Is anything more fun to think about than sex and man/woman commonalities and differences?
So amidst all the recent heated and sometimes nasty discussions of those issues, I propose a new rule:
Whoever first turns a fun topic into an unfun discussion loses the debate.
What?
Well, where’s the fun in that?
Does anybody thinks that the “tricks, dodges, and chicanery, to which people resort in order to be right in the end” [1] are fun in any way?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Being_Right
I am a teachers in the Chicago public school system and I teach an AP psychology course. Today 9/13/2017 I lectured about the nature vs. nurture debate and used gender and sexual preference as topics to compare the explanations each gives for differences. I showed a debate between Jordan Peterson and Matt Nicholas who are both from Toronto university. The debate was about pronouns and forcing people to use them. Peterson recently gave a lecture about post-modernism and directed me to Stephen Hicks book on the subject. I thought this would be a good education for the students. I have been accused of “insensitivity” and was brought down to the administration who had no idea what they were talking about. However, they were perfect examples of spouting post-modernist jargon. The student did not feel safe. They asked me if my room was a safe space and I said it was not. It is a classroom of competing ideas. They couldn’t grasp what I was saying. The mother in an e-mail accused me of having an agenda and so forth. It’s obvious that she has one and uses her son’s sensitivity to silences other sources of information. Jordan Peterson says we need to fight post-modernism at every step. Stephen Hicks books gives insight into what you are fighting. They are anti-reason because they have an irrational belief system that causes them to attack. They use feelings but have none for others.
I respect your stand in the battle for real education, Mr. Pasowicz. You are in the front lines, and I am glad and hopeful that the intellectual resources you mention prove useful.