Students Who Want ‘Safe Spaces’ Should Avoid Alan Dershowitz And My House

Alan Dershowitz, Harvard Law professor and frequent commentator, lashed out on a New York radio station, calling university students a “bunch of hypocrites," He went on to add that students want everything their own way and ‘safe spaces’ are just another form of kowtowing to the student body.

‘Safe spaces,’ if you’re not familiar with the term, have emerged on campuses where students can go to avoid criticism and foul language. Universities and colleges have provided these safe refuges as a way to keep "students’ morale high and their sense of entitlement even higher."

Dershowitz says it’s hypocrisy because they want all sorts of freedoms, yet, the moment they hear anyone else exercise their freedoms, they suddenly become like Hindu idols, holding hands over their eyes, ears and mouth at the same time.

On top of that, there’s another trend Dershowitz is particularly worried about, since he’s been the target on numerous occasions. This involves students engaging in the somewhat silly but proven effective pursuit of filling their mouths with saliva and expectorating on someone they disagree with.

“They’re prepared to spit on people going out of lectures,” Dershowitz said, wiping his sweater.

In all fairness, students are prepared to spit on people going into lectures as well. That’s a lot of spitting in the hallowed halls of learning, particularly at places like Johns Hopkins University where tuitions are so high, students should save their saliva. They may need it when they receive the bill for their tuition. Students spit like lizards when they discover they’ll be in debt for the next twenty years.

Dershowitz, by the way, is a highly regarded lawyer and the youngest professor to ever teach Harvard Law, so being spit on is a bit much, especially since he doesn’t spit back. In fact, he’s surprised he’s getting spit on at all, considering he was a rebellious student himself. During his early years, he was a strong defender of ‘free speech,’ something he sees being lost today as students hide from micro-aggression, commonly known as “being mean.”

“This idea of safe places and stopping yourself from being micro-aggressed,” Dershowitz said. “My God, sense of humor has disappeared from college campuses.”

Numerous comedians feel the same way and no longer want to perform at college campuses, including Chris Rock and Jerry Seinfeld. The late George Carlin stopped performing at universities and colleges, even though that’s where he found “his true voice in comedy during the seventies.” Those were the days when you could give “The 7 words You Can’t Say on TV,” which now would be met with mass ear-covering and a resounding chorus of “La, la, la, la!”

Freedom of speech is a double-edged sword, liberating on one hand since you can say what you want, and irritating on the other because students don’t feel you should say what you want. They’ve even started asking comedians for their routines in advance so they can edit profane words. At one commencement ceremony, they had “saliva depots” in case Bill Maher showed up.

It sure doesn’t take much to upset students these days, and since I’m not a fan of spitting, or ‘safe spaces,’ I think students should definitely avoid my house.

I regard my home as a safe refuge for free thinkers, mostly because I do quite a bit of free thinking myself. I’m not a terrorist, or anarchist—or even a Walmart shopper. I’m simply someone who believes we’ve come so far in terms of free speech, it seems a shame to lose it—not to a totalitarian regime, or a dictatorship, or even a lousy monarchy—but to a bunch of loogists.

I just made this up, folks, but it seems worth making up if students are going to fight their battles with loogies. Someone has to start acknowledging these people as freewheeling horkers of the highest caliber, and not without plenty of ammunition when cold season comes around.

If students want a ‘safe space,’ they sure won’t find it at my house. I’m already short of space as it is, and, as much as I respect all points of view, loogists just don’t fit into my way of thinking. For one thing, they’d hate my black and white kitchen motif, being offended by the distinct separation of the two colors. They prefer grey, a color that combines rather than segregates. I have no intention of going grey, even though I hear there are "fifty shades" and I don’t remember anyone protesting that movie—and it was really terrible.

I’m also convinced my collection of Charles Bukowski would infuriate many, not to mention my Jack Kerouac poster that says: “The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time…” Any self-respecting, 'safe space' inhabiting student will tell you, people who are desirous of everything are gluttonous beasts, and “mad to talk” is someone just jonesing for an increase in their wireless phone rates.

There’s also the whole precedent set by having ‘safe spaces.’ At some point, students will have to face the real world. Imagine what they’ll do when they discover no ‘safe spaces’ in their offices. This could cause more saliva buildup than those old jawbreakers we had as kids.

And what happens when someone tells these former students something objectionable like “I don’t agree with you.” Loogies will be flying all over the place. I had an experience where a junior account executive asked for twenty headlines. I asked her why twenty, and she said, “So the client can choose.” I said it didn’t make the agency look very professional. Would a doctor offer twenty options for curing Plantar Wart? She lodged a formal complaint the next day, saying, “I talked down to her.”

With so much sensitivity in this world, I see no option but to classify my home as an ‘unsafe space,’ where, hopefully students won’t hear my Cheech and Chong albums or run across the foul passages of Charles Bukowski. As one female student once said: “I appreciate him as a poet, but he was such a pervert.” In my ‘unsafe space’ Bukowski is required reading and Kerouac can ramble on without someone tossing a loogie at his picture (or apply a Hitler mustache like they did with Dershowitz).

Do you think campuses have gone too far with ‘safe spaces’? Are we running the risk of creating hypersensitive people instead of thoughtful ones? Let me know at rcormack@rogers.com

Robert Cormack is a freelance copywriter, satirist, novelist and blogger. His first novel “You Can Lead a Horse to Water (But You Can’t Make It Scuba Dive)” is available online and at most major bookstores. For more details, go to Yucca Publishing or Skyhorse Publishing.