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Around Thanksgiving, many of us try to pause and reflect on the things we are grateful for in our lives.

Gratitude doesnt come easy for humans, but on the fourth Thursday in November many of us do our best to try to be grateful, at least for this one day of the year.

There are many things for which Im grateful. We live during a time noteworthy for its peace and plenty, both of which are remarkable compared to any other period in human history. Im grateful for the good health I enjoy today and the relative lack of suffering Ive had to endure in more than four decades on this earth. In my personal life, Im thankful for the friends and family who have given me so much, and for a devoted wife who has given me three healthy children, and much more.

Its good to be grateful for such things, I think, but last night it occurred to me I was also missing something. My daughter had just finally fallen asleep, and I was re-reading Jordan Petersons book 12 Rules for Life on the floor. (We read books together at bedtime.)

Someone had remarked to me recently that Peterson talks about gratitude in the books second chapter, Treat Yourself Like Someone You Are Responsible for Helping. Sure enough, near the end of the chapter Peterson mentions a miracle of life he feels a profound, dumbfounded gratitude for: the persistence of humans in severe pain to continue bearing lifes burdens.

It is they, Peterson argues, who hold society together through little more than grit and tenacious spirit.

Most individuals are dealing with one or more serious health problems while going productively about their business, Peterson writes.

If anyone is fortunate enough to be in a rare period of grace and health, personally, then he or she typically has at least one close family member in crisis, he continues. Yet people prevail and continue to do difficult and effortless tasks to hold themselves and their families and society together.

Its easy to forget the number of people in pain in this world. By the nature of his profession, Peterson, a clinical psychologist, is more aware than most of the pain humans endure.

What shocks Peterson, and makes him profoundly grateful, is the masses of suffering people who do not give in to despairbut instead continue to bear responsibility despite the slings and arrows of life.

People are so tortured by the limitations and constraints of Being that I am amazed they ever act properly or look beyond themselves at all, Peterson writes. But enough do so that we have central heat and running water and infinite computational power and electricity and enough for everyone to eat and even the capacity to contemplate the fate of broader society and nature, terrible nature, itself.

"All that complex machinery that protects us from freezing and starving and dying from lack of water tends unceasingly towards malfunction through entropy, and it is only the constant attention of careful people that keeps it working so unbelievably well, he continues. Some people degenerate into the hell of resentment and the hatred of Being, but most refuse to do so, despite their suffering and disappointments and losses and inadequacies and ugliness, and again that is a miracle for those with the eyes to see it.

In a sense, this is the flip side of Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rands popular 1957 magnum opus on individualism and capitalism. Rand saw the Atlases of the world as the productive entrepreneurs who worked tirelessly to create value despite looters seeking to steal the fruits of their labor.

The Atlases of the world, as Peterson sees it, are the millions and millions of faceless people who persevere in the face of adversity and suffering that would drive so many to despair.

This is why people must treat themselves like someone they are responsible for helping. We must care for ourselves so we can bear the burden and suffering that life will inevitably inflict upon us, Peterson argues.

You need to consider the future and think, 'What might my life look like if I were caring for myself properly? What career would challenge me and render me productive and helpful, so that I could shoulder my share of the load, and enjoy the consequences? What should I be doing, when I have some freedom, to improve my health, expand my knowledge, and strengthen my body?'

Heaven, Peterson explains, will not arrive on its own. And if we fail to strengthen ourselves, we may find its opposite here on earth.

So this Thanksgiving, I can only express my deepest thanks to all the people who continue to persevere despite the chaos and pain, who refuse to succumb to despair, resentment, envy, and cruelty.

You, too, are the Atlases of this worldparticularly during this season of despair and suffering.

See more here:
Why Jordan Peterson's Message on Gratitude Is More Important Than Ever | Jon Miltimore - Foundation for Economic Education

Neumann-Goretti senior Omoiye Jordan controls the ball during a recent game against Conwell-Egan. Photo/Mark Zimmaro

Omoiye Jordan isnt all talk.

As a vocal leader of the Neumann-Goretti High School girls basketball team, Jordans actions are both heard by her teammates and followed on the court. But Jordan goes a step further when it comes to school and standing up for things she believes in.

