King's College London employs 'safe space marshals' to stop students having 'feelings hurt' - Sensationalist Headlines

[quote]The monitors are paid almost £12 per hour to monitor events at the college. Students have taken aim at King's College London after it was revealed that they were employing "safe space marshals" to patrol events that could cause controversy. A job advert on the university's student union website is offering £11.89 and hour, or £13.32 if holiday pay is included, for someone to patrol and monitor events which "have been risk assessed as having potential for a Safe Space breech [sic]." It comes after the posting was mocked by some when the marshals were deployed to oversee a talk being given by the Conservative MP Jacob Rees Mogg on 18 October. One student who was unsure about the need for the marshals was Jack Emsley, editor of The 1828, the Conservative Association Journal who said on Facebook: "Massive thanks to KCLSU for providing a fantastic safe space yesterday! "I know that without the five Safe Space Marshals working tirelessly, I definitely couldn't have listened to Jacob Rees-Mogg without having my feelings seriously hurt. Definitely not a waste of paper, manpower or our money!" The monitors, according to the job description, are expected to place posters around the event space and university explaining what "safe space" is, as well as reminding people at talks that they are being monitored by the marshals.[/quote] [url]http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/kings-college-london-employs-safe-space-marshals-stop-students-having-feelings-hurt-1644858[/url] [t]https://s1.postimg.org/59qm4i0jen/ibt.png[/t] [url]https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/kings-college-slammed-for-patronising-and-problematic-safe-space-marshals-paid-12-an-hour-to-police-a3669151.html[/url] [url]http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/2017/10/26/kings-college-hires-safe-space-marshals-police-controversialspeaker/[/url] [url]http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/kings-college-london-student-union_uk_59f2ec38e4b077d8dfc8c7a6[/url] Would make a former Stasi agent proud.

[B]"as well as reminding people at talks that they are being monitored by the marshals."[/B] this is seriously messed up. when did feefee's become so fucking imperative to people?

What a great way to prep students for the real world. It's a shame the government capped uni fees as I'd be totally willing to bury myself in further debt for such a great use of tuition fees.

Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.

What a time to be alive

Just a reminder, 99% of colleges do not do this shit

So the same people that hate the real police want to employ thought police? I guess we already knew that, it's just weird seeing it in practice.

This would be more useful in earlier schoolyears like elementary, where they could stop bullying. Maybe bullying happens in colleges too but I bet it's more frequent during younger years.

Reminder that this is KCLSU not KCL itself employing these people. Entirely separate organisations.

After reading the articles, it's obvious that this is being blown out of proportion. The "protect people's feelings" narrative is being pushed by conservative commentators, but here's what's really happening: 1. The school's students voted on and approved a "safe space" policy which prohibits hate speech. The measure is meant to protect both students and speakers from harassment. The whole thing basically boils down to "keep it clean." 2. The school hired the marshals to put up posters and explain to students the difference between academic debate and hate speech/harassment. The students are informed that if they violate the policy, their actions can/will be noticed and that actions can be taken if need be. 3. No speaker has been prohibited from appearing at the school as a result of the policy.

[QUOTE=Sableye;52834637]Just a reminder, 99% of colleges do not do this shit[/QUOTE] I'd say even more than that. But our world just wouldn't be the same without our so loving and thoughtful cherrypicked headlines to really get everyone riled up.

[QUOTE=Tudd;52834597]Would make a former Stasi agent proud.[/QUOTE] Oh, I'm sorry. I missed the part where the school was repeatedly CT-scanning dissidents to give them cancer. Yeah, what an accurate comparison, now that I think of it.

Man this is truly the best thing they could have done.

Damn that's pretty decent pay... More than a primary school teacher gets.

This news makes me uncomfortable. Not uncomfortable enough to warrant a personal escort by safe space marshals, but still iffy.

Student's Unions are 99% useless trash anyway, no surprise.

[QUOTE=F.X Clampazzo;52834952]Student's Unions are 99% useless trash anyway, no surprise.[/QUOTE] They're pretty much just a mechanism to try and give the student body a go-to to the university administration, whilst also giving those running it a chance to "play politics" in an environment where it really doesn't fucking matter before they enter the real world with no experience managing things (most of the people who take SU roles tend to be fairly "managerial" in a way after uni I've found). 90% of the time their attempts to get the university to do stuff are ignored because "lmao fucking shit kids go away". The only real benefits I got from my SU were student discounts and the on campus nightclub that was managed somewhat well.

