:43:17 PM
Sure but I mean, this specifically. I'm fairly savvy to the arguments of redpillers, LOGICbois and Jordan Breakdown Peterson himself. himself.

Not trying to have a pop or anything, just curious as to what drew you in about this - clearly something did.

I'm not sure why it grabbed me, to be honest. I tend to gravitate towards these subjects.

But aside from my having my own axe to grind on these topics (for whatever reason) there is the added fact that it concerns the powerful institution of Eton; it concerns gender differences; and is a story that a lot of people are spinning as the free speech issue du jour - so three big contemporary issues intersecting here.

Quote from: Rizla on December 01, 2020, 04:42:14 PM
Is this one of those cunts that read Iron John in the 90s and never got over it? Miss me with that shit bro.

He's my generation, so I'm guessing that  he got the masculine vs feminine mythology stuff from Jordan Peterson, not this book. But reading the synopsis of it on wikipedia it seems like the kind of book Peterson might have read and assimilated: all this stuff about "positive masculinity" is very reminiscent of what he has to say about it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_John:_A_Book_About_Men

Zetetic


Poirots BigGarlickyCorpse

Quote"Procreate" "Protect" and "Provide" are the pillars of "Manhood", and "protect" above all. This is evidenced by sex differences in lion prides,
Does this genius know about all the solitary big cats (i.e. most of them) where the father fucks off after mating and the mother raises her cubs alone?

Does he know that male lions drive away their own sons (and sometimes their daughters, if the pride is larger than can be sustained) when they become adults?

Does he at least know that male lions are driven out or even killed by younger, stronger males who then murder all the cubs in the pride so as to bring the females back into heat?

QuoteThought experiment: what if all men were killed? Mining and other heavy industry (forestry, deep sea fishing etc) and the women would revert to hut-dwelling and die at age 40 on average.
I forgot that machines don't exist. Or maybe they do but our silly ladybrains and weak, fragile bodies would be incapable of using them.

Quotewomen's aggression is more acceptable than men's aggression
Define "aggression". Are we comparing a woman slapping her male partner with a man throwing his female partner down a flight of stairs? Or are you talking about behaviours that get a man labelled as "assertive" but a woman labelled as "aggressive"/"pushy"/"hysterical"/"over-emotional"?

QuoteMen do not exert power over women because women manipulate men in this way.
"THOSE FUCKING FUCKING BITCHES, MAKING MY DICK ALL HARD AND THEN NOT SLEEPING WITH ME!!!!"

Quotean article in Marie Claire titled "Why I Left My Beta Husband"
yeah that sounds fair and balanced and incredibly scientific

This was a bit, right? This was to encourage his students to tear apart the entire video for how ludicrous it was, right? It falls apart at the fucking lion example. Hey stepdads, murder your stepchildren to put your new wife in an amorous mood.

Bernice


Retinend

Quote from: Bernice on December 02, 2020, 08:02:37 AM
Shoulda used the lobster example.

😆

QuoteThis was a bit, right? This was to encourage his students to tear apart the entire video for how ludicrous it was, right? It falls apart at the fucking lion example. Hey stepdads, murder your stepchildren to put your new wife in an amorous mood.

Same. It was at that step (not to mention the "3 P's") that I thought "this is utter nonsense". Then I look at the comments section and see this:




"impartial"? "thought-provoking"? "carefully argued"?


Quote from: Poirots BigGarlickyCorpse on December 01, 2020, 11:19:22 PMDefine "aggression". Are we comparing a woman slapping her male partner with a man throwing his female partner down a flight of stairs? Or are you talking about behaviours that get a man labelled as "assertive" but a woman labelled as "aggressive"/"pushy"/"hysterical"/"over-emotional"?

Exactly. He made what seems to these commenters oh-so "carefully argued"... but imagine you were a pupil in his projected "critical studies" class. If you were actually listening critically you would have to put your hand up 101 times to clarify the scope of the 101 talking points he raises in 33 minutes. You would slow down the entire class past the bell in order to simply understand the perspective being offered.  It would look like you were being pedantic, when in fact only being a thorough thinker, and doing intellectual "due diligence". 


For me, it would be a good thing for another teacher to take this video and use it as a case study in real "critical thinking": assessing the relative value of differing kinds of evidence; assessing the divergence of fact from opinion; assessing the right scope of material to comfortably fit into a single presentation, and that sort of thing.


