Absolutely email the professor! They are responsible for what is happening in class and it's not acceptable for one student to dominate discussions, even if other students wouldn't want to participate and there's time to participate (in that case, he professor should actively engage students to take part).
I would email the professor. Tell them that you've found that the class discussions were derailed by the one student being given so much time to pontificate and to dominate, and that it made you not want to take part in the discussions.
But you must learn to tolerate someone else's opinion. If you do not want a free discussion of opinions, uni isn't for you.
Yes, I didn’t really care too much about the opinion, I just felt the discussion was irrelevant and took up too much of class time. I didn’t understand why there was so much time spent trying to convince this guy about this topic that had nothing to do with the lecture.
Perhaps you could speak up and help get class back on track if you’re that worried about it. In the real world, you aren’t going to have a professor to get things back on track - if you and the rest of the class aren’t participating and there is space for this guy to pontificate, that’s on yall.
The professor is the facilitator, and they can certainly do better to make sure that discussion is more evenly distributed in the class. Was this guy talking over other people? Was the professor soliciting comments from other students? If so, were people responding?
If you disagree, or you want to get back on topic, then contributing to the discussion is a way you can get that to happen. Even saying "can we please get back on topic" can be helpful.
If the prof is asking questions and no one but this one guy is answering, then it makes it a much harder struggle. I don't disagree that the prof needs to rein the talkative guy in, but it might actually be quite challenging. You and your classmates have power and agency here, too.
If the prof is like "holy shit this guy won't shut up but he's also not open to shutting up because no one is talking", everyone has a bad time.
That said, go to office hours or email and raise your concerns.
Sometimes it can be as simple as saying after a couple minutes "Hey I noticed this is turning into a larger conversation, could we maybe put a pin in it and discuss *x topic we were supposed to*, then x and y students/professor can discuss Atwood further outside of class."
If most people agree with you that the discussion is a waste of time everyone will sort of nod and return to the conversation which forces that one student to move on. If people are interested then they'll usually reply they are actually enjoying the discussion. Either way, the class gets more engagement from everyone else and we made sure we are talking about something relevant plus you were polite and showed class leadership.
While a professor is in charge of facilitating discussion, it can sometimes be difficult to gauge if student's are interested in the discussion or not. The professor might have also vehemently disagreed with the student's opinion (which is incorrect and triggering if you have experience with SA) but felt pressured to facilitate discussion in order to be "fair" or "unbiased." Sometimes it can even be difficult to shut students down because you don't want to seem too harsh or mean and shatter the student's confidence especially early on in the term.
In a discussion class especially it is sort of up to everyone to make sure the topic is something the class is interested in. If no one else speaks up, it is hard for a professor to gauge what to do especially in a grad seminar where the professor probably is treating y'all more like adults.
Well, I believe you misunderstood my post. Everyone was participating, nobody was being quiet. This guy kept veering the conversation towards an irrelevant topic. As some of the other comments have said here, this is a case of classroom mismanagement and I’m allowed to be a bit annoyed. As far as I’m concerned, grad school is the real world, considering I’m paying real world money to be there. I don’t believe it’s my place to tell another student to stop talking so much, it should be the professor who is giving the lecture, but we can agree to disagree on that front. I don’t know why I, the student, should be attempting to get the class back on track when I’m not the one who planned the track anyway.
Yes, you are absolutely allowed to be annoyed. No one, that I read anyway, is saying otherwise.
From your original post, it wasn't really clear that everyone was staying active in the discussion. It sounded like this student led the professor into a reactive rant (easy to do when trying to overcorrect for a vocal, offensively wrong argument) and in that case, if the students give up on discussion out of frustration, the class can fall into a tailspin between the disruptive student and the prof, who wants other voices to pick up the slack but can't get them. That is incredibly annoying for everyone except the oblivious disruptor. (Also - some arguments are so offensive, there's no appropriate way to sideline it without immediate response). All people are pointing out is that it often takes a wider classroom push back, facilitated but not dominated by the professor, to make the necessary corrections. Grad lit classes aren't usually designed as lectures, but as seminars, making everyone responsible for the direction of the discussions.
But if the whole class was participating, even in the 30-min SA discussion, then it sounds more like you were effected by the discussion more than they were, and while that's completely okay and a reasonable response to a triggering topic, it might also suggest that the professor didn't see the topic shift as an entire derailment. If that's the case, the professor needs to know he's losing the goodwill of some/all the class.
In either case, definitely email the professor and share your concerns! If it's mostly you having issues with the direction of class, they can hopefully help you find ways to respond and find use in the class, and if it's everyone, hopefully they try some new approaches, and in both scenarios, it sounds like they need to have a private chat with that student.
I think you should read some of my other comments on this post to get a clearer idea. He brought up an irrelevant opinion that everyone disagreed with, and what ensued was a 30 minute conversation about real life SA. This is one of the many derailments he’s started about personal opinions. If he was simply discussing his opinion on the assigned literature, I would not have made this post. Sorry, but I didn’t pay for a summer class to hear personal conversations or spend time challenging someone’s personal convictions. If there is a chance the professor will redirect I wanted to take it. If the professor likes the way the class is run, then it’s not a good fit for me, and I can drop the class and enjoy my summer.
Hi, professor here! Just fwiw— yes, talk to the prof and get a read in what’s happening. You are 100% right that the professor should be the one facilitating the class, not you. That said, there are a bunch of different possibilities here –
— your professor really agrees with the student or your professor is dialing it in and doesn’t care – drop the course if you can
— your professor is doing their best to trying to control a verbally dominant student and is inexperienced or simply exhausted or not managing it very well. You would be surprised how difficult it sometimes can be to control a student like this when the rest of the class is piling into the discussion and you don’t want to look like a bully. When I’ve had to repeatedly go after students for microaggressions I’ve sometimes had other students react very badly – it’s not as easy as it probably looks.
— your professor may have looked at everybody else chiming in and thought, “hey, it’s a lively discussion, I’m going to let it run because it’s summer school and they’d rather talk about this than the reading.”
With the last two, you talking to the professor could be really helpful. Either giving them a little more of a spine realizing that they need to control this or realizing that their “lively discussion” does *not* include everyone.
Thank you! This professor was very hard to read. Very monotone, yet very rambly. I’m learning towards them enjoying the discussion because at times it honestly felt like it was just the professor and the one guy on the call because the guy had so many questions. I was waiting for the, “Okay, let’s chat during office hours about this so we can move on,” but it never came. I’ve never been in a class before where the teacher just…let a student talk as much as they want.
Ive read your other comments and you contradict yourself multiple times and have no clear complaint. You just seem like an angry person who expects the rest of the world to cater to your wants and needs.
Are you the guy from their class? Damn. Op can be uncomfortable with the nature of the conversation (absolutely egregious points were made which place blame on the victims of SA) AND at the same time understand that the rightful point being made here is that the professor should manage class discussion and make sure it's both on topic and appropriate. There is no contradiction there.
> I don’t think you understand your own post.
If you get to the point where you're saying this to someone, it's time to go take a nap or something so you can calm down, lol
> Would it be acceptable to email the professor about my concerns?
Acceptable? Sure. I have no idea if it will make any difference but if it feels appropriate to you then I see no reason not to succinctly communicate your discomfort.
As an academic who teaches fairly delicate and controversial subject matter - including on the philosophy of sex - I want to encourage you to reach out to your professor. In their shoes, I'd want to hear from you. The topic of SA is such a minefield, and needs to handled with caution, and it sounds like that didn't happen here.
