[news] Free Speech University Rankings

[unixman_again]

Free Speech University Rankings! - a spiked campaign

 

If you dig through the results, there are some quite chillings examples of censorship. It was all different when I was as uni in the 1970s - you could say what you wanted, read what you wanted and nobody cared. I still have my copies of The Anarchist Cookbook and Kitchen Explosives from this era. We were too busy getting drunk to be a worry - the most dangerous thing we did was tip all the benches over in the park.

[synaesthesia]

Not sure what that is supposed to be promoting. There's a difference between free speech and protecting people. I'm sure a lot of it is true and correct, but noone can possibly hold it against an establishment for banning the insertion of vegetables in someone's anus to initiate them into their football team or to pick a local example, banning payday loan adverts...

[Diello]

It's frightening... Universities by their nature are supposed to be places of intellectual rigour and open-mindedness, the regressive authoritarianism that has taken hold in the US, and increasingly here, makes me fear for the future. A dangerous minority of vocal students who believe that it is more important to not be exposed to opinions they don't like, than it is to have truth and intelligence. This is a world of "safe spaces", "no platforming", and "trigger warnings" - when you start scratching the surface it almost seems unbelievable.

[localzuk]

Universities are supposed to be the bastions of freedom of thought and speech. They no longer are. We now live in a world of "safe spaces" and people fearing causing offense. You can probably guess that I don't really have that fear. If someone disagrees with something I say, I expect a response via the same mechanism - speech.

 

Banning someone from speaking is pointless - it is divisive and aids them through the mechanism of infamy.

 

Instead, have them speak, have them make a fool of themselves, and then counter their speech yourself. Prove them wrong.

 

There's a bit of irony with banning fascists from speaking, that's for sure.

[nicholab]

Radio 4 the moral maze Policing Offence is looking at this very issue. One University banned Life from handing out leaflets and that is a discrace. I think CND would have been banned today.

[Duranis]

I agree but at the same time some of these things that are "anti free speech" according to this website can be boiled down to the university having a policy of "don't be a ------, treat others with some respect" which I don't have so much of an issue with.

 

Just because a university doesn't want people being opening racist/homophobic/complete A***hats doesn't mean they are really anti free speech. They just want an environment were people can learn without having to worry about ignorant, um, lets say people, causing them distress because of their skin colour/sexuality/pokemon go team choice.

 

Yeah I'm sure there are Universities out there that have some odd restrictive policies in writing but even out of all of them how many are actually enforcing them? Probably not as bad a problem as this website is painting it to be honest.

[Diello]

The problem is, we're not really talking about taking action against people who have gone out of their way to offend someone just for the sake of offending someone. We're talking about a self-selected group of people, who have taken it upon themselves to divide people up by identity politics, and decide which group may express an opinion, and influence political discourse. Erika Christakis - Who students told to resign because he said university wasn't about building a comfortable home for students, but about intellectual thought, heck the NUS even attacked Peter Tatchell, you know, that famous bigot of a man... https://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/2015/feb/14/letters-censorship

[Duranis]

The problem is, we're not really talking about taking action against people who have gone out of their way to offend someone just for the sake of offending someone. We're talking about a self-selected group of people, who have taken it upon themselves to divide people up by identity politics, and decide which group may express an opinion, and influence political discourse.

 

I don't disagree with that, what I disagree with is that this website goes out of it's way to find problems which probably don't really exist.

 

For example an amber mark against a University for:

‘An atmosphere of free and open discussion which is so essential to the life and work of the university is only possible if everyone involved behaves in a tolerant manner and avoids actions and language which are needlessly offensive and provocative.’

 

To me this reads as free and open discussion is welcome but don't be needlessly offensive about it and IMO isn't about limiting free speech but about directing it away from pointless name calling and more towards actual discussion and debate.