The skeptics were wrong, Part 3

Surveys on student attitudes toward free speech show alarming trends

Protestors force evacuation of event featuring former IDF solder at UC Berkeley (Source: NBC Bay Area)

Note from Greg: I know campuses are erupting, and here is my extended take on it from last week. But now we will be returning to the conclusion of a three-part series we started back in March.

In 2020, FIRE launched its College Free Speech Rankings to rank colleges and universities on their free speech climates. The CFSR combines survey data on college undergraduates at specific campuses nationwide, FIRE’s evaluation of each ranked university’s speech code policies, and data from FIRE’s databases — the Campus Deplatforming Database, the Scholars Under Fire Database, and the forthcoming Students Under Fire Database.

We have already written at length about the Campus Deplatforming Database in this series: First showing that 2023 was the worst year on record for campus deplatforming and that the vast majority of attempts came from the left; then highlighting that the last decade saw an explosion of deplatforming attempts on campus; and finally pointing out that attempts were increasingly targeting expression deemed conservative.

Here, we’ll delve into FIRE’s CFSR survey data to highlight some alarming trends in student attitudes toward free speech on campus.

Survey data on college students and free speech from 1950-2020

Research into college students’ political attitudes dates back roughly a century. Early studies primarily focused on the impact of college on a student’s politics, religious beliefs, economic attitudes, and feelings about war and pacifism. Research into college students’ attitudes toward freedom of speech accelerated in the 1950s. In 1952, the Cornell Values Study surveyed undergraduates at Cornell and 11 other colleges — at Cornell males and females were surveyed; at the other schools only males were surveyed. Here is how the researchers described the “political flavor” of the American college campus at the time:

The investigator attempting to describe the political flavor of contemporary American campuses is immediately struck by two themes. The first is what seems to be a remarkable absence of any intense or consuming political beliefs, interests, or convictions on the part of college students [emphasis added]. The second is extreme political and economic conservatism.

Let that sink in: “A remarkable absence of any intense or consuming political beliefs, interests, or convictions on the part of college students” coupled with “extreme political and economic conservatism.” 

Things have definitely changed.

The Cornell Values Study directly asked students about freedom of speech and produced fascinating results. Roughly 60% of students at the 12 colleges surveyed disagreed that “religions which preach unwholesome ideas should be suppressed.” Among the men surveyed at the 11 colleges besides Cornell,  62% disagreed that “people who talk politics without knowing what they are talking about should be kept quiet.” And, at Cornell 62% of students surveyed disagreed that “people should be kept from spreading dangerous ideas because they might influence others to adopt them.”

During the 1970s and 1980s, Dean Hoge, a sociologist, continued to periodically run the Cornell Values Study at Dartmouth College and the University of Michigan, two of the 12 schools included in the original study. Hoge’s research, which like the original survey at these institutions sampled males only, found that agreement with restricting speech declined considerably.

Hoge also sampled University of Michigan male undergraduates in 1989 and found agreement to be similar to the levels of agreement reported in 1984.

Other sociologists obtained similar results, and they sampled female students. Hanan Selvin and Warren Hagstom surveyed 894 undergraduates at the University of California Berkeley in 1957 and asked them about their support for the principles of the Bill of Rights. Student responses were ardently supportive of freedom of speech:

• Only 6% agreed that the circulation of Russian or Chinese newspapers should be restricted to scholars.

• Only 10% agreed that the government should have the right to prohibit any group of persons who disagree with our form of government to hold public meetings or that state governments should have the power to pass laws making it illegal to speak against racial or religious groups.

• Only 13% agreed that it is reasonable to suspect the loyalty of a lawyer who represents accused communists before a congressional committee and that a high-school teacher who pleads the fifth while being questioned by a congressional committee should be fired at once.

• Majorities said that it is wrong for legislative committees to investigate the political beliefs of university faculty members (61%). 

Harvey Rich surveyed undergraduates at 12 colleges in California in 1976, sampling about 300 students at each school, and he found that only 11% of students think that “state governments should have the power to pass laws making it illegal to speak against racial or religious groups.” Rich also found that 75% of students think that “legislative committees should not investigate the political beliefs of a university faculty member.”