After witnessing a summer of racial tension unfold across the country, Jordan took a stand when she noticed similar things were happening in her own life. She began building the groundwork for a black student forum at her school.

After everything hit during quarantine and police brutality was happening, there was a lot of insensitivity going on in my school, Jordan said. And I felt people need to be more educated about racial situations like that and I thought this would help. I wanted to bring in speakers to the school to talk to students and teachers about it, hoping problems would come to an end.

The process of forming an official forum has been slowed during the pandemic, but Jordan isnt giving up, even if it happens after she graduates in the spring.

With COVID and everything, the administration at school was having a struggle with it, Jordan said. But they are talking to me about starting it next year for the underclassmen. There have been some Zoom meetings so far with parents on the topic, helping them know what to say to their kids. I dont know exactly how many people attend but it started happening and it wasnt happening before. So its a step in the right direction.

Its that type of bravery and persistence that has earned her teammates and coaches respect both on and off the court. Jordan is seen as one of the Saints leaders as the team once again competes in the tough Philadelphia Catholic League Red Division, and shes pretty good at putting the ball in the basket, too. Jordan has both an inside and outside presence with the ability to grab big rebounds or knock down a crucial 3-pointer when her team needs it. Saints coach Andrea Peterson says Jordan checks a lot of boxes, especially when it comes to leadership.

Shes fantastic, Peterson said. She leads this crew and wants to do a lot of things off the court and lead movements. Omoiye is the one that takes the lead on a lot of stuff, and people respect her for that and I think its going to bring awareness to a lot of things. And on the court, even if she struggles scoring, she finds a way to play harder on defense to find her stride.

The Saints had a tough start to the season, as they were able to participate in full-contact practices only a handful of times before starting the season against perennial powerhouses Cardinal OHara and Archbishop Wood, which resulted in an 0-2 start. Since then, Neumann-Goretti has rebounded with wins over Bonner-Prendergast and Conwell-Egan before taking a tough loss to Archbishop Carroll over the weekend.

Were still trying to figure it out, Peterson said. Its not a sprint, its a marathon. Weve had limited practice, but as long as we stay together, well hit our stride. If we can dig deep a little bit, were going to be really, really good.

Jordan says her team is rounding into form.

We started off a little slow, Jordan said. But weve been able to pick it up and get in a rhythm because we rely on each other more instead of relying on one person to win the game for us like last year.

Preparation wasnt easy. When teams werent allowed to practice due to COVID restrictions, Jordan helped unite her team with workouts whenever possible, even if it meant just keeping in contact.

We try to call each other or text each other for open runs if they were available, or get into the gym when we can, so thats been helpful, but it was way better being able to actually practice again, she said.

Jordan says shes undecided on where she plans to attend college next year but hopes basketball is in her future. Right now, shes just thankful that there is indeed a high school basketball season after some doubt lingered surrounding the pandemic.

I was really disappointed at the beginning of the season because it wasnt looking good, Jordan said. But I was really glad our coach was able to tell us that we were going to play and finish out my senior year with an actual season.

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Jordan a leader on and off the court - South Philly Review

The YouTube of today is a vastly different platform from the YouTube of yesteryear. Once characterized by cheesy, poorly-filmed comedy skits and the dominating presence of Vevo, it was a mecca of low-brow humor and cat videos. YouTubes audience, however, has matured, and so has its content.

The video essay is taking over YouTube as a primary form of content on the platform. YouTubers with niche knowledge and impeccable production value are becoming major stars. These YouTubers are smart they have high level knowledge about topics from critical theory to historical dress and they perform for the camera in a manner that is entertaining, educational and far-reaching. Many viewers are flocking to YouTube, not just to laugh, but to learn and the best creators offer both.

The video essays I will discuss in this column are nothing short of works of art. They often combine musical score, high fashion and makeup alongside performance and narrative, with sturdy cultural critique and analysis that is both complex and easily digestible. And, perhaps most importantly, they are a hoot to watch.

