Student traumatized by maintenance workers

[Caracal]

Perhaps not, but none of the people expressing sympathy for the student seem willing to do so on the grounds that this is a mental health issue serious enough that treatment is required. In other words, one can claim to be an "ally" of this student by essentially supporting this distorted view of reality, (or at least not directly challenging it), rather than trying to help the student correct it. "Lived *experience" is a force field that must not be penetrated. Anyone attempting to do so is evil.

I really am not all that sympathetic. The student might have mental health issues, but you can't really tell that from reading an editorial. They also might just be a pain. Regardless, there is obviously a lot of immaturity and entitlement going on here. I just don't think any of this reveals anything very interesting or important.

[mahagonny]

Perhaps not, but none of the people expressing sympathy for the student seem willing to do so on the grounds that this is a mental health issue serious enough that treatment is required. In other words, one can claim to be an "ally" of this student by essentially supporting this distorted view of reality, (or at least not directly challenging it), rather than trying to help the student correct it. "Lived *experience" is a force field that must not be penetrated. Anyone attempting to do so is evil.

I really am not all that sympathetic.

I am. I consider him a victim of rampant far left victimology culture.

The student might have mental health issues, but you can't really tell that from reading an editorial. They also might just be a pain. Regardless, there is obviously a lot of immaturity and entitlement going on here. I just don't think any of this reveals anything very interesting or important.

The student thinks that he is showing how sophisticated he is, and he needs to be told to knock it off. Of course, the real problems are not these young impressionable students dealing with common post-pubescent stresses and strains, but the miscreants of academia who spawned the radical left mania, the social climbers of Hollywood and the power-hungry tycoons who currently fund 'antiracism' movements, and such, throughout the USA. And the media outlets they own.
ETA: There are people who are getting mobilized to oppose the unfortunate direction society has taken. Expect to hear more. Once things get into the courts it's a little different.

[no1capybara]

I think the problem here is that the student put his (?) objections in an op-ed, as if they were a norm or a template.

People do have all kinds of objections to things, some silly, some less so. I once worked in a place where a co-worker went ballistic because the maintenance people had opened the package of toilet paper and left some sitting in the bag while waiting to be put on the roll. My co-worker thought that this would pollute the toilet paper and make it unsafe (but not when it got put on the roll — don't ask me, I'm just reporting).

But in the long run, as far as the bigger picture, the whole thing is a tempest in a teapot. "College student expresses immaturity." Headline news?

Exactly. It is a perfectly reasonable thing to be mildly to moderately annoyed about. It is irritating and stressful to know that some people are going to need to come into your living space at an unspecified time during the day. If you come back from class, can you take a nap? If you go take a shower are you going to come back in your towel and open your door to find 4 people putting in the radiator?

There are also ways in which dorm living gives students fewer rights in their space than renters. You have to allow your landlord to make repairs, but unless those repairs are urgent, they can't just tell you they are going to come fix something at some random time. You get to tell them "actually, Wednesday isn't good for me."

Is any of this important and consequential? Of course not. Is it worth writing an editorial about? No. You actually get a pretty good window into how everyone else because the student reports asking people if they were also outraged and angry. The response is basically, "yeah, that was kind of annoying, oh well."

I don't think the student feels this way because of the rhetoric of safe spaces and victimhood. Rather, they were grumpy and anxious  about this, and they are reaching for this available rhetoric to try to elevate this above the mundane and the personal into some larger and more important problem. I try to do this all the time with my petty annoyances. I just have enough self awareness to realize that this isn't a great subject for an op-ed. That said, go to a faculty meeting and you'll hear from a lot of people who try to turn trivial annoyances into matters of great import...

Wow, Caracal, this is marvelously insightful.  Or at least it totally agrees with my viewpoint.

[Hegemony]

Another way of characterizing the op-ed, this thread, and much of everyday expression, would be "Human blows trivial annoyance out of proportion."

[marshwiggle]

Another way of characterizing the op-ed, this thread, and much of everyday expression, would be "Human blows trivial annoyance out of proportion."

Apparently, that's a feature rather than a bug for some people.

