Once progressives recover from their complete meltdown over the confirmation of Betsy DeVos as U.S. Secretary of Education, they might want to take a look at a new survey that hopefully would raise some red flags about today’s high school students.
Then again, today’s high school students are tomorrow’s college students, who choose to designate “No Media” zones in which to protest, demand black-only safe spaces on campus, and are then are likened by administrators to the soldiers buried at Normandy for their bravery.
In any case, the New York Times was excited to report Tuesday on a Knight Foundation survey of 11,998 high school students and 726 teachers that found “a slow but steady increase in support” for the First Amendment, with 91 percent of students believing people should be allowed to express unpopular opinions.
91 percent of high school students say they believe that people should be allowed to express unpopular opinions https://t.co/Sx6FPjePhg
— The New York Times (@nytimes) February 7, 2017
There’s a stipulation, though: that percentage of support drops to only 45 percent “when the speech in question is offensive to others and made in public,” and to 43 percent when the offensive speech is delivered via social media.
https://twitter.com/wokieleaks1/status/829419098056622080
https://twitter.com/TCoop6231/status/829467326659440641
Not reassuring. Only 45% of high school students support the right to express "offensive speech." https://t.co/d5xLCcnumI pic.twitter.com/sw5LP8tN6t
— Jason (@jasonelevation) February 8, 2017
Supporting free speech "with limits" is not supporting free speech.
— Jason (@jasonelevation) February 8, 2017
now ask them what each of those categories actually means. Makes me sad and not nice are likely answers.
— Just a Catholic Lady (@HLMinNJ) February 8, 2017
@CamEdwards wonder who gets to draw the line between "offensive" and "bullying" speech?
— Jason Hart (@jasonahart) February 8, 2017
https://twitter.com/JTmoney1234/status/829402305820708864
Revised title: "Students don't Support Free Speech"
— UnCivil Servant (@AKuhn4U) February 8, 2017
SIGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH@nytimes pic.twitter.com/smfcZrQcte
— NeoN: Automataster (@neontaster) February 8, 2017
i wonder what the heck they think the distinction between "unpopular" and "offensive" speech is. neither is objective.
— internaut (@the_internaut) February 8, 2017
We checked the survey questions (available as a PDF) and didn’t see any definition given for either “offensive” or “bullying,” so unless we missed something, it was up to the students to decide what those terms meant.
What's "offensive" is totally subjective, which is why ALL speech is protected or NONE of it is. Couldn't be any simpler.
— Doubleplus Ungood (@Jawmo2) February 7, 2017
Join the conversation as a VIP Member