A PRE-EMPTIVE “NONOFFENSIVE” STRIKE
How do you roll out acceptable standards in your classroom or workplace to minimize the chances of anyone getting offended? What steps do YOU need to take? Here are a few steps to consider:
3 STEPS:
1. Careful Review---Carefully review your humor, music, videos, or any other form of media you plan on using. If you have any reservations about their appropriateness, DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT!
2. Peer Review---Pick 2 or 3 colleagues to review your material regularly before you use it, especially if you have any doubts. A fresh perspective or 3 can be eyeball opening to what you didn't see in your review.
3. Setting the Standards---On the 1st class of the semester OR other appropriate time with co-workers,
a. set standards for offensive material with everyone involved. You propose and define the categories and adjust accordingly based on their feedback. Make sure everyone is clear on what is appropriate and inappropriate material---where the LINE IS DRAWN, and
b. issue a disclaimer to all students OR employees regarding your own behavior to hold you accountable to those standards, such as
“Should I ever offend anyone with anything I say or do, or any print material, music, or videos offend you, please know it wasn’t intended. I may make mistakes. Tell me about any material that offends you so I can change it before the next class or semester.”
This 3b disclaimer is extremely important. We rarely hear that anywhere. Instead, to the contrary, we hear performers and, possibly, even our colleagues and friends tell us they don’t care who they offend. They often do that with great pride, puffing themselves up, as if offending people intentionally and having no respect for another person’s values or principles is a badge of honor. That should not be your position in the classroom or workplace.
If the preceding steps are taken regularly, you should be able to minimize offensive jokes and media from rearing their ugliness in your workplace and, more importantly, minimize the chances of hurting the people with whom you work every day. At least, when you do make mistakes, and you will, you’ll be prepared to handle them appropriately.
Well, that’s the end of my offensive blog series. Can you believe it? I know you couldn't wait for my anti-climatic, predictable finale. I hope at least one idea hit you that was of value to think about in your teaching or position in the workplace. Let me know your thoughts.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
PUT-DOWNS
Ya gotta love ‘em. Most everybody does it. The put-down may be the most ubiquitous form of humor. Everywhere we look, from Leno to Conan (Where ever you are!) to Letterman, to images of professionals on sitcoms, to colleagues, and even to our closest friends and our families, the put-down is inescapable.
Check out the regular insults spewed by Dr. Gregory House (played by Hugh Laurie) at his colleagues, boss, associates, and patients on House. Lawyer Denny Crane (played by William Shatner) on the now defunct, but great, TV series Boston Legal was just as insensitive in his put-downs of racial and religious groups and people with physical disabilities.
DISPARAGEMENT HUMOR: Tendentious or disparagement humor belittles an individual or group that has been victimized, or that has suffered some misfortune or act of aggression. Sometimes it is rather harmless in the context of kidding around or teasing; at other times it can be mean, cruel, and hurtful, albeit a powerful weapon for verbal abuse. Freud believed this to be an important function of humor, allowing people to express aggressive and hostile feelings in a “socially acceptable” manner. There is even research evidence that people enjoy put-downs more when they have negative attitudes toward the victim.
Although there may be a time and a place for put-down humor, such as in those over-advertised videos of Friar’s Club Celebrity Roasts emceed by the late Dean Martin and others, the classroom is definitely not the place. Even recent versions of those roasts have become mean-spirited, profane, and vulgar.
HIGHER EDUCATION EXAMPLES: In higher education as elsewhere, the perpetrator is usually in a superior position in the organizational food chain compared to the victim. Since the victim, which is often the student, administrative assistant, TA, RA, or lower rank colleague, is already in a vulnerable position, the put-down by a lofty faculty member or dean can be devastating. This behavior is part of the bullying mentality and incivility in the workplace that is on the rise.
In the classroom and department, a faculty put-down may be followed by the words, “I was just joking” or “I was only kidding.” This is the typical “redeeming” strategy to get the faculty member off the hook for the direct hit (aka put-down insult). It never does redeem and never will. Anyone who does that should be reprimanded.
SPECIFIC TARGETS TO AVOID: I suggest you avoid the following specific targets of put-downs in all forms of media in the classroom and workplace:
• Popular, entertainment, or political personalities
• Race, ethnicity, culture, nationality, gender, religion, or sexual orientation
• Physical characteristics (e.g., fat, thin, short, tall, blonde, pregnant, bald, or all of the preceding)
• Physical disabilities or handicaps
• Mental handicaps or illnesses
Also, don’t even think about these put-downs of your students, administrative assistant, TA, RA, and colleagues.
ALTERNATIVE HUMOR: Creating humor that builds your students up rather than tearing them down is not easy. However, yielding to the temptation to tear down can produce the negative consequences described previously.
Are you having fun yet? Next topic is sarcasm, which is almost as much fun as put-downs. What do you think about these issues? Have you had experiences you would like to share? Please comment.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
IMPACT ON STUDENTS (continued)
My previous blog listed 6 possible negative effects of offending any student in your class. So what’s the impact?
DISCONNECT: Does the word disconnect come to mind? It should. It's the paragraph head. Those emotional effects can squash a student’s motivation and spirit. More importantly, a single offensive comment can irreparably damage your relationships with those offended students. If collaborative learning activities are an integral part of your teaching repertoire, that collaboration could be uncomfortable or impossible based on the offensive remarks you made to any student. That student may intentionally avoid you to minimize the chance of confrontation. This is an individual issue in each offense because what is offensive to one student may not be offensive to other students.
