Free Speech Is Not Threatened

As American universities and colleges grow their demographics, diversity and ideas there is a continued and an accelerated debate regarding freedom of speech within these higher education institutions. College campuses are struggling to simultaneously provide a learning environment that is inclusive to traditionally unrepresented students while also providing an environment that allows for ideas to be challenged and debated no matter how offensive or controversial.

“Free Inquiry? Not on Campus” by John Leo is an important essay that shows exactly how important it is to protect people's political views and opinions. In Leo's essay, he elaborates how times have changed and how we live in more of a liberal left-wing society and because of this everyone has to be more politically correct. Leo talks about the social change universities and colleges on how they used to promote free speech, but now are more like the speech police telling us what's opinions you should have on any given subject and any other opinion is considered wrong. Leo gives an example of this and writes “in October 2007, for instance, a student mob stormed a Columbia University stage, shutting down speeches by two members of the Minutemen, an anti-illegal immigration group.The students shouted they have no right to

Former president of Harvard University, Derek Bok, in his essay, “Protecting Freedom of Expression on the Campus” published in the Boston Globe, addresses the topic of protection and regulation of freedom of expression on college campuses and argues that rather than prohibiting the expression of offensive speech, it would be better to ignore it. He fails to support his claim by dismissing the emotional discomfort that people might find themselves in, in response to someone’s offensive expressions, and by not being a credible source of information on the topic, but he successfully appeals to the reader by offering logical reasons as to why

“A movement is arising, undirected and driven largely by students, to scrub campuses clean of words, ideas, and subjects that might cause discomfort or give offense” (Lukianoff and Haidt 44). Colleges are sheltering their students from words and ideas that students do not like or are found to be offensive. Affecting their education and cognitive skills, scientists are warning colleges to refrain from coddling the students and allowing other viewpoints to be spoken. People are speaking their minds, saying their own views; however, some people are over sensitive and take these viewpoints offensively. In the article “The Coddling of the American Mind,” Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt successfully argues using rhetorical questions, specific examples, and affective visuals that protecting college students from words and ideas deteriorates their education and mental health.

“Over the years, courts have ruled that college officials may set up reasonable rules to regulate the ‘time, place and manner” that the free speech can occur, as long as the rules are “content neutral,’ meaning they apply equally to all sides of issues” (Fisher, 2008). Speech codes and free speech zones on campus do exist for many reasons: many of the causes or topics that students or others looking to interact with students take up are controversial and can frequently take on less of an academic or social justice overtone and more of a hateful one. Hate speech is the greatest threat to freedom of speech on college campuses, and the limitations colleges and universities put on student’s verbal freedoms are largely in place as efforts to avoid it. Religion, in particular, is a hot topic on campuses and it has an unfortunate tendency to become more aggressive and argumentative than universities would like. However, under the First Amendment, individuals do have a right to speech that the listener disagrees with and to speech that is offensive and hateful. It’s always easier to defend someone’s right to say something with which you agree. But in a free society, you also have a duty to defend speech to which you may strongly object.

Freedom of speech is a fundamental American freedom and a human right, and there’s no place that this right should be more valued and protected than in colleges and universities. A college exists to educate and to advance a student 's knowledge. Colleges do so by acting as a “marketplace of ideas” where ideas compete. It is important to be able to compare your ideas with everyone else as it helps to open your mind to other people’s views and can give you a different perception on things. In the article “The Coddling of the American Mind,” Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukiankoff talked about how too many college students engage in “catastrophizing," which is in short, the overreaction to something. They also said that “smart people do, in fact, overreact to innocuous speech, make mountains out of molehills, and seek punishment for anyone whose words make anyone else feel uncomfortable.”(Haidt) Many colleges have the belief that prohibiting freedom of speech will resolve such issues. But instead, colleges should take a different approach on the matter by teaching students how to properly utilize their Freedom of Speech which will help to resolve future conflicts and misunderstandings.

If you keep a close eye on the news, you have heard of situations dealing with the issue of free speech on college campuses. This topic has been a hot button issue throughout recent years. Numerous institutions have become more politically correct in an effort to make their students feel safer on campus. Many people, however, claim that “word policing”, or telling students that they are not allowed to use certain vocabulary, is a violation of their right to free speech. In the articles “The Betrayal of Liberty on America’s Campuses” by Alan Charles Kors and “’Nigger’: The Meaning of a Word” by Gloria Naylor, readers are shown just how ridiculous the practice of word policing can be. Additionally, the article “Regulating Racist Speech on Campus” by Charles R. Lawrence III challenges the common arguments in favor of word policing. Based on the evidence presented in these articles, I believe that word policing is preventing college students from having honest and educational conversations on campus.

