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This Week in the Academic Jungle
I’m knee-deep in bureaucratic, faculty paperwork already today, so the last thing I wanted to see was this email from our university’s Coordinator of the “Women’s and Gender Equity Center”:
April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month.
- Pride Week with SAGA includes Drag Battles on Friday at 6 pm in Flohr Lecture Hall. All are welcome.
- Family Connect is free as a group event if you join us.
- Inclusivity Training on the 11th and 12th are the last opportunities of the semester to complete training and be recognized at Lavender Graduation to receive the rainbow bear of inclusivity for your door.
- Night of Healing is a discussion and candlelight vigil for and in support of sexual assault survivors.
- Denim Day is an international movement to stand in solidarity with sexual assault survivors against the “What were you wearing?” commentary.
- Lavender Graduation is a ceremonial right of passage for LGBTQ+ students and allies to celebrate overcoming the additional obstacles they face. All in support of the community are welcome.
As always, thank you for your support. We appreciate you.
XXXXXXXXXXXXX
Coordinator, WGEC
Grant Writer, Institutional Research
Deputy, Title IX
XXXXXXXXXXXXX
First Generation College Student
Preferred Pronouns: She/Her /Hers
A few points and pet peeves:
- I really hate seeing these “drag” events getting mainstream promotion across campus.
- You mean there’s only one more chance for me to receive the “receive the rainbow bear of inclusivity“? I’m going to roll my eyes so hard, I’ll sprain a muscle.
- Denim Day is probably better than a slut walk, so there’s that.
- “Lavendar graduation” is a “ceremonial rite of passage” for “overcoming additional obstacles”? You’re talking about 22-year-olds. Treat them like grown men and women and stop this kind of condescending language.
My college has not been as bad as many, as things have gotten worse in academia over the past decade. But there are some radical changes going on, and I’m not happy about them.
Published in Education
Take heart and be of good cheer. I was in college from 1972 to 1978 (I wandered a bit and work full time). And I am sure there were profs who felt the world was doomed because of that generation. For me, the grounding point were the Vietnam vets who were not there to mess around, they were there for the one time shot at the GI bill benefits.
So it looks bad, mostly due to adults, but the majority of the students are serious and do not pay much attention to this stuff. There are a couple of guys right now selling counterfeit inclusivity bears.
Denim Day is completely new to me. Sponsored by Levi-Strauss?
It would be more inclusive if there was a Yoga Pants Day. Something to work on.
This is a parody, right?
Academia is impossible to parody today. ;)
I would be too tempted to respond, “I do NOT support you. You are evil. You are harming our students. And you should be fired for promoting such utter nonsense and demonstrably harmful material.”
Obviously I would not last long in academia today.
You’re certainly right that most students aren’t paying attention to this stuff. I wish the university offices were more representative of them. I’ve been thinking of doing a poster count across campus. The fraction of left-leaning, radical, or just weird ideas promoted in the posters and fliers is pretty high, but our student body isn’t, in my experience.
I am so tempted to counterfeit the rainbow inclusivity bears! That’s a business opportunity, right there.
If they were truly inclusive, how could there be counterfeits?
I’m torn on yoga pants. They’re more pants than leggings are. I think that the ubiquity of exercise clothing on girls is the biggest difference in style between today and the 1990s, a twenty-year period where we’ve seen very little mainstream changes (unlike, say 1965 to 1985, or even a ten-year period from 1963 to 1973!). I’m in the camp of “leggings aren’t pants,” but they can also be pretty attractive on the right person.
The then-titled “Women’s Center” sent out a questionnaire about 2-3 years ago, asking if they should continue as such or expand to become a “Gender Equity Center.” Part of the reason they were suggesting the Women’s Center needed to continue was that women make up 60% of the student body, so they have unique needs, etc., etc., etc….
I wrote (anonymously—I’m not suicidal) that the very fact they were 60% of the student body meant that they were not an oppressed minority on campus, and in fact the university catered more to them than to men. Therefore, the Women’s Center should declare victory and close shop.
