In the May 7th edition of the Chronicle of Higher Education, the ProfHacker section (no relation) asks for input on how to handle students “who display offensive/insensitive slogans on their clothes.”  I thought I would offer my two cents.  Here’s the scenario from ProfHacker:

Scenario #1:You are teaching a general education class at your institution, a mid-sized public institution that is (almost) open access. The student body is diverse in both age, race, gender, and socio-economic status. The class is fairly large (50+ students) and you are in a tiered classroom. The content of that day’s lecture is not controversial or politically charged. Students are alternately dozing off or taking notes as you work through that day’s lesson. A student comes into the classroom late, and as the door is at the front of the room, you and all the students turn to look as she noisily walks in the door. You notice her t-shirt. As she walks up the steps to the top of the tiered classroom, other students notice her t-shirt, too. You hear gasps erupting from many students. What’s she wearing? A t-shirt with images of aborted fetuses on it. On the back? “I’m pro-life!”

The premise of this article is disturbing (what to do with “students who display offensive/insensitive slogans on their clothes”).  The answer should be simple:  nothing.  Yet, the article typifies current thinking on today’s public university campus–”we must create a utopia where no one gets their feelings hurt.”  This thinking led to the creation of speech codes in the 1980s and has resulted in the censorship of countless students since.

University administrators ask questions like these because they have a distorted view of student First Amendment rights.  They view students as minors who must be protected from controversial ideas.  But the Supreme Court differs, calling the university the “marketplace of ideas.”

Often college administrators try to apply primary and secondary schools standards on campus.  But even high schools know that they cannot prohibit students from wearing a t-shirt with “offensive” language on it, even one that says “Abortion is not Healthcare.”

The mere fact that ProfHacker asks how faculty should handle a student with a pro-life t-shirt demonstrates the distorted view of student speech on campus today (just look at the comments to the article).  While pro-life t-shirts create “offense” and “disruption,” Che Guevara t-shirtsare considered edgy and thought-provoking (even though he brutally murdered countless Cubans).  So to answer ProfHacker’s question:  Faculty should let the student wear the t-shirt and instead focus on teaching the curriculum.

The Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) has wrongly declared that Trinity Western University (TWU) violates academic freedom because of its Christ-centered character.

CAUT bases its conclusion upon two facts.  First, TWU draws its faculty and staff from among those who voluntarily embrace its Statement of Faith.

Second, TWU “rejects as incompatible with human nature and revelational theism a definition of academic freedom which arbitrarily and exclusively requires pluralism without commitment, denies the existence of any fixed points of reference, maximizes the quest for truth to the extent of assuming it is never knowable, and implies an absolute freedom from moral and religious responsibility to its community.”  Accordingly, TWU “is committed to academic freedom in teaching and investigation from a stated perspective, i.e., within parameters consistent with the confessional basis of the constituency to which the University is responsible, but practised in an environment of free inquiry and discussion and of encouragement to integrity in research.”

CAUT has put TWU on a list of schools it says do not respect academic freedom and is investigating other Christ-centered universities in Canada, including Crandall University and Canadian Mennonite University.

CAUT acknowledges that TWU is a legitimate institution of higher education with qualified scholars.  It nonetheless has essentially deemed Christ-centered higher education to be pedagogically illegitimate.  This is a remarkable departure from precedent.  Many similar institutions have operated in the United States and Canada for many years with their distinctive conception of academic freedom.  The higher education establishment has accommodated and accepted the distinctive nature of such institutions, respecting their legitimate place in the tapesty of North American higher education.

I suspect that simple disagreement with (and probably even animosity towards) TWU’s religious commitments has motivated this unfortunate departure from the respect that the world of higher education has generally afforded Christ-centered higher education.  The notion that God is the source of truth and that He has revealed truth in Scripture is foolish and offensive to most university professors, who believe that the exclusive means for discovering truth is through empirical observation or rational deduction.  A disagreement over epistomology is hardly a reason to deem schools like TWU to be illegitimate. Yet this is precisely what CAUT has done.

Over at the American Thinker, (h/t Pope Center), Jon Lipsman writes about his experience as a conservative professor in academia over the course of a few decades.

He began his career as a young McGovernite, but personal experiences led him to reevaluate his political beliefs and he became a conservative.  Voicing those beliefs in opposition to all of his colleagues only resulted in a negative impact on his career, so he did what many professors in that position do—he kept his mouth shut.  Only then did he receive the promotion he deserved.  In the years leading up to his retirement, however, he decided to speak out once more.  The reaction from his colleagues wasn’t a vigorous debate, or even a mere discussion.  Instead, they essentially ignored him, dismissing his ideas out of hand.

Unfortunately, Professor Lipsman’s experience is all too common.  I know I’m not the only one who knew a conservative or Christian professor who dared not speak out until they received tenure.  And the ADF Center for Academic Freedom is currently representing Professor Mike Adams, who found out the hard way what happens to a professor who dares to convert to Christianity and speak about it prior to becoming a full professor.

Professor Lipsman’s description of his experience should send chills down the spine of any freedom loving person, conservative or liberal:

I was not the only one failing to make waves. In fact, there were no waves whatsoever. There was no debate, no controversy; just the calm serenity of a campus at peace with its almost universally accepted mind set. I attribute this to three things. First, of course, anyone raising an objection was viewed, as I was, as hopelessly out of it and worthy only of being ignored. This has a chilling effect, perhaps even more effective than derision. Second, I suspect that those who believed as I did were still in lockdown mode — for the same reasons as I was over the years. And third, I believe the liberal brainwash has been so effective on campus — and in the national educational system in general — that many in the liberal majority can’t even fathom that there is anyone who doubts the legitimacy of their point of view.

It is frightening to realize that those in academia—those charged with thinking of new ideas, challenging our assumptions, making new discoveries—are so closed-minded to any ideas outside of the accepted norm on campus that they refuse to even entertain them.

This has serious implications, not just for individual professors discriminated against because of their beliefs, or students who learn only one perspective.  As the Supreme Court stated many years ago, “[t]he essentiality of freedom in the community of American universities is almost self-evident. . . . Teachers and students must always remain free to inquire, to study and to evaluate, to gain new maturity and understanding; otherwise our civilization will stagnate and die.”  Keyishian v. Bd. of Regents of the Univ. of N.Y., 385 U.S. 589, 603 (1967) (quoting Sweezy v. New Hampshire, 354 U.S. 234 (1957)).

It is not overstating the case, then, to say that free inquiry in our colleges and universities has a direct impact on our democracy as we know it.  All of us, regardless of political belief, should hope that colleges and universities soon learn that “diversity” means more than skin color, and embrace their role as the marketplace of ideas once again.