Republicans often rightly complain that college campuses are hostile to the free exchange of ideas. Speakers over the past decade have regularly been disinvited, shouted down and even physically attacked by student activists unwilling to entertain different ideas and perspectives. This behavior is anathema to a university’s mission and deeply damaging to our nation.
Unfortunately, instead of taking a principled stand for free speech, many Republicans are now saying: “If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.”
Consider Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who signed a bill that as of July 1 bars professors from expressing any view in a classroom that “espouses, promotes, [or] advances” anything that could make students feel guilty about history, as it relates to race and gender. The bill is known as the Stop Woke Act, short for Stop Wrongs to Our Kids and Employees, and its principal target is critical race theory, which has become a bugaboo on the right and is divisive on the left.
Free inquiry and discourse—including professing ideas and beliefs—lie at the heart of higher education and democratic society. In both the sciences and humanities, rigorous debates based on facts, data and reason allow ideas and theories to be evaluated and amended, adopted and discarded, in ways that promote understanding, advance knowledge and teach responsible citizenship.