CONNECT: The aforementioned negative effects of offensive media content are exactly the opposite of the positive effects to accrue from many of the uses of media in the first place. One primary purpose of humor, music, and videos is to improve relationships and connections by leveraging content and media to which students can relate. For example, nonoffensive humor and media content can break down barriers, relax, open up, and reduce stress, tension, and anxiety to foster connections between you and your students. It can grab and maintain the students’ attention and ability to focus or refocus on a particular point.
BEST TEACHERS: Furthermore, consider the characteristics of the “best teachers.” Use of offensive material is inconsistent with some of the affective character attributes of effective teachers, such as sensitivity, caring, understanding, compassion, and approachability.
MAJOR CATEGORIES OF OFFENSIVE CONTENT
In the humor research literature, joke types usually fit the following themes: superiority, aggression, hostility, malice, derision, cruelty, disparagement, stupidity, sex, and ethnic put-downs. Is there anything positive or nonoffensive in that list? I don’t think so.
The problem is that these themes are also prominent in music, movies, music videos, YouTube, and other media products that we could potentially use in our classroom as teaching tools. For example, some music, videos, and comedy with big name performers carry warning labels of “Adult Content.” These media have become increasing risqué by attacking and maligning the police, women, and political and “establishment” figures and issues. They are also chock full of obscenities, profanities, vulgarity, and other crude and explicit language.
I’ve identified seven major categories of offensive content: (1) put-downs, (2) sarcasm, (3) ridicule, (4) profanity, (5) vulgarity, (6) sexual content and innuendo, and (7) sensitive personal experiences. This material appears in jokes, music lyrics, and video content.
My future blogs will address those 7 categories.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
DISCLAIMER: This blog series deals with censorship in the classroom. Despite our academic freedom, the issue here is exercising your best professional judgment and discretion to set boundaries on what material could offend students and destroy your classroom environment. It is not my intention to preach, but to inform based on 30 years of teaching statistics and measurement with what most faculty would consider over-the-top methods involving humor, a variety of media, and drama. I learned the hard way at the expense of several students along my journey. I hope these blogs will spare you and your students those lessons.
METASTASIS OF OFFENSIVE MATERIAL
Offensive material is metastasizing throughout our culture. It permeates every nook and cranny and is spreading into our classrooms. Consider the following:
WRITERS, DIRECTORS, AND PERFORMERS: We already know there are whack-jobs everywhere. But here I’m thinking of specific whacky writers, directors, and performers who have lost their minds. Hannibal Lecter has dined on their brains? Why do so many (a) stand-up comedians on Comedy Central and in comedy clubs, (b) writers for commercial media, TV, and movies, and (c) singers or rappers seem addicted to content that pushes the boundaries of profanity, vulgarity, sexuality, and political incorrectness, or is just plain out there to offend?
For example, Quinton Tarantino has become infamous for the barrage of filthy, profane language, violence, and sexuality in all of his movies. If there is a substantive message to be conveyed in one of his films that would be valuable to your students, should that clip be shown?
DON’T CULTURAL NORMS SET THE STANDARD? Rather than reflecting prevailing norms and tastes, some of the content in the products of our culture seem to be lowering them. The producers have trained consumers like our impressionable students and us to accept progressively lower standards of language and behavior. For example, many movies are edgy, cryptic, potty-mouthed dramas that mutilate the old proverbial envelope. This sinking of standards enables their work to stand out in an increasingly crowded field. Profits outweigh whatever criticism results. Falling standards, consequently, become self-fulfilling. Each new breach of the existing “standard” establishes a new, lower standard that comes to be seen as the norm, at least until the next breach.
You need to define what is potentially offensive and set explicit guidelines to prevent it from invading your classroom. The next blog will tackle a definition and then move on to identifying specific types of material.
It doesn’t matter whether you agree with the list I present. The decision you have to make to where you are going to draw the line—set the standards for your classroom. Every instructor may draw the line at a different point. That LINE is the over-riding bottom line for these blogs, if you ride over lines.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
WHY STANDARDS?
The issue of offensive material in the classroom is usually not discussed. We have academic freedom to do just about anything we want under the guise of “teaching.” The problem is that NOW the intersection of our culture with the technology has significantly changed the rules of the game.
Yup, the Standards Police have arrived! BEWARE! As many of you already know, I have written on this topic in all of my books and several articles and blogs. Why? Because what we model or permit in the classroom, especially anything negative or contentious, will most likely be emulated by our students and pushed to the next level.
We have a responsibility to set appropriate guidelines and standards in our classroom as a learning environment and in our workplace. We need to filter what is in the culture before it contaminates our domains and diminishes our control and effectiveness. We need to sift through all of the material and extract what is positive, uplifting, and constructive to facilitate learning, not impede it. Anything that can offend our students can destroy their learning spirit and our classroom atmosphere.
SO WHERE’S THE PROBLEM?
The problem is (Are you ready? Do you want the truth? Can you handle the truth?): Media in our culture are OUT OF CONTROL. What we read, listen to, and see on TV, the Internet (particularly YouTube and social media), and Comedy Central, and in movies, theaters, and comedy clubs is now stretching the limits of decency. Much of that material is blatantly offensive and would be inappropriate in the classroom. I’m not saying that it is not entertaining; it just doesn’t belong in your classroom or department.
This blog series will address this problem and how you can set standards for a safe, productive, yet, also exciting, learning environment. I hope you will stick around.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