People have to think twice before saying anything for fear that they are faced with charges of aggression or insensitivity. While the press looks at this as a rebirth of political correctness which sought to restrict hate speech amongst the marginalized groups to encourage inclusivity, others argue it’s more concerned with emotional well-being of the students and that it seeks to protect students from mental harm that can be caused by offensive words, ideas or actions. All in the purpose of making campuses a safe place for students.

In the past couple of decades till now, there have been countless numbers of hate speech cases on college campuses across the country. Due to hate speech taking on many forms such as written, spoken, and symbolic, the number of incidents have skyrocketed. While many colleges have attempted to regulate hate speech on campus, other colleges have found that they have limited too much speech and that their regulations are starting to go against the first amendment. Three incidents of hate speech on college campuses in the years 1993-1995 occurred in the college campuses of Penn, UCR, and Caltech respectively.

Nearly all colleges and universities have adopted some form of anti-discrimination/harassment policies. These policies are meant to ensure that no student will be discriminated against due to race, color, national origin, religion, sex, sexual orientation, age or disability. Many universities have adopted more specific policies regarding “hate speech” which prohibits speech or conduct that creates an intimidating, hostile, or an offensive educational environment towards minorities, women, gays and lesbians, and the disabled. The problem with universities enforcing a strict speech code is that it is often a vague policy that in itself is discriminatory as it violates The First Amendment. The case of Omar Mahmood, a student at the University of Michigan who was disciplined for writing a satirical article, “Do the Left Thing” illustrates the problems with these types of policies.

In, On the Repression of Free Expression, Mike Bloomberg argues that freedom of speech is needed on campuses. Bloomberg also believes it is not right to take away the privilege of learning from students, just because of other individual students. “we cannot others the right and privileges that we demand for ourselves” (Bloomberg.104). They cannot have campus wide trigger warnings over one individual student. Condensing what students could learn, is not helping their education. Professors should be allowed to teach and discuss the topics they have to without fear. “Ideas can be dangerous” (Bloomberg.105). Not everyone’s opinion will be one to agree with, nor everything a person has to say, but people have to adjust to the real world where everything is not sugar

Censoring is not only in college classrooms, but in high school classrooms as well. It impedes on a student’s ability to develop and learn, hinders their ability to prepare for the modern-day world. Although cliché, and very sadly so, it is very apparent that today there is almost nothing that can be said that offends nobody. Thick skins have been replaced with fragile minds, and college students do not even know the extent of the first amendment. However, these same students believe they have the right to interpret the amendment their own way, and some believe they have the right to become the judiciary system if the speech doesn’t appeal to them.

This essay argues that universities have gone too far in suppressing unpopular, even distasteful, speech that is accorded the highest degree of First Amendment protection and that is vital to facilitating the robust exchange of ideas and viewpoints among students and faculty. As discussed below, university administrators have censored faculty members and, in some cases, adopted policies that discourage core political speech, discriminate against speech on the basis of its content, and deter faculty and students from expressing controversial views.

With the rise of intersectionality and sensitivity discussions across college campuses, there has been intense discussion regarding the nature of free speech, what is protected, and what is not. Several universities (mostly public institutions) have attempted to implement speech codes for the stated reason of protecting their students from harm. However, these speech codes have largely been struck down when challenged in court. Some scholars have challenged these decisions, arguing that the harm principle should allow schools to protect their students from harmful language. Others push back, arguing that not only does the right to freedom of expression trump these concerns, but that there are actually net harms caused by the restriction of

Recently, we have seen increased violence and tension on college campuses and even violent protests against conservatives like Ben Shapiro from speaking on highly liberal college campuses such as UCLA and University of California, Berkeley. Some universities have even adopted speech codes to stop students from “uttering sexist and racist slurs” (Kakutani). While this might seem like a noble cause, speech codes only do more harm as they attempt to silence certain views even if they are in no way promoting violence of evil in any way. While it might be understandable to ban certain slurs like “nigger” in certain private universities, some educators have gone to far. According to a brochure distributed to elementary teachers in Ontario, educators were instructed to no longer use phrases like “it’s an uphill battle” because they might offend someone and/or promote violence (North York Women Teachers’ Association). Such limitations of expression are dangerous to the right of freedom of speech given to all of us by God. We must do everything in our power to promote equality and opportunity for all, while silencing or name calling the views of