The closing of the Canadian mind

POSTMEDIA NETWORK

FIRST POSTED: FRIDAY, JANUARY 08, 2016

The J. N. Desmarais Library at Laurentian University in Sudbury, Ont., is pictured in this file photo. (JOHN LAPPA/THE SUDBURY STAR/Postmedia Network)

[Universities stopped being bastions of free speech and academic freedom] so long ago that the latest fiasco at Laurentian U. in Sudbury, Ontario is no surprise.

There, award-winning psychology professor Michael Persinger, popular among students as an excellent and dynamic teacher, has been banned from teaching his introductory psychology course.

Why? Because every year he warns his incoming students that in order to teach them how to reason effectively without being unduly influenced by emotional language and situations, he sometimes uses obscene words, slurs and explicit content to drive home his point.

For over 10 years, Persinger has asked students at the start of the year to sign a form saying he has told them about his teaching methods and that if they find his use of language offensive, they are free to take another class.

While that’s never been a problem before, a complaint this year prompted the administration to remove Persinger from the course, insisting the issue isn’t academic freedom, but that no professor can ask students to sign a consent form prior to taking a class.

This even though Persinger says he doesn’t prevent students from attending if they don’t sign the form.

In any event, there would appear to be an obvious solution.

That would be for Persinger to stop handing out the form to students at the start of the year and simply tell them about his teaching methods.

Students could then decide for themselves whether to take his course, which is a right they have always had.

Past and present students have come to Persinger’s defence, in the wake of the university’s decision.

That, at least, is a hopeful sign that Laurentian hasn’t yet turned them all into delicate, politically correct flowers who mistakenly believe they have a right never to be offended by anything they see or hear in a classroom, or anywhere else.

The faculty association has filed a grievance on Persinger’s behalf.

What’s really going on is another example of the phenomenon described by U.S. academic Allan Bloom in his famous 1987 book, The Closing of the American Mind, which argued that, “higher education has failed democracy and impoverished the souls of today’s students” due to runaway political correctness.

Sadly, Canada is no exception
.