Paste your essay in here…I. Introduction
From the dawn of the republic, freedom of expression and speech have been our most prized values. This great experiment of American republicanism was based on these ideas. For centuries, Americans respected this most sacred institution in our society. It is what distinguished us from our counterparts in the world. In order to have the vibrant American democracy that exists, freedom of speech needed to be emphasized above all else. For centuries, American universities stood proud as bastions of free speech that safeguarded our most basic freedoms. They fiercely debated the issues of the day, and everyone respected the tradition.. Central to these debates and discussions was a common respect. Liberals and conservatives, Democrats and Republicans, atheists and Christians, all believed in the free exchange of ideas and worldviews. However, the respectful dialogues that defined American institutions of higher learning have all but ended. Student leaders, faculty, and administrators at nearly every major university in America have chosen to forego the legacy of free speech in order to combat “hate speech”, a term that has spun wildly out of control. At colleges and universities, freedom of speech is under assault. From speech codes and restrictions against speech deemed “hateful”, to the uninviting of conservative speakers and mobs of angry students who shout down those who disagree with
them, it is clear that one of America’s most fundamental tenants is under assault. The Founding Fathers believed that we do not receive our most basic rights from those in power, but by divine providence. That by our creator’s will, we are endowed with certain basic rights. This basic truth has been lost, and has led to the totalitarian practice of silencing dissenting opinions. As a college student, I see the suppression of dissent everyday. Students are afraid to voice a contrary opinion out of the fear that they will bear some sort of social cost. I have seen friends denigrated as racists, and bigots for not accepting the mantra of “social justice.” I am a liberal. That does not mean that I support wealth redistribution, gun control, or any modern day liberal policy. I am a liberal in the most classical sense of the word. I believe in liberty. I believe in freedom. I want to free people from coercive authority. In order to truly be a “liberal”, one must seek to increase freedom. There is no more basic component of freedom than freedom of speech and expression. In order to create a truly free society, individuals must be free to express any opinion they have, regardless of how unpopular it may be.
II. Research
From the earliest days of western civilization, freedom of speech has been prized as the ultimate tool in allowing democracy to prosper. Both the ancient Greeks recognized the deep importance of citizens’ voices, and how they can shape a nation. Eventually, freedom of speech was passed down to the English who codified it in their Bill of Rights. By the time freedom of speech was realized as a fundamental human right in the United States, it already had a long and rich history. Writers from Voltaire and John Stuart Mill, to the late Alan Bloom expressed the importance of this concept in any democratic nation. Voltaire brilliantly explained the simple concept of “I disagree with what you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it.” In On Liberty, John Stuart Mill advocated that opposing viewpoints be respected in order to search for truth and lead society to a more prosperous future. Bloom famously warned against the trends towards postmodernism and political correctness in his masterpiece, The Closing of the American Mind, Bloom argued that, over the last few decades, “the intellectual minority expected to enhance its status, presenting itself as the defender and the spokesman of all the others.”
While other nations have embraced freedom of speech, none have embraced it quite like the United States. Freedom of speech is more than just stating a political opinion. It means that individuals must be willing to tolerate, what they believe to be, the most detestable and awful opinions. It is for this reason that Americans overwhelmingly accept the notion that certain racist attitudes should not be banned. In order to combat bad speech, the answer is not less speech, but more speech. If individuals are forced to stay quiet about their thoughts, those prejudices will only strengthen. Individuals only become more divided when they are not allowed to speak out. For example, France outlawed any racist behavior towards minorities in the Gayssot Act of 1990. Hate speech is punishable by law in multiple European countries including Britain, Germany and Sweden. This is not the case in the United States, as hate speech laws are nonexistent. Individuals are allowed to express disgusting viewpoints, as long as they don’t act on that prejudice and physically harm someone. While the Universal Declaration of Human Rights clearly addresses freedom of speech, and all western countries subscribe to some form of free speech, their definitions of it greatly differ. All of the previously mentioned nations have
experienced a backlash from fringe populist movements whose support bases are largely made up of disaffected individuals who see problems with the status quo. The suppression of speech in these nations certainly played a role in creating the resentment that drives these far-right movements.
