As a rule, conservatives believe that the matter of free expression is extremely simple: First, you let everybody speak on equal terms, whatever they choose to say; then, you permit anybody so moved to respond; and then, possessed of a decent respect for the opinions of mankind, you let the chips fall where they may, all the while accepting that life isn’t fair and that man is fallen. The academic and cultural Left, by contrast, seems increasingly to maintain that the question of speech is a convoluted and sticky one, and that the Right’s seemingly straightforward appeals to diversity of thought and free expression are hopelessly complicated in reality by Foucauldian power dynamics, by the existence of qualitatively different types of speech (“hate” speech, “propaganda,” “corporate speech,” voices that “must be heard,” etc.), and by the disquieting potential for listeners to be in some way damaged or set off (or “triggered”) by the experience. One really cannot overstate the incompatibility of these positions. For modern conservatives, an absolute defense of free expression is a cut and dried principle — the hallmark of civilization and human liberty. But for many modern progressives — especially those in academia — unfettered speech represents just one item within a busy hierarchy of competing values; an important idea, certainly, but not an unalienable one. This, I think, explains a great deal. If you believe — as many of his critics suggested at the time — that George Will did not merely write a criticism of the alleged campus rape epidemic but that, in some way, he actually did “violence” to women, it seems clear that you wouldn’t want him on campus.
Only unwashed rubes think in terms of straightforward approaches to matters pertaining to rights, you see. It's all very nuanced and relative, you see.
Until all nuances that don't fall in line with the Freedom-Hater agenda have been wiped out. Then it's all very absolute and easy to see.
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