OPINION| Universities are also 'speakers,' with an independent mandate to teach, research, and pursue truth for the common good. And this requires taking sides.
on campus. When a speaker traffics in racist discourse, delegitimates students, or questions their presence on campus, the university should counter those viewpoints.
This is particularly true in a moment marked by organized attacks targeting people of color, LGBTQ+ people, and religious minorities. Those who shoutto discredit antiracism or DEI know that neutrality is an illusion. Opposing tolerance, compassion, and inclusion doesn't create a university without values. It fosters a university with different values—those of an era when most Americans had no seat at the table.
We often hear that conservative students must navigate an unfriendly campus climate. Yet while we view the classroom as a sacred place where everyone—conservative or liberal, socialist or libertarian—should feel welcome and valued, we are troubled by stories that privilege the feelings of conservative students—who suffer neither presumptions of incompetence nor the denial of their very identities—after decades in which even the mainstream press belittled similar concerns from students of color.
Commentators routinely caricature students as intolerant children. Even absent petty insults, many admonish students for protesting the wrong way. We understand. When a speaker aims merely to provoke, even thoughtful protest can"feed the trolls." Still, we are troubled when professors and pundits claim authority over the right way to speak. Students might be younger and less experienced, but students deserve our respect.
is"not the absolute freedom of utterance of the individual scholar, but the absolute freedom of thought, of inquiry, of discussion, and of teaching, of the academic profession." Rightwing ideologues have abandoned academic freedom; they seek instead to control knowledge.
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