As European universities embraced mandatory political correctness and became less free, American universities remained a beacon of free thought and expression. However, this reputation is in danger now more than ever. A recent Pew poll sparked surprise when 40% of millennials expressed support for banning hate speech. After an analysis of colleges and universities though, this statistic makes all too much sense. Colleges around the country have instituted speech codes that imposes restrictions on speech that would normally be protected by the First Amendment. Speech codes often target speech on both the viewpoint and content expressed. Instituted in the late 1980’s, speech codes were meant to create a better learning environment by fighting against biases and prejudice. According to the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), nearly 50% of the 440 colleges it analyzed in its most recent report, had restrictive speech codes. Many colleges have banned so-called “offensive language” and “disparaging remarks.” The problems with these classifications are that they are not only too malleable to distinguish between an actual act of racism and a political opinion, but that they try to ban racist speech at all. Innocent remarks are turned into microaggressions that can damage individuals. If both sides were engaging in this suppression of dissent, there would be equal blame to go around. However, this is not the case. Speech codes are used by left-leaning faculty and students to denigrate conservatives or even disaffected liberals who do not conform to their
expected standards for social justice. Basic statements such as “Where are you really from?” and “Why are you so quiet?” are turned into deeply damaging sleights against racial minority groups and women. How do we, as a people, decide whose ideas and speech are worth protecting? Is it based on a standard of fairness? And if so, what constitutes “fairness?” And if we decide that something is unfair and should be limited, is it truly “fair” to threaten someone to be silent or face the consequences of disciplinary action or, as in the case of European countries, arrest? Is it truly “fair” for any coercive force to determine what is and isn’t acceptable speech? This amounts to picking winners and losers, as the individuals who determine what is acceptable speech can tailor the standards in their favor. In R.A.V. Vs. City of Saint Paul, Justice Scalia noted that “St. Paul has no such authority to license one side of a debate to fight freestyle, while requiring the other to follow Marquess of Queensberry rules.”
In R.A.V vs. City of Saint Paul, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that Saint Paul’s Bias-Motivated Crime Ordinance was unconstitutional, which overturned a teenager’s conviction for burning a cross on a African American family’s lawn. In delivering the majority opinion of the Court, Justice Scalia wrote:
A State may choose to prohibit only that obscenity which is the most patently offensive in its prurience — i.e., that which involves the most lascivious displays of sexual activity. But it may not prohibit, for example, only that obscenity which includes offensive political messages. And the Federal Government can criminalize only those threats of violence that are directed against the President, since the reasons why threats of violence are outside the First Amendment (protecting individuals from the fear of violence, from the disruption that fear engenders, and from the possibility that the threatened violence will occur) have special force when applied to the person of the President.
This is a clear representation that the First Amendment is meant to protect opposing political opinions and not threats to violence. Expressing a particular political or social opinion is acceptable speech, no matter how repulsive it may be. However, any calls to action or threats of violence are unacceptable. Part of the problem with these speech codes is that they are not enforced impartially, and serve one particular viewpoint. This is an example of viewpoint
discrimination. Based on precedent, it is unlikely that the Supreme Court would find campus speech codes at public universities Constitutional. The goal of speech codes is to foster a more egalitarian society, where people are forced to treat others with respect. This would likely be seen as an unconstitutional attempt to impose certain values and beliefs on society. However, the fight for free speech at private universities is much more bleak. Private institutions are allowed to regulate the activity of members in its community. The Courts can only do so much. A much larger cultural shift will have to occur in order to protect the speech rights of a conservative minority.
