*Sigh* If you haven’t heard, University of Oklahoma student Samantha Fulnecky responded to her failing essay grade by filing a report claiming she was discriminated against because of her religious beliefs. Now, the internet is abuzz over the essay, Fulnecky’s teacher being put on paid leave, and the hypothetical grades they think she deserved.
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Let’s start with the fact that this whole situation gained popularity last week after Charlie Kirk’s organization, Turning Point USA, shared Fulnecky’s apparent essay and her teacher’s alleged feedback about X.
(The post has almost 44 million views at the time of writing.)
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According to a report by HuffPost, Fulnecky’s class was prompted to respond to a “psychology article about gender stereotyping in middle school students and how it affects their mental health.”
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Instead, Fulnecky’s essay was centered around God and the Bible. Her document includes lines like, “The article discussed peers using teasing as a way to enforce gender norms. I don’t necessarily see that as a problem,” and “Society that pushes the lie that there are multiple genders and everyone should be who they want to be is demonic.”
She also claimed, “Women naturally want to do women’s things because God created us with those women’s desires in our hearts.”
Fulnecky does not formally use the Bible as a source by quoting it, but rather paraphrases its interpretations.
TPUSA also shared apparent feedback on the essay from Fulnecky’s teacher, Mel Curth, who the outlets identified as trans. In a screenshot, the response notes:
“I’m not deducting points because you have a certain belief, but instead I’m deducting a point for you posting a reaction paper that doesn’t answer the questions for this assignment, contradicts itself, uses a lot of personal ideology over empirical evidence in a science class, and is sometimes offensive.”
A second teacher reportedly reviewed Fulnecky’s essay and agreed with Curth’s grading.
Now, the internet is reacting to TPUSA’s posts, and they are NOT holding back.
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Overall, many believe that the essay got the grade it deserved…
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…particularly for the way it was written.
“So, when a professor gives someone a zero for writing a bad essay that didn’t even try to adhere to the rubric, the university decides to put the professor on administrative leave for the rest of the semester??? No wonder Oklahoma ranks [among the] the latest in education in the United States”
They are pointing out that the Bible is not a peer-reviewed source.
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…..yeah…..
“She deserves to fail,” one person said. “If you want to argue for a gender binary, get some peer-reviewed studies to back up your claims. I’m so sick of Evangelical conservatives encouraging bad scholarship.”
And someone took the liberty of grading the essay himself:
MAGA, on the other hand… They are staying with Fulnecky.
“It’s time for conservatives to take a stand and show teachers that we will not be intimidated for sharing more conservative or Christian beliefs about assignments,” TPUSA tweeted. “The only right thing to do is fire this professor.”
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“Someone with psychological problems should NOT be teaching a psychology class,” charged another. “The student followed the directions perfectly. The professor is both biased and driven by a deranged ideology.”
Someone else wrote, “This raises serious First Amendment concerns and looks very much like unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination by a state actor.”
And finally: “I wish I was as brave and steadfast about the truth as Samantha was in college.”
According to a statement from the University of Oklahoma, this situation is currently being reviewed, but the teacher of the graduate students who provided the degree has been placed on administrative leave.
What are your thoughts? Tell us in the comments.
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