Bias reporting systems were a nightmare on campus — and now they’re everywhere

Neighbors reporting neighbors for speech that is protected under the First Amendment is textbook totalitarianism, and it must not be tolerated

As regular ERI readers and followers of FIRE will know, I’ve been defending free speech on campus since 2001 — nearly all of FIRE’s 25-year history. In 2022, FIRE expanded its mission, going from being the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education to the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression. This was in no small part because we grew more and more concerned that the free speech crises we were dealing with on campus could and would spill over to other areas of our country.

That has actually been my biggest nightmare, and it has become reality in more ways than one. As I posted on X this morning, the word “fascist” is overused, mainly for things that look nothing like fascism. Words have meanings, and “fascism” is often invoked for a range of things — from the very bad but nonetheless distinct idea of “authoritarianism” to something more akin to “anything I don’t like.” Hell, I’ve even heard people equate support for free speech with fascism, which is just about the most ahistorical assertion imaginable.

But neighbors reporting neighbors for speech that is protected under the First Amendment, and entire government entities created for fielding and responding to those reports, is absolutely what fascism, or really any form of totalitarianism, looks like.

I am speaking about bias reporting systems, sometimes called bias response teams, which are essentially snitch hotlines where people can report others for “offensive” or “hateful” speech. The act of doing this to your fellow Americans over protected speech would be bad enough, but these systems go further. They often consist not only of administrators, but also law enforcement. Your eyes are not deceiving you. These systems include law enforcement dedicated to “responding” to reports on First Amendment-protected speech.

These terrible policies grew up on campus, and now they are trying to infect the real world. FIRE Senior Writer & Editor and ERI contributor

Angel Eduardo

has just published a thorough explainer on bias reporting systems on FIRE’s website, explaining what they are, how they work, and why they’re an obvious and egregious threat to free speech. I encourage you all to read it.

Additionally, Washington Free Beacon journalist Aaron Sibarium has also published a piece on bias reporting systems with examples you wouldn’t believe if they weren’t corroborated by links, screenshots, and even quotes from bias reporting system administrators themselves:

In January 2020, the top law enforcement agency in the state of Oregon launched a “Bias Response Hotline” for residents to report “offensive ‘jokes.’”

Staffed by “trauma-informed operators” and overseen by the Oregon Department of Justice, the hotline, which receives thousands of calls a year, doesn’t just solicit reports of hate crimes and hiring discrimination. It also asks for reports of “bias incidents”—cases of “non-criminal” expression that are motivated, “in part,” by prejudice or hate.

Oregonians are encouraged to report their fellow citizens for things like “creating racist images,” “mocking someone with a disability,” and “sharing offensive ‘jokes’ about someone’s identity.” One webpage affiliated with the hotline, which is available in 240 languages, even lists “imitating someone’s cultural norm” as something “we want to hear” about.

It is not entirely clear what the state does with these reports. While the hotline cannot “sanction a bias perpetrator,” according to its website, it does share “de-identified data” with the Oregon Criminal Justice Commission, a body that develops “public safety” plans for the state, and connects “survivors” with “resources” like counseling and rent relief.

You read that last part right. In Oregon, the purveyors of these systems are using taxpayer money to provide “victims” of these “non-crime hate incidents” with “resources” that include therapy, help buying security cameras, and even assistance with paying their bills. Sure sounds like setting up a number of very tempting incentives to snitch on your fellow Americans for protected speech, doesn’t it? What could possibly go wrong?

It gets worse, too. Bias reporting systems in some states, like Connecticut, let you report things you weren’t even there to witness yourself. In Philadelphia, bias reporting systems literally collect your personal information and reach out to you to recommend sensitivity training:

Connecticut’s system lets users flag “hate speech” they “heard about but did not see.” Vermont tells residents to report "biased but protected speech" directly to the police. Philadelphia has an online form that asks for the "exact address" of the "hate incident," as well as the "name" and gender identity of the offender—information the city uses to contact those accused of bias and request that they attend sensitivity training.

“If it is not a crime, we sometimes contact the offending party and try to do training so that it doesn’t happen again,” Saterria Kersey, a spokeswoman for the Philadelphia Commission on Human Relations, told the Washington Free Beacon. The offender is free to decline, she said.

To justify this, some states go so far as to claim that “‘biased’ speech, while not actionable in itself, can lead to hate crimes.” Yes. Seriously:

“People who engage in bias incidents may eventually escalate into criminal behavior,” reads a report from the Maryland attorney general’s office, which maintains its own bias reporting system. By collecting data on those incidents, states say they can predict where hate crimes will occur and develop strategies for combating them.

Sibarium’s piece quotes FIRE Senior Fellow and former ACLU president Nadine Strossen as saying, “We associate snitching with some of the most oppressive regimes throughout history.” She couldn’t be more correct. And when she adds that “The Stasi comes to mind,” she isn’t being hyperbolic.

One more section from Sibarium’s article:

California, Illinois, and New York all set up systems to report not just hate crimes but “bias incidents,” defined as any expression of bias against a protected class that does not rise to the level of a crime. Washington state will launch its own system this year. Local-level systems exist in Westchester County, N.Y., Montgomery County, Md., Eden Prairie, Minn., and Missoula, Mont.

By the end of 2025, nearly 100 million Americans will live in a state where they can be reported for protected speech.

If that last line doesn’t chill you to the bone, I don’t know what will. I encourage you to read Sibarium’s piece in full to get all the frightening details, but suffice it to say that this campus cancer has metastasized into our country as a whole, and it is a free speech killer.

As FIRE’s bias reporting systems explainer notes:

Like their campus counterparts, the state systems use expansive definitions of “bias” and “hate” that could encompass a vast range of protected expression, including speech on social or political issues.

However, unconstitutionality isn’t the only concern. Even a bias reporting system that stays within constitutional bounds can deter people from freely expressing their thoughts and opinions. If they are afraid that the state will investigate them or place them in a government database just for saying something that offended another person, people will understandably hold their tongues and suppress their own voices. Moreover, the lack of clarity around what some states actually do with the reports they collect is itself chilling.

We are teetering on the edge of becoming like the United Kingdom, where police have been keeping databases of people for so-called “non-crime hate incidents” since 2014 — and have in fact threatened to prosecute speech beyond their borders. I can’t say this emphatically enough: We do not want to be like the U.K.

Thankfully, we have a First Amendment here in the U.S., which guarantees us the right to speak our minds no matter who finds our speech ugly or offensive. We also have FIRE — who will not rest as long as unconstitutional and speech-chilling tactics like these remain on the books.

If you or someone you know is willing to step up to help us challenge and defeat these censorial, unconstitutional, and, yes, totalitarian bias reporting systems, contact FIRE.

SHOT FOR THE ROAD

Speaking of prosecuting speech beyond your country’s jurisdiction, FIRE’s Senior Scholar for Global Expression

Sarah McLaughlin

recently reported that the Chinese government is accused of setting up over a hundred secret police stations worldwide — and using them to surveil, threaten, and silence dissidents outside its borders.

We definitely do not want to be like China, either.