They didn’t take my advice.
I live in a state that is largely rural/small town. I fear that the more mentally agile (those who score very well on tests), are very susceptible to the leftist milieu on campus of the big state university. Their desire to be accepted as a cosmopolitan overcomes sober judgement in a rush to acquire and exemplify the leftist mind set. It seems a cruel irony that they seemingly cannot use there intellectual gifts to criticize or analyze this all encompassing world view.
More interesting, anyway.
Good grief, Tim. It really does sound like someone made it up to sound as silly as possible. I guess the head of the Women and Gender Equity Center has to do stuff that sounds like it’s important . . . to someone. What a waste of time and money. All of them just need to grow up.
This would be funny except I keep remembering that these “diversity directors” make six figure salaries. I count my blessings that I do not have children of college age these days.
Feminists should demand pocket equity. Women’s pants either have no/fake/tiny pockets. It just isn’t right.
Something tells me the “drag battles” thing doesn’t involve cars or other vehicles racing one another.
There’s something about that rainbow bear thing. And the woods. It’s just on the tip of my tongue.
And if they are truly inclusive, they shouldn’t be exclusive. Everyone, everywhere is entitled to one for any reason.
Crimenutely. The mind boggles.
I’ve got my spreadsheet out, and I’m trying to figure out the timeline. I think you’re telling me I have to go to inclusivity training first, prior to getting to Lavender Graduation, and I can’t have the rainbow bear of inclusivity unless I finish both the other things beforehand. Why do they have to make this so hard? Don’t they understand that I already face additional obstacles in my life and I really don’t need any more pressure?
Also, are Denim Day and the Night of Healing optional? Or do I have to do them too? And in what order and when? What about Drag Battles, and what are they anyway? Anything like Drag Races? I do know what those are. But they don’t seem to fit the rest of your narrative and I’m not even sure they’re legal.
I really do want the rainbow bear, though. Can’t you just give it to me? You know, without my having to do all that other stuff? Seriously, I mean, c’mon. I deserve it.
Let me know. I’ll be one with the blanket, in the safe space, cuddling the puppy.
A “denim day” is a nefarious plot to claim that there’s more support for some outlandish idea than there really is.
A couple of years ago there was a relatively quiet campaign about wearing denim to demonstrate support for something or another, and it quickly became apparent that “denim” was chosen so the organizers could claim everyone wearing denim that day supported their cause, notwithstanding that most college students wear denim as a default and therefore most of the students wearing denim that day wore it irrespective of the cause supposedly being celebrated. The campaign was relatively quiet before the day because the organizers understood that if it were heavily publicized many students would be aware NOT to wear denim that day. Subversive action by the organizers to make support seem higher than it really was.
I would not assume that these two concepts cannot be combined.
I like the preferred pronouns in the email signature 😂
“Never send to know for whom the Rainbow Bear of Inclusivity knocks; it knocks for thee.”
That would make a good Night Gallery episode.
Don’t forget the “preferred pronouns’ . . .
While we have had a big growth in administrators over the past several years, this position doesn’t make any six figures. This is a “Coordinator” position, so it’s really part-time. I’m Coordinator of our planetarium, in addition to being a professor, and I just get a little bit extra in my paycheck. Now, I still don’t think we should have a “WGET Coordinator” or a Title IX office, out of principle, but at it’s not costing us much.
Is that pronounced “wigit” as in a small gadget or mechanical device, especially one whose name is unknown or unspecified? Seems sort of like a micro aggression in that context.
“Sexual Assault Awareness Month”…when we become ‘aware’ to the fact the 13 out of 10 statistics on sexual assault are 110% false?
Aaaah. “Coordinator” not “Director”. A couple of years ago U Of A hired two directors at over $200K each.
Is ‘snowflake’ masculine or feminine?
Another example that once established, a bureaucracy becomes more interested in its own continuity than in addressing the supposed reason for its creation.