Retinend

Something I should have put in the OP: a grassroots petition among the older students of Eton was put to the headmaster in very strongly worded terms demanding he reverse the decision to fire the videomaker; accusing the decision of being in contravention of Knowland's human rights.

Telegraph: Eton students turn on headmaster over teacher's dismissal (By Camilla Turner, Phoebe Southworth and Christopher Hope, 28 November 2020 • 5:41pm)
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/11/28/eton-students-revolt-free-speech-row-escalates/

QuoteEton College students are in open revolt against their headmaster as a row over free speech threatened to boil over into a major fall-out.

Pupils at the 580-year-old school have accused it of acting in a "heartless and merciless" way by dismissing one of its masters amid a dispute over a lecture that questioned "current radical feminist orthodoxy".

Hundreds of students have now signed a petition accusing Eton College of "institutional bullying" claiming that it was a "gross abuse of the duty of the school to protect the freedoms of the individual".

It comes after The Telegraph revealed that Will Knowland was allegedly dismissed for gross misconduct following a dispute over a lecture he was due to give pupils earlier this year.

The lecture, titled The Patriarchy Paradox, was part of the Perspectives course taken by older students to encourage them to think critically about subjects of public debate.

But Mr Knowland, who has taught English at Eton for nine years, claimed that he was banned from delivering the lecture and dismissed after he refused to remove a video of the lecture from his personal YouTube channel.

The students' petition, addressed to Eton's provost, Lord Waldergrave, said they felt the episode has given rise to "some very grave implications about the nature of freedom" at Eton.

They said: "There is a sense that, by dismissing Mr Knowland, the school is seeking to protect its new image as politically progressive at the expense of one of its own. If this is true, it points to a complete lack of moral integrity and backbone."

The students went on to say that they disagreed with the Head Master's assertion that ideas which can be deemed "hostile" to minority groups at the school could be censored.

"We think this test is too severe," they said. "Young men and their views are formed in the meeting and conflict of ideas. A conflict of ideas necessarily entails controversy and spirited discussion. The Head Master's 'hostility' test excludes nearly all of what makes up a liberal education."

Last night a number of former pupils threw their support behind pupils. Douglas Murray, an old Etonian and author of The Madness of Crowds: Gender, Race and Identity, told The Telegraph that Eton had "discredited" itself by failing to allow the free exchange of ideas between students and lecturers.

"The main thing is that the prerequisite for a good education is to make the students in your care think and there's no sure-fire way of doing it but the best way is to introduce them to ideas they otherwise wouldn't or haven't encountered - as far as I can see, this teacher was merely doing that," he said.

"Any educator in charge of informing or instructing or demonstrating how to acquire knowledge to young people ought to be able to explore such things. The fact that he did is to his credit and to the benefit of the pupils."

Cornelius Lysaght, the former BBC Radio 5 Live racing correspondent, added: "Once you start stifling debate, that gets concerning. It strikes me as a difficult area but one that schools like Eton should be examining."

Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, senior Conservative MP and old Etonian, said: "We are going far too much in this country down the path of telling people what they should think rather than allowing them to make up their own opinions."

On Friday Bim Afolami, the MP for Harpenden and Hitchin, urged the £42,500-a-year school not to "succumb to what it feels is an outside pressure to be 'woke' or to avoid controversial subjects".

Meanwhile, Lucy Allan, the MP for Telford and private secretary to the Leader of the House, wrote to Mr Knowland to offer her support.

Prof Steven Pinker, an expert in experimental cognitive psychology at Harvard University, has also written to Lord Waldegrave urging him to intervene on Mr Knowland's behalf. 

Mr Knowland said he is appealing against his dismissal and if this fails he intends to take the school to an employment tribunal.

An Eton College spokesperson said: "The school has engaged with senior boys on the issues involved, within the limits of what is possible at this stage. In this case, Mr Knowland has chosen to publicise his version of events notwithstanding the fact that he is engaged in an ongoing disciplinary process.

"The College will not provide substantive comments at present in order to respect the integrity of Mr Knowland's appeal. There will be a time for Eton to say more about the issues raised by this case, but that time is not now."

I am disappointed with Pinker and hope he didn't actually watch the video.