[QUOTE=Sega Saturn;52834692]After reading the articles, it's obvious that this is being blown out of proportion. The "protect people's feelings" narrative is being pushed by conservative commentators, but here's what's really happening: 1. The school's students voted on and approved a "safe space" policy which prohibits hate speech. The measure is meant to protect both students and speakers from harassment. The whole thing basically boils down to "keep it clean." 2. The school hired the marshals to put up posters and explain to students the difference between academic debate and hate speech/harassment. The students are informed that if they violate the policy, their actions can/will be noticed and that actions can be taken if need be. 3. No speaker has been prohibited from appearing at the school as a result of the policy.[/QUOTE] This doesn't sound nearly as bad as the op makes it sound :/

[QUOTE=Snickerdoodle;52835091]This doesn't sound nearly as bad as the op makes it sound :/[/QUOTE] It's Torygraph and the Evening Standard, two conservative leaning papers that are de-factor mouthpieces for the Tory party. Shit, the Standard is part of the Daily Mail corporation, along being edited by George Osborne and this little gem; [quote]It is owned by Russian businessman and former KGB agent Alexander Lebedev.[/quote] no fucking wonder it aligns with Tory interests and anti-progressive interests. As per usual Tudd has picked some cherry-as-fuck articles about a total non-issue that blow it vastly out of proportion to push this fucking asinine "THE LEFT ARE BABIES" rhetoric. [editline]edited[/editline] And the HuffPo article doesn't remotely balance it out as they are secondary sourcing the Daily Mail, their article relies on information not of their own finding a fair bit, so any exaggerations will have carried over as like fuck they'd do research of their own properly. Gotta get them headlines out.

[QUOTE=Sableye;52834637]Just a reminder, 99% of colleges do not do this shit[/QUOTE] Reminder, any institution of [I]higher learning[/I] should not HAVE to do or even consider this shit. If you are old enough to vote, wield a weapon or vehicle or get dranked off your ass, you are old enough understand the premises of [B]context[/B], [B]contention[/B], [B]cause and effect[/B] and [B]consequences[/B], which conveniently happen to be interlinked for most denizens of planet earth, including, as it have it, people. [QUOTE]students the difference between academic debate and hate speech/harassment[/QUOTE] You need clarification? Where in the hell would these students have gone to school previous that such a thing is an actual convention. Must be some full contact debate program.

[QUOTE=Bradyns;52834839]This news makes me uncomfortable. Not uncomfortable enough to warrant a personal escort by safe space marshals, but still iffy.[/QUOTE] Jesus for a moment I thought Morgen got modded

[QUOTE=hexpunK;52835111]It's Torygraph and the Evening Standard, two conservative leaning papers that are de-factor mouthpieces for the Tory party. Shit, the Standard is part of the Daily Mail corporation, along being edited by George Osborne and this little gem; no fucking wonder it aligns with Tory interests and anti-progressive interests. As per usual [B]Tudd[/B] has picked some cherry-as-fuck articles about a total non-issue that blow it vastly out of proportion to push this fucking asinine "THE LEFT ARE BABIES" rhetoric. [editline]edited[/editline] And the HuffPo article doesn't remotely balance it out as they are secondary sourcing the Daily Mail, their article relies on information not of their own finding a fair bit, so any exaggerations will have carried over as like fuck they'd do research of their own properly. Gotta get them headlines out.[/QUOTE] Ah fuck I didn't read the username. His posts were much more noticeable to me before I disabled the avatar :v:

[QUOTE=27X;52835129]Reminder, any institution of [I]higher learning[/I] should not HAVE to do or even consider this shit. If you are old enough to vote, wield a weapon or vehicle or get dranked off your ass, you are old enough understand the premises of [B]context[/B], [B]contention[/B], [B]cause and effect[/B] and [B]consequences[/B], which conveniently happen to be interlinked for most denizens of planet earth, including, as it have it, people. You need clarification? Where in the hell would these students have gone to school previous that such a thing is an actual convention. Must be some full contact debate program.[/QUOTE] As someone currently teaching at an institution of higher learning, I can assure you there are a number of students that despite being legal adults are still basically six months away from being high school students. Being in college doesn't magically make you a well-rounded or educated individual. Weird shit happens at Uni because people are in the process of hopefully becoming those two things. Imagine how fucked up society would be if [I]less[/I] people bothered to go through the educational process.