***

You cant talk about YouTube video essays without mentioning ContraPoints, also known as Natalie Wynn. She is one of the pioneers of this digital movement toward video essays, and her videos, perhaps best described as films, present some of the highest art, critical analysis, skilled performance and humor that the platform has to offer. Wynn delivers all of this surrounded by elaborate sets and beautiful score, while wearing full drag, tipping a 40 oz. to the head and engaging her own hilariously on-the-nose characters through dialogue, a la Plato. If anyone can be described as the intellectual figure of this generation, its ContraPoints.

Wynn might be described by some as a classically trained academic. She studied piano at Berklee College of Music and received a bachelors degree in philosophy from Georgetown. She then attended Northwestern to pursue a Ph.D. in philosophy.

But this is where Wynns career diverged from the traditional academic. She dropped out of the Ph.D. program at Northwestern, saying to Vice News, The idea of being an academic for the rest of my life became boring to the point of existential despair.

Wynn plays an important role in the contemporary intellectual community she is no modern liberal. ContraPoints, rather, is a radical leftist. But while many modern left-liberal movements have condemned discourse with the other side, ContraPoints has embraced it. She doesnt shy away from engaging with the arguments of incels, the alt-right, TERFs and public intellectuals such as Ben Shapiro and Jordan Peterson (whose visage she hilariously flirts with in a bathtub).

This is where Wynns academic training combined with her high emotional intelligence make her a powerful public presence. Shes been credited with converting many young alt-right leaning men away from dangerous racist, sexist, transphobic rhetoric. If youve ever argued with an alt-righter or Trumpist, you might be wondering, how the f*** does she do it?

Wynn herself says, Its not just about calling someone out and using logic, because there are emotional and psychological reasons that people hold their political convictions. From a psychological standpoint, you have to empathetically enter a persons world; not just why do they think what they think, but why do they feel what they feel? Repeat that back to them and you can really gain traction.

Indeed, her critiques are always based on charitable interpretations of the arguments that she addresses, and her combination of philosophical argumentation and sociology has proved to be powerfully effective. For many, its difficult to explain to someone why white supremacy is wrong, they just know that it is. But ContraPoints can do it. Her video on the alt right breaks down both the factual incorrectness and negative ethical value of common, normalized white supremacist arguments. She takes the alt-rights very own arguments and talking points and breaks them down in a clear, charitable and thorough way that makes her critique nearly impossible to dispute. She puts words to concepts that, for many, have been impossible to describe. And she does so in a way that reaches people on every side of every aisle.

Contras content isnt just devoted to changing the opinions of alt-righters. She also makes video essays that critique and analyze cultural phenomena (such as cringe, beauty, cancelling and degeneracy) with the double-edged sword of philosophical breakdown and extreme drag looks. These videos are fun, but so solid in their argumentation that I was able to use The Darkness as a source for my philosophy capstone paper; they have true academic utility. Within these films, she discusses each topic as it pertains to gender, sexuality, behavior, personal beliefs and more. She works out meaningful and thorough descriptions for these topics that provide exquisite foundations for her analysis. She, critically, has perfected the fine art of meaningfully differentiating between expedient political rhetoric such as trans people are born in the wrong bodies (phrasing which is not philosophically nuanced, nor true to every trans persons experience, but is critical to the acquisition of rights for trans people) and more complex metaphysical discussion about gender, sex and orientation which many modern academics shy away from.

What puts ContraPoints a step above the rest is her bold, critical and unapologetic nature. Shes not nice. She doesnt cater to anyone or anything, left or right. Shes not afraid to say, I am an evangelical transsexual. I dont want toleration, damn it. I want converts, and she certainly doesnt care whether you think she means it or not. She pursues whats true, whats expedient and whats hilarious. And she does it all while dressed as a sexy catgirl.

Natalie Wynns work is of the highest art, but dont just believe me, check it out for yourself. Did I mention shes funny?

Contact Rachel DAgui at rdagui at stanford.edu.

The rest is here:
The Rise of the Video Essay as Art: ContraPoints - The Stanford Daily

Nafeez Ahmeds investigation reveals that the Governments new proposal is inspired by attempts to suppress free speech about racism

The Education Secretarys proposal to regulate free speech at universities by appointing a national free speech champion at the Office for Students (OfS) came from an academic defender of white identity politics who has argued that ethnic diversity in itself increases white threat perceptions.

