Penn & Teller on the 1st Amendment

[pedroh 21]

but then.. are the public universities be better known to promote free speech, or to promote a safe environment for all students? you know that when you have such freedoms, as let racist organizations express themselves, conflicts are gonna arise... and such conflicts are not part of the university values

A very complicated question. Speech from tenured professors is different than from students, and generally they should not be penalized for publishing things that administrations don't like (at all schools).

For students, there is a difference between public and private universities. The policies restricing the speech of students have been short sighted though, and schools are probably better off letting existing laws handle things.

Private schools with religious affiliations get into trouble here, because they will either be prohibiting speech that their religious affiliation encourages, or end up being viewed as intolerat. No policy is probably best here.

Public universities probably should not be regulating the speech of students at all that would otherwise be legal, since they are funded principally by the government. It isn't much of a stretch to say that their rules are governmental in nature, since the administration of such schools is put in place by the legislature in most states.

Many schools that have such policies have been involved in lawsuits because of them.

I guess theres interests too.. while it must be good for a public university to be recognized for its free speech, I don't think any univ wants to be the one that 'let the neonazis hang out' or the 'islam extremists' or the 'mechas'... while some laws indeed restringe the freedom of speech, it also (probably) promotes tolerance, avoiding intolerance expressions in their campus..

I'm talking about extremes here of course, not about normal debates like politics, religion or such

Edited November 8, 2007 by pedroh