Activists from Emory University demanded that the university administration take action against chalk markings of “Trump” and “Trump 2016” on campus sidewalks, citing that the markings were “deliberate intimidation” that made students “fear for [their lives].” On March 22, responding to activists’ demands, Emory University president James W. Wagner agreed to examine security camera footage and take disciplinary and legal action against the chalkers.
The events at Emory would surely jar someone unfamiliar with today’s campus leftism. To a Harvard student, however, what went down at Emory looks jarringly similar– simply a more extreme version of the Currier House housing video controversy. Students at Harvard, too, felt personally threatened, after one of Harvard’s undergraduate houses released a video, featuring a parody of the loudmouthed, small-fingered shade of orange that is the GOP presumptive nominee. As a result, the controversial video was swiftly removed.
It is clear that the very majority of people who believe in liberal values–whether in or out of college, progressive or conservative–believe that such censorship of either Trump support or Trump satire is wrongheaded. Support for a major political candidate in an election year ought to be permitted, especially support in such a mild, chalky form. The same goes for a Trump impersonation, which is already everywhere in mainstream culture: a staple of American late-night comedy.
The Sensitivity Conundrum
This consensus makes it especially easy to bash and dropkick college activists for being coddled, Orwellian, and overprotected babies who want an excuse to get out of midterms. But caricaturing wayward college activists only makes them feel silenced by a media that, according to them, serves the interest of the powerful. Indeed, if critics seriously want to address this culture of sensitivity in leftist campus activism, mockery is counterproductive.
Essentially, the culture of sensitivity poses a conundrum. Imagine yourself as a college student, a college administrator, or a faculty member. Students come to you, saying that a Trump reference has made them feel traumatized, fearful, and physically distraught. Some students even shed tears. Are you really going to stare at those students in their teary eyes and call them “goofy participation-trophy loons,” while lecturing to them about “the real world,” as one commentator suggests? Will you really be able to have a rational, well-principled discussion with these students? Even if you find their pain unbelievable and downright irrational, you would probably have an instinct to comfort them. To validate their suffering. You would likely nod your head and show sympathetic solidarity. No critique at this point, no matter how reasonable and mild, can stand the power of genuine tears.
Yet, in this eagerness to protect the teary and the vulnerable, you agree to restrict speech, like the case of the Emory chalkings, or to institute changes without due process, like the case of Harvard’s house master titles.
This is the situation faced by college administrators nationwide. College administrators want to promote free intellectual debate, but they cannot invalidate the suffering of their students. In an understandable yet misguided rush of empathy, they adopt demands ranging from the debatable to the laughable. The real and valid emotions and sensitivities of campus activists, while deserving comfort, assurances of safety, and support, do not warrant special treatment that overrides due process–and especially do not call for encroachments on the freedom of speech.
There are those who justify restricting speech by arguing that such restrictions are necessary for combatting bigotry. Yet silencing the bigots does not rectify bigotry–the bigots would simply shut up and maintain their views. Instead, allowing the bigots to speak and openly confronting them is the best way to combat oppression. Moreover, on a more philosophical note, a university’s raison d’être is to advance the truth, for which the protection of free speech is indispensable. Granted, there are nuances regarding extremely hateful and violent speech, yet a Trump chalking is nowhere near this gray zone. Such speech must be protected.
Towards a Solution
Is there a way, then, for university administrators and students to ensure due process and freedom of speech, without trivializing the physical and emotional distress that activists experience?
The University of Chicago may have found an answer. Last year, it adopted a statement, drafted by a committee of faculty members, which formally affirmed its commitment to the freedom of speech. The statement specifically asserts that “it is not the proper role of the University to attempt to shield individuals from ideas and opinions they find unwelcome, disagreeable, or even deeply offensive.” Dubbed the “Chicago Principles” by free-speech advocacy groups, the statement has been adopted by other colleges like Purdue and Princeton.
Other colleges should follow suit. The freedom of expression ought to be constitutional to a university. Therefore, in accordance with this fundamental importance, colleges must draft and adopt free speech principles in a fair and formal process. These principles should be strictly enforced and made readily accessible to students. Moreover, in addition to workshops regarding sexual assault, substance use, and academic integrity, workshops on the freedom of speech should also be available during freshman orientation.
A public set of principles, if not preventing unreasonable demands for curtailing speech from gaining traction in the first place, allows administrators to express solidarity with teary-eyed activists, while still respectfully defer to written policy. More importantly, such principles would benefit campus activists as well. The core message of the Yale protests last semester–grievances about the experience of people of color at Yale–was eclipsed by a debate of free speech. While many activists wanted to have a conversation about race, observers rightly criticized that certain elements of the protests aimed to curtail speech. A set of principles reassures the public that activism does not threaten freedom; thus, student activists can voice their grievances unobstructed by a “free speech diversion.”
Of course, a written code is not nearly enough: Harvard itself has a much-forgotten set of free speech guidelines. As fellow HPR contributor Peter Wright makes clear, self-censorship of controversial ideas due to peer pressure is far more fundamentally jeopardizing to the freedom of speech than official erasure of Trump impersonations. Wright rightly argues that no single administrative policy suffices to resuscitate free speech on America’s college campuses. It is up to us college students to “take individual action to promote free exchange in any way we can.” Indeed, a student-driven climate of the free exchange of ideas–in which people are happy, and not distressed, to be exposed to uncomfortable ideas–will be the ultimate solution to the sensitivity conundrum.
That goal is far away. On the other hand, public and formal free speech principles serve as the first line of defense against demands to restrict speech and as a bright line separating social justice and censorship. Free speech principles are no silver bullet, but they may be a necessary first step.
Image Source: Youtube/WeaponizedNEWS