A Cambridge University professor now claims that using words like “genius” or “brilliance” to describe students’ work because words like that are sexist.

Cambridge University examiners have been warned against using words such as “flair”, “brilliance” and “genius” when assessing students’ work because they are associated with men, an academic has revealed.

Lucy Delap, a lecturer in British History at the top-ranking institution, said History tutors are discouraged from using the terms because they “carry assumptions of gender inequality”.

She told The Telegraph: “Some of those words, in particular genius, have a very long intellectual history where it has long been associated with qualities culturally assumed to be male.

“Some women are fine with that, but others might find it hard to see themselves in those categories”.

Ms Delap, who specialises in gender history, said one of the reasons why men get more first class degrees at Oxford and Cambridge than women is because female students struggle with the “male dominated environment”.

She pointed towards reading lists dominated by male authors and the lack of diversity seen in college portrait collections as examples.

So basically, she’s saying not to treat women equally because they’re burdened with the history of women not being treated equally. An unfair situation exists, but correcting it is also unfair because addressing the lack of fairness only reminds the victims of how unfair everything is. It’s like an Abbott and Costello bit.

Maybe we should coin entirely new words to describe smart women. That will really level the playing field. Maybe “shenius” would work. Or how about “jilliance?”

It’s probably just easier if the faculty just starts saying things like, “You’re really smart…for a girl.”

Oxford recently had a similar eruption of idiocy when some declared that take-home exams were chauvinistic. In that case though, the school specifically stated that the purpose of that method of testing was intended to “boost results for female students.”

Amanda Foreman, an honorary research senior fellow in history at the University of Liverpool, told The Telegraph: “The reason why girls and boys perform differently in exams has nothing to do with the building they are in.

“I think it is extremely well intentioned and I applaud them for taking the matter seriously. But it is so insulting.

“You are saying that the girls can’t take the stress of sitting in the exam room, which does raise one’s anxiety levels. I don’t think girls are inherently weaker than boys and can’t take it. Women are not the weaker sex.”

But they curl up in a fetal position if some knuckle dragging professor tells them they’re brilliant. Feminism, especially in academia has become an exercise in self parody. They really don’t know what they want. They just want to complain about everything.

Cambridge and Oxford are world renowned and an education at one of them is seen as a prestigious bit of information at the top of one’s curriculum vitae. I have long said we need to redefine our notion of “prestige” when it comes to education though. Schools like these are in some ways dining out on their past reputation while descending into politically correct lunacy masquerading as thought. Clearly a lot of higher education is making people stupid.