Majority Of U.S. College Students Now Support “Regulating” Free Speech
While the public’s attention has been largely focused on the Obama administration’s crusade against the Second Amendment, a more troubling development is taking place in the fight against free speech, and the First Amendment, a war waged far from D.C., on the campuses of America’s liberal colleges.
We read the following excerpt from the upcoming issue of the New Criterian, in which we find that 51% – or a majority – of college students favor “speech codes” (i.e., regulated “free speech”), with only 36% against, first with amusement (as we thought it has to be a joke) and then great concern (once we realized it is all too real) because it reveals that America’s best and brightest young minds have decided on their own that they don’t really need all those liberties enshrined by America’s founding fathers, especially if they “infringe” upon the current mania of “politically correct” everything.
A recent survey reported college students, by a margin of 51% to 36%, favor speech codes.Williams College (Tuition and fees: $63,290) has undertaken an “Uncomfortable Learning” Speaker Series in order to provide intellectual diversity on a campus where (like most campuses) left-leaning sentiment prevails. What a good idea! How is it working out? The conservative writer Suzanne Venker was invited to speak in this series. But when word got out that an alternative point of view might be coming to Williams, angry students demanded her invitation be rescinded. It was.
Explaining their decision, her hosts noted that the prospect of her visit was “stirring a lot of angry reactions among students on campus.” So Suzanne Venker joins a long and distinguished list of people—including Ayaan Hirsi Ali, George Will, and Charles Murray—first invited then disinvited to speak on campus. It’s been clear for some time that such interdictions are not bizarre exceptions. On the contrary, they are perfect reflections of an ingrained hostility to free speech—and, beyond that, to free thought—in academia.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