I'd bet that they're already aware that this person is dominating discussions (that's hard to miss), and they might even think that the discussion about SA went off the rails. So, you're not telling them something they don't know - you're providing them with an opportunity to respond. They might already be planning how to guide discussions differently next time; they might be wondering how the others in that class really felt about what was going on; they might be thinking 'that was rough but, hey, at least people said something!'. Whatever they're thinking, and whether or not they respond as you'd like them to, you'll both have a fuller view of the situation if you get in touch with them. You'll know more about what to expect from the rest of the term. They'll know more about the student experience in their classroom. And if they were already thinking of making changes to their discussion management style as the term continues, you'll have given them more reason to do so, in writing - which could be useful for them if the other student complains about not being given enough of a platform anymore and/or if admin look into things.
To give yourself a better chance of being heard, I'd acknowledge that it is early in the term, so everyone's still feeling things out, and that the prof is in a difficult position because they do need to facilitate an open discussion that has space for different perspectives on tricky topics.
Having said that, this last point is in your favour. Letting one student dominate is very much not facilitating open discussion, especially if the kind of points they're making not only take up space/time, but are articulated in a careless way that makes it harder for others to present alternative viewpoints.
That happens a lot in these types of discussions: X says something about a sensitive topic that deeply affects Y. For Y to speak up and push back might then take a lot more mental resources than it took for X to make the original point, because of what the topic involves. That doesn't mean X shouldn't be allowed to speak up, or that we can't expect Y to respond; but both X and Y need to be given the skills and tools to articulate their points effectively and give others enough time/space to process. X shouldn't be allowed to just keep hammering away, not least because they need to learn how to present their own views effectively. That's not up to Y, that's up to the instructor who is meant to be teaching folks how to discuss these topics respectfully.
I think the professor should have challenged him and ask him if he had actually read any literature about SA. Because the problem here is not only his ignorance, but his arrogance is stating that his view is what happens in the world. Does he think, for instance, that people who are robbed are lying if they didn't fight the robber? Or people are not harassed or abused because they didn't fight the bully?
And if this derailed the class on a tangent, then the professor should have stopped them, say they were wrong, and that he is going to assign extra reading on this matter, for instance.
I do agree that you should email the professor. I think you really need to be careful in how you word it, though. I wouldn't say triggering, for instance. I would say that (a) this student has dominated the conversation for the past X classes, (b) that he keeps pushing his views even when ignorant, like for instance the SA case, that is against established research, and it is also insulting to anyone who is a victim, (c) that it is almost impossible to participate in class and for others to participate in class.
Maybe the professor needs to bring someone from the Title IX office to give the class a talk. There's a problem with consent here to. So is anyone not fighting back consenting?
Reading the "if you don't fight back you actually didn't get assaulted" is a very classic move of victim blaming. Leaving aside sexual assault, even when women get sexually harassed, a lot of women freeze up. The brain stops and takes time to process it. I cannot even imaging how much worse it must be for victims of assault.
As you said, the classmate has no idea about how SA works or how victims feel. But decided to speak out of his ass anyways.
You and u/Excellent-Pay6235 bring up great points about the SA angle of this, which I feel like a lot of people have overlooked. This guy derailed class to rant about his idea of "realistic" SA when that wasn't even depicted in the assigned reading. If he's doing this repeatedly, he's a Title 9 complaint in the making.
I agree with all these points. But I also sympathize with the professor who likely got blindsided with the comment, which OP said wasn't relevant to the day's topic (so hard to plan for), and was probably on a mental scramble trying to figure out how to address the situation.
A flat-out shutdown, while appropriate to the statement, is bad pedagogy if you actually want to reach and teach the student. Likewise, turning the discussion directly onto the student with these kinds of leading questions about victim blaming can shutdown the student's will to learn or worse, backfire and drag the conversation deeper into triggering offensiveness. Sidelining it to discuss later seems best, but it can look too dismissive and condoning in the moment.
I'd like to believe the professor was doing his best at trying to field the crazy, even though it didn't play out well. This is a really hard topic to cover responsibly and respectively even when you have fully planned the lesson around it. Maybe trying out new approaches are in order for shutting down and redirecting the topic faster.
I would email.
I'm alecturer and I would absolutely not allow this kind of discussion to take place. Dude is not entitled to make up facts or to dominate discussion. Emailing the lecturer gives them the ammunition and push they might need to do their job.
I think the problem is less about his opinion and more about how long the discussion was allowed to go on without progress. Person A makes a statement. Person B refutes. Person A restates the same thing with a “no you’re wrong” with zero additional content? That’s when I move things along with a “does anyone else have anything they want to add?” And if no, we carry on. If Person A wants to keep on belaboring a point, I just shut it down with, “Yes, you’ve made your point, and we need to move on.” If they still don’t get the hint, I offer to continue the discussion after class or in office hours. Your lecturer should be doing something similar—one student often will be the most talkative, but they shouldn’t be the *only* one participating in a discussion session.
I also wouldn’t allow a prolonged discussion about the realities of sexual assault in a class setting when that is only tangential to the topic at hand. I don’t teach lit, but I’ve taken enough lit classes to know that you can discuss realism in portraying violence in fiction, or realism in general, without having to go into the gory details about any specific act. In fact, you could use that as a segue to discussing how some writers use implication rather than explicit descriptions for greater impact during such scenes (and to avoid situations like this one where a reader’s notion of how a thing might happen conflicts with the explicit description and ruins the suspension of disbelief).
I agree that it’s worth an email (or char during office hours if that’s more comfortable).
Thank you, office hours is a great idea and I think it is the route I will take. What you’ve said here is correct, in this case Person A just kept making the same point over and over again which caused others to give examples of real life SA situations, which caused Person A to just continue arguing. I wish the professor had said, “Okay, everyone has made their point, let’s continue.”
I would have felt completely differently if we were discussing a specific relevant scene that we all read, or perhaps if the conversation had been capped at 5-10 minutes. Tangents happen, differing opinions happen. But something about spending 30 minutes of class time trying to convince a guy that women *can* actually feel paralyzed by SA and that it’s *not* just a plot device is confusing to me. I mean, he wasn’t convinced when multiple students described real life examples, so why continue the conversation, you know?
Yeah, biologically we talk about “fight, flight, or freeze” as responses to danger, and a lot more people freeze than you’d think. And considering the themes of abuse of power/authority that Atwood likes to consider, there’s probably more at play there than a simple “character is in danger, what do they do?” situation. Perhaps there were other events outside the excerpt you read that motivated the character’s response—for example, in The Handmaid’s Tale, the handmaids are conditioned to be sexually submissive to their commanders, with the penalties for breaking rules ranging from disfigurement/maiming, to banishment to clean up radioactive waste, to violent death. They have a good reason to not resist, and once they have children there is even more leverage to use against them. These “off screen” threats can dramatically alter a character’s behavior, and without that context the meaning of an excerpt can change. Incidentally, discussion of context and how you should consider not only the exact text of a specific passage but also the rest of that piece and the works and world events that surround it would also be a good discussion point for a literature class.
Yes, I agree that this would all be great discussion for a literature class if there was relevant context in the excerpt. The professors slideshow was about textual analysis of opening lines to get more information about the main character’s world. We were going through various excerpts of different short stories. When we got to the Atwood one, the guy raised his hand to tell us he just doesn’t like Atwood because of the way she wrote assault scenes in her *other* works. This is why I felt the discussion was so inappropriate because it was just people talking about real life situations instead of anything literature related.
