Opinion: After Stanford’s latest anti-free speech incident, we should be asking (more) questions
Stanford campus. Image by hdz
You can’t make this up: on 2.25, a planned debate between a Berkeley prof and Harvard’s president—in a class called “Democracy and Disagreement,” no less—was derailed by jeering protestors. In response, First Amendment expert Daniel Ortner calls for a thorough independent investigation of Stanford admin. From Substack.
Yesterday at Stanford University, protestors hijacked a debate on the merits of a potential wealth tax held between UC Berkeley Professor Emmanuel Saez, and former Treasury Secretary and Harvard president Lawrence Summers (a member of FIRE’s advisory council). Just as Summers was to begin his remarks, protestors began shouting over him, throwing fake money in the air, calling him a “capitalist who sold our country out,” and blaming him for enabling the “corporate oligarchy which has caused the rise of Elon Musk,” among other barbs and accusations.
Oh, and by the way, the name of the class where this debate was meant to take place is called “Democracy and Disagreement,” and its purpose is to “model civic disagreement.” If this were a movie to television script, that part would be nixed for being too on the nose.
You’ll remember that something similar happened at Stanford last year with 5th Circuit Judge Stuart Kyle Duncan, although in this case Stanford claims the disruptors were not students. Another important (and welcome!) difference between this incident and the one with Judge Duncan is that members of the audience, presumably students, actually turned on the protestors, shouting "let him speak!"
Regardless, if you’ve been following my commentary on this stuff recently, you’ll know my position is that administrators have actually been not just allowing these disruptions and shoutdowns, but actively facilitating them. At the very least, they have been effectively incentivizing them by refusing to punish students who behave this way, granting them even more power on what actually gets to be said on campus in the process.
And as I’ve said before, every single time one of these incidents happens:
There needs to be an independent investigation.
We need to find out whether or not administrators did anything to stop the disruption or cancellation. If they didn’t, they should be punished.
We need to find out if they did anything to facilitate or encourage a disruption or cancellation on campus. If they did, they should be fired.
This would not only begin to cut down on the overwhelming problem of administrative bloat, but also eliminate administrators who have become an actual threat to freedom of speech and academic freedom on campus.
Read the whole thing here.
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