Shoutout to the Student Protesters at Middlebury College

Because they did nothing wrong?

Jay Caspian Kang wrote about liberal punditry’s infatuation with the idea that young people should sit down and learn how to engage opposing viewpoints civilly on college campuses. What prompted him to write this was the reaction to the students at Middlebury College who protested a lecture given by Charles Murray, a conservative and co-author of controversial book titled The Bell Curve. The protest turned towards violence when a professor was physically attacked. (You can read about the incident here.)

I bring up Kang’s piece not only because it’s a good read, but because of the highlighted part of the paragraph below:

This is an extremely small sample size, but in my lifetime, I’ve never witnessed anyone lose an argument and concede to the winning side. Nine times out of ten, the loser is going to walk out of that conversation thinking things “If I would’ve said [insert here], I would’ve won that argument.” That’s why I’m inclined to believe Kang about polite discourse and its inability “to change anyone’s mind about anything.”

This also reminds me of a post I published on Facebook at the end of my senior year of college. There was an incident that I believe was unfair and I decided to say something, right then and there, to campus police. Campus police, of course, did not take kind to this, and I was reported to the Dean of Student Affairs. While in the Dean’s office the next day, he said that I should have said nothing and instead go to him first. Hence this post:

It’s like those who are outside the bracket of “young people” or “millennials” do not know how to handle how us “young people” or “millennials” decide to take on issues. Sit down and shut up, they say. You don’t understand; you’re too young, they say. Listen to me, I’ve experienced life, they say.

Well, to them, I say, You don’t have the answers, Sway.

But on a serious note, I think it’s important that we all learn from each other. Young people from older generations, and older generations from young people. Maybe Frank Bruni, whose book Where You Go Is Not Who You’ll Be is a great read for those worried about not getting into elite colleges and universities, should think more deeply about why the young people at Middlebury decided to protest Charles Murray instead of insinuating that they have not “learned enough to conclude on [their] own that [his assertions in The Bell Curve] were wrong.” And maybe the young people at Middlebury should have thought more deeply about how to engage a thinker like Murray. Either way, there is no clear cut answer.

So as not to ramble on incoherently, I’ll leave you with this question, posed by Kang:

Do we still have so much faith in both the academy and the theater of ideas to really believe that Charles Murray will be defeated by smart arguments delivered in an elite place like Middlebury College?