A WORLD OF THEIR OWN: Richard Fernandez writes that “The New York Times has a series of articles examining the causes of why an entire generation ‘has become less tolerant of free speech’ noting the growing list of subjects or persons that are now banned on campuses to prevent people from freaking out:”

The safe spaces they crave don’t exist in in the ambient environment. To maintain a “nuclear free” or “gun free” zone someone has to do the distasteful work of maintaining it.  Probably some guard, soldier or policeman with a gun. Cafeterias and dorms have to be supplied with meat, fossil fuels and dirty pharmaceuticals; the wrong people have to be shown the door by the academic equivalent of a bouncer.  All this takes labor and costs money.

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In the past, when schools still regarded it  their job to prepare the young for a world of danger and disappointment, mentors were expected to teach their students how to look unflinchingly at the facts.  In those days educated men were distinguished by their ability to gaze full upon the truth armed with a free speech, which as Eugene Volokh reminds, opened our eyes to the pleasant and unpleasant alike.

Today, we don’t want to know.  We don’t even want to know what we don’t know.  In all the wide world the only trigger warning that is forbidden is the one which alerts us to our own ignorance.

Related: “A liberal New York Times writer told a liberal MSNBC host that the problem with conservatives is they exist in their own ideological echo chamber. Without a sense of irony, All In host Chris Hayes on Monday night wondered, ‘What do you make of this sort of inward turning that we’re sort of seeing effectuated in the Republican field?’”