While college should be a time of intellectual discovery, microaggressions and safe spaces have come to dominate higher education. Campuses have increasingly transitioned from a place of intellectual growth to a place promoting victimhood culture.
“Victimhood is a culture where an individual’s status as a victim elevates him or her to the moral high ground. Its hallmarks are taking offense in microaggressions, shouting down controversial speakers, and demanding ‘safe spaces,’” writes Anthony Hennen of the James G. Martin Center.
Unfortunately, university administrators have turned this value system, held by both professors and students, into an acceptable system of violence. Where intellectual curiosity should be encouraged, college campuses have recently seen an intellectual divide: camp A, where exploration of ideas matters, and camp B, where victimhood culture is king.
Those who identify with the Left seem to routinely care more about the identity of a speaker rather than that speaker’s viewpoints or merits. In some instances, yes, what makes a person unique is their ethnicity, race, or geographic allegiance. However, in most cases it is intellectual diversity that makes a speaker worthy of attention. Sadly, many on the Left on college campuses have increasingly become more obsessed with identity politics and no longer have an interest in stepping outside of their ideological comfort zones to experiencing new ideas.
This victimhood culture has been taken to the extreme. In one case at the University of Florida, administrators notified students that a 24-hour counseling hotline was available for anyone who felt offended by Halloween costumes. Other colleges “in an attempt to pre-empt the psychological threat of offensive costumes” created and distributed Halloween costume guidelines “to help students make appropriate choices if they decide to dress up.”
College culture has become engulfed in this mentality that everything is offensive in some way or form. While students should be able to brush off a costume they may not like, victimhood culture has all but demonized an entire tradition for the sake of one’s potential feelings.
Colleges have grown into a breeding ground for victims by propping up an over-sensitive campus climate. While college should be a time to expand a student’s way of thinking, colleges have turned to censoring ideas that are often deemed “too controversial.” Instead of caving to leftist demands, administrators should stand up for freedom of speech. They should prop up the individual and explain that victimhood mentality and collectivism does nothing to empower or enrich students’ lives. Without a bold stand, victimhood culture will only grow.
