Trustee Responsibility Free Speech

Ben Raab
Yale News

Excerpt: Timothy Snyder evacuated his “Hitler, Stalin, and Us” lecture on Thursday afternoon after a Communist activist group entered the classroom and would not leave.

Around 10 demonstrators affiliated with the Revolutionary Communist Party showed up at the classroom in William Harkness Hall five minutes after the start of class and began shouting at Snyder while holding up signs and recording students. “It seemed like they just wanted to shout Professor Snyder down, not engage in any sort of discussion,” William Wang ’26, a student in the class, told the News. “After a few minutes of shouting it was clear they weren’t gonna go away. Eventually, we just left and went to another classroom.”

Bryan Caplan
James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal

Excerpt: I recently discovered that George Mason University, where I teach, plans to adopt a “Just Societies” course requirement. “Students entering Mason in Fall 2024 or later will be required to take two Mason Core courses that have the Just Societies flag.”

If you read any closer, you unsurprisingly discover that this is a thinly veiled woke-indoctrination requirement. Students are not exploring substantively different views on justice; they are hearing about “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” in all its Orwellian wonder.

Jim Martin
The News & Observer

Excerpt: Recently, all Davidson College student-athletes were required to watch a film entitled, “I’m Not Racist, Am I?” Its provocative message disavows “The Dream.” Regardless of what you think, say or do, it insists that if you’re white, you are racist. If you’re of color, you cannot be racist. In their lexicon, “racist” is just a synonym for “white.”

Oddly, some activists believe this fiction. They want to indoctrinate America’s youth for the noble goal of eliminating racism. Great. Then why insist upon bogus definitions that evoke only insult and injury? How can racism be eliminated if some of us remain melanin challenged? Their Cynical Race Theory is malicious and unworkable.

Randall L. Kennedy
The Harvard Crimson

Excerpt: The scenario is familiar: A university invites a speaker to campus that outrages some sector of the community. Perhaps the guest is Ann Coulter, Angela Davis, or Mohammed El-Kurd. Angered or disappointed, protestors demand that the invitation be withdrawn.

Many free speech advocates categorically denounce campaigns to disinvite speakers, pointing to such protests as evidence of moral and intellectual rot. They decry even more harshly authorities that rescind invitations, portraying them as shameful cowards. It’s important that universities host a diversity of perspectives. But, as a strong supporter of free speech myself, I have to say: The reflexive, absolutist scorn for these campaigns ought to be reconsidered.

Greg Lukianoff and Angel Eduardo
The Free Press, Substack

Excerpt: On our most elite college campuses—most recently, the University of California, Berkeley—the plan seems to be to unfound it. Earlier this week, a student group called Bears for Palestine published on Instagram its intention of “combatting lies” by shutting down an event featuring Israeli Defense Forces reservist and lawyer Ran Bar-Yoshafat.

The mob got their way. The event was canceled. Bar-Yoshafat, along with the students who had attended the event, were escorted out the back of the theater. Any students who took part in the violence should be expelled—assault is a crime and most certainly violates the school’s code of conduct. As for the students who organized the shutdown but did not participate in the violence, they should be punished.

Elizabeth Nolan Brown
Reason Magazine

Excerpt: State lawmakers are getting creative in their attempts to control what young people read. Across the U.S., we're seeing legislation aimed at school materials and public libraries.

These measures often wear the mantle of "parental rights" or "protecting kids" from obscenity. But in practice they tend to take aim at any books depicting sex or sexuality. These aren't outright book bans. But they still strike at the heart of things like student privacy and academic freedom, giving the most conservative parents, politicians, or administrators the power to determine what anyone can access of offer at public institutions.