Data from the Higher Education Research Institute’s annual college freshman survey, conducted every year since 1966, reinforces these findings. In 1967, HERI began asking freshmen if they “somewhat” or “strongly” agree that “colleges have the right to ban extreme speakers from campus.” When first asked, 37% agreed with the statement. The question was repeated every year until 1986, and agreement hovered between 20% and 30%. 

In other words, from 1950 to the late 1980s the data on college students’ free speech attitudes clearly showed that students are staunch supporters of free expression. 

Yet, when HERI asked freshmen if they “somewhat” or “strongly” agree that “colleges have the right to ban extreme speakers from campus” in 2004 — the first time the survey was conducted since 1986 — 44% agreed. From 2006 to 2009, agreement was around 41% before increasing slightly to 43% in 2015 and reaching a majority, 51%, in 2019 — the last year the question was asked. 

In the early 1990s, during the waning years of the first Great Age of Campus Political Correctness (discussed in “The Canceling of the American Mind” as roughly 1985-1995), HERI began asking freshmen if they agree that “colleges should prohibit racist/sexist speech on campus.” When first asked in 1992, 59% of students “somewhat” or “strongly” agreed, and from 1993-2005 agreement ranged from 58% to 63%. When asked again in 2009, 2012, and 2015, agreement was around 70%. This tells us that college freshmen are similar to the general public — their support for free speech drops when given more specifics about who a speaker is or what that speaker is speaking about. It also tells us that trends in political tolerance among college freshmen are similar to trends among college graduates, who have become less tolerant of “hateful” speakers over the past decade and a half.

Surveys of college undergraduates conducted by other organizations (like the Knight Foundation and the Cato Institute) over the past decade reinforce the recent trends of decline in support for freedom of speech among college freshmen found by HERI. For instance, a 2017 survey by the Cato Institute found that at least 50% of undergraduates opposed allowing the following speakers on campus:

• A speaker who says “Muslims shouldn’t be allowed to come to the U.S.,” “transgender people have a mental disorder,” or “gays and lesbians should receive conversion therapy” (50% oppose each speaker).

• A speaker who says “all White people are racist” (51%).

• A speaker who says “the Holocaust did not occur” (57%).

• A speaker who would “reveal the names and identities of unauthorized immigrants attending the college” (65%).

• And, a speaker “who advocate(s) for violent protests” (81%).

At least 40% of students opposed all of the remaining speakers asked about (e.g., a speaker who says “all Christians are backward and brainwashed” or who “publicly criticizes or disrespects the police”). 

Findings from a 2021 Knight Foundation and IPSOS survey of undergraduates paint a similar picture. Almost half of college undergraduates (45%) think colleges should restrict a student’s ability to display a pornographic poster in a dorm room; that about 1 in 5 (19%) think colleges should restrict the expression of political views that are upsetting or offensive to certain groups; and that 1 in 3 students favor the institution of speech codes, codes of conduct that restrict potentially offensive or biased speech on campus that would be permitted in other public places. This survey also found that 1 in 4 students favor disinviting speakers because some students perceive their message as offensive or biased against certain groups of people, but that more than half (53%) believe that a university should disinvite a speaker from speaking on campus because that speaker’s views deprive other people of their right to free expression.

FIRE’s survey data on college students and free speech

Over the past four years, FIRE has surveyed more than 155,000 undergraduate students in the United States. We asked them whether they would support or oppose allowing different controversial liberal or conservative speakers on campus and how acceptable it is for their peers to use various forms of illiberal protest (e.g., shouting down a speaker) to stop a campus speech.

As has become our refrain in this series, the results are not encouraging.

A majority of students oppose allowing every controversial conservative speaker on campus we have asked about since 2020. We anonymized the speakers themselves to avoid capturing any biases students may have about the speakers and to ensure that the responses were based on the content of the speech alone. Three anonymized speakers were included every year, and opposition to them has mostly held steady. The one exception to this is the speaker who has said, “Abortion should be completely illegal,” who has seen opposition to their presence on campus decline. In 2020, a majority of students also opposed allowing speakers who have said, “Some racial groups are less intelligent than others,” (85%) and “Censoring the news media is necessary,” (64%). In 2021, 61% opposed allowing a speaker who has said, “Covid lockdowns violate our civil liberties. And in 2022, 67% opposed allowing a speaker who has said, “The 2020 election was stolen.”

This is astounding. We would be concerned if “only” one-tenth of the student body did not want to allow controversial speakers on campus; two-thirds to three-quarters is utterly insane. Unfortunately, we suspect that people have grown accustomed to this intolerance. 