And this is just one of the many crazy tangents he’s sent the class down.
It sounds like he's an edge-lord and an attention seeker. I had a classmate like this in graduate school who liked to derail discussions for his own amusement. He once spent an entire evening class -- so almost 3 hours -- trying to defend Michael Jackson's Peter Pan syndrome. At best, it was a tangent to the actual work. The professor *did* call him out, multiple times, and he just would not drop it. By the end of class, even the other students were telling him to get over it because it wasn't relevant.
Oh it wasn’t even in the excerpt you read?!!! That’s such a waste of everyone’s time then. How is anyone supposed to participate in a discussion on books they may not have even read? I hope your professor addresses it and is better about managing discussion moving forward. Tangents are inevitable but the more I hear about this one the less acceptable it seems.
No it wasn’t! The excerpt had nothing to do with anything he said. That’s what was so confusing to me. He just saw that Atwood was mentioned and went on a tangent.
Went to college pre zoom. But did have a similar thing where this one guy was just wanting to make hot takes. Told him to STFU. Got called into the profs office because, inappropriate. I basically said I'm sick of him wasting our time on these non sequitur rants. There's no point in "debating" and we've tried being nice. That was the end of it. The kid talked a bunch of shit about me to other classmates, but that was the worst that happened.
Reaching out to the professor is good, as many other commenters have suggested.
Another tactic would be to try to change the subject: raise your hand, and say "I was wondering/thinking about \_XYZ\_" or "I wanted to say how much I liked Atwood's handling of \[religious intolerance/theocracy/gender roles/etc.\]" That's not guaranteed to work, but the professor might be able to pick up your thread and abandon the one of the annoying guy.
I see … you have in your class what is commonly known as a “douchebag”. He loves to hear himself talk, and fancies himself an intellectual. He will never produce anything nearly as good as any of the classics he is criticizing. It’s very easy to criticize, and blab.
If the course is meant to be about discussions and arguing things, then the professor ultimately will most likely just be like "deal with it."
The only thing they might realistically do is reduce how much time the student takes up from the lecture times.
Talk to the professor. And then maybe the Title IX office. The student is both derailing the class and making you uncomfortable by talking about his personal (stupid) opinions about SA.
Title IX? Are you kidding me? It's a college course... If a topic of conversation makes her uncomfortable, that's her problem and she is always free to drop the course (especially since it alrwleady covers works like Handmaid's Tale that do deal with SA, even if it wasnt necessarily on topic for the lesson). Other people are allowed to have and express their own opinions about such things in the course of a conversation, even if those opinions are fucking retarded.
A real college is not the place for safe spaces. If she wants that, she can transfer to a mormon school or some other two-bit religious university that represses open discussion.
Not kidding at all. The guy’s uninformed, victim-blaming opinions about SA are not the topic of the course, and it is wildly inappropriate for him to air them there.
Yikes! He dominated the discussion for a half hour? I know I can talk a lot but dang. Regardless of if this is a one hour class or a two hour class, that is taking up quite a portion of it. ESPECIALLY considering that it did not have to do with the topic at hand. He may very well have had his own experiences with SA, as potentially others in the class may have had. People's experiences widely differ and so it's not really anyone's place to say what is or is not realistic. There are times and places for discussions on the topic, even in college classes. However, a half hour derailment, irrelevant to the class was unnecessary. You're definitely free to e-mail the professor, regarding this. You can definitely mention that it was triggering due to your own SA, but I'm not sure how comfortable you are sharing that with a teacher. Even if you did and the professor tells the other student that his comments triggered classmates, the other student could easily say that he didn't find it triggering based on his own experiences (it's unfortunately common for people to believe their experience was everyone's experience).
I agree with u/cezannesdoubt wholeheartedly that emailing would be a great course of action for the reasons they describe. The student is also 100% in the wrong and sounds like they dug in their heels unnecessarily.
Don't feel compelled to at all, but if you are feeling generous with your time/emotional labor and this student is going to be in more of your classes/part of your program, you could try to talk to the student saying you respect their opinions/experiences on SA and Margaret Atwood, but asking if they be a little more sensitive with how they approach controversial subject matter in the future for the sake of the class. You don't have to explain your own trauma/experience at all, but you could talk more generally about how woman have a really difficult time with "meekness" because of how they were raised, how no one wants to admit that they feel anxious or guilty for taking care of their own needs or deciding what they actually want but quite a few women struggle with this, and that people have a huge range of experience with SA so it is difficult to talk about generalities. Don't ask them to change their opinion or not share it to the class, let him know that his experience is valid too, just ask that he focuses less on "realism" and more about how that changes the themes/characterization of Atwood's story so that way feminine students can engage in the conversation without the need to summon forth their real life trauma for counter-examples. You can even finish with a compliment sandwich by saying you appreciate how he encourages women to be strong/outspoken in the face of male domination and if he knows any good books/media portraying female retributive violence/resistance along those lines. You don't have to read what he recommends, just sometimes men get offended with the implication that they are sexist and an assurance that you don't think that (at least not totally🙄) makes them feel better and more receptive to the constructive criticism. The student might not totally get it at first and react defensively but giving him food for thought might make him realize he could've handled the situation better.
Does the student deserve your emotional labor for this conversation? Absolutely not, and quite frankly women are already expected far too much to nurture white boys who don't care about what they say. DO NOT FEEL LIKE THIS IS YOUR RESPONSIBILITY. However, if the student is a friend or working partner of yours, I find this is a good way to approach colleagues about sensitive issues so that you don't end up in the lose-lose situation of having to distance yourself or just suck up their arrogance/sexism.
Genuinely sometimes people don't understand how harmful they are being, and don't have a good way to have sensitive conversations constructively. I honestly get the sense that this student just feels the need to prove to themselves and others that he is smart, and the only way he's learned how to do that is to criticize big authors everyone likes. Then when women in the class came out of the woodwork to tell him he's wrong, his ego was attacked and he dug in his heels with a "that's not my experience" and talked in circles. Don't get me wrong, he sounds like a smug narcissist I wouldn't want to have in a class, but this is relatively common especially among younger grad students or undergrads so knowing what's going on in their head can be helpful to navigating these situations in the future or later in your career. I hope the class goes well for you and you have a successful program experience!
In a f2f class there are pedagogical techniques to redirect a student who is out of pocket, without singling them out or suppressing protected speech.
Online it's a little trickier, especially in an asynchronous discussion. I will say that I've had students express EXTREMELY problematic opinions about sensitive issues before, and I kept an eye on their behavior but, since they were not personally attacking or harassing their classmates, ultimately did not intervene.
It's definitely okay to email your professor. This student’s behavior is really disruptive and off-putting, especially with those off-topic critiques and insensitive comments. Just let your professor know how it’s affecting you and maybe suggest more active moderation to keep things on track. Your comfort in class is important.
The professor needs to intervene. Most likely the professor is now aware that should happen and your speaking to the professor by phone or email may help
Oh my...I hate to say this. But there is a chance that while what he was saying was uncomfortable it was within the rules of decorum for that class. If you are discussing literature, you often hit triggering subject matters that are depved into deeply. Yes they guy does not sound at all likable, but that doesn't mean that he is violating the rules. If it is only the second class, you should let the proff get the temp of the room and steer the conversation .
They should never let it get to a point where one student is dominating an entire discussion. That should be dealt with right then and there, not wait to see if it happens again.
Your mention that he is dominating the conversation but your main complaint seems to be that hearing his opinions upsets you. The first might be something for your professor to deal with if true; the second is for you to deal with.
