Recent events at a Yale University free speech conference conjured images of the worst aspects of China’s “Cultural Revolution,” in which independent thought of any sort that differed even minutely from official party doctrine was harshly restricted and severely punished.
The event, which came at a time when conservative-minded students have been substantially pressured to remain silent on many campuses, discussed the necessity of unrestricted discourse and debate. This enraged “progressive” students, who attempted to storm the building where it was being held. When their attempt to do so was halted by security guards, the furious leftist youth, as reported by Jack Fowler of the National Review Institute, resorted to noise-making tactics in an effort to prevent the conference from proceeding. The meeting attendees were forced to leave the premises, and were subjected to a gauntlet of hate-filled rants. The protestors spat on several unlucky participants.
The incident is not an isolated example.
The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) conducted three consecutive national surveys which found that “the majority of our nation’s colleges and universities violate students’ and faculty members’ right to freedom of expression. Of the 364 institutions surveyed … approximately 270 of them—74 percent—maintain policies that clearly restrict speech that would otherwise be protected by the First Amendment. FIRE’s annual report is based on a comprehensive analysis of the policies restricting speech maintained by colleges and universities. In researching school policies for the past seven years, FIRE attorneys have noticed that nearly every speech code—that is, nearly every regulation prohibiting expression that would be constitutionally protected in society at large—is an example of one of several commonly made mistakes in policy language or application.”
According to The College Fix, students who differ with the prevailing leftist views are frequently “smeared, attacked and harassed by the very peers who demand tolerance, inclusion and diversity.”
Socially conservative students are the hardest hit. The Family Foundation notes that “As academia has embraced the progressive liberal agenda, students who are socially conservative have felt less and less welcome on college campuses. We’ve all heard the horror stories about professors failing students for refusing to back down from their beliefs, but the problem runs deeper than that. The conservative shaming on college campuses has trickled down from the academia and into the brains of the students themselves…Basically, if you are a college student who holds politically conservative beliefs, and in particular social conservative beliefs, you are considered less intelligent than your fellow peers. There aren’t any professors involved in this one: this is all students shaming other students.”
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At least one university has also moved to counter the rising Fascism of the progressive movement on campus. The Committee on Freedom of Expression at the University of Chicago was appointed in July 2014 “in light of recent events nationwide that have tested institutional commitments to free and open discourse.”
The result was a statement of principles in support of free speech, which noted:
“…It is not the proper role of the University to attempt to shield individuals from ideas and opinions they find unwelcome, disagreeable, or even deeply offensive. Although the University greatly values civility, and although all members of the University community share in the responsibility for maintaining a climate of mutual respect, concerns about civility and mutual respect can never be used as a justification for closing off discussion of ideas, however offensive or disagreeable those ideas may be to some members of our community…
“n a word, the University’s fundamental commitment is to the principle that debate or deliberation may not be suppressed because the ideas put forth are thought by some or even by most members of the University community to be offensive, unwise, immoral, or wrong-headed. It is for the individual members of the University community, not for the University as an institution, to make those judgments for themselves, and to act on those judgments not by seeking to suppress speech, but by openly and vigorously contesting the ideas that they oppose. Indeed, fostering the ability of members of the University community to engage in such debate and deliberation in an effective and responsible manner is an essential part of the University’s educational mission…
“Although members of the University community are free to criticize and contest the views expressed on campus, and to criticize and contest speakers who are invited to express their views on campus, they may not obstruct or otherwise interfere with the freedom of others to express views they reject or even loathe. To this end, the University has a solemn responsibility not only to promote a lively and fearless freedom of debate and deliberation, but also to protect that freedom when others attempt to restrict it. As Robert M. Hutchins observed, without a vibrant commitment to free and open inquiry, a university ceases to be a university.”