Bernice

I'm unsurprised by Pinker. He seems to dedicate a lot of time to spouting off about culture wars bullshit on twitter.

Retinend

In this case I'm totally with you. Even if he merely flicked through the video at the heart of this controversy, wouldn't images like this, that appear uncritically presented, be a big old "red flag"?:




Poirots BigGarlickyCorpse

And of course this school has alumni in fucking parliament because it's one of those fucking places.

Bernice

Quote from: Retinend on December 02, 2020, 08:53:59 AM
In this case I'm totally with you. Even if he merely flicked through the video at the heart of this controversy, wouldn't images like this, that appear uncritically presented, be a big old "red flag"?:



I'd wager he didn't watch the video, and this is just an ingrained response to a vaguely 'campus cancel culture' type story. So much for the enlightenment!

Quote from: Bernice on December 02, 2020, 09:09:15 AM
I'd wager he didn't watch the video, and this is just an ingrained response to a vaguely 'campus cancel culture' type story. So much for the enlightenment!
Pretty likely, and what would really annoy me about such a stance, present in a lot of the below-the-line comments Retinend showed,  is the failure to recognise that there is a massive difference between a school and a university. Critical thought and analysis of what you're taught is key to university education, but school isn't really like that. To a certain extent, school is indoctrination, that's why people think carefully and have political arguments about what values the children are going to be taught.

Bernice

Quote from: Astronaut Omens on December 02, 2020, 10:24:08 AM
To a certain extent, school is indoctrination, that's why people think carefully and have political arguments about what values the children are going to be taught.

And this is meant to be part of a series of talks aimed at older students to inculcate the critical faculties necessary to see past that indoctrination - but is actually just a shallow, poorly researched, one-sided polemic.


Poirots BigGarlickyCorpse

Quote from: Bernice on December 02, 2020, 10:28:22 AM
And this is meant to be part of a series of talks aimed at older students to inculcate the critical faculties necessary to see past that indoctrination - but is actually just a shallow, poorly researched, one-sided polemic.
Yeah but... oh, god, I don't even know why I want this to be a giant misunderstanding but I do. Just from the summary given, this is the kind of video I would make (and have my brother act in since I'm a lady) if I wanted to teach young men (who are very susceptible to this kind of thing) about critical thinking while avoiding any legal issues that might arise if I used a Jordan Peterson video as my example. Like, lions prove men are protectors? Lions? Notable among the big cats because they're the only big cats to live in family groups? Come on. That's got to be a jumping off point for a discussion about how these eminent thinkers cherry-pick examples from the animal kingdom to prove some essential truth about men and women, and why they don't instead harken back to history or even to other modern-day cultures. Women would starve to death in huts gossiping if there were no men? Greater physical strength is still important in a world where machinery, electronics and guns exist??? You don't have to agree or even know anything about Feminazi SJW Cucktural Marxism to realise what childish and stupid examples these are.

Then again, according to The Express
QuoteThe college said an internal disciplinary process "determined that the master's actions represented gross misconduct which should result in dismissal".
I have a feeling a 600 year old school for the sons of wealthy shitbags aren't going to hysterically fire someone because he made a video saying that men are the best without asking him why he made it and what point he was trying to prove.

QuoteNow, multiple donors to the school are attempting to rally support to withhold donations to Eton in protest, The Telegraph has claimed, citing fundraising sources.

One former Etonian has threatened to take the 580-year-old Eton College out of his will.
Good, let it fucking di- oh, the Government will make up the shortfall with funding intended for other schools, won't they.

Bernice

Well, yes. The Lions thing really is funny - not just protect but provide?? The first interesting fact I learned about Lions as a little boy, the first fact I learned that challenged the internalised sexism I blithely projected into nature, was that Lionesses did the hunting. Might as well have picked fucking seahorses.

Retinend

I was supporting Pinker in the Pinker thread for his criticism of Nietzsche's thirst for power and blood ... but what could be more nietzschean than that image with the three pillars? The video is full of that sort of posturing... and since it is not in any sense "chivalric" posturing I suppose it can only be "machismo" posturing.

I suppose if it were put to Pinker why he chose to defend Knowland, and he admitted he had never really watched the video, he would simply say although he may not agree with its strident polemic on the negative effects of feminism, that there nonetheless needs to be a diversity of thought among educational staff, including those who hold -however exaggerated or zealous or one-sided or plain erroneous- not in themselves unjustifiable views on the negative effects of feminism on society. He would say something reasonable like that.