Professor Eric Kaufmann, of Birkbeck College, is an advisor to the Free Speech Union run by Toby Young the disgraced former OfS appointee who resigned from the role after critics highlighted his history of bigoted tweets.

Kaufmann first proposed the idea of a national academic freedom champion at the OfS to investigate alleged breaches of free speech rights in a co-authored report published by the Policy Exchange think tank in November 2019. Kaufmann joined the advisory board of the Free Speech Union when it launched in February 2020, when Young publicly endorsed Kaufmanns proposal.

Youngs influence on the Governments latest proposals raises questions, given his own role in defending scientific racism and biological theories of racial and gender inequalities.

Byline Times has previously exposed his defence of pseudoscience funded by the Pioneer Fund a neo-Nazi eugenics foundation established in 1937. Among other things, the Funds affiliated authors several of whom Young has openly supported claim that black people have lower IQs than white people.

Toby Young is also the man behind a free speech students network with the same name as the new OfS role Free Speech Champions launched in February. Although it claims to be led by young people, Byline Times can reveal that the project is, in reality, a Toby Young front trying to suppress free speech on equalities among university students.

Documents and email communications obtained by Byline Times, as well as interviews with students, confirm that Free Speech Champions network is actually controlled by its funders the Free Speech Union and the Battle of Ideas, which is part of a network sponsored by the Charles Koch Foundation.

Under the guise of promoting free speech, Toby Youngs Free Speech Champions promoted alt-right figures such as Jordan Peterson, defended the alleged speech rights of Nazis in universities, fed students an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory, and discouraged students from using words such as racism and sexism.

That the Governments new role was inspired by an academic advising Young suggests that, far from defending free speech, Gavin Williamson is attempting to shut it down to defend alt-right speech.

The Department for Education did not respond to a request for comment.

In January, the Guardian exposed the role of the Free Speech Union in the Free Speech Champions project, interviewing a range of students who had been involved. The students eventually resigned over concerns they were censured if they disagreed with the groups right-of-centre orthodoxy and described Free Speech Champions as an astroturfed front for Youngs Free Speech Union.

However, the Guardian story only scratched the surface of what the Free Speech Champions project represents.

The project was not conceived by any of the students described as founding champions. Instead, Inaya Folarin Iman who sits on the board of directors of the Free Speech Union sent unsolicited emails to students at different universities early in 2020 asking them if they wanted to join the project.Students who agreed to get involved were then enrolled in a series of meetings and workshops to receive training on free speech and to help develop the project.

On 9 November, Iman emailed the participants links to online videos on free speech, including one titled Would Todays ACLU Defend the Speech Rights of Nazis, published by Reason magazine. The video calls for Nazis to be able to freely express their views.

Other videos recommended by Iman included one by the controversial psychologist Jordan Peterson and another by Brendan ONeill, the editor of Spiked magazine. Peterson described by The Times as an alt-right darling has been widely criticised for claiming that gender and class hierarchies are a function of the natural order. According to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Peterson has a track record of promoting revisionist falsehoods about Hitler, the Holocaust and Nazism.

Imans interest in defending the free speech rights of Nazis was in contrast to the opposition to students talking freely about the idea of punching a Nazi. In an email to participant Harry Walker, president of the Bristol University Free Speech Society, Iman appeared to oppose the freedom of speech to advocate punching Nazis, while simultaneously defending the right of Nazis to advocate genocide: One thing I hope for this project is to see whether its possible to engage with the most reprehensible ideas in a way that is in the spirit of intellectual ambition, bravery and curiosity.

The Free Speech Unions education and events director Dr Jan Macvarish was involved in steering discussions with the students from the beginning.

According to Harry Walker, Macvarish inexplicably sat-in on all of the meetings despite the students being told that the project would function independently of the Free Speech Union.

WhatsApp logs reveal that, early on, she actively discouraged students from challenging racist and homophobic attitudes, describing doing so as an affront to free speech. Macvarish told the students: I dont think racism is irrational, its not a phobia. Neither is an objection to homosexuality.

