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[acrimone]

Supernumerary said, in another thread in this section:

I have sometimes given examples in class (in a lighthearted tone) and a student comes up afterwards and says 'hey, that happened to my family, it's a really serious thing'. That doesn't mean I should never say lighthearted stuff in class in case a student has a personal experience of it in a serious context. There's always someone with a serious experience of lighthearted stuff, and I really don't think it's fair to assume that people are being dismissive because they make lighthearted remarks about stuff that happens in class.

So let's say that you say something funny in your lecture, and someone takes offense.  The complaint is something like this:

"I didn't appreciate your joke about radioactive waste, professor.  Six of my family members died in an accidental spill."

How do you respond?  I would (and have) said something along these lines:

"Well Catherine, I'm very sorry for your loss, and I'm glad you feel comfortable bringing these sorts of things up, but I must confess that I'm a bit confused as to why exactly you are telling me this, or what it is you would like me to do."

The students, on both occassions, have looked at me with a sort of stupefied caught-in-the-headlights sort of look, then mumbled "Never mind" and walked off.  I consider this a very satisfactory resolution.

How do you deal with this?

[oldchair]

This post raises an interesting question.  On the one hand, if we constantly question whether or not we might offend a student, we will not only rob our classes of spirit and humor, but we'll also censure ourselves in ways that might ultimately limit our ability to explore important ideas.  It would be the final nightmare of political correctness. 

On the other hand, we should never overlook our own ability to be insensitive  to the real pain of others nor to the pain that our words cann inflict--however light-hearted we intend for them to be. 

Maybe the best approach is to offer the student a sincere apology.  You certainly didn't intend to be hurtful, and you shouldn't put yourself in a position where YOU decide whether or not  a student's emotions are valid and appropriate.  Try something like, "I'm very sorry for your family's loss.  Had I known, I would have offered a different example or used a different tone.  I didn't mean to cause you pain or trivialize your suffering."

This is the kind of statement I would make to a friend.  In this circumstance, I think a student deserves the same courtesy.

[anthroid]

"Well Catherine, I'm very sorry for your loss, and I'm glad you feel comfortable bringing these sorts of things up, but I must confess that I'm a bit confused as to why exactly you are telling me this, or what it is you would like me to do."

I stop after "I'm very sorry for your loss."  Why do you need to say anything else?  Certainly you don't need to justify the example.  Really.  I mean that.  How were you supposed to have known?  Common human decency requires that you offer condolences, but I don't really go beyond that.  Why would I?  And, BTW, this has happened to me (though, to be honest, not about radioactive waste related deaths.  It had to do with a moose and a--well, you don't really need to know.  *sob*).

[acrimone]

I add the rest of that because I think it's important to get the student thinking about why they are complaining to the professor in the first place.  The fact that you are angry or upset or sad doesn't provide a basis, by itself, for the type of complaint we're talking about.  (At least not in Professor Acrimone's world view, it doesn't.)  I think that even students whose families were completely destroyed by a rampaging hormonal moose need to understand that the world goes on, and that they aren't entitled to a moose-free existence, and that some of their professors are really going to love Bullwinkle.  So by asking the student what it is they want (in the nicest way I can while still actually doing it) I'm asking them to examine their motivations and to make a determination of whether complaining to me is really a productive course of action or not, because frankly I find it just a bit inappropriate.

Have you ever seen "The Ghost and the Darkness"?  Good film.  There's a scene there were this guy hires another guy to build a bridge and says he wants it done by X date.  The other guy says that he'll have it done hopefully before then, because he's got a child on the way and would like to be back for Christmas.  The boss says something to the effect of "Well, I'm touched that you'd share the details of your family life with me in so intimate a fashion.  But I don't give a f*ck about your impending litter.  I want my bridge built."

Large swaths of the world (including much of academia) work like that, and rightly so, I think.  But I'm not a monster like the guy in that movie, so I try to correct inappropriate behavior, as I can, as gently as I can.  But I don't let it go without comment, either.

[francie_]

"Well Catherine, I'm very sorry for your loss, and I'm glad you feel comfortable bringing these sorts of things up, but I must confess that I'm a bit confused as to why exactly you are telling me this, or what it is you would like me to do."

The students, on both occasions, have looked at me with a sort of stupefied caught-in-the-headlights sort of look, then mumbled "Never mind" and walked off.  I consider this a very satisfactory resolution.

No.  I do not consider this a satisfactory resolution, and I was going to say that if I were the student, I would hope that there is a special place in hell for such a professor. 

But then I read this:

Have you ever seen "The Ghost and the Darkness"?  Good film.  There's a scene there were this guy hires another guy to build a bridge and says he wants it done by X date.  The other guy says that he'll have it done hopefully before then, because he's got a child on the way and would like to be back for Christmas.  The boss says something to the effect of "Well, I'm touched that you'd share the details of your family life with me in so intimate a fashion.  But I don't give a f*ck about your impending litter.  I want my bridge built."

