Joe Rogan is no fan of my work, obviously. The chart-topping conservative influencer famously insists that universities are “cult camps” where professors like me indoctrinate students with leftist ideas. Typically, I do not worry about my haters, but increasingly it seems that if I want to create a meaningful learning experience, I need to.
I teach first-year undergraduate humanities electives. Like most universities, ours offers large-format 200-student lectures for training in academic writing and critical theory. This would be the “indoctrination” in question, as I introduce students to canonical thinkers from Karl Marx to Sylvia Wynter. These electives are degree requirements, snaring students who might intentionally avoid liberal arts in an otherwise professional degree.
In the current political climate, many of my students come to the classroom with their minds made up based on authorities who directly undermine my scholarship and profession. Rogan is just one of many conservative anti-intellectuals who regularly attack liberal, feminist, social justice–oriented biases in university education. The result is a polarized atmosphere antithetical to learning: a tangibly mistrustful, sometimes even resentful classroom.
Although only a small handful of students typically adhere to anti-intellectual doctrine, their small group undermines my authority with risky jokes in the classroom and intense criticism in student back channels (as reported by concerned classmates). This causes undecided students to falter in their trust of my authority, while students who do not share their views nervously censor their contributions.
Ironically, my dissenting students often do not recognize that I am interested in their views. I am convinced that the way out of this explosive historic moment is through rigorous discussion in educational forums. Like any academic, this is why I teach: I love sincere inquiry, debate and critical engagement, and I was a rabble-rouser myself as a student. But the current classroom mood is less debate and more deadlock.
So, I spent this year brainstorming with my students to build creative assignments to spin resentment into passion, no matter how opposite my own, welcoming self-directed research and encouraging deeply engaged reading. I offer any one of these assignments, with the goal to bring disaffected, anxious students back to a love of learning and democratized engagement. This is a work in progress, and I welcome suggestions.
Turn Tensions Into Data: This introductory exercise eases students into an atmosphere of open collegial discussion. Surveys or anonymous polls quantify disagreements, and then we analyze the results as a class.
Example: Class Belief Inventory—anonymously poll students on hot-button questions (e.g., “Is systemic racism a major problem?”). The objective here would be to compare the class’s responses to national survey data. Potential discussion topics: Why might differences exist? What shapes our perceptions?
Hostile Influencers as Primary Sources: This in-class activity treats figures like Rogan or Jordan Peterson not as adversaries but as authors of texts to analyze, to disarm defensiveness and position students as critical investigators.
Example: “Compare/contrast an episode of [X podcast] with a peer-reviewed article on the same topic. How do their arguments differ in structure, evidence and rhetoric? Whom do you find more persuasive, and why?”
Gamifying Ideological Tensions: This class activity turns assigned readings into structured, rule-bound games where students must defend positions they don’t personally hold.
Example: Role-Play a Summit—Students are assigned roles (e.g., Jordan Peterson, bell hooks, climate scientist, TikTok influencer) and must collaborate to solve a fictional problem (e.g., redesigning a curriculum). They must cite course readings to justify their choices.
Therapy for Arguments: This fun early activity teaches students to diagnose weak arguments—whether from Rogan, a feminist theorist or you—using principles of logic.
Example: Argument Autopsy—Students dissect a viral social media post, podcast clip or course reading. Identify logical fallacies, cherry-picked evidence or unstated assumptions. Reward students for critiquing all sides.
Intellectual Sleuthing: This is a scaffolded midterm writing assignment building up to a final essay. Ask students to trace the origins of their favorite influencers’ ideas. Many anti-establishment figures borrow from (or distort) academic theories—show students how to connect the dots.
Example: Genealogy of an Idea—Pick a claim from a podcast (e.g., “universities indoctrinate students”). Research its history: When was this idea popular in mainstream news or on social media? Are there any institutes, think tanks, influencers or politicians associated with this idea? What are the stated missions and goals of those sources? Where do they get their funding? Which academics agree or disagree, and why?
Leverage “Forbidden Topics” as Case Studies: If students resent “liberal bias,” lean into it: make bias itself the subject of analysis. This might work as a discussion prompt for tutorials or think-pair-share group work.
Example: “Is This Reading Biased?”—Assign a short text students might call “woke” (e.g., feminist theory) and a countertext (e.g., Peterson’s critique of postmodernism). Have students evaluate both using a rubric: What counts as bias? Is objectivity possible? How do they define “truth”?
Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Assignments: The final essay assignment gives students agency to explore topics they care about, even if they critique my field. Clear guardrails are important here to ensure rigor.
Example: Passion Project: Students design a research question related to the course—even if it challenges the course’s assumptions. They must engage with three or more course texts and two or more outside sources, as in favorite influencers or authorities, even those who oppose course themes.
Red Team vs. Blue Team: For essays, students submit two versions: one arguing their personal view and one arguing the counterpoint. Grading is based on how well they engage evidence, not their stance.
Elisha Lim is an assistant professor of the technological humanities at York University in Toronto. They used generative AI tools to assist with the editing of this piece.