Readers may bristle at these statements and the fact that we are considering their rejection a problem. But our concern is not about the content of the speech itself; It’s about the intolerance of dissenting and disfavored points of view in general. The issue is that institutions of higher education are special places that cease to fulfill their missions unless people engage in experimentation, devil’s advocacy, and counterfactual thinking. Simplistic, moralistic frameworks defeat the purpose of the university. Truth must not be revealed and guarded; truth must be pursued through arduous, ongoing inquiry no matter how certain we may be that we are correct. This principle was beautifully expressed in John Stuart Mill’s seminal work, “On Liberty,” as the third prong in what Greg calls “Mill’s Trident”:

If you are 100% correct (which is unlikely) you still need free speech for dissent, disagreement, and attempts to disprove you, both to check your arguments and to strengthen them.

A notable subset of students also oppose allowing controversial liberal speakers on campus. In 2020,  74% opposed allowing a speaker who has said, “All White people are racist,” and 55% opposed allowing a speaker who has said, “Christianity has a negative influence on society.” In 2021, 60% opposed allowing a speaker who has said, “Looting is a justifiable form of protest.” Almost half of students surveyed in 2021 (47%) also opposed allowing a speaker who has said, “The police should be abolished because they are racist.” 

We’ve also asked multiple times about a few controversial liberal speakers. Opposition to allowing a speaker on campus who has said, “Religious liberty is used as an excuse to discriminate against gays and lesbians,” has slightly increased from 2021 to 2023. In contrast, opposition to allowing a speaker who has said, “The Second Amendment should be repealed so that guns can be confiscated,” declined in 2023. 

Opposition to allowing a speaker who has said something about “White privilege” also declined from 2021 to 2023 — although this decline may be the result of a change in question wording: In 2021 and 2022, the survey indicated that the speaker has said, “White people are collectively responsible for structural racism and use it to protect their privilege,” whereas last year the speaker was described as having said, “Structural racism maintains inequality by protecting White privilege.”

In a healthy academy, the viewpoints that students do not want speakers to express would be discussed openly, without fear of reprisal. 

An alarming number of students also say that other students’ use of illiberal protest tactics (e.g., shouting down a speaker, blocking other students from entering an event, using violence) to stop a campus speech is at least “rarely” acceptable. Although the percentage of students who say this has not changed much in four years, the percentage of students who say this about blocking other students from entering an event or using violence to stop a campus speech has increased.

It’s important to note that these illiberal attitudes are not just hypothetical. As we have demonstrated, students are increasingly trying to get speakers deplatformed. When these attempts fail, the students often try to shout the speakers down. 

This won’t stop unless we stop it

What do we make of these trends? College students’ attitudes toward free speech have trended downward in the last two decades. Large swaths of college students want to, and try to, censor views they oppose. These students cite emotional health concerns, which they conflate with concerns about physical safety — though ironically, they are willing to engage in tactics that threaten the physical safety of others. 

When faced with pressure, demands, and threats, administrators must not yield. Students have the right to petition for redress when they are offended by a speaker or professor, but when the speech in question is — or in public settings would be — constitutionally protected, the administration should not intervene. And there must be no tolerance when student protests devolve into heckler’s vetoes and/or violence. When this occurs, administrators must swiftly act to allow the controversial speech to continue, remove the hecklers, and expel those engaged in violence.

But holding the line is only half the battle. The real question is, how do we get students to understand the importance and value of free speech and a larger culture of open inquiry and debate — especially in higher education? As Greg and FIRE have pointed out in multiple places, including “FIRE’s 10 common-sense reforms for colleges and universities,” part of the solution is centering free speech values in hiring and admissions, teaching a scholarly mindset from day one, and insisting that colleges and universities uphold First Amendment standards across the board.

Students enter higher education to learn, and they should learn not only how free speech and the First Amendment work, but also why they must be valued and protected. Without that foundational knowledge and the institutional commitment to inculcating it, we can expect student attitudes toward free speech to continue to decline. The data is there, and what it says isn’t pretty. Now, the question is: What are we going to do about it?

SHOT FOR THE ROAD

I had the pleasure of joining Michael Horn and the “Future U Podcast” to talk about “Fighting for Free Speech on Campus.” Enjoy!