WSU students may fail classes for saying ‘illegal immigrant’

Update:
Washington State University issued a statement via Fox, saying, “We are working with these faculty members to clarify, and in some cases modify, course policies to ensure that students’ free speech rights are recognized and protected. No student will have points docked merely as a result of using terms that may be deemed offensive to some.”

—Original story—

If you enroll in certain Washington State University courses, some professors may fail you for not complying with their thought policing and censorship.

Conservative blog Campus Reform revealed a number of syllabi at WSU that establish a frightening and chilling atmosphere antithetic to what college campuses should be. Rather than being the best of what an open marketplace of ideas can offer, students are exposed to an environment where if they commit a microaggression (on purpose or by accident), their future degrees will be on the line.

If you take “Introduction to Comparative Ethnic Studies,” be warned that Professor Rebecca Flower bans certain terms, such as “illegal alien” and “illegal immigrant.” If you use those terms, among some other no-no’s, “your grade will suffer a deduction of one point per incident.”

Related: Microaggressions are an excuse to be offended, feel victimized

She further warns that she “will not entertain discussions that are not solidly grounded in textual evidence but are solely based on your personal ‘opinions’ or preferences.” However, she says after you take her course, students will ” come to recognize how white privilege functions in everyday social structures and institutions.” (That is an opinion for which her students must treat as fact &#8212 and don’t you dare give your personal opinion that questions white privilege, lest you’re filling to fail.)

In an email to Campus Reform, Fowler explained why she bans the terms on illegal immigrants thusly: “The socio-legal production of migrant illegality works to systematically dehumanize and exploit these brown bodies for their labor.” This doesn’t really mean anything; it’s someone using contrived, faux-academic jargon.

Unfortunately, she’s not the only WSU professor engaging in this shameful censorship and thought policing.

In Professor Selena Lester Breikss’ course “Women & Popular Culture,” if students use “oppressive and hateful language,” they could earn a big fat F+. According to the syllabus, which is a handy tool to read if you’re looking to find out how too many college courses seek to indoctrinate rather than teach, Breikss notes you shouldn’t use language she deems “derogatory/oppressive”, which includes the term “illegals” – common shorthand for “illegal immigrants.”

In another course, “Introduction to Multicultural Literature,” Professor John Streamas says if white students want to do well in class, they should defer to non-white classmates and what the professor believes is a “historically informed definition of racism…”

Ironically, Streamas demands that students “challenge all racist discourse,” but thinks telling white people to defer to people based on their minority status (and not on the validity of their commentary) isn’t offensive and tokenizing (I would fail the class because I suspect his view on racism is that only people in position of power &#8212 aka “white people” &#8212 can be racist).

Related: Rachel Dolezal is everything that’s wrong with political correctness

In his syllabus, he goes after “insensitive whites such as Glenn Beck,” and was also accused by a student of calling him “a white ,” which should be a warning to any student who is looking for an honest discussion of the issues who do not want to be failed for an opinion that isn’t shared by their professor.

And as Campus Reform notes:

Several other WSU professors require their students to “acknowledge that racism, classism, sexism, heterosexism, and other institutionalized forms of oppression exist” or that “we do not live in a post-racial world.”

Whether or not you approve of the language or the concepts being taught, is immaterial to this discussion. College is supposed to be a place where you express opinions and offer critical thinking on the items presented to you in class. You’re not, however, supposed to be penalized for holding a different opinion. You shouldn’t have to deal with censored language. There should not be off-limits discussion on a college campus; this is where you’re supposed to go to learn and grow and be challenged, not coddled or propagandized.