Students call for Camille Paglia to be replaced with ‘queer person of colour’

Students of Philadelphia’s University of the Arts have created a petition calling for professor Camille Paglia to be replaced with a “queer person of colour” following accusations of anti-trans comments.

The petition accuses Paglia of “degrading transgender individuals” in classes and interviews.

“She believes that most transgender people are merely participating in a fashion trend,” student Sheridan Merrick wrote.

Critics have pointed to a 2017 interview, in which Paglia told the now-defunct Weekly Standard: “Although I describe myself as transgender (I was donning flamboyant male costumes from early childhood on), I am highly skeptical about the current transgender wave, which I think has been produced by far more complicated psychological and sociological factors than current gender discourse allows.”

Camille Paglia accused of mocking #MeToo

The petition goes on to allege that Paglia has “blatantly mocked survivors of sexual assault and the #MeToo movement” in recent interviews.

It links to a video, taken from an April 2016 interview with Spike, in which Paglia says she finds it “ridiculous” that universities “tolerate” historic accusations of rape.

“These girls have been coached to imagine that the world is a dangerous place. They expect the omnipresence of authority figures in every stage of their lives,” she says.

“They expect that a mistake they might make at a fraternity party, that they might regret six months or a year later, that somehow this isn’t ridiculous?

“To me it’s ridiculous if even for a second that any university ever tolerated a complaint from a girl coming six months or a year after an event.”

Philadelphia students demand apology from David Yager

Students have demanded that university president David Yager apologise for a “wildly ignorant and hypocritical letter” which he released on April 10.

In it, the university’s president spoke of how “artists over the centuries have suffered censorship, and even persecution, for the expression of their beliefs through their work.”