Actually, I'm having the time of my life. Students have been asking me if I'm "okay," thinking I was a Hillary Clinton supporter. That's because I try to teach it down the middle and not let my own ideological predisposition influence my instruction. It's not hard, being a former Democrat, as I know exactly what warms the hearts of progressives, but then if I go too easy on the Democrats the conservative students think I'm "biased."
I guess that's better than being hounded as a conservative, which has of course happened in the past when my blogging has become an issue on campus.
In any case, I'm actually sympathetic to students who are sad, but at this point it's time to buck up and move on. Moping around all depressed about it won't change a thing. Trump's coming and folks better get used to it, or at the least start mobilizing for the next round of elections.
In any case, here's Professor Glenn Reynolds, at USA Today, "'
Tolerant' educators exile Trump voters from campus":
Official safe spaces marginalize Republicans as the 'other' and turn universities into a joke.
One of the more amusing bits of fallout from last week’s election has been the safe-space response of many colleges and universities to the election of the “wrong” candidate. But on closer examination, this response isn’t really amusing. In fact, it’s downright mean.
Donald Trump’s substantial victory, when most progressives expected a Hillary Clinton landslide, came as a shock to many. That shock seems to have been multiplied in academe, where few people seem to know any Trump supporters — or, at least, any Trump supporters who’ll admit to it.
The response to the shock has been to turn campuses into kindergarten. The University of Michigan Law School announced a ”post-election self-care” event with “food" and "play,” including “coloring sheets, play dough (sic), positive card-making, Legos and bubbles with your fellow law students.” (Embarrassed by the attention, UM Law scrubbed the announcement from its website, perhaps concerned that people would wonder whether its graduates would require Legos and bubbles in the event of stressful litigation.)
Stanford emailed its students and faculty that psychological counseling was available for those experiencing “uncertainty, anger, anxiety and/or fear” following the election. So did the University of Michigan’s Flint campus.
Meanwhile, even the Ivy League wasn’t immune, with the University of Pennsylvania (Trump’s alma mater) creating a post-election safe space with puppies and coloring books:
Student Daniel Tancredi reported that the people who attended were “fearful” about the results of the election.
“For the most part, students just hung out and ate snacks and made small talk,” Tancredi told "The College Fix." “Of course, that was in addition to coloring and playing with the animals.”
Keep reading.
Funny enough, I'm going to attend a "
safe spaces" lunchtime meeting tomorrow, mostly because I want to make sure students get accurate information, particularly on immigration (deportations could increase, although the "build the wall" might not play out in concrete policy right off the bat).
More on that later.
