How Free Speech Died On Campus

theodp writes "The WSJ catches up with FIRE's Greg Lukianoff and his crusade to expose how universities have become the most authoritarian institutions in America. In Unlearning Liberty, Lukianoff notes that baby-boom Americans who remember the student protests of the 1960s tend to assume that U.S. colleges are still some of the freest places on earth. But that idealized university no longer exists. Today, university bureaucrats suppress debate with anti-harassment policies that function as de facto speech codes. FIRE maintains a database of such policies on its website. What they share, lifelong Democrat Lukianoff says, is a view of 'harassment' so broad and so removed from its legal definition that 'literally every student on campus is already guilty.'"

Comments

Wow, don't have opinions online..

[slashkitty]

Norfolk State: "The policy broadly prohibits using any university internet technology resources "to further personal views" or "religious or political causes." It also prohibits downloading or transmitting "inappropriate messages or images," without defining "inappropriate."

Re:Wow, don't have opinions online..

[Anonymous Coward]

In any decent university there is an academic appeals committee where, if the professor isn't abiding by the terms laid out in the course syllabus, the professor's evaluation can be overruled. Furthermore, consideration of such cases often involves independent evaluation of student work. In my experience, if a student really is being treated unfairly, the situation usually gets corrected. I've sat on such a committee. It usually went 40:60 student versus prof's stories. I've evaluated plenty of examples where students thought they were being treated unfairly, but actually they were not.

The key in both situations is not to base it on "They don't like me", but "They said I'd be evaluated this way, and, here, take a look at this work for yourself and compare it to the rest of the class to see for yourself." The worst when sitting on that committee was hearing the student's story, then asking to see the work, and they've lost it or some other lame reason that may as well be equivalent to "the dog ate it". Well, I sympathize, but if it was that important and you were being shafted, you better keep that stuff or we can't help you.

I've also helped a student at graduate level who really was being treated unfairly. As it started to turn sour I told them to meticiously document the time they spent on their work, perform outstandingly in all their course work, keep copies of their work, records of e-mail exchanges, everything. The idea was that if it did come to the point where they had to make a case to others, they could show to any impartial person what went wrong (and that it wasn't them). When the time came they found plenty of support from other faculty, because the evidence was kind of obvious.

Profs can be unfair assholes, just like anyone else can, but on the whole most of them aren't. It's unpleasant and risky to deal with a situation like that as a student, because the prof is in a position of power. However, 9 times out of 10 the problem *is* with the student, and blaming the prof is just a convenient excuse. I know this, because I *strive* to be fair, yet I've heard all sorts of unjustified complaints. I don't mean the "prof is a hardass kind", but "prof said it would be X, but actually it was Y", even though I can go back to the syllabus and point at the part that does indeed say I'm expecting "X". Statistically, these aren't many cases anyway (most students are satisfied), but the ones that aren't, well, a lot of them are a bunch of whiners who want to blame everyone *else* for their problems. I've had people show up at my door at the end of term with a 49% saying "Oh, gee, Dr. X, can you please (arbitrarily) increase my mark by 1% so I can pass?" [Checks records. Student didn't do easy bonus point assignment X, Y, or Z, and lost 10% right there]. "Uh, no" == "Professor X is an unfair hardass" on Rate My Professor. Naturally, the the prof figures prominently when people get an F, not them, even if 90% of the class passed just fine. Go figure.

For the other tenth, the legitimate complaints, students need to look out for themselves and realize that the other profs will support them if the evidence is clear enough. For graduate work, one of the reasons there's a committee rather than a single supervisor is to ensure that a student has someone knowledgeable to turn to if someone is being unreasonable. It can still go horribly wrong, and profs do have a lot of power, but there are checks-and-balances for a reason, and students need to avail themselves of those if they discover that their supervisor is an ass. It is going to be messy and it doesn't always turn out well, but I've seen enough examples to know that it often does turn out ok.

Re:High conservative bent

[Anonymous Coward]

No...the issue is that FIRE says it is concerned about freedom at campuses in general, but is largely silent whenever, for example, private religious institutions like Liberty University trounce all over their student's freedom of speech.

Re:Could the summary possibly be more slanted?

[rtfa-troll]

"If my guy does it, you're just overreacting if you disagree," and "if their guy does it, it's automatically suspect, move along, nothing to see."

Except, you and the guy you are supporting are completely wrong about what's going on here. This really is a Murdock propaganda piece. Look, sometimes a person is reliably and consistently stupid and evil. This means saying "oh, I'm sure Ghengis isn't riding towards those young girls to be nice to them" is not prejudice, just justifiable wisdom. Now your point would be really great if this was an exception. But let's see what I find if I look it up.

WSJ:

At Western Michigan University, it is considered harassment to hold a "condescending sex-based attitude."

Actual policy (I'm not going to include the context here; please read yourself):

Sexual harassment is defined as unwelcome sexual conduct which is related to any condition of employment or evaluation of student performance.

and in a separate paragraph near to but not related to the definition of harassment, the only use of the word condescending:

All persons should be sensitive to situations that may affect or cause the recipient discomfort or humiliation or may display a condescending sex-based attitude towards a person.

If something is put in a media outlet which belongs to Murdock, assuming that the truth is the opposite will only make you wrong about 10% of the time. In this case, it's about Murdock trying to attack the freedom of speech of the people at universities.