At universities across the country, conservative speakers are regularly uninvited from speaking engagements and not allowed to speak. For example, Ben Shapiro, the conservative commentator has been uninvited from both CSULA and Depaul University this year, as students complained that his proposed lecture would not be a debate of ideas, but a personal attack on them. Depaul banned Shapiro from speaking on campus, as he was associated with an increased security risk on campus. The irony though, is that, in November, Shapiro was supposed to speak at a Young Americans for Freedom event at the school, and was not allowed on campus, even though there were no protesters. Cal State Los Angeles had similar concerns that Shapiro would
create an increased security risk. The idea that Cal State Los Angeles and Depaul are using the excuse that Ben Shapiro constitutes a security risk is absurd, as it implicitly accepts any protesters’ demands that an individual not speak. This effectively shuts out any sort of conservative conversation on campus, as any individual with an opposing opinion is denied the opportunity to speak. This provides social justice minded administrators the opportunity to deny speakers like Shapiro from entering campus without saying it is because of his beliefs. Conservative speakers were disinvited from speaking on college campuses 17 times in 2016 alone. In 2015, President Obama weighed in:
I don’t agree that you, when you become students at colleges, have to be coddled and protected from different points of view. I think you should be able to — anybody who comes to speak to you and you disagree with, you should have an argument with ‘em. But you shouldn’t silence them by saying, "You can’t come because I'm too sensitive to hear what you have to say." That’s not the way we learn either.
It is very easy for speakers be to be dismissed as radicals and thus ignored.
The mob mentality that exists on so many college campuses is toxic and dangerous for those with dissenting viewpoints. Recently at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, the College Republicans brought in three prominent members of the conservative movement: Steven Crowder, host of the popular podcast, Louder With Crowder, Milo Yiannopoulos, a senior editor at Breitbart.com, and Christina Hoff Sommers, a second wave feminist liberal, philosophy professor of 20 years, and scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. The event was supposed to focus on the question of whether or not political correctness has gone too far on college campuses. Instead, it devolved into 50 students screaming at the panel of guests, culminating in a profane rant my Mr. Crowder. This is another example of activists shouting down conservative speakers on campuses This generation is possibly the first to advocate for less rights in America. At the event, Ms. Sommers asked what has happened since 1980 to provoke such angry vitriol from the left? The answer does not lie in any increased oppression towards any group, but in the composition of our university professors. Only 13 percent of university professors identify as conservatives, and an NYU study indicated that 96% of social psychology professors identify as left of center, 3.6% as moderates, and 0.03% as right of center. It is not difficult to imagine that the numbers change when you look at the professors in courses like philosophy, ethnic studies, and gender studies. Students at were heard chanting “keep your hate speech off this campus”, and “this is my free speech!”. At Yale University last year, faculty member, Nicholas Christakas was approached by an angry mob of students who screamed at him saying that college isn’t about creating an intellectual space, but about creating a true and genuine home for students. Christakas and his wife faced so much pressure that they were forced to leave the school. Recently at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, protesters entered the lecture hall at Ben Shapiro’s speaking event, and disrupted him for a good twenty minutes. Screaming about his white supremacy, and refusing to have a substantive conversation, protesters hijacked the event. Stories like these are all too common in higher education, and light needs to be shed on them.
After an interview with a college student, Sarah Maliarik from Wheaton College in Massachusetts, it is clear that suppression of speech is not only reserved for conservatives who speak out, but for liberals who challenge the narratives put forward in class. When speaking out
against affirmative action, Maliarik said, “ But then I’ve got these girls telling me that I need to go check my privilege, just for not agreeing with them on something.” This is all too common in academia as even liberals who speak in favor of a traditionally “conservative” idea are denigrated as racist and sexist. Professors are often so interested in promoting all kinds of diversity, but eschew any sort of intellectual diversity.
III. Conclusion
Freedom of speech remains one of the most sacred rights in America, as it empowers us to have a democratic society that we can all be proud of. In order to have true “tolerance”, we must be willing to tolerate those with radically different perspectives. The usurpation of freedom is always done with a noble cause, but the slippery slope that follows is always dangerous. Silencing dissent is the first step to totalitarianism. With all of the evidence, it is easy to see a trend. American Millennials are moving away from free speech. The picture is not very rosy. However, the case for freedom is not easily defeated. Freedom of speech is part of what it means to be an American, and there is no reason to believe that this generation will not see that as well. If we do not fight these trends, we will be condemned to an Orwellian future where an anointed elite chooses what is and isn’t acceptable speech. The First Amendment is alive, but not well today. It is largely up to this generation to reinspire support for it in this century. The traditions of intellectual diversity in America are too strong to be defeated by postmodernism or social justice. Americans will be forced to fight these trends and stand up for tolerance. Tolerating those who disagree with you is the only way to keep the democracy strong. At every juncture, Americans have chosen to fight for freedom. I am confident that we will do it again.