The petition calling for the rescinding of a Universities UK document permitting sex segregation in British universities is heating up the airwaves, having in only a couple of days attracted almost seven thousand signatures.
Manfredi La Manna, an economist at the University of St Andrews, writes to the vice-chancellors of Scottish universities:
[M]ake a stand for Scottish universities and state unequivocally that the abhorrent guidance on external speakers issued recently by [UK Universities] does not apply to Scottish universities.
The document mandates any British university to accede unconditionally to the conditions imposed by any external speaker who demands a gender segregated audience.
Indeed, in the Orwellian newspeak language of the UUK document, it is the “imposition” of an “unsegregated” area contravening the “genuinely held religious belief” of the speaker demanding segregation that British universities should oppose so that the “freedom of speech of the religious group or speaker is not curtailed unlawfully”.
Do you really want your female students to be treated as sex objects and second-class citizens and to be marshalled into special female-only pens so that the “genuinely held religious belief” of external speakers is not challenged? Would you have acceded to the demand for race segregated audiences by the Dutch Reformed Church (before it apologised for its role in propping up apartheid)?
La Manna is quite right to note the Orwellian newspeak by which, as women are herded into pens, FREEDOM IS SLAVERY.
After pointing out that the document is “horrible,” “wretched,” and “stupid,” Charles Crawford goes on to sketch a non-disgraceful policy.
[For] an open event no segregation along gender or other lines is acceptable…
As with all grotesque illiberal eruptions, the UUK document is in fact bolstering freedom of speech by mobilizing people against its vileness. Sometimes people need to be reminded of the democratic basics. Fools like the authors of this document provide reminders.
November 30th, 2013 at 12:08PM
UD, would you guess that the British unis are going along with this bullshit because quite a number of Muslim students are attending their unis? Given how much money foreign students bring to American unis, I’m thinking anything to keep the gravy train running.
Here in the Northwest, we’ve had much smaller conflicts with Middle East students. At U of Oregon, an hour is set aside for women to use a certain part of the athletic complex. A few guys walked in after the hour, and were booted due to Muslim women still in the gym. A couple of American guys demanded that never happen again, it’s the women’s problem if they can’t finish their workouts on time, not the guys. What was interesting was the admins response, that we had to respect all religious beliefs.
Of course, the real issue is that universities are desperate for money, as is U of O, foreign students pay huge tuition in order to go to any college…