Conor Friedersdorf

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

RT @DouthatNYT: Say a prayer for peace tonight. https://t.co/zDsRuSOzhA — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@ijbailey Do you disagree that ad hominem should be discouraged when professors model how to argue for students? — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@kapoano @Yascha_Mounk With that kind of defeatist attitude it is, but Yascha is urging a better world, and people should join his project to help effect it — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

Two divided I've been noticing in the conversation about cous speech norms: 1) a divide between people who find debate a useful way to learn and those who don't. 2) a divide between people who think logos and pathos are equally valid modes on campus and those who don't. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

Socrates thought cooperative argumentative dialogue was an effective method of teaching, and so do I. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@drvolts @binarybits @FeedbackRobust @HalfBakedHoward @jasonjdelaney @kdrum If that's the only survey data you've seen you haven't looked very hard! — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@drvolts @binarybits @FeedbackRobust @HalfBakedHoward @jasonjdelaney @kdrum That's factually inaccurate. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@drvolts @binarybits @FeedbackRobust @HalfBakedHoward @jasonjdelaney @kdrum I know it's true because I've done extensive reporting on college campuses speaking with both students and faculty members over a number of years. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

This is bad, not good. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

RT @ijbailey: I'm gonna take off my columnist hat and put on my professor hat to give you the results of a quick survey I did of two of my… — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@ijbailey People who shut down the exchange of ideas through personal insults and public shaming are a threat to a healthy academic environment. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@ijbailey I'm conversing beyond the bounds of the piece. And if a student called another student a blathering ninny in class and I were the professor, I would point out that they were indulging in cheap insults and encourage them to engage constructively with reason rather than invective. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@ijbailey I try to use the phrase "liberal speech norms" rather than "free speech" to capture that idea. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@ijbailey If I tell someone, *Shut your mouth you blithering ninny," that's me exercising free speech... to try to shut someone else up. And especially on college campuses, it's important to give ideas a hearing and respond with reason. At least I think it's important. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@ijbailey I think one thing going on here is that different uses of "free speech" are confounding things, and that it might be better to say that all these students are exercising free speech, but some are using it to try to engage in debate and others to stymie it — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@CathyYoung63 @ijbailey @HistoryBoomer I think it feels similar to the 90s PC backlash, but different because it's happening in a social media world. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

RT @MattWelch: So, 31 years ago today, the debut issue of the first post-communist independent English-language newspaper in the former Eas… — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@Popehat Hissing was a thing? Weird. I don't think that made you a victim of oppression, but I do think that a classroom where hissing replaces counterarguments is worth lamenting for the sake of everyone in it. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

...you could rightly object that they were eschewing substantive debate in favor of speech-chilling personal attacks and shaming, and lament that in doing so, they were harming everyone's ability to get closer to the truth through the exchange of ideas. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

This example works. If classmates told you, "You're wrong to be antiwar, Hussein is a moral monster and the moral thing to do is remove him from power," that's disagreement. Whereas if they said, "How dare you oppose this righteous war, you unpatriotic terrorist sympathizer..." — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@harrislapiroff If it seems like that to you, then you didn't read carefully enough, because there is a passage that directly refutes your characterization. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@Cagedbeing1 What makes you think the student is a "right-winger"? — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@drvolts @binarybits @jasonjdelaney @kdrum No, in the anecdote they don't debate her position, they shame her for holding the position. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@drvolts If you think that study is the only such survey data you're incorrect. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@drvolts Why falsely state that the piece "ONLY" included anecdotal evidence when it actually marshalled survey data, even if you disagree with the survey data? — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

A very strange phenomenon is people who chose a career as knowledge workers mocking a teenager for... wanting a college experience that includes debating ideas, as if that's cringe. When did the intellectuals adopt the position that the jock frat used to have? — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@paint771 There's a difference between declining to presume someone is a reliable narrator and asserting that they are not. — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@prof_gabriele What a strange nonsequitir — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

@tkdylan Recommended: https://t.co/c9ufOrLNZi — PolitiTweet.org

Conor Friedersdorf @conor64

A psychological aversion to diversity and difference and comfort in oneness and sameness that's so strong they are willing to force it on others via coercion. — PolitiTweet.org