Lower division article: a breakdown

Is It Me Or Are We Going Too Far?

It’s you.

More and more I feel like I’m losing touch with the world we live in. 

Strong lede. You’ve established yourself as the type of person I would like to listen to.

Yes I realize that it’s largely due to my age

No, please, you’re being too hard on yourself. I think it’s ABOUT TIME we hear more from the middle-aged, straight white male point of view, especially when it comes to matters of inclusivity.

but I always through I was pretty understanding when it came to change and the need to accept it. 

“I always through I was pretty understanding”

I’m not sure I can say that any longer.

Technically you couldn’t say it just now.

Within the last few days my beloved Penn State University, which got eight years of my money as a parent of two graduates has as one newspaper called it, “become the latest college to make a move towards wokemania.”  That may be strong but it also may be correct.

I’ve never quite been able to understand the apparent deep, emotional connection people feel toward the multi-billion-dollar institutions they paid tens of thousands of dollars for other people to attend and/or paid thousands of dollars to attend themselves. It took me 17 years to pay off my student loan and I let out a hearty LOL every time my alma mater hits me up for money. But sure, rah rah.

“One newspaper.” I’m going to assume it’s not name-dropped because it’s a terrible newspaper.

The university’s faculty senate has approved a new resolution that will remove “gendered” and “binary” language from the school’s program and course descriptions that are considered not to be inclusive.  In a document released that explains the rational for the change, “the University, as with most all academic institutions world-wide, has grown out of a typically male-centered world and as such many terms in our lexicon carry a strong, male-centric, binary character to them.”

OK, cool. Not cool?

So what does this mean? 

Yes, what DOES this mean and how it will impact MY life?

Terms like freshman, sophomore, junior and senior will be replaced by first year, second year, etc.  Upperclassmen and underclassmen will go away with terms like lower division and upper division replacing them.  The resolution said the current words are “decidedly male-specific” or in some cases “both sexist and classist.” In addition the school is looking to get rid of gendered pronouns like him/her and he/she with them/they as it will make students feel more comfortable.

OH NO!

Stealing a question from someone on Twitter

Always a good journalistic practice, to attempt to enhance your non-argument with a hypothetical from a Twitter rando, but please, go ahead:

in reference to the school’s nickname, “How long before the male term Nittany Lion is replaced by the gender neutral Eastern Cougar?’ 

To get this straight: The worst theoretical outcome of this progression toward inclusivity would be having to wear a T-shirt with a cougar on it instead of a lion? 

I certainly hope it’s after I’ve left this world.

“I would literally rather die than witness my children’s college slightly alter their pretend mascot” is a helluva stand, but OK.

There is plenty to be mad about re: Penn State—ONE THING COMES TO MIND—including its nearly $4.3 billion endowment. Having to use the term “first-year” instead of “freshman” is not one of them. There is no way in hell that anyone, including the author of this nonsense, is actually upset about this; it will not affect his life in any discernable way whatsoever, at all, ever.

What’s fascinating—and by fascinating I mean utterly embarrassing—about this “old man yells at cloud” nonsense is its inherent rejection of the notion that the minor inconvenience of having to adjust to something new and unfamiliar might be a “sacrifice” worth making in the interest of numerous people feeling seen, acknowledged, and accepted. It demands an exploration of what, exactly, is so “beloved” about an institution if not the human beings who make it up.