Penn State puts out a series of short videos to illustrate for instructors how they might deal with troublesome students. One of these depicts a veteran who's portrayed as unreasonable and angry. Why PSU chose to portray a veteran as "worrisome" is unclear except that possibly Penn State faculty are finding that young men coming back from the war are less docile, pliable and vulnerable to professorial political proselytizing than are their non-vet classmates.
In the last few years I've had a number of students in class who were combat veterans, and their behavior has been exemplary. They do sometimes seem a little amused by some of the views expressed by classmates who haven't experienced much of the world's ugliness, but they've always been polite and conscientious.
Perhaps this hasn't been the experience of Penn State instructors, however. Perhaps there've been numerous cases on the PSU campus of veterans threatening or intimidating teachers. Or, on the other hand, perhaps the makers of the video are simply displaying their own prejudices by drawing on the stereotypes common among people of the left of what veterans are like.
I think one of these explanations is more probable than the other, but I'll let you decide which one you think it is.
Thanks to Hot Air for the video.
RLC
