Eton teacher is sacked for video presenting a non-feminist perspective on masculinity

iptba · 28-12-2020 2:01pm

daithi7 wrote: »

He is not the 'sexist monster' here, it's his employer, Eton, who are acting like that.....

Reminds me a bit of this:

https://youtu.be/j64SctPKmqk

I was thinking of the Dead Poets’ Society particularly when one of the students wrote a letter of support for the teacher/against his removal and he was suspended.

iptba · 28-12-2020 2:45pm

Eton College reported teacher they sacked over 'male superiority' lecture to anti-TERRORISM Prevent programme

English tutor Will Knowland was dismissed for 'gender roles' YouTube lecture

Eton referred him to the local authority because of the controversial lecture

Prevent programme requires schools to report potential pupil radicalisation

Mr Henderson is accused of pushing 'woke' agenda and suppressing free speech

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9091635/Eton-College-reported-sacked-teacher-anti-TERRORISM-programme-male-superiority-lecture.html

But after reporting the lecture, the LADO found it did not meet the threshold for the Prevent duty and it was referred back to the Windsor school to deal with internally.

iptba · 30-12-2020 2:58am

A recent comment by the teacher in question:

Sadly, the content of the lecture alone was deemed gross misconduct. And absurdly, the objection to it being on YouTube was its link to the College via the disclaimer saying it's not College views that they told me to add - a Kafkaesque twist almost as ridiculous as considering the video terrorism.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTHgMxQEoPI&lc=UgzQ-P7SLz7tU9hWen94AaABAg.9Ho6VTp8uws9Ho7gQb7Py2

iptba · 01-01-2021 8:08pm

From: Will Knowland
Subject: Thank you

Dear All,

Happy New Year!

Thank you for your very kind donations to help me fight my dismissal by Eton College and for having indicated that you'd like to be on a mailing list for updates.

You might have seen the piece in The Telegraph about the Headmaster's failed attempt to refer me under Prevent as a terrorist:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/12/27/eton-college-attempted-refer-dismissed-master-prevent-duty-advocating/

How did it come to this? John Gray has some suggestions:

The metamorphosis in liberalism that has occurred over the past generation has played a role. From being a philosophy of tolerance aiming at peaceful coexistence among divergent world-views, it has become a persecutory orthodoxy that tolerates no view of the world other than its own. If the contemporary academy is hostile to liberal values as they used to be understood, one reason is the rise of a new liberalism that dismisses these values as phoney and repressive.

https://unherd.com/2019/08/why-the-humanities-cant-be-saved

Only because of your generous support am I now able to mount a legal challenge to this 'persecutory orthodoxy'. It took my job from me before I was fired, and this chilling article by an Eton mother explains why its stranglehold on education must be broken:

https://thecritic.co.uk/eton-needs-a-headmaster/

In addition to the legal challenge, I also plan to keep up the resistance by making more videos. In response to requests I received after 'The Patriarchy Paradox', I will soon post a video on the Frankfurt school's influence on radical feminism.

Although the Headmaster plans to refer me to the Teaching Regulation Agency, potentially banning me from the classroom for life, at least I can continue providing educational public benefit online. Thank you to those of you who suggested setting up a Patreon account for this. If you would like to support the project, please see the details here:

https://www.patreon.com/knowlandknows

Best wishes, and thanks again,

Will

iptba · 09-01-2021 4:39am

Why I was sacked from Eton
On being sacked from the College
Will Knowland

https://www.spectator.com.au/2021/01/eton-mess-2/

It was not new legislation I’d transgressed, just a new religion with an old-time zeal to suppress dissent and punish heresy. The College’s ‘approach to equality and diversity’ — which it finally claimed I had breached — has never been explained to staff, making it impossible to follow. The boy who wrote to me afterwards saying he wished more could have been done to defend my case needn’t have felt so bad.

Victor Klemperer wrote in The Language of the Third Reich that ‘words are like tiny doses of arsenic, swallowed unnoticed, and then after a while the toxic reaction sets in’. And so ‘diversity’ demands conformity; ‘inclusion’ is only for those already in the group; ‘tolerance’ cannot bear tradition; and ‘lived experience’ counts for some, not for others.

