The Incoherence of Rethinking Education's Justification for Disinviting Alka Seghal Cuthbert.

Or: Psychological Safety, My Arse.

Photo by Melanie Wasser on Unsplash

The disinvitation of Alka Sehgal Cuthbert From the Rethinking Education conference following claims that her presence had made other attendees claim to feel unsafe, has now been ‘explained’ by this decidedly incoherent notice by James Mannion,

Unfortunately we have taken the difficult decision to ask Alka Sehgal Cuthbert not to attend the conference tomorrow, and we owe our speakers and delegates an explanation as to why. We have also discussed the reasons behind this decision with Alka directly, on the phone and via email.

As an organisation, Rethinking Education values freedom of speech and we recognise the importance of free and open discussion in improving educational and life outcomes for current and future generations.

At the same time, as a conference organiser, we have a duty of care to our speakers and delegates. At short notice, we have been contacted by several people – a combination of speakers and delegates – who communicated very clearly that they would not feel safe to speak at or attend the conference alongside a representative of Don’t Divide Us. When someone tells you that they feel unsafe, you need to listen.

In seeking to re-imagine an education system where all young people and adults can flourish and thrive, we strongly believe that we need to have difficult conversations and that people should be prepared to subject their ideas to scrutiny and challenge.

However, when multiple people came to us at short notice to express very clearly that they did not feel safe to appear at the conference, this placed us in an incredibly difficult position.

As an organisation and as a conference organiser, Rethinking Education is not taking a stance for or against any particular viewpoint. We are prioritising the safety of our speakers and delegates. We appreciate that the late notice of this decision is not ideal for any parties concerned but once the matter was brought to our attention, safety considerations needed to be our primary focus.

We hope this helps provide some context around this difficult decision. We look forward to an exciting conference and to focusing on our central mission - how we can improve educational and life outcomes for current and future generations.”

To summarise the main points of this explanation:

• Rethinking Ed is holding a conference to discuss ‘What is indoctrination within education and how can we avoid it?’

• Alka Seghal Cuthbert, a seasoned teacher and scholar in the field of education with numerous publications and a particular focus on opposing indoctrination within education was due to contribute.

• Rethinking Ed values freedom of speech and recognises the importance of free and open discussion.

• Rethinking Ed is not taking a stance for or against any viewpoint.

• Rethinking Ed believes that a thriving education system depends on being able to have difficult conversations and people subjecting their ideas to scrutiny and challenge.

• Rethinking Ed believes that when someone tells you they feel unsafe, you need to listen, but not only to listen but to prioritise those feelings & make them your primary focus.

• Several (seven?) people said that Alka Seghal Cuthbert made them feel unsafe because of her role in Don’t Divide Us from where she argues for a colour-blind anti-racism that treats people as individuals and opposes any attempt to constrain or define them by race.

• Therefore, Dr. Cuthbert must now be disinvited from the panel along with her highly relevant research into the teaching of contested contemporary critical theories of race in schools and calls to ‘decolonise’ education.

• We are not informed if any of the other contributors to the panel ‘What is indoctrination within education and how can we avoid it?’ have equivalent expertise in Dr Cuthbert’s area of research or whether the issue of ways of teaching about race and racism will no longer be part of the conversation. (*Update below)

This “explanation” offered by James Mannion does not seem like much of an explanation at all and the “context” offered by him raises more concerns that it allays. If read literally, it leads to three particularly worrying logical conclusions about the principles and priorities of Rethinking Education.

1. Taking together the claim that the removal of Dr Cuthbert was necessary for the safety of speakers and delegates, the fact that Dr Cuthbert is a tiny lady of 62 who has never committed or threatened any violence and the fact that it was her affiliation with DDU that the complainants said made them feel unsafe, it seems clear that Mr Mannion is defining safety as protection from speech and ideas. Some other sources refer to him claiming a need for ‘psychological safety.’This contradicts his statements above about supporting freedom of speech and expecting people to be prepared to have their ideas scrutinised and challenged.

2. Taking together the claim that Rethinking Education is not taking a stance for or against any particular viewpoint and the claim that we need to listen to and prioritise people expressing feelings of unsafety, it seems that Rethinking Education is committing to indulging any ideological group that claims to feel unsafe in the greatest numbers. If seven people felt too unsafe to attend due to the presence of Dr Cuthbert, could this have been trumped by eight people claiming to feel too unsafe to attend due to the absence of Dr Cuthbert? This is a ridiculous way to operate.

3. Given that we have established that Dr Cuthbert is no kind of physical threat at all, the statement, “We are prioritising the safety of our speakers and delegates” stands in stark contrast to the statement, “In seeking to re-imagine an education system where all young people and adults can flourish and thrive, we strongly believe that we need to have difficult conversations and that people should be prepared to subject their ideas to scrutiny and challenge.” Does Rethinking Education exist to try to create an education system where all young people and adults can flourish and thrive or to pander to seven adults who may have a case of the vapours if confronted with ideas like these from the DDU’s report on anti-racist policies in schools:
   

   

   You really have to pick one and I recommend the former because this is the only way to achieve progress. People can claim to feel unsafe about almost anything and often do. Enter Twitter on any given day and you’re bound to find someone claiming the existence of a fictional black mermaid marks the end of Western Civilisation and someone else that use of the term ‘master bedroom’ is a literal endorsement of reinstituting slavery. We have to ignore these people and focus on the grown-ups capable of engaging in robust reasoned and civil debate on issues of importance. I would argue this is especially important when it comes to our educators. If anybody involved in education is unable to cope with the possibility that someone might express an idea they don’t like or that challenges their own, they are in the wrong profession. At the very least, they need to go away and get something like Cognitive Behavioural Therapy until they feel capable of functioning like adults who can cope with the reality of an ideologically diverse world and are fit for the job of equipping our children to function in it.

   _

   P.S., Mr Mannion has updated his message with an apology to Dr Cuthbert since I started writing that makes it clear that the decision was strongly influenced by the logistical problem of several people backing out at the last minute when the tickets had all been sold. I sympathise with the headache this must cause but we cannot pander to people who behave this way or incentivise using this method as a way for ideologues to pressure an event into only platforming their own ideas. He writes,

   We wish to make clear that we respect Dr Cuthbert and her deeply held beliefs and views, and we would be happy to invite her to be involved in any future events that we stage. The loss of her involvement at the event was a loss for Rethinking Education and the values of free speech and open debate that we hold so dear.

It was indeed and it is to be hoped that Rethinking Education will respond differently in the future should this happen again and uphold those values they hold so dear.

P.P.S., Many people are pointing out that the removal of Dr Cuthbert from the panel resulted in the issue of indoctrination in schools being discussed only by white people. This is true, and I am not immune to the irony, but the cognitive dissonance felt by anybody who feels strongly about the importance of racial diversity on panels discussing important social issues and also de-platforms black and brown thinkers who do not hold Critical Social Justice views is their problem to deal with. We can only hope they realise at some point that racial standpoint epistemology is not real. Alka Seghal Cuthbert was disinvited because because people disliked her critiques of contemporary critical theories of race and the decolonise movement, especially in schools. Consequently the discussion of indoctrination in schools is now lacking one of the country’s most eminent experts on that very subject.

Update: One of the other panelists, Dr Wareham, has informed me that the panel session has been withdrawn. This decision by Mr. Marshall not to run a session that lacked viewpoint diversity was sound. However, as Dr Wareham points out, it would have been a valuable discussion and the conference will be the poorer without it.