Bernice

To which the obvious reply would be that there are all sorts of topics/views teachers would be expected to avoid expounding in public, many of them far less obviously fucking dumb.

Mister Six

Quote from: Bernice on December 02, 2020, 01:11:25 PM
Well, yes. The Lions thing really is funny - not just protect but provide?? The first interesting fact I learned about Lions as a little boy, the first fact I learned that challenged the internalised sexism I blithely projected into nature, was that Lionesses did the hunting. Might as well have picked fucking seahorses.

And beyond the idiocy of the example given, the notion that you can point to a completely different species as an indicator of how to behave is stupid beyond belief. Bonobos are genetically closer to us than lions, and they spend their time masturbating and having transactional bisexual sex, so why not stand up in your wanky post-Peterson "critical analysis" class and point to them as your animal guides?

And if genetic distance from humans isn't a factor, why not point to seahorses, where the male carries the child to term, or frogs that change sex, or to male angler fish that permanently fuse their bodies to females and basically become sex slaves?

Cuellar

I'm quite frankly pretty shocked at this. Shocked that an all male public school would actually fire someone for saying this that is!!!

Isn't this sort of thing the foundation upon which public schools are built? Are you just not meant to be so blatant about it?

Retinend

Quote from: Bernice on December 02, 2020, 02:51:21 PM
To which the obvious reply would be that there are all sorts of topics/views teachers would be expected to avoid expounding in public, many of them far less obviously fucking dumb.

I'm thinking about just what I would compare this debacle to for someone like my parents who have never heard of Peterson or incels or whatever... I can't really think of a point of comparison that isn't too harsh or too lenient. I suppose it's a bit like someone was discovered to be down the TERF or pizzagate rabbithole and was promoting it under his own name, as well as submitting such a presentation to his class for "critical thinking" appraisal.  But even if these comparisons were exactly at the same level, my parents won't really know anything about those subjects either (which is only natural I suppose)...

Quote from: Mister Six on December 02, 2020, 03:15:14 PM
And beyond the idiocy of the example given, the notion that you can point to a completely different species as an indicator of how to behave is stupid beyond belief. Bonobos are genetically closer to us than lions, and they spend their time masturbating and having transactional bisexual sex, so why not stand up in your wanky post-Peterson "critical analysis" class and point to them as your animal guides

Apes do hold a mirror up to our nature better than any other animal, though, not least in this regard. So I suspect Knowland would be all too happy to take your example of bonobos, adding that it is a somehow degenerate form of transcendentally masculine behaviour (and Jordan Peterson would say that the apes are descended from Ham in Genesis... archetypally).

But you're spot on about the arbitrary choice of male/female behaviours from the animal kingdom: ironically this is a case where we have to recognise our human uniqueness and see that gendered behaviour is so enmeshed with our broader set of social behaviours (unfathomably more complex than lobsters or lions) than there is virtually no sense in which you can compare lions with humans, or even apes with humans: it would be like saying "Louis CK was just doing what many apes of this clade do upon arousal".

edit: come to think of it, do apes and monkeys ever go a'courting? or (that old Louis CK joke) is it all pretty much degrees of rape?

chveik

Quote from: Retinend on December 02, 2020, 01:52:07 PM
I suppose if it were put to Pinker why he chose to defend Knowland, and he admitted he had never really watched the video, he would simply say although he may not agree with its strident polemic on the negative effects of feminism, that there nonetheless needs to be a diversity of thought among educational staff, including those who hold -however exaggerated or zealous or one-sided or plain erroneous- not in themselves unjustifiable views on the negative effects of feminism on society. He would say something reasonable like that.

and it would be absolute bollocks, and I'd be concerned that such a thicko was considered to be a brilliant intellectual. teachers just aren't allowed to make sexist rants at school, they are supposed to be as neutral ideologically as they can be.

Zetetic

I mostly imagine that he'd have had the piss ripped out of him at Winchester, but perhaps I'm being overgenerous.

There was that time where a Holocaust-denying excommunicated "bishop" turned up one night and the Catholic-convert headmaster let him give us a morning sermon about staying away from rock music and womanly subjects.