With the headmaster threatening to refer me to the Teaching Regulation Agency, potentially banning me from the classroom for life, at least I can be grateful to Covid for boosting demand for my online tutoring. While not making such threats or pursuing tendentious Prevent referrals, he offers empty platitudes about free speech thriving at Eton. Maybe so: just don’t expect to keep your livelihood afterwards.

iptba · 14-02-2021 2:18am

Teacher sacked from Eton over anti-feminist video could be banned from teaching for life after school reported him to watchdog

Will Knowland was sacked from Eton College over video 'The Patriarchy Paradox'
He was told to take the online lecture down but repeatedly refused the requests
College's headmaster Simon Henderson sacked him for not taking video down
He has been referred to the teaching authority and could now get a lifetime ban
By DANYAL HUSSAIN FOR MAILONLINE

PUBLISHED: 01:26, 9 February 2021 | UPDATED: 08:49, 9 February 2021

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9238951/Teacher-sacked-Eton-anti-feminist-video-banned-teaching-life.html

Speaking to Times Radio, he also claimed the lecture was a 'counter argument' to lessons about 'toxic masculinity' at the college.

He said: ‘To help you understand what that orthodox narrative is, the boys are given half-day training sessions by an external organisations called the ‘Good Lad Initiative’ and that has been described by one of its former members as ‘encouraging boys to seem themselves through a prism of toxic masculinity and dysfunction.

‘Now I don’t think it is fair and responsible to encourage boys to see themselves in this way exclusively.

'I think it’s fair for them to consider the arguments regarding toxic masculinity but they should also be given counter arguments.

‘The aim (of my video) was to provide a counter weight to what they are normally taught on this topics.'

JupiterKid · 14-02-2021 4:11pm

I really think that governments, policy makers, local authorities, regulatory agencies etc need take a good long look at themselves at how they have been taken over by a very intolerant so-called ”liberal” orthodoxy where buzzwords such as “tolerance”, “inclusion” etc are ticked off but in this case, I see precious little tolerance being applied.

Common sense seems to have taken a leave of absence as well in the headlong rush to be “right on” and “hip.” And I say all this as an openly gay man who has benefited massively from traditional intolerant orthodoxies being challenged and removed over the past 50 or so years, but I know that suppressing “other” viewpoints and shutting down any debate is very, very bad for society too and will just leave those who are punished for daring to have an alternate view to the groupthink orthodoxy feeling more and more frustrated and ignored.

gctest50 · 14-02-2021 4:27pm

"He said: ‘To help you understand what that orthodox narrative is, the boys are given half-day training sessions by an external organisations called the ‘Good Lad Initiative’ and that has been described by one of its former members as ‘encouraging boys to seem themselves through a prism of toxic masculinity and dysfunction."

Ah toxic masculinity - a term made up by women nobody would ride

Wibbs · 16-02-2021 10:28am

gctest50 wrote: »

Ah toxic masculinity - a term made up by women nobody would ride

Eh. No. Let's keep the daftness going the other direction down to a minimum please.

iptba · 16-02-2021 1:56pm

Saying that seems very similar to the use of ”incel”.

iptba · 27-02-2021 3:48am

I haven't watched this so far.

Sacked Eton teacher: I stand by my patriarchy lecture
79,405 views•21 Jan 2021

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0SXWEQMsgM

UnHerd
123K subscribers
Freddie Sayers meets Will Knowland to discuss his sacking from Eton College.

Accompanying article here: https://unherd.com/thepost/sacked-eton-teacher-i-stand-by-my-patriarchy-lecture/

Podcast link here: https://shows.acast.com/lockdowntv-with-freddie-sayers/episodes/sacked-eton-teacher-i-stand-by-my-lecture

Watch The Patriarchy Paradox here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTHgMxQEoPI

When teacher Will Knowland was sacked by Eton for refusing to take down a lecture from his YouTube account, his departure sparked furious debate. The provocative lecture, ‘The Patriarchy Paradox’, argued that the idea of a repressive patriarchy throughout history is a myth, that men have had it harder than women, and that traditional gender roles are not social constructions but due to innate biological differences.