I don't think the student feels this way because of the rhetoric of safe spaces and victimhood. Rather, they were grumpy and anxious  about this, and they are reaching for this available rhetoric to try to elevate this above the mundane and the personal into some larger and more important problem. I try to do this all the time with my petty annoyances. I just have enough self awareness to realize that this isn't a great subject for an op-ed. That said, go to a faculty meeting and you'll hear from a lot of people who try to turn trivial annoyances into matters of great import...

Wow, Caracal, this is marvelously insightful.  Or at least it totally agrees with my viewpoint.

[history_grrrl]

I'm guessing that, fifteen years ago, this student would have written in a journal, confided in friends, or talked to a counselor. In the current tell-all social media climate, in which we're saturated with accounts of individuals' personal problems - ranging from devastating to trivial - it's no surprise that this student should go the tell-all route.

I see this sort of thing frequently even in professional journalism these days. The CBC regularly posts "news" articles based entirely on one individual's complaint about mistreatment of one kind or another, with no independent verification. I first noticed this in a story about some woman's claim to have had a bad experience with a Cuban hospital when her kid got sick during their vacation; it seemed utterly banal, and she was the only source of information. I understand the value of human interest, but human-interest stories typically involve actual reporting, and these just don't; in fact, they easily could be op-eds by the aggrieved party.

Anyway, this student's airing of personal angst seems to fit right in with the current zeitgeist.

[mamselle]

Is anyone who's willing to come out as trans male-to-female here willing to say there is no reason, ever, for such an individual to fear cis males, plural or singular, in any situation, ever?

There are in fact cases of rednecks (to be blunt) attacking non-binary individuals simply on the basis of their gender preference/identity, and some of those attacks were lethal.

I know one M-to-F member of a seminary chapel I attend who is very careful where they go and who they are even walking with across campus for personal safety reasons.

Maintenance workers, as a general type, can be, maybe even are, often (but not always) hurly-burly cis/anti-alt guys with a tool belt and a chip on their shoulder about their own sexual ID.

Not all, of course, and usually they've all by now had to do training on appropriate behavioral limits with students (interthreadual references, anyone?).

But it's still not irrational to be afraid in those circumstances.

How one addresses those fears and seeks redress for undue consideration when it's been requested is a different question.

But unless you, yourself, personally, have been endangered by others in some similar setting, you have no empathic judgment seat from which to pontificate.

Charity, or mercy, might be more appropriate.

M.

ETA, I have mostly ignored this thread because I could guess (correctly, as it turns out), where it was going. I'll go back to ignoring it until the defensive cis-white-male rectangular firing squad get done sqwaking over picayune irrelivancies so as to try to drown out the actual urgency of the issues involved.

See you in six weeks, which is the length of time it takes people to process a crisis...

M.

[history_grrrl]

Mamselle, I appreciate what you have said and want to note that I posted my comment before reading the student's column. I have read it since and, while I found it overwrought, certainly understand the concern. I found it ironic that this student made gendered assumptions about who would be doing the work. And I also wonder about past trauma, because I think there is a strong possibility that this student is trans female-to-male.

[mamselle]

Mamselle, I appreciate what you have said and want to note that I posted my comment before reading the student's column. I have read it since and, while I found it overwrought, certainly understand the concern. I found it ironic that this student made gendered assumptions about who would be doing the work. And I also wonder about past trauma, because I think there is a strong possibility that this student is trans female-to-male.

Yes, and thanks.

I have worked with three young adolescents who were music students of mine in the past five years; each is also either contemplating or undergoing various forms of F-to-M transitions, as well, and there are reasons for them to be afraid, too (one went to a very secluded beach so as not to be mocked for his top covering, for example).

It's also true that while they may still be in the minority, there are also some female maintenance workers in some settings (whether in this one or not is as yet unknown); maybe the simplest solution would have been to find out if anyone was less likely to present a threat to the student, and work out an option that way.

Taking people at their best, and on their own terms where personal safety concerns are involved, would seem to be the usual best first step.

M.

[mahagonny]

There are reasons for them to be afraid...

I believe you.