>But that, once upon a time, and it wasn't too long ago, there was a thing known as "civil discourse" in this country. In which (and granted the boundaries are fuzzy hear) -- in itself the mere fact of having an unpopular (or difficult) opinion on the state of the world ... did not run such an alarmingly and dysfunctional risk of getting you shut down in form or another as it does today.
But doesn't this cut both ways? Once upon a time it wasn't possible to spout whatever's in one's head to countless people at once. The surface area is much larger today, and so are the consequences.
This is a consequence of the Internet. In the old days if you said something stupid people would laugh at you and that would be the end of it. Now if you say something stupid and it ends up online people will dig it out of your past to use against you. This is an especially big problem for people who were edgy in their youth but are older now. Societal standards shifted out from under them and you aren't grandfathered in the court of public opinion.
The surface area isn't always all that big. The student's essay, cited in the article, had to do with comments she made within the walls of a college classroom. And I think that essay (if I didn't mix it up with another one) talked about students getting lambasted on social media for their comments in class.
I think among the action items that TFA suggests for discussion, another could be: "What happens in class stays in class." If a student needs to be called out for egregious behavior, that can be handled by the teacher.
Also, things like electronically submitted essays and papers need to be deleted from any kind of server or database once the class is finished.
But doesn't this cut both ways? Once upon a time it wasn't possible to spout whatever's in one's head to countless people at once. The surface area is much larger today, and so are the consequences.
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