From Cruelty to Critique to Charity

What happens when “iron sharpens iron” turns into something more damaging? Timothy Shaffer, the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Chair of Civil Discourse and director of the SNF Ithaca Initiative at the University of Delaware, recounts a tense, unexpectedly explosive thesis defense that left a student in tears and a faculty committee in conflict. The conversation explores where productive intellectual challenge crosses the line into accusation, ego, and harm. Shaffer argues that the real work of disagreement isn’t winning the argument, but cultivating the conditions where learning, dignity, and democracy can survive.

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