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No jibber jabber1/8/2024 ![]() ![]() Rather than considering the possibility that there could be genuine self-censorship she muses: “… the mere fact that a student or professor has silenced themselves in class doesn’t establish that anyone’s expressive or academic freedom has been compromised. But Dea shows no awareness that any student in her or anyone else’s classes has ever been uncomfortable. One would expect that any professor concerned about the intellectual wellbeing of all her students would address Heather’s concern. Since this time, I have spoken to professors at a few universities about freedom of expression and they agree that less popular perspectives, regardless of how well substantiated by empirical research, can result in marginalization of faculty and students” (Heather / Decemat 11:20). For example, one commenter on Dea 2018a wrote: “… When it comes to a point that students are seeking out psychotherapy (an hour away for fear of academic sanctions if they pursue it closer to home, no less), there is a freedom of expression crisis. Even less does it follow that all who remain silent are comfortable. From the fact that occasionally some excessive chatterboxes should be shushed to allow for productive conversation, it does not follow that all shushing is justified. But those who feel their voices are frequently excluded or fear expressing their views and do self-censor are unlikely to be ignorant of such trivialities. And to listen, one must be quiet” (Dea, 2019). If no one listens, no ideas are exchanged. But without listening, speech would be pointless. This exchange is often characterized in terms of speech alone, with no mention of listening. Rather, people need to be quiet at times so they can listen to others: “We are often told that a free exchange of ideas is essential to the university. Dea describes several cases where silence indeed would be preferable over speech and attempts to convince readers that in our universities no one has to self-censor. I suggest that the jibber jabber about the proverb was merely an excuse for Dea to once again (for earlier examples see Dea 2018a, 2018b) trivialize the concerns of those who believe they have to “self-censor because they are afraid of the possible consequences of some controversial speech” (Dea, 2019). ![]() So given that most Canadians and immigrants are probably familiar with one version of this proverb, one has to wonder why Dea would unleash such a flood of words defending it. Many languages have a proverb expressing the idea that speech is silver but silence is golden: Reden ist Silber, Schweigen ist Gold (German), La parole est d’argent, le silence est d’or (French), Слово - серебро, молчание - золото (Russian), إذا كان الكلام من فضة، فالسكوت من ذهب (Arabic), en boca cerrada no entran moscas (loose lips sink ships, Spanish), 言わぬが花 (not to speak is a flower, Japanese), “diam-diam ubi berisi” (the silent sweet-potato is full of substance Indonesian). Recently, academic freedom guru Shannon Dea (University of Waterloo) published a 1270+ word essay titled “Sometimes refraining from speech is good”.
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