Against ‘No Debate!’ in the University

Abstract

For many decades now there has been pressure on universities as institutions and on university academics to take a stance on culture war topics. One of the latest pressures relates to trans rights—to use institutional mechanisms to enforce the orthodoxy that trans people are what they identify as and should have access to any provisions offered to the sex of identification. Activist academics deploy a range of behaviours aimed at the enforcement of this orthodoxy. This paper grants that such behaviours can be politically savvy, and focuses on two further questions. Is orthodoxy enforcement through ‘no debate!’ behaviours sometimes normatively justified?—and if so, are there countervailing professional obligations not to engage in such behaviours? Which of the personal and the professional responsibilities take priority when they conflict?