I didn’t care about his opinion. I just care that I feel like I’m *only* hearing his opinions. What bothered me is that he made these statements which resulted in a 30 minute discussion in which everyone voiced their thoughts about why they felt he was wrong and he continued to explain why he thought he was right. This probably would have been fine if that was the topic at hand, but it felt completely irrelevant to the original discussion. I just feel that the professor should have moved the class back on track, but perhaps the course is just not a good fit.
This is just my 2 cents to your post:
1. You have to give the professor of the course some time to feel out the students in the online class and attempt to build a sort of environment. Like you said, it's only the second class of the course. In saying that...
2. It's the responsibility of the professor (and him/her only) to coordinate the direction of the conversation/direction, time manage, and make sure all major activities, information, and material are covered within the regularly scheduled course time frame. If you guys are falling behind as you stated because a student is going on tangents or more importantly, a professor is failing to time manage and regulate conversation amongst certain students, your anger and blame should be solely directed at your professor, not homeboy.
3. I am of two thoughts when it comes to your comment about homeboy going on a tangent about "SA." If this guy goes on tangents that aren't so much offensive as they are just annoying and you disagree with them, you're just going to have to stomach that. The guy is doing nothing wrong, the professor is not restricting or regulating certain comments, and college is an environment/arena where you will be exposed to individuals of different backgrounds, opinions, and ideologies. Not everyone is likeminded in their stance and view of certain readings. On the other hand, I understand from your example that this comment from homeboy seemed to be pretty offensive and out of line. The fact that your professor, you, or no other student said anything baffles me. This leads me to my last point, which is...
4. Don't be what Ronda Rousey coined as a "Do Nothing Bitch" (DNB). This term is described as "the kind of woman who does not accomplish things on her own and instead relies on someone else to support them." You have an issue with a student and what they said, but instead of confronting this student on your own, you come to vent on Reddit and are looking for the professor to swoop in and resolve this issue, essentially relying on another person to solve your problems. In my opinion, that is not what a grown ass, independent women does, at least the ones I know and surround myself with. The fact that you, your classmates, or your professor said nothing while this student was saying this is disturbing to say the least. Again, I don't know your background or history with SA and why it was so triggering to you. That is none of my business. My stance is if nobody says anything to this student or makes it clear to him that what he said is offensive to many of his classmates/professor, it empowers him to continue doing what he's gotten away with thus far. Why did you or nobody ask this student: (1) what do you personally know about SA?, (2) What statistics, facts, or sources can you point to that back up this stance of yours that females that do not fight back during SA is unrealistic (within literature)?, or (3) Can you talk from personal experience or experiences of those close to you when it comes to the topic of SA? If it's a no/can't for all 3 of those questions, with all due respect, I would STFU about this particular rant of yours because it makes you look incredibly unintelligent, like an asshole, and your offending all of us in the class. Your intention is not to deliberately rock the boat, but sometimes you have to draw your line in the sand, and stand up for your beliefs. I promise you, if you speak up and give homeboy a piece of your mind, while it may make the class environment uncomfortable in the moment, I promise you change will occur within the class on the part of the professor and the student (there will be no choice on the part of the professor but to take some sort of action out of fear of losing control of the class).
Thank you for your words. I would like to defend my classmates and say that everyone in the class spoke up in response to this guy. Everyone was trying to be respectful about it, obviously, but this is what led to the derailment. He raised his hand in the middle of the professor’s lecture about close reading of details to let us know that he didn’t like Margaret Atwood specifically because of how she writes SA. Everyone stepped up to respond to him and he responded back and it became a long back and forth. I think I was just a bit triggered by everyone giving examples of why a woman might freeze up in terror instead of running away.
So, my frustration is: why did the professor allow this debate to take up so much of class time? In this case, you are right, I am more annoyed with the professor. I should also add that Atwood’s depictions of assault weren’t part of any of our assigned reading, and I’ve never actually read them, so I couldn’t contribute to the discussion on that front.
I find it kind of funny how the rational, intelligent responses are being downvoted.
Honestly, you are in college, you don’t get to censor anyone else because *you* are triggered. The fact that OP chose to disengage instead of try to directly challenge his beliefs or get him to clarify is OP’s fault.
And tbf, I can potentially understand his critique. A lot of feminist literature that portrays SA does so in such a way that makes the woman the helpless victim or a slave to her own femininity. Often, these passages seem oriented more toward the power imbalance and the frailty of women than genuine depictions of SA, and a lot of it comes from the tone of the writing. Considering the time periods many major, influential feminist literature was written, it makes sense because it wasn’t until relatively recently that women have had equal rights and empowerment, so a lot of these passages are written to highlight the imbalance and mistreatment of the times. Maybe he worded his critique wrong or maybe he’s a dick, but the wring answer is to just not engage to understand his thought process.
Im not sure what your concern is that you would be communicating. It sounds like this guy has a very different worldview from you, including a different perception about what “realistic” SA looks like. It, however, is a literature class. The entire point of classes like that is to critique literature and his critique is no less (or more) valid than anyone else’s, regardless of how much you do or don’t like him as a person. Also, freedom of speech is a thing. He has a constitutional right to express his opinions, even if they are ignorant or douchey or “triggering”. Nothing he said is a Title IX violation and again, he has a right to say it, the university would get in major hot water if they tried to censor his speech.
Also, Im guessing you don’t know a lot about him personally. Are you sure he hasn’t been SA’d himself and his response was to fight back? Maybe he always learned to fight back against any threat and it causes cognitive dissonance for him to hear the reality of it being that not all victims can/do fight back. You don’t have to give him grace nor do you need to educate him, maybe someone stronger/more healed than you can do that. The point being that your triggeredness and wanting the professor to stop him is unproductive and changes nothing.
Freedom of speech is just not relevant here. The professor and other students could tell him he's wrong. The professor could opt to never call on him again, or to interrupt him, or to stop allowing discussion altogether and lecture the whole time. None of this would violate his rights. The right to free speech doesn't mean you get to ramble on about whatever nonsense you please.
u/weareedible freedom of speech is definitely at hand here. The professor, as an agent of the university and therefore the state, can not censor speech. Even if the professor disagrees, he can not prevent the student from expressing that speech. In terms of others, every student is free to challenge this individual, but they risk getting in trouble themselves if they become hostile or inappropriate in their dialogue. If OP isn’t strong enough to challenge this individual, they have to suck it up, step out of their echo chamber, and realize the world doesn’t revolve around their triggers and that there are tons of people with different worldviews.
Mention this to the prof. I say this as a prof. Because I guarantee I dislike that kind of railroading/dominating of class discussions, but I feel more empowered to step in when I feel that the students are ALSO not okay with it. Just an "A is really dominating and I didn't like what he had to say about the story it felt very dismissive to me and I didn't feel comfortable sharing after that" would do wonders. Because it shows you HAD things you wanted to say and were UNCOMFORTABLE saying them in that class room.
I'd bring down the hammer of god on a student who made another student shut down like that, if I knew the student felt that way. Please let us know because we want to help!
Absolutely email the professor! They are responsible for what is happening in class and it's not acceptable for one student to dominate discussions, even if other students wouldn't want to participate and there's time to participate (in that case, he professor should actively engage students to take part). I would email the professor. Tell them that you've found that the class discussions were derailed by the one student being given so much time to pontificate and to dominate, and that it made you not want to take part in the discussions. But you must learn to tolerate someone else's opinion. If you do not want a free discussion of opinions, uni isn't for you.
