Why Are Female College Students Against Free Speech?

Article here. Excerpt:

'Historically, speech restrictions have been opposed by disadvantaged groups — civil rights advocates, labor union organizers, left-wing radicals. Now, as the Times gingerly notes, those students who most value free speech are from “groups historically or currently in positions of power.” Historically, perhaps, but not currently. It is left-wing and liberal orthodoxies and policies of racial quotas and preferences that campus speech restrictors are attempting to shield from comments anyone deems “offensive.”

So the difference between male and female students may reflect different power positions, with those most at risk of proscription more favorable to free speech. It may also reflect differences between male and female temperaments on average.

Psychological studies over many years conclude that women tend to prize agreeableness and consensus, whereas men tend to seek out conflict and competition. One can easily imagine evolutionary explanations for this group difference, which, of course, is not apparent in every individual.'

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Laws, regulations, rules, etc., limiting speech restrict only certain designated kinds of speech, topics, ideas, opinions, etc. They don't ban speech, period, now do they?

Rules limiting speech the way they are limited on campuses are made by ppl who want ideas they disagree with or for whatever reason don't want expressed to be in essence suppressed. So those who think they're more likely to benefit from the policies as they currently are are predictably more likely to support them. In this case the beneficiaries of restricted speech are these days more likely as not to be female students vs. male.

For those who seek to suppress ideas or opinions, historically, these efforts always fail. America's FFs saw this and knew what threatened govt stability wasn't speech that the gov't didn't like; it was what inevitably followed efforts to suppress free speech that threatened gov't stability. Because when ppl can't blow off steam by talking smack against The Man, they start getting other ideas re how to express themselves, and it's usu. pretty ugly.

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Who has the power?

I'd say the people with the power want to squelch free speech.

These groups aren't as "disadvantaged" as they appear to be. On campus, being disadvantaged gives you lots of power.

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