‘I’m Not Paying for Your Opinion’

By Rob Jenkins. Perhaps, to explain Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa’s now infamous findings in Academically Adrift, we need look no further than the current customer-service culture. That thought came to me after a recent incident in my introductory rhetoric course.
We were talking about the way that social mores and public opinions change over time, and how writing both influences and reflects those changes. When I broached one particularly controversial topic, a student interjected, “But that’s just your opinion, and I’m not paying for your opinion.”
OK, then.