[QUOTE=Cyke Lon bee;52834626]What a time to be alive[/QUOTE] shit is getting dystopic in both directions at the same time, its great

[QUOTE=Ninja Gnome;52835825]shit is getting dystopic in both directions at the same time, its great[/QUOTE] If the leftist dystopia is paid hall monitors at college I'm gonna be real disappointed.

[QUOTE=Raidyr;52835845]If the leftist dystopia is paid hall monitors at college I'm gonna be real disappointed.[/QUOTE] they're just now running out of the gates compared to the rightist dystopia, which has been building up speed since the 80s at least

[QUOTE=LeonS;52834610][B]"as well as reminding people at talks that they are being monitored by the marshals."[/B] this is seriously messed up. when did feefee's become so fucking imperative to people?[/QUOTE] when postmodernism asserted that the subjective experience of the individual supplants truth as the highest value. For example, the self esteem movement basically claims that "everyone has the right to always feel good about themselves.", bug negative emotions are usually feedback that you're doing something wrong. If you're feeling sad that you're not doing things very well, that's the truth of your mediocrity feeding back as being sad, which provides motivation to git gud. But if you have the right to always feel good about yourself, that means that the 'wellbeing' of your subjective experience transcends the truth of your performance. Ergo, your subjective experience transcends or precludes reality itself. Which is predicated on a postmodernist set of reasoning, which is that there is no such thing as truth, only subjective interpretations and social power games. Also fuck meritocracy. Then extrapolate all that out over the 40 years its' been since the self esteem movement, and raise people under that culture and line of reasoning. Here we are, we got the feels stasi running around making sure nobody is ever in any way made uncomfortable because they have an intractable right to feel good about themselves. And because of the postmodernist idea of social power games, since there is no truth, only people and groups who have claims of truth to further power games to establish a hegemony, that makes any antagonistic speech/ideas directly equivalent to violence, as they are supposedly trying to play for power and control over any other groups, therefore anyone who betrays that status quo is basically committing political violence. I wish i had the ability to make this shit up.

[QUOTE=Trilby Harlow;52836013]when postmodernism asserted that the subjective experience of the individual supplants truth as the highest value. For example, the self esteem movement basically claims that "everyone has the right to always feel good about themselves.", bug negative emotions are usually feedback that you're doing something wrong. If you're feeling sad that you're not doing things very well, that's the truth of your mediocrity feeding back as being sad, which provides motivation to git gud. But if you have the right to always feel good about yourself, that means that the 'wellbeing' of your subjective experience transcends the truth of your performance. Ergo, your subjective experience transcends or precludes reality itself. Which is predicated on a postmodernist set of reasoning, which is that there is no such thing as truth, only subjective interpretations and social power games. Also fuck meritocracy. Then extrapolate all that out over the 40 years its' been since the self esteem movement, and raise people under that culture and line of reasoning. Here we are, we got the feels stasi running around making sure nobody is ever in any way made uncomfortable because they have an intractable right to feel good about themselves. And because of the postmodernist idea of social power games, since there is no truth, only people and groups who have claims of truth to further power games to establish a hegemony, that makes any antagonistic speech/ideas directly equivalent to violence, as they are supposedly trying to play for power and control over any other groups, therefore anyone who betrays that status quo is basically committing political violence. I wish i had the ability to make this shit up.[/QUOTE] I consider myself very anti-sjw, but this hate boner for postmodernism is the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen. It's borderline hilarious how dogmatic the hatred of it has become. It's pretty telling that Jordan Peterson's attack on postmodernism is so poorly understood that everyone else just connects it to the most unrelated things, like you in this example. The quoted text has nothing to do with your rant, ironically your entire post is based on such a subjective and abstract concept that it itself is postmodern, good job I guess.

Don't Mormon Colleges have something similar? I swear I read somewhere that they employ people to keep an eye on people so they adhere to the rules of the college (which coincide with the MB too often).

It's good they're finally making sure that space marshalls are safe. Had enough of those loose cannons!