The Censoring Generation

Kids don't like free speech:

A whopping 52% of students think it can be acceptable to block other students from attending a controversial campus speech, way up from just 37% saying the same thing as recently as 2022. Meanwhile, a shocking 32% of students think using violence to block a campus speech can be acceptable, up from 20% saying the same in 2022. And finally, an astounding 68% of students said “shouting down” a controversial speaker can be acceptable, up from 62% in 2022. In an unfortunate but unsurprising twist, students who identified as “very liberal” were more likely to support these censorious tactics, and their support for censorship clearly skewed in one ideological direction. A clear majority of students, 68%, said that a speaker who argues “transgender people have a mental disorder” should not be allowed to speak on campus. Meanwhile, two-thirds of students similarly said that campuses shouldn’t let someone arguing “Black Lives Matter is a hate group” talk at an event. Nearly 60% said the same about someone who would argue that “collateral damage in Gaza is justified for the sake of Israeli security.” Whether one agrees with these opinions or not, students supporting their censorship are hopelessly misguided. These aren’t all even particularly fringe ideas, but even if they were, the answer to bad or upsetting speech is more speech: arguments that explain why something is wrong and offer another alternative. If ideas considered too “offensive” or “radical” are shut down instead of debated, the kind of social progress many of these young people claim to care about is hampered; after all, Martin Luther King Jr. was considered a “radical” in his day. Their approach is also remarkably short-sighted. If tactics such as shouting speakers down or using violence to disrupt talks are allowed, there’s nothing to stop right-wing opponents from using those same tactics to disrupt speeches by the people from whom these very liberal college students do want to hear. These things simply can’t go only one way. Regardless, the trend here is clear.

They really are rebelling against the Boomers...