Oxford University is allowing students to be exempt from lectures that they find too stressful. This is an attempt to help victims of rape or sexual assault, of not having to relive those experiences in class. Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian, hosts of The Young Turks, break it down. Tell us what you think in the comment section below.

“They are destined to be barristers and judges – but undergraduates studying law at Oxford are being told before lectures on cases involving violence or death that they can leave if they fear the content will be too ‘distressing’.

The revelation marks the arrival from the US of ‘trigger warnings’ – the politically correct notion that students should be warned before they encounter material that could elicit a traumatic response.

Lecturers have been asked by the director of undergraduate studies for law to ‘bear in mind’ using trigger warnings when they give lectures containing ‘potentially distressing’ content.”


What's not clear to me is if these students are then exempt from knowing the material. If so, this is horrendous, but if they are simply excused from a lecture, but still responsible for knowing what's taught in the lecture, that's fine with me....but I will say it would make them less effective lawyers with no ability to face problems or issues that bother them. Learning to overcome being uncomfortable about a subject is a LARGE part of what college is for, removing that portion of the educational experience only means less prepared graduates.