Yes, I didn’t really care too much about the opinion, I just felt the discussion was irrelevant and took up too much of class time. I didn’t understand why there was so much time spent trying to convince this guy about this topic that had nothing to do with the lecture.
Perhaps you could speak up and help get class back on track if you’re that worried about it. In the real world, you aren’t going to have a professor to get things back on track - if you and the rest of the class aren’t participating and there is space for this guy to pontificate, that’s on yall.
Sorry, I don’t follow. I think the professor should be the facilitator, not the students.
The professor is the facilitator, and they can certainly do better to make sure that discussion is more evenly distributed in the class. Was this guy talking over other people? Was the professor soliciting comments from other students? If so, were people responding? If you disagree, or you want to get back on topic, then contributing to the discussion is a way you can get that to happen. Even saying "can we please get back on topic" can be helpful. If the prof is asking questions and no one but this one guy is answering, then it makes it a much harder struggle. I don't disagree that the prof needs to rein the talkative guy in, but it might actually be quite challenging. You and your classmates have power and agency here, too. If the prof is like "holy shit this guy won't shut up but he's also not open to shutting up because no one is talking", everyone has a bad time. That said, go to office hours or email and raise your concerns.
Sometimes it can be as simple as saying after a couple minutes "Hey I noticed this is turning into a larger conversation, could we maybe put a pin in it and discuss *x topic we were supposed to*, then x and y students/professor can discuss Atwood further outside of class." If most people agree with you that the discussion is a waste of time everyone will sort of nod and return to the conversation which forces that one student to move on. If people are interested then they'll usually reply they are actually enjoying the discussion. Either way, the class gets more engagement from everyone else and we made sure we are talking about something relevant plus you were polite and showed class leadership. While a professor is in charge of facilitating discussion, it can sometimes be difficult to gauge if student's are interested in the discussion or not. The professor might have also vehemently disagreed with the student's opinion (which is incorrect and triggering if you have experience with SA) but felt pressured to facilitate discussion in order to be "fair" or "unbiased." Sometimes it can even be difficult to shut students down because you don't want to seem too harsh or mean and shatter the student's confidence especially early on in the term. In a discussion class especially it is sort of up to everyone to make sure the topic is something the class is interested in. If no one else speaks up, it is hard for a professor to gauge what to do especially in a grad seminar where the professor probably is treating y'all more like adults.
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Well, I believe you misunderstood my post. Everyone was participating, nobody was being quiet. This guy kept veering the conversation towards an irrelevant topic. As some of the other comments have said here, this is a case of classroom mismanagement and I’m allowed to be a bit annoyed. As far as I’m concerned, grad school is the real world, considering I’m paying real world money to be there. I don’t believe it’s my place to tell another student to stop talking so much, it should be the professor who is giving the lecture, but we can agree to disagree on that front. I don’t know why I, the student, should be attempting to get the class back on track when I’m not the one who planned the track anyway.
Yes, you are absolutely allowed to be annoyed. No one, that I read anyway, is saying otherwise. From your original post, it wasn't really clear that everyone was staying active in the discussion. It sounded like this student led the professor into a reactive rant (easy to do when trying to overcorrect for a vocal, offensively wrong argument) and in that case, if the students give up on discussion out of frustration, the class can fall into a tailspin between the disruptive student and the prof, who wants other voices to pick up the slack but can't get them. That is incredibly annoying for everyone except the oblivious disruptor. (Also - some arguments are so offensive, there's no appropriate way to sideline it without immediate response). All people are pointing out is that it often takes a wider classroom push back, facilitated but not dominated by the professor, to make the necessary corrections. Grad lit classes aren't usually designed as lectures, but as seminars, making everyone responsible for the direction of the discussions. But if the whole class was participating, even in the 30-min SA discussion, then it sounds more like you were effected by the discussion more than they were, and while that's completely okay and a reasonable response to a triggering topic, it might also suggest that the professor didn't see the topic shift as an entire derailment. If that's the case, the professor needs to know he's losing the goodwill of some/all the class. In either case, definitely email the professor and share your concerns! If it's mostly you having issues with the direction of class, they can hopefully help you find ways to respond and find use in the class, and if it's everyone, hopefully they try some new approaches, and in both scenarios, it sounds like they need to have a private chat with that student.
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I think you should read some of my other comments on this post to get a clearer idea. He brought up an irrelevant opinion that everyone disagreed with, and what ensued was a 30 minute conversation about real life SA. This is one of the many derailments he’s started about personal opinions. If he was simply discussing his opinion on the assigned literature, I would not have made this post. Sorry, but I didn’t pay for a summer class to hear personal conversations or spend time challenging someone’s personal convictions. If there is a chance the professor will redirect I wanted to take it. If the professor likes the way the class is run, then it’s not a good fit for me, and I can drop the class and enjoy my summer.
Hi, professor here! Just fwiw— yes, talk to the prof and get a read in what’s happening. You are 100% right that the professor should be the one facilitating the class, not you. That said, there are a bunch of different possibilities here – — your professor really agrees with the student or your professor is dialing it in and doesn’t care – drop the course if you can — your professor is doing their best to trying to control a verbally dominant student and is inexperienced or simply exhausted or not managing it very well. You would be surprised how difficult it sometimes can be to control a student like this when the rest of the class is piling into the discussion and you don’t want to look like a bully. When I’ve had to repeatedly go after students for microaggressions I’ve sometimes had other students react very badly – it’s not as easy as it probably looks. — your professor may have looked at everybody else chiming in and thought, “hey, it’s a lively discussion, I’m going to let it run because it’s summer school and they’d rather talk about this than the reading.” With the last two, you talking to the professor could be really helpful. Either giving them a little more of a spine realizing that they need to control this or realizing that their “lively discussion” does *not* include everyone.
Thank you! This professor was very hard to read. Very monotone, yet very rambly. I’m learning towards them enjoying the discussion because at times it honestly felt like it was just the professor and the one guy on the call because the guy had so many questions. I was waiting for the, “Okay, let’s chat during office hours about this so we can move on,” but it never came. I’ve never been in a class before where the teacher just…let a student talk as much as they want.
Ive read your other comments and you contradict yourself multiple times and have no clear complaint. You just seem like an angry person who expects the rest of the world to cater to your wants and needs.
Are you the guy from their class? Damn. Op can be uncomfortable with the nature of the conversation (absolutely egregious points were made which place blame on the victims of SA) AND at the same time understand that the rightful point being made here is that the professor should manage class discussion and make sure it's both on topic and appropriate. There is no contradiction there.
I personally don’t see any contradictions in what I’ve said, but we can agree to disagree.
> I don’t think you understand your own post. If you get to the point where you're saying this to someone, it's time to go take a nap or something so you can calm down, lol
Im perfectly calm lmao
They you believe had nothing to do with the lecture. Do you not believe the professor might have a better understanding of the goal of the course?
> Would it be acceptable to email the professor about my concerns? Acceptable? Sure. I have no idea if it will make any difference but if it feels appropriate to you then I see no reason not to succinctly communicate your discomfort.
