Queen's Axes Language Police

Queen's finally came to their senses and got rid of the thought crime police at Queen's reports the Montreal Gazette:

Queen's University in Kingston, Ont., has scrapped its "dialogue facilitator" program, calling it "incompatible with the atmosphere required for free speech." A scandal arose last year when it was revealed the student "facilitators" were mandated to intervene in private conversations to encourage discussion of social justice issues and discourage offensive language. In a report to the administration, a panel of experts noted the risk of "making students feel unsafe or under surveillance because of their opinions."

Three cheers! What a bad idea. I bet those volunteers who signed up to "monitor" conversations are being ridiculed, as they should. You can picture some liquored up students on pub night:

"Hey, asshole, you got a problem with what I'm saying? Well there's nothing you can do about it!"

Good! Those types of people deserve our scorn.

I've written about this before here and here

Queen's Thought Police In Action

Matt Gurney of the National Post has new information on the Queen's Thought Police today:

My friend's friend -- we'll call her "Judy" -- was part of a school club that helped organize an off-campus charity event. A skilled dancer, Judy was part of a group of female students who got up on stage and performed a "cabaret dance," which fitted with the theme of the evening. The costumes of the women in the dance group were what you'd expect --dress shirts tucked into shorts, fishnet stockings, etc. Fun was had by (almost) all, and money raised for a worthy cause.

But shortly thereafter, Judy was contacted by a representative of the Equity Office, which is tasked with ensuring that the university's workers and students can work and learn in an environment free of discrimination-- a laudable goal.

Judy, however, wasn't being accused of standing in the way of anyone's employment or education, but rather of causing offence.

A student had complained to Equity that Judy's costume was demeaning to women.

The Queen's Thought Police want to make sure nobody speaks publically about this because they know if absurd charges like this are brought to light they'll lose their power. I remember when I was on campus in the early 90's there was a universal lack of common sense throughout the faculty and the student organizations. This is why all of this does not surprise me at all.

Future Queen's and Carleton Graduates?

"Parsons was Winston's fellow employee at the Ministry of Truth. He was a fattish but active man of paralyzing stupidity, a mass of imbecile enthusiasms—one of those completely unquestioning, devoted drudges on whom, more even than on the thought police, the stability of the Party depended."

- George Orwell, 1984, Book 1, Chapter 2

Queen's Speech Police Update

Here's a transcript from Ezra Levant's website, as he discusses the Queen's issue with CTV's Mike Duffy. Duffy makes a great point here:

I've had a number of Conservative MPs say to me, Duff, this will be used by people at Queens of a left wing persuasion to go after Conservatives. They'll try to bait the Conservatives into conversation and then have the speech police have them up on charge for daring to defend their political point of view which is at odds with the lefties.

I will post the video of this interview if it is available.

Earlier posts on this: Official Language Police at Queen's and Hello Queen's University

Hello Queen's University

I see some folks at Queen's U in K-town have been onto my site. Howdy!

The reference you're looking for is here:

Official Language Police at Queen's

Update: I don't know if things have changed since the early 90's but don't you just hate Queen's students? I remember these two women at a party I was at in England. They were pulling the trademark Queen's snobbery, going as far as making Carleton jokes at me in front of the Brits. The ironic Brits rolled their eyes and were unimpressed. Nobody had heard of Queen's and they thought their humour was witless. Stupid hicks didn't realize that they weren't in Eastern Ontario anymore.... Now they have conversation police. What a joke.

Official Language Police at Queen's

(Article here)

KINGSTON (CP) -Students who make politically incorrect comments at Ontario’s Queen’s University can expect a lecture, whether they’re in or out of class.

The Kingston university has hired student facilitators to step in if they overhear students making homophobic or racial slurs, remarks bashing women or other offensive language.

The dean of student affairs at Queen’s says if students are making offensive comments loud enough for others to hear, it’s not a private conversation anymore.

Jason Laker says the facilitators use a respectful, non-confrontational approach.

But Angela Hickman, who edits a campus newspaper, says having such a program could stifle public discussion.

Can you imagine the type of people that will sign up to be a facilitator? University campuses are hardly the hotbed of racism. These people are going to make up everything conceivable to be able to exercise their power. It's not like they're going to report back at the end of the year and say they witnessed no homophobic, racist or misogynist comments.

UPDATE: Meet some facilitators here. Listen to the saccharin explanation:

"If there's a teachable moment, we'll take it," said assistant dean of
student affairs Arig Girgrah, who runs the program. "A lot of community building happens around food and dining."

She gave the example of a conversation about a gay character on
television as a good example of such a moment.

"It is all about creating opportunities to dialogue and reflect on
issues of social identity," Ms. Girgrah said. "This is not about preaching. It's not about advice giving. It's about hearing where students are at."

Can a university student survive without being able to make a 'perfume ponce' reference from 'Withnail and I" every now and then? Impossible, I say.