Macvarish described words such as racism, sexism and transphobia as phobia words which, if used, would undermine free speech. She also dismissed the idea of Islamophobia: If you look at who gets accused of Islamophobia it really isnt people who are actually oppressing and abusing Muslims though is it?

In several meetings, Walker said that Macvarish was railing against the notion that the personal is political, suggesting this is the issue with the discourse around gender, race and so on. She also encouraged us not to use terms like sexism, racism, transphobia, arguing that doing so was making concessions to the anti-free speech camp.

In other words, in the name of free speech, the Free Speech Union was trying to convince the students that certain words around racial, sexual and gender equality should be expunged from discourse while words opposing racial, sexual and gender equality should be protected.

Macvarish, a visiting research fellow at the University of Kent, did not respond to Byline Times request for comment.

In WhatsApp conversations, the Free Speech Unions Inaya Folarin Iman also went on to endorse fears of cultural marxism, which she incorrectly defined as rooted in a critique of the Marxist critique of capitalism, supposedly in which certain post-modernist thinkers moved on from Marxism to focus on identity politics such as white = oppressor, non-white = oppressed (again, simple explanation).

Her reference point was a book by James Lindsay and Helen Pluckrose called Cynical Theories: How Universities Made Everything About Race, Gender and Identity. Apart from the book offering a systematically flawed analysis of critical theory, Lindsay is funded by the conservative Christian nationalist Michael OFallon, who co-created a statement branding social justice a threat to the gospel. OFallon is founder of Sovereign Nations, the entire remit of which is based on an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory about George Soros.

Imans attempt to promote fear of cultural marxism to the students is of particular concern as the term actually designates a far-right anti-Semitic conspiracy theory, thoroughly debunkedby historians and quantitative analysis of academic research.

Last year, the Board of Deputies criticised Conservative MP Suella Braverman for using this anti-Semitic trope. She refused to apologise and was instead made the Governments Attorney General.

As Jason Wilsonhas observedin theGuardian, the theory is blatantly anti-Semitic, drawing on the idea of Jews as a fifth column bringing down western civilisation from within, a racist trope that has a longer history than Marxism. Like The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the theory was fabricated to order, for a special purpose: the institution and perpetuation of culture war.

The theory of cultural marxism is credited largely to white nationalist Kevin Macdonald and far-right ideologue William Lind of the Free Congress Foundation. But itoriginated from the Nazis,who first used the term cultural Bolshevism. It claims that a cohort of German Jewish Marxist academics behind the Frankfurt School orchestrated an academic and cultural effort to undermine the US through an identity politics-driven cultural war on US values, mobilised through the Trojan Horse of minority rights.

The theory of cultural Marxism has since become astapleof the alt-right, used by the likes of Steve Bannon, Breitbart and even neo-Nazi terrorist Anders Behring Breivik who killed 77 people in Norway in 2011.

Inaya Folarin Iman did not respond to request for comment.

Perhaps the most direct evidence that the Free Speech Champions project is not led by young people is the fact that, despite going through the motions of allowing the students to brainstorm together a name of their own choosing, Toby Youngs Free Speech Union forced the project to take on the title Free Speech Champions despite it being universally rejected by all of the students.

In a letter to the group on behalf of members Harry Walker, Ben Sewell, Charlotte Nuernberg and Maya Thomas, sent in December 2020, they noted: It seems that many of the major decisions regarding the project (its name, and belligerent approach to the culture wars to name a few) were made executively despite the groups advice, not as a result of it; we dont recall Free Speech Champions being raised as a naming suggestion.

The letter noted that the same name had been prematurely announced by Toby Young nearly a month ago on Darren Grimes Reasoned podcast.

The students letter pointed out that, when participants voiced approaches different to that of the Free Speech Union, they were largely shut down: Those criticising the predetermined FSU-esque direction of the project were dismissed as overly sensitive or caving to censorious factions.

Youngs Free Speech Champions is plugged into an opaque network of lobby groups which are funded by the Charles Koch Foundation.

Apart from the Free Speech Union, its other chief organisational sponsor is the Battle of Ideas, a charity which runs the annual flagship festival of the same name on behalf of the Academy of Ideas (formerly the Institute of Ideas), chaired by former Brexit MEP Baroness Claire Fox who also sits on the Free Speech Unions advisory board.

