What We’re Reading: October 2022

This month’s selections include stories about silenced speech, from a University of Idaho memo limiting employees’ speech about abortion to student protestors shouting down University of Florida presidential finalist, Sen. Ben Sasse (R-NE).

Campus Happenings

Freedom of Expression and Expressive Conduct
American University | September 19, 2022

On August 29, American University adopted a new policy on free expression, including free expression in the classroom, invited speakers, and counter-speech and protest. This follows the AU Faculty Senate’s adoption of a new Statement of Values on Free Expression in May.

University of Idaho Gives Employees New Guidance on Abortion
Becca Savransky | Idaho Statesman | September 27, 2022

In the wake of new state legislation disallowing public funds to provide, counsel in favor of, or promote abortion, the University of Idaho issued a memo cautioning that enforcement of these laws “remains unclear” and “warned employees against promoting abortion or services for the ‘prevention of conception’ and recommended limits on discussions of abortion in the classroom.” The AFA, FIRE, and AAUP sent letters responding to the memo.

UCLA Administrators Monitor Students’ Social Media Activity
Victoria Li and Phoebe Brous | Daily Bruin | October 9, 2022

After being named in a Dallas Morning News investigation as one of several dozen campuses hiring a vendor to monitor students’ social media accounts, UCLA acknowledged it used the service. A campus spokesperson said that the service is “not used to proactively monitor any social media account” and has used the service to identify and support students at risk of harming themselves or others. A research fellow and graduate student are quoted, expressing concerns that monitoring social media chills expression and discourages campus protests.

‘He Won’t Live a Day in Peace’: UF Presidential Finalist Ben Sasse Cut Off By Protesters Flooding Q&A
Alligator Staff | The Independent Florida Alligator | October 10, 2022

About 300 student protestors used the heckler’s veto at a student forum, where the student body president was moderating a Q&A session with University of Florida presidential finalist Sen. Sasse. Demonstrators cited Sen. Sasse’s positions on abortion, gay marriage, and student debt relief and what they saw as a lack of transparency during the presidential search process.

MUSG, BSC, LASO Leaders Removed From Offices
Julia Abuzzahab and Megan Woolard | Marquette Wire | October 11, 2022

After leading a demonstration calling “for more support for students of color” at Marquette University’s 2022 New Student Convocation, leaders of the Marquette University Student Government, Black Student Council, and Latin American Student Organization faced disciplinary hearings and dismissal from their leadership positions. The campus response has been mixed, with some calling for the student leaders to be reinstated and others expressing their disapproval of the students’ disruption.

Op-eds and Thought Pieces

Free Speech: The Lost Progressive Cause
Bea Millan-Windorski | The Daily Cardinal | September 22, 2022

Bea Millan-Windorski, a student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, writes: “It is shortsighted to abandon free speech, a historically progressive cause… By reclaiming the defense of this inalienable civil liberty against all potential censors, the left can begin an effective campaign against the radical right’s more pressing attacks on free speech.”

Conservatives Have Turned Against Academic Freedom. Here’s Why.
John K. Wilson | The Washington Post | September 26, 2022

The author asserts, while as recently as the 1980s, conservatives supported free speech values to ensure right-of-center ideas would have a place on liberal campuses, “in 2022, neither side in the campus speech wars wants to protect the other’s ideas.” Meanwhile, while neither right nor left defends free expression on principle, “vast armies of administrators…increasingly control campuses with the goal of squelching controversy.”

I’m a Conservative. I’m Dismayed by Right-Wing Campus Activists
Jonathan Marks | The Chronicle of Higher Education | September 28, 2022

Jonathan Marks, a professor of politics at Ursinus College and a self-identified conservative, observes colleges “are more left-liberal than they have ever been.” However, he finds the conservative response wanting: Turning Point USA and its donors support a movement “that is more Alex Jones than Allan Bloom,” while too few conservative academics criticize TPUSA and step up to help students “engage with the depth and complexity of the conservative intellectual tradition.”

These 12 College Students Don’t Like the System They’re In
Patrick Healy and Adrian J. Rivera | The New York Times | September 30, 2022

In a focus group of 12 college students, five reported that they are sometimes nervous about expressing an unpopular political view, while four said they’ve heard a professor say something harmful. Overall, students had “a generally progressive outlook on society but not a doctrinaire one, with real skepticism about institutional systems and practices (even traditionally progressive ones like affirmative action and liberal politics in the classroom).”

Polarization Is About to Get a Lot Worse: Students Are Even More Divided Than We Are | Opinion
Eric Kaufmann | Newsweek | October 6, 2022

According to Eric Kaufmann, a professor of politics at Birkbeck, University of London, elite colleges have “little to no political diversity.” He observes, “a century ago, intellectuals from small midwestern towns sought out the freewheeling intellectual environments of major East Coast universities” but now attend college in red states. His hypothesis: “political compromise will be even harder to achieve among the elite of tomorrow than it is today.”