One only has to go onto campus once at rush hour and turn 360 degrees: first you see people in suits rehearsing the run to the courtroom with their fake briefcases.
A little further to the left, a group of jogging bottoms with white socks in adilettes stand in an almost perfect circle.
If you keep turning, you see smoking mullets sitting on the floor and having a deep discussion – probably about the next tattoo appointment.
Before you get to understand the details, the passing followers of the Gothic movement draw your attention.
And then of course there are the classic nerds, the artists and the crowd.
It was very liberating for me when I entered the open world of the university after the restrictive, uniform school structure, the experience: different types of people live side by side and respect each other.
Whoever you wanted to be - you found allies immediately.
The university offers you different spaces to express yourself and develop as you decide.
I was particularly enthusiastic about the experience of the struggle for sexual freedom and a self-determined gender, which reached its peak in these years and pervades the entire student landscape.
You take part in it, even if it doesn't directly affect you.
I'm lucky to live in a generation of students where outing among fellow students is considered a bygone practice because sexual preference doesn't even need to be kept a secret.
I also see it as an enrichment that fundamental gender role concepts are in question, are even part of the teaching content (in appropriate subjects) and that there is generally great enthusiasm to fight oppression.
There are educational events on feminism in the university rooms, stands in the canteen,
where you can buy tickets for the next queers party;
there are actions and demos that are financially supported by the student body and political demands of the student body towards the mother university.
Of course, not everything goes perfectly and the moral corridor is sometimes very narrow.
However, when it comes to gender and sexuality, our uni-bubble is incredibly progressive and it's frightening when you step out of it and realize how backward large parts of society are.
A subculture with “safe-spaces” has developed at the universities that we can be proud of.
Of course, not everything goes perfectly and the moral corridor is sometimes very narrow.
However, when it comes to gender and sexuality, our uni-bubble is incredibly progressive and it's frightening when you step out of it and realize how backward large parts of society are.
A subculture with “safe-spaces” has developed at the universities that we can be proud of.
Of course, not everything goes perfectly and the moral corridor is sometimes very narrow.
However, when it comes to gender and sexuality, our uni-bubble is incredibly progressive and it's frightening when you step out of it and realize how backward large parts of society are.
A subculture with “safe-spaces” has developed at the universities that we can be proud of.
Little effort for the moral account
There are many reasons to applaud the university institutions and student space for being so progressive in many ways.
A lot is going very well, that's my impression.
But as a critical philosophy student, you should regularly question your beliefs.
And by doing this, I realize that much of the progressive image is illusion, that with success comes arrogance and hubris, and that the universities sometimes play a problematic role:
It is also advantageous for the universities to support gender issues because they want to compete with other universities.
Basically, they market the achievements of their students to attract more.
The progress made by students is advertised publicly, and then, as soon as they are firmly enrolled, the students are left to their own devices.