According to a joint investigation by the Guardian and DeSmogUK, Fox and the Battle of Ideas are part of the Koch-backed Spiked network of organisations which emerged from the ashes of the Trotsksyist left Living Marxism (LM) magazine itself a splinter of the Revolutionary Communist Party.

In 2000, LM was shut down after it became bankrupt due to losing a libel trial in 2000, in which it claimed falsely that ITN had fabricated evidence of Serb atrocities against Bosnian Muslims. The same figures involved in LM including Fox, Brendan ONeill and Frank Furedi resurfaced through the Spiked network in the early 2000s.

It later emerged that, from 2016 to 2018, Spiked US Ltd the networks US fundraising vehicle had received $300,000 from the Charles Koch Foundation to produce public debates in theUSabout free speech.

The Spiked networks interest in promoting free speech is clear from what it publishes and promotes namely opposition to bans on child pornography; regulations on tobacco; gun control; limiting hate speech; bans on Nazi free speech; Black Lives Matter; anti-racism; the Me Too movement; and so on. It also regularly promotes climate science denial.

Battle of Ideas trustee Frank Furedi contributes to the Koch-funded climate denial lobby group, the Global Warming Policy Foundation. Another Battle of Ideas trustee is Luke Gittos, author of Why Rape Culture is a Dangerous Myth. Gittos is a lawyer with extensive experience in defending allegations of rape and sexual violence, according to the book blurb, and is also a legal editor for Spiked.

The Battle of Ideas did not respond to request for comment.

It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that the Free Speech Champions is merely yet another astroturfed front group for the Koch-backed Spiked network. That its backer, Toby Youngs Free Speech Union, is linked to the Governments new free speech czar proposal indicates that the biggest threat to free speech on campus is coming from an alt-right pincer movement with ties to the Government itself.

The Office for Students told Byline Times: Free speech and academic freedom are essential elements of higher education teaching and research. Ourregulatory requirements are designed to uphold the widest possible definition of free speechpermittedwithin the law.However, weallmust be clear where thelawrestricts speech for exampleprohibitingunlawful harassment and incitementsto racial or religious hatred.

Free speech is never an excuse for illegality or violence.It is essential that higher education is free of all unlawful discrimination, harassment and violence, and all students should feel confident that that is the case. It is vital that any student who suffers thisbehaviouris given the support they need, and that universities deal with complaints effectively and robustly.

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'Free speech' Czar Role linked to Toby Young's Free Speech Union and US Right-Wing Funding Network Byline Times - Byline Times

Universities will be required to adopt the free speech condition in order to be registered in England and receive public fundingNumber 10/Flickr

The government is to name a free speech champion with powers to fine universities or student unions found to curtail free speech, and order reinstatement if universities demote or dismiss an individual for their opinions.

The education secretary, Gavin Williamson, is due to announce the new role today (16/02), with reports in the Independent indicating that it will be an appointment within the Office for Students (OfS), the UKs Higher Education regulator.

Speaking to the Sunday Telegraph, a Department of Education source said that the measure was a response to the chilling effect of supposed unacceptable silencing and censoring across universities, with the plans requiring universities to adopt the free speech condition in order to be registered in England and receive public funding.

The regulator for the OfS would then be entitled to impose fines on universities breaching the new rule.

Student unions will also bear legal responsibilities, and will be encouraged to ensure that free speech is secured for students and visitors. Meanwhile, individual members of universities will have the right to seek compensation through the courts if they suffered an expulsion, dismissal or demotion under the new law.

News of the new role comes as Williamson said he wrote to vice-chancellors to press them to champion free speech, adding that the government was looking at how to strengthen it further.

What must not happen is that universities decide whose words will be heard and handed down to the next generation and whose will be unheard, Williamson said.

Williamson had previously stated that the government would step in to defend free speech last year after an event at the University of Oxford event featuring Amber Rudd, the former Home Secretary, was cancelled thirty minutes before it was due to start. This was a result of student opposition in an alleged act of no-platforming, with students at the time such as Safa Sadozai from the Oxford Feminist Society criticising Rudds role in the Windrush Scandal.

