Thursday, December 08, 2016

Student Threatened With Legal Action After Recording Prof's Anti-Trump Lecture/Tirade

'Cause somehow it's the student who's the problem here.

6 Comments:

Blogger Aa said...

The policy is actually fairly clear, so I don't see the problem here. The student could have reported what the teacher said to the administration (the department head, Dean, etc), but instead broke the rules and then went public. In some cases students have recorded lectures, severely edited them (junior O'Keefe's) and then the right wing media swamp starts in. I tell my students they may record my lectures but not to put any online, they seem to understand common courtesy. This kid broke the rules, if he doesn't like the rules challenge the rules.

11:01 AM  
Blogger Winston Smith said...

Yeah, I feel ya. I'm not inveterately opposed.

But this student *didn't* do anything nefarious with the recording. Such policies are usually aimed to prevent students from recording lectures on a daily basis for pedagogical ends.

If a prof is doing something wrong--e.g. slipping into proselytizing and indoctrination...naked bias...I say it's permissible for a student to bend/break the rules in that case.

Obviously if the prof had gone on a racist tirade students would be justified in taping it... I'd say this is in that direction.

11:11 AM  
Blogger Aa said...

Then why not take it to the administrators? In that case it would still be private and they would have (hopefully) investigated. Going public almost guarantees nothing internally will be done beyond a hand slap, and the student will be punished. Hell, maybe only a hand slap would have occurred initially but at that point they would have, in my opinion, been justified in going public (and still face the penalty)

7:35 PM  
Blogger Winston Smith said...

Nothing's going to be done internally for lefty bitching in a lecture.

Going public was the only way there was going to be any pushback at all.

7:47 PM  
Blogger Aa said...

I disagree. In the climate we are now in, administrators are just as afraid of the PC backlash, as they are of the right wing backlash. Granted, my univ is in the conservative part of a mostly red (sometimes purple) state, but other friends across the country are seeing similar things. We got hit with the right wing backlash years ago, it was not pretty.

8:55 AM  
Blogger Winston Smith said...

Needless to say, you could be right. But, consequences aside, I think the student had a right of some kind or other to record under those conditions.

9:13 AM  

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