[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by rubecube

Yeah, pot meet kettle. There are numerous examples of me conceding points on this site. Meanwhile your posting history is a litany of militant, condescending intransigence. But I'll watch the video and get back to you.

Militant? Hahahaha. Condescending, sure, I frequently can be accused of that; it's a failing. But as for intransigence, my first principle on any topic is that I don't want to be wrong for a second longer than I need to be. I'm not sure I'm right about anything.

If any of my views have been militant, it's often been of the precise sort I'm now opposing: I at one point would not even brook discussion with anyone who had any opposition to gay marriage, for example; I just naturally considered them homophobes and that was that. I've come to believe that even if I'm basically positive I'm right - and I'm pretty goddamned sure on that issue - I need to be more interested in contrasting views. Some of them actually can be filtered out as in many cases it's pretty obvious when someone just hasn't thought about an issue in any particular depth (see, that could very well be considered condescending). But there are smart people who disagree with me on a lot of things, and if it's on a topic I'm actually interested in I'd like to know why that is.

If your position is that you can understand the degree to which racism or marginalization affects someone as deeply as someone who actually experiences it, then that's pretty damn arrogant.

So once again you have characterized my position and dismissed me as arrogant. No, that's not my view. If a person who has been affected by racism can leverage that experience to make a strong rational point on the issue of racism, then that may be where the value of these experiences comes in. However, their view should never be privileged over anyone else's simply because of that experience, which is precisely what happens in a ton of cases. Any argument, statement, perspective or what have you has its own merits irrespective of who is offering it. The inverse is inherently fallacious.

I think there's a difference between an exchange of ideas and an administrator holding to a sentiment that could contribute to the marginalization of certain segments of the student body. Again, I don't think she should be fired and I do agree that some campuses have gone overboard in this respect, but I can also understand why this would bother some people.

Sure, and they should engage in a conversation about why her views bother them if they do, and why she should alter them. This is not, as in the earlier example, Fred Phelps. There seems to be a huge desire to cast people as horrible monsters here. From that letter, this woman doesn't seem evil to me, and if there are good reasons she should alter her views, maybe she would be receptive to such. Probably somewhat less so, now, I'd wager.