To its critics, the video was deemed offensive and sexist for espousing such a retrograde view of masculinity. But to Knowland and his supporters, whether the content was offensive or not was secondary to the video’s broader purpose: that these ideas, however provocative they may be, are fair game for discussion and debate.

That this incident occurred at the world’s most prestigious school — home to over 20 British Prime Ministers (including the current one) and princes William and Harry — only served to give the controversy more attention.

It's an intriguing case study of the nexus between elite institutions, competing visions of masculine virtue and the limits of acceptable ideas. Knowland argues that he was upholding Eton’s traditions, which he sees as being under threat:

"I felt that my duty to uphold Eton's very long rich tradition of encouraging independent critical thoughts and having broad based debate was being called into question. Why should we stop boys from watching this even in their own time? People should be allowed to make up their own minds about it."

He positions his lecture in the spirit of a liberal education, in which a full range of ideas should be discussed:

"I think, watching the way in which debate had been narrowed over the last five years or so, particularly on this topic at an all boys school struck me as slightly strange. And if you're an all boys school, and you can't have a rigorous open discussion of masculinity, as informed by anthropology, and psychology, I think something is going wrong. And if the reason for that is that it might upset a member of staff, then you're heading in the safespace direction. And I think that if Eton can't resist that, which is a threat, that is, I think it's fair to say permeating the wider culture, if Eton, can't resist that then I think very few places have got a chance of doing so."

But was sacrificing a job that he held for nine years, to defend such a deliberately provocative and one-sided treatise, worth it?

"Well, I knew I was taking a risk making a stand on a point of principle. But as far as I see it, it's a point of principle that is essential to the identity of the college, and also essential to what a liberal education is all about. So there's a sense in which, if I'd allowed that, my job already wouldn't have been as valuable to me. I mean, there are people who might say, you stay in it just for the money, but any teacher who's in teaching for the money is very easily bought. And I think that there are more important things than that. And there's a sense in which I'd lost my job even before I was sacked."

As ever, we'll leave you to decide whether is a point of principle you would defend. Many thanks to Will for his time.

#Eton #Patriarchy #ToxicMasculinity

newmember2 · 27-02-2021 5:02am

boardise wrote: »

...Unless there are other contexts we don't know of-I'm shocked that the Headmaster of Eton has succumbed to this latest intellectual spawn of PC.
It shows how far and deep the rot has spread.

daithi7 wrote: »

He is not the 'sexist monster' here, it's his employer, Eton, who are acting like that...

The college's hands were tied once their legal department was consulted - this is the world we are currently living in.

iptba · 11-06-2021 1:55am

Published on May 26, 2021

Education and Masculinity—An Interview with Will Knowland

written by Hannah Gal

https://quillette.com/2021/05/26/education-and-masculinity-an-interview-with-will-knowland/

iptba · 05-07-2021 1:44am

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6yohTYJ8w0

Teacher Cancelled by Eton for Controversial Lecture Speaks Out

I don't watch that many YouTube videos but perhaps this channel may be known by some of you:

About TRIGGERnometry:

Stand-up comedians Konstantin Kisin (@konstantinkisin) and Francis Foster (@francisjfoster) make sense of politics, economics, free speech, AI, drug policy and WW3 with the help of presidential advisors, renowned economists, award-winning journalists, controversial writers, leading scientists and notorious comedians.

I'm around a 3rd of the way true this video and was stuck by the following:

18:07
i don't mean to misquote you i think
18:08
that's what you said yeah
18:10
that's part that what you've just said
18:12
is part of it what else do you mean by
18:13
that
18:15
well i went into education into eton in
18:18
particular
18:19
because i like the excitement of rigorous discussion of debate i like challenging not just other people's viewpoints but my own as well and this is why free speech is so so valuable because it enables that kind of discussion that means that the rough edges can be taken off ideas and one question people often have is well do you think everything in the video is completely true the whole point is that i'm not actually really sure and the discussion should be had so we can all learn more from it like the proverb says the pearl is formed by abrasion we need the marketplace of ideas to be able to actually find out which ones stand attest to that kind of conflict
19:01
that makes sense and

iptba · 19-07-2021 2:13am

Another point I liked: