college today is sure not what it was back when I went

[@meric@nwom@n]

http://www.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/11/08/si ... index.html


Sounds interesting.

[Gob]

Sounds like a bunch of arse..

Bloody students...

[Econoline]

A Steve Goodman song that seems appropriate here...(couldn't find a live version by Steve Himself, but this is a pretty good performance--by a duo I've never heard of called Madison Violet):
(lyrics)

[Scooter]

Sounds like a bunch of arse..

Bloody students...

It's a "bunch of arse" unless you happen to be the person going thru the very stressful and painful process of transitioning between genders. If you have no knowledge or sensitivity about what's involved, best shut your yap.

[Gob]

Why?

[Jarlaxle]

Sounds like a bunch of arse..

Bloody students...

It's a "bunch of arse" unless you happen to be the person going thru the very stressful and painful process of transitioning between genders. If you have no knowledge or sensitivity about what's involved, best shut your yap.

There is a term for people like that. That term is "serious mental problems".

[Scooter]

Why?

Why is it best to avoid commenting on issues about which one understands nothing? I would have thought that to be self-evident (except for people like Steve and Quad).

It's a "bunch of arse" unless you happen to be the person going thru the very stressful and painful process of transitioning between genders. If you have no knowledge or sensitivity about what's involved, best shut your yap.

There is a term for people like that. That term is "serious mental problems".

Indeed there arre serrious mental problems,, it's called gender identity disorder, it comes from the realization that one is inhabiting a body that does not reflect one's true gender. The treatment consists in making the body conform as much as possible/practical with onre's true gender. And interference in treatment such as preventing students in transition from wearing gender-appropriate clothing can set back treatment by years. One would have thought that a university would demonstrate more undderstanding and sensitivity, but...

[@meric@nwom@n]

I think that time has come for a University to be started that caters to the needs of gays, lesbians, and transgender folks. I am dead serious. It would be an environment free of the usual prejudice, harassment and general bs that I watched several gay friends go through in college. GayU. I like it.

What do ya think would be the downside or upside of such a venture? Scoot?

[oldr_n_wsr]

What do ya think would be the downside or upside of such a venture?

The same as any "exclusive" college has faced. White only college, blacks want in. Black only college, whites want in. Transgender college? Hetero's want in. Why not go further and have three seperate distinctions, Lesbians, Gay guys and then those "not decided" with automatic transfer to one of the others when they finally do decide.

Come on, you go to college to learn. You choose a college that best fits your filed of study. Someone don't like you for what you are, that's thier problem. Make the best of it as there are other just like you. Go to the "activities/clubs" seminar at the beginning of the semester and you will find there are just about every walk of life type of club out there.

When my daughter first started colleg and Univ of Maryland I could not believe the amount and diversity of clubs they had.

A Seperat college for every sexual preference? I think not.

[Gob]

Well Scoot, if you can show I "know nothing" about "person going thru the very stressful and painful process of transitioning between genders" you may have some credence here.

But that still is nothing to telling me to "shut my yap", when and why did you become so fucking high and mighty here?

[@meric@nwom@n]

Come on, you go to college to learn. You choose a college that best fits your filed of study. Someone don't like you for what you are, that's thier problem. Make the best of it as there are other just like you. Go to the "activities/clubs" seminar at the beginning of the semester and you will find there are just about every walk of life type of club out there.

Never bullied as a yoot were you? Had you ever been so you would no so easily dismiss that which leads so many young people to suicide. I am thinking that providing young gays, lesbians and transgender with a particularly nurturing environment during a very difficult period in thier lives might keep them out of the morgue until they are loder and perhaps a bit stronger and able to fend off a hostile world.

A Seperat college for every sexual preference? I think not.

I wasn't suggesting that.

[tyro]

If admirably liberal thinking some what older folks - like some who have posted here – are uncomfortable with the issue in the OP, then how could we expect the younger, more liberal generation to welcome their peers as who they are?

And so how do you expect these people to behave, react and select their institute of higher learning?

I think Dante was wrong, hell is being young and made to feel like an outcast.

It is too easy to be branded an outcast by boneheads who know how to out shout the others. Usually these shouters are idiots who fret that the world might not see things they same way they do.



Some of us don't

[Scooter]

Well Scoot, if you can show I "know nothing" about "person going thru the very stressful and painful process of transitioning between genders" you may have some credence here.

But that still is nothing to telling me to "shut my yap", when and why did you become so fucking high and mighty here?

I beg your pardon. This

Sounds like a bunch of arse..

Bloody students...

clearly demonstrated an exceptional level of knowledge and sensitivity about what these 18,19 and 20 year old kids are going thru.

[Scooter]

I think that time has come for a University to be started that caters to the needs of gays, lesbians, and transgender folks. I am dead serious. It would be an environment free of the usual prejudice, harassment and general bs that I watched several gay friends go through in college. GayU. I like it.

What do ya think would be the downside or upside of such a venture? Scoot?

I think programs like Positive Space would be a good start. My alma mater implemented this program, and within a few years went from having the most queer-hostile reputation in the province, to being seen as one of the most queer-friendly, probably because a very few hardcore homophobes were very vocal and the many more numerous queer-friendly did not feel empowered to oppose them, until senior administration sent out a very strong signal by introducing Positive Space to the campus. They were no doubt spurred into action by the handful of students and faculty who refused to bend over and take it anymore and were brave enough to take cases to the Ontario Human Rights Commission.

I wish some of us had been brave enough to do it 20 years ago, when, just as one example, someone who later became one of my best friends, while living in universtiy residence, had one of his desk drawers broken into by his roommate and a few of his sidekicks, who found a gay skin mag and had my friend hauled before the residence don and was made to attend counselling as a condition of being allowed to stay in residence. (Nothing, of course, was said to the homophobic roommate who committed a criminal act which should have gotten him expelled from residence and from the university). In the course of said counselling, with one of the university chaplains, no less, my friend was advised that he should try having sexual liaisons with prostitutes to see if he was capable of developing sexual desire for women.

Actually, now that I think of it, that happened before the province added sexual orientation as a prohibited ground of dscrimination to its Human Rights Code, so that option would not have been available, BUT some heads should have rolled; unfortunately, my friend was not out to his family at the time and could not risk making any kind of stink over the incident.

[alice]

At Smith College, Roth, 20, said he was admitted to the school as a woman. He says he grew up in a conservative Asian-American household and was surprised to encounter a "whatever floats your boat mentality" from fellow Smith classmates.

During the second semester of his freshman year in 2009, he started taking hormones. He underwent top surgery last summer, a process that included the removal of his breasts.

"It [Smith] definitely helped me transition faster," said Roth, who, even as a man, was elected junior class president last year.

That 'whatever floats your boat mentality' seems to be prevalent at the primary and secondary schools my kids attended, and at the university I attended and the one my oldest son attended.

There are young kids at the secondary school and university who are very comfortably openly gay, and there are some interesting and at times flamboyant clothing style choices. For all the negative things I usually have to say about this area and the public (ie: government run, not private) education system in this area, one thing they do encourage and support is diversity. Diversity of culture, skin toning, fashion style, sexuality, lifestyle - all are accepted as just a part of life. As it should be. And as a result my kids have grown up with tolerance toward difference, and no prejudices or pre-formed opinions of people. As it should be.

And my work environment is the same.

Never bullied as a yoot were you? Had you ever been so you would no so easily dismiss that which leads so many young people to suicide. I am thinking that providing young gays, lesbians and transgender with a particularly nurturing environment during a very difficult period in thier lives might keep them out of the morgue until they are loder and perhaps a bit stronger and able to fend off a hostile world.

I've lived and travelled all over Australia and had friends of all genders and many races, and for the most part, not been in any environment where I would have thought gender or identity issues to be a such a problem that it would be a leading reason for suicide or suicide attempts. I would have said, based on my own travels, and based on interactions and discussions with friends etc, that Australia is generally a tolerant and accepting nation.
And we did have a recent newspaper survey that had some overwhelming majority in favour of gay marriages; something that only our politicians seem to be adamantly against.

However there has always been a nasty undercurrent - the gay bashing in parks at night, the racial trouble at Sydney's Manly beach a few years back (caused by incidents from all the races involved - 'australian' and 'mediterannean'), the problems that are highlighted in the media regarding Indians and aborigines etc (some of which are exaggerated and some of which have foundation), etc etc ... it would be naive to think this country has no 'acceptance' problems at all.

But as a whole, and in general, "we" do seem more tolerant and more accepting of individuality than what I perceive America (in general) to be, based on what I read and hear about.

And all the above is a generality - anyone who feels like finding statistics to prove me right or wrong is welcome to go for it!

[oldr_n_wsr]

Never bullied as a yoot were you? Had you ever been so you would no so easily dismiss that which leads so many young people to suicide. I am thinking that providing young gays, lesbians and transgender with a particularly nurturing environment during a very difficult period in thier lives might keep them out of the morgue until they are loder and perhaps a bit stronger and able to fend off a hostile world.

I was bullied, I fought back. I would think it would be better if the univ's they attend would put policies in place to protect and/or nurture rather than have a seperate school that they can attend. Isn't it better to educate (and expose) the general public about homosexuality rather than send the "queers" elsewhere so the general public doesn't have to "deal" with them?

[rubato]

UC Santa Cruz had programs for GLBT students more than 30 years ago and it was an important part of the residential staff training from 1979-on. (perhaps before)

I don't really care if the backwards and stupid parts, meaning the conservative parts, of the country don't want to be civilized. The liberal parts of the country will only benefit just as the U.S. and England benefitted from Hitler's oppression of the Jews.

yrs,
rubato

[Scooter]

I would think it would be better if the univ's they attend would put policies in place to protect and/or nurture rather than have a seperate school that they can attend. Isn't it better to educate (and expose) the general public about homosexuality rather than send the "queers" elsewhere so the general public doesn't have to "deal" with them?

I don't think she means a separate school. I think she's talking more along the lines of a school that would say "we welcome LGBT students here, this is what we do to support them, and we don't tolerate any sort of harassment or discrimination, and anyone who doesn't agree with this philosophy can look elsewhere."

IOW, what every existing university should already be doing, but isn't.

[tyro]

The liberal parts of the country will only benefit just as the U.S. and England benefitted from Hitler's oppression of the Jews.

Could you please connect those two dots with the issue raised in the OP?

[Jarlaxle]

You have to be as hammered as rube to understand. This is normal...he's the resident lush.