Battling Campus Oppression of the Freedom of Expression

[Chris]

The backlash has begun against universities who seek to protect students from free speech.

Battling Campus Oppression of the Freedom of Expression

On election night 2016, Mark Schlissel, the University of Michigan’s president, addressed more than 1,000 students, declaring that the 90 percent of them who had favored the losing candidate had rejected “hate.” He thereby effectively made those who disagreed with him and with the campus majority eligible to be targets of the university’s “bias response teams.” That his announced contempt for them made him a suitable target of the thought police is a thought that presumably occurred to no one, least of all him.

Now, however, this leader of a public institution is being sued for constitutional violations. So are some members of Michigan’s archetypal administrative bloat — the ever-thickening layer of social-justice crusaders and orthodoxy enforcers who, nationwide, live parasitically off universities whose actual purpose is scholarship. These include Michigan’s vice-provost for equity and inclusion and the director of the Office of Student Conflict Resolution. Such bureaucrats have professional stakes in finding inequities to rectify and conflicts to resolve.

A splendid new organization, Speech First, headed by Nicole Neily, is not content merely to respond after the fact to violations of students’ constitutional rights. It is suing to invalidate Michigan’s “elaborate investigatory and disciplinary apparatus” that exists “to suppress and punish speech other students deem ‘demeaning,’ ‘bothersome’ or ‘hurtful.'” Speech First’s complaint notes that “the most sensitive student on campus effectively dictates the terms under which others may speak.” The university darkly warns that “bias comes in many forms” and “the most important indication of bias is your own feelings.” Speech First says that Michigan’s edifice of speech regulation, with its Orwellian threats to submit offenders to “restorative justice,” “individual education,” and “unconscious bias training,” amounts to unconstitutional prior restraint speech and is too overbroad and vague to give anyone due notice of what is proscribed.

“Verbal conduct” that “victimizes,” or jeopardizes a “social climate” that is “safe and inclusive”? Such vaporous language must have a chilling effect on humor, parody, satire, or plain speech about almost anything. What constitutes forbidden “cultural appropriation”? You will be told — after someone, encouraged by the administration to do so, has notified law enforcement.

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[DGUtley]

Huge battlefield. Huge.

[Chris]

Huge battlefield. Huge.

Yes, indeed, just report on Evergreen. I think there are issues at Ohio and other universities. And the real problem is one-time students who were indoctrinated into postmodern neoMarxism have graduated and moved out into the workplace, HR departments especially, and state and federal bureaucracies.

[Peter1469]

Where I went to college there was "free speech" square, in a central location. Anyone could give a speech about anything. But that was the early 1990s. I wonder if it is still there and uncensored.

[Chris]

It used to be what colleges and universities were all about, I mean, besides education. I wonder now if you get either.

[Chris]

Another...

University of Minnesota Alumnus Pulls Financial Support Over School's Discrimination Against Ben Shapiro

Following the University of Minnesota’s decision to censor a Young America’s Foundation campus lecture featuring Ben Shapiro in February, a major donor has decided to revoke his financial backing and instead partner with Young Americans for Freedom—the chapter affiliate of Young America’s Foundation—in order to bring real education to college students.

In a letter to University of Minnesota President Eric Kaler, a financial supporter and member of the U of M’s class of 1962 writes with “great sadness” over his alma mater’s treatment of Shapiro and the conservative students who hosted him.

“I believe the treatment of Ben Shapiro was clearly a case of discrimination,” writes the concerned citizen. “It was not discrimination by race or gender. It was more damaging than that. You have discriminated against the free dissemination of ideas.”

...The anonymous letter continues with a stinging indictment of the underlying fear of campus leftists who inflict their censorship out of concern that students might be inspired by conservative ideas:

“The question then becomes why you discriminate against conservative thought. My simple theory is that the administration and faculty of our major bodies of higher education are fearful. They are fearful that once people like Ben Shapiro speak about their conservative ideas, the students will begin to understand a simple fact. It is the fact that they have been exposed to only one way of thinking and thus will be furious over having spent so much time and money only to find out that they have been essentially brainwashed.

Because of this, I have decided to give my annual contribution for scholarship at the U of M to the Young Americans for Freedom [the chapter affiliate of Young America’s Foundation].

An excellent example of how much damage you have done; I am not signing my name for fear of Political Retaliation.”

...

[DGUtley]

It is a very dangerous trend. I liken it to the Nazis’ suppression of contrary political thought.

[Peter1469]

The alumni are the ones who can control these universities. Piss them off, and major funding disappears.

[Mister D]

Universities have been losing free speech cases for decades now but it is nice to see more groups taking them to task. It's also nice to see donors pull out.

[Chris]

Back to Evergreen...

'It's Turned Authoritarian': Former WA Prof Who Refused to Leave Campus Over His 'Whiteness' Blasts College

The now-former Washington state professor at the center of campus unrest over his refusal to leave campus based on his skin color returned to "Tucker Carlson Tonight" to give an update on his situation.

...Weinstein, who Carlson noted holds a liberal political stance, said Friday that things have gotten even worse at Evergreen since he was all but forced to resign his professorship.

"[It's] taken a turn toward the authoritarian that is nothing short of breathtaking," Weinstein said.

He said that people at the school blame his initial decision to appear with Carlson as the reason violence erupted on campus.

Weinstein added that one of the only examples of "right-wing" "violence" on campus was a threat phoned in by a man in Morris Plains, N.J.

He said the man never showed up in Washington state, and has since been arrested for the threat.

He said the school is firing staff who challenge the administration's views and promoting those who support what it considers "equity."

Weinstein said the college is now millions of dollars "in the red" and that prospective students are avoiding it because of its newfound reputation.