Why even progressive students feel stifled by the atmosphere on college campuses
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CounterCurrent:
The Root of Self-Censorship
Why even progressive students feel stifled by the atmosphere on college campuses
CounterCurrent is the National Association of Scholars’ weekly newsletter, bringing you the biggest issues in academia and our responses to them.
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Category: Freedom of Speech; Reading Time: ~2 minutes
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** Featured Article - Emma Camp Almost Gets It by Peter Wood ([link removed])
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If you spend any time on Twitter, you likely heard about the New York Times guest essay published last week that gave the academic world an opportunity for introspection. (Did it take that opportunity? Of course not.)
In an article titled “I Came to College Eager to Debate. I Found Self-Censorship Instead. ([link removed]) ,” Emma Camp, a current senior at the University of Virginia, writes about the “strict ideological conformity” that has defined her college experience. She explains that “hushed voices and anxious looks dictate…many conversations on campus” and that “students of all political persuasions hold back—in class discussions, in friendly conversations, on social media—from saying what [they] really think.”
Emma provides more than just anecdotal evidence for her claims. She cites a College Pulse survey ([link removed]) of over 37,000 students at 159 colleges in which 80% of the students admitted to self-censoring at least some of the time and 48% said that they were “somewhat uncomfortable” or “very uncomfortable” expressing their views on a controversial topic in class.
Many on the left were quick to point to Emma’s past internship with the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education and her upcoming job with Reason as evidence of her supposed affiliation with the conservative right, but Emma is, in fact, a self-described liberal. The views that she fears speaking aloud are fairly vanilla and even typical of left-leaning students: she describes asking questions of her gender and sexuality professor in a low voice and uneasily criticizing ritual suicide by Indian widows in her feminist theory class.
Emma’s efforts to signal her support for pro-choice policies and anti-racism initiatives were not enough to stave off the fury of the progressive arbiters of acceptable discourse. The Twitter backlash ([link removed]) came nearly instantly, and a host of critical articles reacting to the piece soon followed. Some expressed their disappointment with the New York Times for publishing the piece; others (Nikole Hannah-Jones included ([link removed]) ) gleefully pointed out the irony of writing about censorship in a large outlet.
In this week’s featured article ([link removed]) , National Association of Scholars President Peter Wood describes the oppressive ideology that leads students to self-censor any views that may prove unpopular. Emma highlights a real problem, he says, but she only sees part of the picture. The stifling atmosphere on college campuses stems from the notion of “academic justice” that radical progressives use to justify silencing dissent. We must recognize the root of the issue in order to have any hope of combating it. Dr. Wood writes:
Today’s campus is effectively ruled by those who present themselves as champions of something like “academic justice.”... they see no need to tolerate opinions that differ from their own superior and supposedly “just” views. They trample on dissent gleefully and are full of righteous indignation towards anyone who would venture even a slight divergence from the prevailing dogmas of the left. …
Speaking up, as Camp writes, takes courage, and if too few speak up, it may simply be reckless. It will take more than speaking up to defeat today’s Korn-topia. It will take an awakening to the real nature of the “social justice” ideology on which this censorious regime is founded. That in turn would require a fundamental reorientation of our colleges and universities that have fallen under the spell of a false ideal. When Camp realizes that, she will know what to do next.
Emma’s article started an important conversation, but it offered neither the full story about nor the antidote to the oppressive atmosphere on college campuses. In order to have any hope of preserving academic freedom and ideological diversity, we must address the toxic ideology at the core of campus censorship head on. Only then can students and professors begin to speak and research freely.
Until next week.
Marina Ziemnick
Communications Associate
National Association of Scholars
Read More ([link removed])
For more on freedom of speech and higher education:
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February 18, 2022
** Tracking Cancel Culture in Higher Education ([link removed])
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David Acevedo
UPDATED: A repository of 217 professors, administrators, and students who have been canceled for expressing views deemed unacceptable by higher education ideologues.
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October 20, 2021
** Alumni Organize in Defense of College Free Speech ([link removed])
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Stuart Taylor, Jr., and Edward Yingling
A press release announcing the launch of the Alumni Free Speech Alliance, a new organization dedicated to mobilizing college and university alumni in defense of free speech on campus.
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March 16, 2021
** Taking Free Speech Zones to Court ([link removed])
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David Acevedo
The days of free speech on campus are long gone. Or are they? A new SCOTUS opinion sheds light on what may be the future of free speech in higher ed.
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January 12, 2018
** The Architecture of Intellectual Freedom ([link removed])
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Peter Wood
In 2015, campuses across the country erupted in protests aimed at limiting the freedoms of professors and fellow students. This report restates the contexts of academic and intellectual freedom, including their application to a liberal arts education.
** About the NAS
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