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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.'"
It's all because of greed. Universities have adopted corporate tactics to become and stay "more competitive in the marketplace" and that means shielding themselves from lawsuits and making themselves more appealing to donors.
Nice ad hominem. Instead of reading the source and arguing with the points made, you drool on yourself and blabber on about Murdoch.
The fact is that free speech in America has been getting more and more curtailed. Some in a very overt manner (free speech zones). Some in a softer manner (How DARE you suggest that affirmative action is racist, you racist). But the US is not as free as it used to be. No, we are nowhere near a totalitarian state. But freedoms do not go away overnight. If we continue to let the slide continue, we'll be closer to the totalitarian state. Freedoms are hard to get back once they've been ceded.
But thanks for your idiotic response. If anything, it was a nice foil.
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
Posting anonymous so I don't lose my mod points.
> Instead of reading the source and arguing with the points made ...
Everyone here, please read this. This is part of the problem. "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."
Forget political parties. Forget Democrat or Republican, or WSJ vs. NYT. If speech is being curtailed, that should concern you.
Example: friend of mine works with my wife at the Social Security Administration, where the rules are so byzantine, they can mean anything you want them to this week. This friend jokes that says things like, "my, you're looking remarkably neutral and androgynous today." It's fun to watch their puzzled expressions as they try to decide whether it's a compliment, an insult, or something that merits a formal EEOC complaint.
Freedom of speech means FREEDOM OF SPEECH. As the Supreme Court of the US has ruled many times, even OFFENSIVE speech must be protected. Even speech with which you might personally disagree.
This should concern every one of you, regardless of your ideological bent.
so if you are using your personal computing device you need to go off campus to post your opinions??
also btw you are using the normal WRONG reading of the first amendment.
this should not be used to force me to be atheist.
Any person using FTFY or editing my postings agrees to a US$50.00 charge
"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.
Even a blind pig occasionally finds acorns. My oldest made the comment that "children are nothing but a black hole of need." Some PC idiot said "you can't say that, that's racist." The teacher walked by and told her that she wasn't to make such racist comments in the future (and threatened her with explosion).
Universities are no longer liberal institutions where ideas can be freely discussed. Idiocy and censorship do abound. But feel free to shoot the messenger and ignore the problem.
It's basically a bunch of crybaby Republicans whining about how unwelcome on campus their harassment of women, minorities, gays, muslims, any anyone else not like them is.
Freedom of speech isn't free anymore when you stop crybaby Republicans from whining.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Note that the 1st amendment also says that the government can't prohibit the free exercise of religion either, including its expression through speech and the press. There is a world of difference between a student or ordinary citizen expressing themselves in a voluntary manner (aka offering a prayer right before a test on their own or holding a prayer vigil on Christmas Eve in a public area... even on public property) as opposed to having the government mandate that you must pray to a certain god or have tithing extracted from your paycheck as a tax.
I don't have a problem with a student setting up a web page expressing their religious opinions using government funds... as long as you offer that same opportunity to all of the students on a reasonable basis to express whatever their opinion is including having no opinion or even being against organized religions in general. The problem is the censorship, and this attitude that religious expression is something that should be feared.
I think it would even be healthy to have a "debate corner" on a college campus where any student could express any political opinion they may have... including "hate speech" full of bigotry, sexism, and racism. If you think some sort of speech should be censored, you definitely don't understand the purpose or the philosophy behind the 1st amendment and why it was ratified in the first place. Suggesting that university websites, dorm doors, or even bulletin boards should be off limits to religious expression completely misses the mark... especially at a public school. Private schools have a little more latitude to ban some forms of speech as there is a contractual relationship to even attend. It definitely shouldn't be the other way around.
I have many views that you would probably label as right-wing and extreme, and yet I'm not the slightest bit sexist, racist, or homophobic. Will that truth affect your gross caricaturizations in the future? Probably not.