Williamson has elsewhere praised Cambridges Statement on Freedom of Speech, passed in December last year, as more than a victory for common sense, adding that freedom of speech, thought or expression is one of the most prized aspects of a civilized society.

The Universitys new Statement on Freedom of Speech, which was passed by a majority of 75% with a 32.1% turnout in a Grace at Regent House, was the subject of three amendments authored by Dr Arif Ahmed, a Reader in the Faculty of Philosophy. These included that the views of others should be met with tolerance rather than respect, as well as only permitting no-platforming in the event that a speaker is likely to express unlawful speech.

The vote followed accusations of a previous Statement made in March 2020 as being vague and authoritarian, with the Campaign for Cambridge Freedoms arguing that the insistence on respect for the views of others could have risked disciplinary charges and even dismissal for mockery of ideas and individuals with which we disagree, adding the University [had] no right to demand that we be respectful towards all beliefs and practices: on the contrary, we have a right, in some cases practically a duty, to satirize and to mock them.

The vote caused divisions amongst academics at the University, with Dr Priyamvada Gopal, Professor of Postcolonial Studies at the Faculty of English, drawing on the example of Toby Young, social commentator and Director of the Free Speech Union, and his wish to invite Canadian professor Jordan Peterson to talk at Cambridge to argue that what is at stake is giving eugenicists, racists, and transphobes a prestigious platform.

The governments new measure will also see a discussion around national heritage, with Culture Secretary, Oliver Dowden, being expected to lead a roundtable discussion with over twenty heritage and culture bodies, including the National Trust and the British Museum.

Dowden has also sent heritage and cultural institutions a letter arguing that countries should not run from or airbrush the history upon which they are founded, with a source from Dowdens department saying that the roundtable initiative is aimed at defend[ing] our culture and history from the noisy minority of activists constantly trying to do Britain down.

This defence of British culture and history expounded by Dowden follows a discussion held by Churchill College last week (11/02) which proposed a critical re-assessment of Winston Churchills views on race and his legacy in British society.

The negotiation with Britains racial past and present saw speakers such as Kehinde Andrews, Professor of Black Studies at Birmingham City University, suggest that Churchill is perceived as a saintly figure whos beyond reproach and an important part of British identity. Meanwhile the event itself caused controversy prior to it being held, with Nicholas Soames, Churchills grandson, calling this re-assessment an idiotic debate thats got out of control in all our universities, as Frank Furedi, Emeritus Professor of Sociology at Kent Univeristy, called it a plundering of history and a systematic attempt to recant the past.

Jo Grady, the University and College Union (UCU) General Secretary, has criticised the governments priorities amidst the Covid-19 pandemic, arguing that it appears more interested in fighting phantom threats to free speech than taking action to contain the real and present danger which the virus poses to staff and students, adding that the biggest threats to academic freedom and free speech come [...] from ministers own attempts to police what can and cannot be said on campus.

A 2018 report from the Parliamentary Human Rights Committee did not find the wholesale censorship of debate in universities, but the Committees chair, Harriet Harman, maintained that there is a problem of inhibition of free speech in universities.

Meanwhile Hillary Gyebi-Ababio, Vice President for Higher Education at the National Union of Students (NUS) argued that claims of a freedom of expression crisis on campus are unfounded, but added that the governments new legal obligation will act as an opportunity for us to prove once and for all that there is not an extensive problem with freedom of expression across higher education.

The Cambridge SU has been contacted for comment. The Cambridge Union declined to comment.

Varsity is the independent newspaper for the University of Cambridge, established in its current form in 1947. In order to maintain our editorial independence, our print newspaper and news website receives no funding from the University of Cambridge or its constituent Colleges.

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Therefore we are asking our readers, if they wish, to make a donation from as little as 1, to help with our running costs at least until this global crisis ends and things begin to return to normal.

Many thanks, all of us here at Varsity would like to wish you, your friends, families and all of your loved ones a safe and healthy few months ahead.

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Education Secretary set to announce 'free speech champion' with powers to fine universities - Varsity Online