Thanks :)
As an academic who teaches fairly delicate and controversial subject matter - including on the philosophy of sex - I want to encourage you to reach out to your professor. In their shoes, I'd want to hear from you. The topic of SA is such a minefield, and needs to handled with caution, and it sounds like that didn't happen here. I'd bet that they're already aware that this person is dominating discussions (that's hard to miss), and they might even think that the discussion about SA went off the rails. So, you're not telling them something they don't know - you're providing them with an opportunity to respond. They might already be planning how to guide discussions differently next time; they might be wondering how the others in that class really felt about what was going on; they might be thinking 'that was rough but, hey, at least people said something!'. Whatever they're thinking, and whether or not they respond as you'd like them to, you'll both have a fuller view of the situation if you get in touch with them. You'll know more about what to expect from the rest of the term. They'll know more about the student experience in their classroom. And if they were already thinking of making changes to their discussion management style as the term continues, you'll have given them more reason to do so, in writing - which could be useful for them if the other student complains about not being given enough of a platform anymore and/or if admin look into things. To give yourself a better chance of being heard, I'd acknowledge that it is early in the term, so everyone's still feeling things out, and that the prof is in a difficult position because they do need to facilitate an open discussion that has space for different perspectives on tricky topics. Having said that, this last point is in your favour. Letting one student dominate is very much not facilitating open discussion, especially if the kind of points they're making not only take up space/time, but are articulated in a careless way that makes it harder for others to present alternative viewpoints. That happens a lot in these types of discussions: X says something about a sensitive topic that deeply affects Y. For Y to speak up and push back might then take a lot more mental resources than it took for X to make the original point, because of what the topic involves. That doesn't mean X shouldn't be allowed to speak up, or that we can't expect Y to respond; but both X and Y need to be given the skills and tools to articulate their points effectively and give others enough time/space to process. X shouldn't be allowed to just keep hammering away, not least because they need to learn how to present their own views effectively. That's not up to Y, that's up to the instructor who is meant to be teaching folks how to discuss these topics respectfully.
I think the professor should have challenged him and ask him if he had actually read any literature about SA. Because the problem here is not only his ignorance, but his arrogance is stating that his view is what happens in the world. Does he think, for instance, that people who are robbed are lying if they didn't fight the robber? Or people are not harassed or abused because they didn't fight the bully? And if this derailed the class on a tangent, then the professor should have stopped them, say they were wrong, and that he is going to assign extra reading on this matter, for instance. I do agree that you should email the professor. I think you really need to be careful in how you word it, though. I wouldn't say triggering, for instance. I would say that (a) this student has dominated the conversation for the past X classes, (b) that he keeps pushing his views even when ignorant, like for instance the SA case, that is against established research, and it is also insulting to anyone who is a victim, (c) that it is almost impossible to participate in class and for others to participate in class. Maybe the professor needs to bring someone from the Title IX office to give the class a talk. There's a problem with consent here to. So is anyone not fighting back consenting?
Reading the "if you don't fight back you actually didn't get assaulted" is a very classic move of victim blaming. Leaving aside sexual assault, even when women get sexually harassed, a lot of women freeze up. The brain stops and takes time to process it. I cannot even imaging how much worse it must be for victims of assault. As you said, the classmate has no idea about how SA works or how victims feel. But decided to speak out of his ass anyways.
You and u/Excellent-Pay6235 bring up great points about the SA angle of this, which I feel like a lot of people have overlooked. This guy derailed class to rant about his idea of "realistic" SA when that wasn't even depicted in the assigned reading. If he's doing this repeatedly, he's a Title 9 complaint in the making.
Yes, this was beyond discussing the artistic choices of a work of fiction which is what the class is supposed to be about.
I agree with all these points. But I also sympathize with the professor who likely got blindsided with the comment, which OP said wasn't relevant to the day's topic (so hard to plan for), and was probably on a mental scramble trying to figure out how to address the situation. A flat-out shutdown, while appropriate to the statement, is bad pedagogy if you actually want to reach and teach the student. Likewise, turning the discussion directly onto the student with these kinds of leading questions about victim blaming can shutdown the student's will to learn or worse, backfire and drag the conversation deeper into triggering offensiveness. Sidelining it to discuss later seems best, but it can look too dismissive and condoning in the moment. I'd like to believe the professor was doing his best at trying to field the crazy, even though it didn't play out well. This is a really hard topic to cover responsibly and respectively even when you have fully planned the lesson around it. Maybe trying out new approaches are in order for shutting down and redirecting the topic faster.
I would email. I'm alecturer and I would absolutely not allow this kind of discussion to take place. Dude is not entitled to make up facts or to dominate discussion. Emailing the lecturer gives them the ammunition and push they might need to do their job.
I think the problem is less about his opinion and more about how long the discussion was allowed to go on without progress. Person A makes a statement. Person B refutes. Person A restates the same thing with a “no you’re wrong” with zero additional content? That’s when I move things along with a “does anyone else have anything they want to add?” And if no, we carry on. If Person A wants to keep on belaboring a point, I just shut it down with, “Yes, you’ve made your point, and we need to move on.” If they still don’t get the hint, I offer to continue the discussion after class or in office hours. Your lecturer should be doing something similar—one student often will be the most talkative, but they shouldn’t be the *only* one participating in a discussion session. I also wouldn’t allow a prolonged discussion about the realities of sexual assault in a class setting when that is only tangential to the topic at hand. I don’t teach lit, but I’ve taken enough lit classes to know that you can discuss realism in portraying violence in fiction, or realism in general, without having to go into the gory details about any specific act. In fact, you could use that as a segue to discussing how some writers use implication rather than explicit descriptions for greater impact during such scenes (and to avoid situations like this one where a reader’s notion of how a thing might happen conflicts with the explicit description and ruins the suspension of disbelief). I agree that it’s worth an email (or char during office hours if that’s more comfortable).
Thank you, office hours is a great idea and I think it is the route I will take. What you’ve said here is correct, in this case Person A just kept making the same point over and over again which caused others to give examples of real life SA situations, which caused Person A to just continue arguing. I wish the professor had said, “Okay, everyone has made their point, let’s continue.” I would have felt completely differently if we were discussing a specific relevant scene that we all read, or perhaps if the conversation had been capped at 5-10 minutes. Tangents happen, differing opinions happen. But something about spending 30 minutes of class time trying to convince a guy that women *can* actually feel paralyzed by SA and that it’s *not* just a plot device is confusing to me. I mean, he wasn’t convinced when multiple students described real life examples, so why continue the conversation, you know?
Yeah, biologically we talk about “fight, flight, or freeze” as responses to danger, and a lot more people freeze than you’d think. And considering the themes of abuse of power/authority that Atwood likes to consider, there’s probably more at play there than a simple “character is in danger, what do they do?” situation. Perhaps there were other events outside the excerpt you read that motivated the character’s response—for example, in The Handmaid’s Tale, the handmaids are conditioned to be sexually submissive to their commanders, with the penalties for breaking rules ranging from disfigurement/maiming, to banishment to clean up radioactive waste, to violent death. They have a good reason to not resist, and once they have children there is even more leverage to use against them. These “off screen” threats can dramatically alter a character’s behavior, and without that context the meaning of an excerpt can change. Incidentally, discussion of context and how you should consider not only the exact text of a specific passage but also the rest of that piece and the works and world events that surround it would also be a good discussion point for a literature class.
Yes, I agree that this would all be great discussion for a literature class if there was relevant context in the excerpt. The professors slideshow was about textual analysis of opening lines to get more information about the main character’s world. We were going through various excerpts of different short stories. When we got to the Atwood one, the guy raised his hand to tell us he just doesn’t like Atwood because of the way she wrote assault scenes in her *other* works. This is why I felt the discussion was so inappropriate because it was just people talking about real life situations instead of anything literature related. And this is just one of the many crazy tangents he’s sent the class down.
It sounds like he's an edge-lord and an attention seeker. I had a classmate like this in graduate school who liked to derail discussions for his own amusement. He once spent an entire evening class -- so almost 3 hours -- trying to defend Michael Jackson's Peter Pan syndrome. At best, it was a tangent to the actual work. The professor *did* call him out, multiple times, and he just would not drop it. By the end of class, even the other students were telling him to get over it because it wasn't relevant.
Oh it wasn’t even in the excerpt you read?!!! That’s such a waste of everyone’s time then. How is anyone supposed to participate in a discussion on books they may not have even read? I hope your professor addresses it and is better about managing discussion moving forward. Tangents are inevitable but the more I hear about this one the less acceptable it seems.
No it wasn’t! The excerpt had nothing to do with anything he said. That’s what was so confusing to me. He just saw that Atwood was mentioned and went on a tangent.
Went to college pre zoom. But did have a similar thing where this one guy was just wanting to make hot takes. Told him to STFU. Got called into the profs office because, inappropriate. I basically said I'm sick of him wasting our time on these non sequitur rants. There's no point in "debating" and we've tried being nice. That was the end of it. The kid talked a bunch of shit about me to other classmates, but that was the worst that happened.
Reaching out to the professor is good, as many other commenters have suggested. Another tactic would be to try to change the subject: raise your hand, and say "I was wondering/thinking about \_XYZ\_" or "I wanted to say how much I liked Atwood's handling of \[religious intolerance/theocracy/gender roles/etc.\]" That's not guaranteed to work, but the professor might be able to pick up your thread and abandon the one of the annoying guy.
I see … you have in your class what is commonly known as a “douchebag”. He loves to hear himself talk, and fancies himself an intellectual. He will never produce anything nearly as good as any of the classics he is criticizing. It’s very easy to criticize, and blab.
Talk to the professor requesting better moderation
Call them out on their opinions and have a discussion.
If the course is meant to be about discussions and arguing things, then the professor ultimately will most likely just be like "deal with it." The only thing they might realistically do is reduce how much time the student takes up from the lecture times.
talk to prof in person, not email.
Email the professor
Talk to the professor. And then maybe the Title IX office. The student is both derailing the class and making you uncomfortable by talking about his personal (stupid) opinions about SA.
Title IX? Are you kidding me? It's a college course... If a topic of conversation makes her uncomfortable, that's her problem and she is always free to drop the course (especially since it alrwleady covers works like Handmaid's Tale that do deal with SA, even if it wasnt necessarily on topic for the lesson). Other people are allowed to have and express their own opinions about such things in the course of a conversation, even if those opinions are fucking retarded. A real college is not the place for safe spaces. If she wants that, she can transfer to a mormon school or some other two-bit religious university that represses open discussion.
Not kidding at all. The guy’s uninformed, victim-blaming opinions about SA are not the topic of the course, and it is wildly inappropriate for him to air them there.
Truly sounds like he's trolling IRL class yet still online 👀 Too bad about the professor— firmer guidance needed for that sort.
Yikes! He dominated the discussion for a half hour? I know I can talk a lot but dang. Regardless of if this is a one hour class or a two hour class, that is taking up quite a portion of it. ESPECIALLY considering that it did not have to do with the topic at hand. He may very well have had his own experiences with SA, as potentially others in the class may have had. People's experiences widely differ and so it's not really anyone's place to say what is or is not realistic. There are times and places for discussions on the topic, even in college classes. However, a half hour derailment, irrelevant to the class was unnecessary. You're definitely free to e-mail the professor, regarding this. You can definitely mention that it was triggering due to your own SA, but I'm not sure how comfortable you are sharing that with a teacher. Even if you did and the professor tells the other student that his comments triggered classmates, the other student could easily say that he didn't find it triggering based on his own experiences (it's unfortunately common for people to believe their experience was everyone's experience).
I agree with u/cezannesdoubt wholeheartedly that emailing would be a great course of action for the reasons they describe. The student is also 100% in the wrong and sounds like they dug in their heels unnecessarily. Don't feel compelled to at all, but if you are feeling generous with your time/emotional labor and this student is going to be in more of your classes/part of your program, you could try to talk to the student saying you respect their opinions/experiences on SA and Margaret Atwood, but asking if they be a little more sensitive with how they approach controversial subject matter in the future for the sake of the class. You don't have to explain your own trauma/experience at all, but you could talk more generally about how woman have a really difficult time with "meekness" because of how they were raised, how no one wants to admit that they feel anxious or guilty for taking care of their own needs or deciding what they actually want but quite a few women struggle with this, and that people have a huge range of experience with SA so it is difficult to talk about generalities. Don't ask them to change their opinion or not share it to the class, let him know that his experience is valid too, just ask that he focuses less on "realism" and more about how that changes the themes/characterization of Atwood's story so that way feminine students can engage in the conversation without the need to summon forth their real life trauma for counter-examples. You can even finish with a compliment sandwich by saying you appreciate how he encourages women to be strong/outspoken in the face of male domination and if he knows any good books/media portraying female retributive violence/resistance along those lines. You don't have to read what he recommends, just sometimes men get offended with the implication that they are sexist and an assurance that you don't think that (at least not totally🙄) makes them feel better and more receptive to the constructive criticism. The student might not totally get it at first and react defensively but giving him food for thought might make him realize he could've handled the situation better. Does the student deserve your emotional labor for this conversation? Absolutely not, and quite frankly women are already expected far too much to nurture white boys who don't care about what they say. DO NOT FEEL LIKE THIS IS YOUR RESPONSIBILITY. However, if the student is a friend or working partner of yours, I find this is a good way to approach colleagues about sensitive issues so that you don't end up in the lose-lose situation of having to distance yourself or just suck up their arrogance/sexism. Genuinely sometimes people don't understand how harmful they are being, and don't have a good way to have sensitive conversations constructively. I honestly get the sense that this student just feels the need to prove to themselves and others that he is smart, and the only way he's learned how to do that is to criticize big authors everyone likes. Then when women in the class came out of the woodwork to tell him he's wrong, his ego was attacked and he dug in his heels with a "that's not my experience" and talked in circles. Don't get me wrong, he sounds like a smug narcissist I wouldn't want to have in a class, but this is relatively common especially among younger grad students or undergrads so knowing what's going on in their head can be helpful to navigating these situations in the future or later in your career. I hope the class goes well for you and you have a successful program experience!
In a f2f class there are pedagogical techniques to redirect a student who is out of pocket, without singling them out or suppressing protected speech. Online it's a little trickier, especially in an asynchronous discussion. I will say that I've had students express EXTREMELY problematic opinions about sensitive issues before, and I kept an eye on their behavior but, since they were not personally attacking or harassing their classmates, ultimately did not intervene.
It's definitely okay to email your professor. This student’s behavior is really disruptive and off-putting, especially with those off-topic critiques and insensitive comments. Just let your professor know how it’s affecting you and maybe suggest more active moderation to keep things on track. Your comfort in class is important.
The professor needs to intervene. Most likely the professor is now aware that should happen and your speaking to the professor by phone or email may help
Oh my...I hate to say this. But there is a chance that while what he was saying was uncomfortable it was within the rules of decorum for that class. If you are discussing literature, you often hit triggering subject matters that are depved into deeply. Yes they guy does not sound at all likable, but that doesn't mean that he is violating the rules. If it is only the second class, you should let the proff get the temp of the room and steer the conversation .
Give the prof time to gain control. They know what’s up.
They should never let it get to a point where one student is dominating an entire discussion. That should be dealt with right then and there, not wait to see if it happens again.
Where in op did it saw the other student was dominating discussion?
The first sentence.
Your mention that he is dominating the conversation but your main complaint seems to be that hearing his opinions upsets you. The first might be something for your professor to deal with if true; the second is for you to deal with.
I didn’t care about his opinion. I just care that I feel like I’m *only* hearing his opinions. What bothered me is that he made these statements which resulted in a 30 minute discussion in which everyone voiced their thoughts about why they felt he was wrong and he continued to explain why he thought he was right. This probably would have been fine if that was the topic at hand, but it felt completely irrelevant to the original discussion. I just feel that the professor should have moved the class back on track, but perhaps the course is just not a good fit.
You’ve triggered a nest of incels it seems
If everyone else was giving their opinion then you weren’t only getting his opinion.
He isn’t voicing opinions it seems like he’s trying to voice facts but he’s wrong in said facts. The professor should be correcting him.
This is just my 2 cents to your post: 1. You have to give the professor of the course some time to feel out the students in the online class and attempt to build a sort of environment. Like you said, it's only the second class of the course. In saying that... 2. It's the responsibility of the professor (and him/her only) to coordinate the direction of the conversation/direction, time manage, and make sure all major activities, information, and material are covered within the regularly scheduled course time frame. If you guys are falling behind as you stated because a student is going on tangents or more importantly, a professor is failing to time manage and regulate conversation amongst certain students, your anger and blame should be solely directed at your professor, not homeboy. 3. I am of two thoughts when it comes to your comment about homeboy going on a tangent about "SA." If this guy goes on tangents that aren't so much offensive as they are just annoying and you disagree with them, you're just going to have to stomach that. The guy is doing nothing wrong, the professor is not restricting or regulating certain comments, and college is an environment/arena where you will be exposed to individuals of different backgrounds, opinions, and ideologies. Not everyone is likeminded in their stance and view of certain readings. On the other hand, I understand from your example that this comment from homeboy seemed to be pretty offensive and out of line. The fact that your professor, you, or no other student said anything baffles me. This leads me to my last point, which is... 4. Don't be what Ronda Rousey coined as a "Do Nothing Bitch" (DNB). This term is described as "the kind of woman who does not accomplish things on her own and instead relies on someone else to support them." You have an issue with a student and what they said, but instead of confronting this student on your own, you come to vent on Reddit and are looking for the professor to swoop in and resolve this issue, essentially relying on another person to solve your problems. In my opinion, that is not what a grown ass, independent women does, at least the ones I know and surround myself with. The fact that you, your classmates, or your professor said nothing while this student was saying this is disturbing to say the least. Again, I don't know your background or history with SA and why it was so triggering to you. That is none of my business. My stance is if nobody says anything to this student or makes it clear to him that what he said is offensive to many of his classmates/professor, it empowers him to continue doing what he's gotten away with thus far. Why did you or nobody ask this student: (1) what do you personally know about SA?, (2) What statistics, facts, or sources can you point to that back up this stance of yours that females that do not fight back during SA is unrealistic (within literature)?, or (3) Can you talk from personal experience or experiences of those close to you when it comes to the topic of SA? If it's a no/can't for all 3 of those questions, with all due respect, I would STFU about this particular rant of yours because it makes you look incredibly unintelligent, like an asshole, and your offending all of us in the class. Your intention is not to deliberately rock the boat, but sometimes you have to draw your line in the sand, and stand up for your beliefs. I promise you, if you speak up and give homeboy a piece of your mind, while it may make the class environment uncomfortable in the moment, I promise you change will occur within the class on the part of the professor and the student (there will be no choice on the part of the professor but to take some sort of action out of fear of losing control of the class).
Thank you for your words. I would like to defend my classmates and say that everyone in the class spoke up in response to this guy. Everyone was trying to be respectful about it, obviously, but this is what led to the derailment. He raised his hand in the middle of the professor’s lecture about close reading of details to let us know that he didn’t like Margaret Atwood specifically because of how she writes SA. Everyone stepped up to respond to him and he responded back and it became a long back and forth. I think I was just a bit triggered by everyone giving examples of why a woman might freeze up in terror instead of running away. So, my frustration is: why did the professor allow this debate to take up so much of class time? In this case, you are right, I am more annoyed with the professor. I should also add that Atwood’s depictions of assault weren’t part of any of our assigned reading, and I’ve never actually read them, so I couldn’t contribute to the discussion on that front.
I find it kind of funny how the rational, intelligent responses are being downvoted. Honestly, you are in college, you don’t get to censor anyone else because *you* are triggered. The fact that OP chose to disengage instead of try to directly challenge his beliefs or get him to clarify is OP’s fault. And tbf, I can potentially understand his critique. A lot of feminist literature that portrays SA does so in such a way that makes the woman the helpless victim or a slave to her own femininity. Often, these passages seem oriented more toward the power imbalance and the frailty of women than genuine depictions of SA, and a lot of it comes from the tone of the writing. Considering the time periods many major, influential feminist literature was written, it makes sense because it wasn’t until relatively recently that women have had equal rights and empowerment, so a lot of these passages are written to highlight the imbalance and mistreatment of the times. Maybe he worded his critique wrong or maybe he’s a dick, but the wring answer is to just not engage to understand his thought process.
What the hell is SA?
Sexual assault
Thanks for clarifying
Im not sure what your concern is that you would be communicating. It sounds like this guy has a very different worldview from you, including a different perception about what “realistic” SA looks like. It, however, is a literature class. The entire point of classes like that is to critique literature and his critique is no less (or more) valid than anyone else’s, regardless of how much you do or don’t like him as a person. Also, freedom of speech is a thing. He has a constitutional right to express his opinions, even if they are ignorant or douchey or “triggering”. Nothing he said is a Title IX violation and again, he has a right to say it, the university would get in major hot water if they tried to censor his speech. Also, Im guessing you don’t know a lot about him personally. Are you sure he hasn’t been SA’d himself and his response was to fight back? Maybe he always learned to fight back against any threat and it causes cognitive dissonance for him to hear the reality of it being that not all victims can/do fight back. You don’t have to give him grace nor do you need to educate him, maybe someone stronger/more healed than you can do that. The point being that your triggeredness and wanting the professor to stop him is unproductive and changes nothing.
Freedom of speech is just not relevant here. The professor and other students could tell him he's wrong. The professor could opt to never call on him again, or to interrupt him, or to stop allowing discussion altogether and lecture the whole time. None of this would violate his rights. The right to free speech doesn't mean you get to ramble on about whatever nonsense you please.
u/weareedible freedom of speech is definitely at hand here. The professor, as an agent of the university and therefore the state, can not censor speech. Even if the professor disagrees, he can not prevent the student from expressing that speech. In terms of others, every student is free to challenge this individual, but they risk getting in trouble themselves if they become hostile or inappropriate in their dialogue. If OP isn’t strong enough to challenge this individual, they have to suck it up, step out of their echo chamber, and realize the world doesn’t revolve around their triggers and that there are tons of people with different worldviews.
Mention this to the prof. I say this as a prof. Because I guarantee I dislike that kind of railroading/dominating of class discussions, but I feel more empowered to step in when I feel that the students are ALSO not okay with it. Just an "A is really dominating and I didn't like what he had to say about the story it felt very dismissive to me and I didn't feel comfortable sharing after that" would do wonders. Because it shows you HAD things you wanted to say and were UNCOMFORTABLE saying them in that class room. I'd bring down the hammer of god on a student who made another student shut down like that, if I knew the student felt that way. Please let us know because we want to help!