Large swaths of the world (including much of academia) work like that, and rightly so, I think.  But I'm not a monster like the guy in that movie, so I try to correct inappropriate behavior, as I can, as gently as I can.  But I don't let it go without comment, either.

The plot is oddly familiar.  Oh yes, Dickens also wrote a story about a boss like that.  Funny thing though, Scrooge did not start out that way and he didn't end up that way.  Thus, there is hope for change, for compassion.

Acrimone, I hope you will be visited by three spirits this night: The Ghosts of Tenure Past, of Tenure Present, and of Post-Tenure Review.  Sleep well.

P.S.  You misspelled "occasions."  I corrected it here.  You're welcome.

[prytania3]

I'd say, "Radio active waste? DON'T BOTHER ME WITH RADIO ACTIVE WASTE--I GOT A MARGIN CALL!"

[anthroid]

Oh, I don't know.  If I don't want to hear about how Bullwinkle frightens them to pieces and flying squirrels are really the work of Beelzebub, I had better not ask anything and just say, somewhat dismissively, "oh, that's a shame."  I really agree, acri.  We can't be protected from all things unpleasant that happened to us.  If we were, I wouldn't agree to talk to you since lawyers were mean to me in the past. 

But I don't see any point in encouraging the discussion with the student beyond acknowledging that the person said something.

And how did you know it was a raging hormonal moose that killed my student's family while they were living in Alaska because the dad financed med school by agreeing to medicate in an underserved area and the good citizens of Cicely, Alaska picked him to go there?

Oh, wait.  That's tv.

[acrimone]

Well, the point is that if the student had an answer to my question, I'd be delighted to talk to them.

[dr_stones]

At some point in time, these youngsters have to recognize that the entire world will be neither aware of, nor sensitive to, their particular life experience. 

There is no right to not be offended, and for every terrible thing that happened to them or their family that was a source of general humor, there are another thousand things that happened to someone else, that the student in question laughed about.

Tell them it wasn't personal, that they should grow a sense of humor, and that they should then go forth to document (for themselves and everyone else) every topic that might seem offensive and is therefore verboten in lecture.  ;)

[anthroid]

Yeah.  Like boogers and farts.

[humanitiesanon]

I once was a student in a Latin class where the instructor made  some extremely insensitive remarks while teaching a poem about Lucretia (as in the Rape of Lucretia).
I was one of about 7 women in the class.  There were about 5 young men.  The instructor was a woman.  She made the old offhand joke about "relaxing and enjoying."  I was shocked that she would say something like that when statistically, there was a chance that one of the women in the class had actually been a victim of rape. 

I think she was way out of line, and I wish I had had the nerve to say something right there in the middle of class.  I still regret that I said nothing.

[fizxdude]

If somebody takes offense at something that you say in your lecture, then merely tell them that you are sorry that they found the comment offensive, and leave it at that.  Unless you made a comment that was obviously in poor taste, it is their problem, not yours. 

[acrimone]

I was shocked that she would say something like that when statistically, there was a chance that one of the women in the class had actually been a victim of rape. 

Statistically there's a chance that one of the women in the class had been visited by little green men and given the key to an interdimensional portal, too.  And that one had had family killed by a raging hormonal moose.  I'm not entirely sure what you are trying to say, here.  Could you be a bit more precise?

[supernumerary]

If somebody takes offense at something that you say in your lecture, then merely tell them that you are sorry that they found the comment offensive, and leave it at that.  Unless you made a comment that was obviously in poor taste, it is their problem, not yours. 

I like your test, fizxdude - personal experiences of students are irrelevant, but I agree that we shouldn't make jokes or comments in poor taste. If a student says 'I think your joke about rape was in poor taste' that's something we can discuss. I would also respect a student saying 'jokes about rape are not funny'. But not 'You shouldn't have made that joke about rape, because my sister was raped'. The mere fact that something happened to a student/their family/friends shouldn't make it off-limits for jokes or lighthearted remarks.

[crazybatlady]

I was shocked that she would say something like that when statistically, there was a chance that one of the women in the class had actually been a victim of rape. 

Statistically there's a chance that one of the women in the class had been visited by little green men and given the key to an interdimensional portal, too.  And that one had had family killed by a raging hormonal moose.  I'm not entirely sure what you are trying to say, here.  Could you be a bit more precise?

Acrimone, the statistic is 1 in 4 women will be sexually assaulted.  I think the number is even higher among certain college populations (within the greek system, for example, I suspect most girls are sexually assaulted).

In any case, I used to like you but lately I don't.  Have you been visited by a little green man who replaced the real you with a cyborg?