Majority of MIT Students Support Shouting Down speakers or Even Physically Blocking Access to Them

The similarities to Hitler Youth are jarring….

There is something terribly, horribly wrong with America’s once great colleges and universities and its destroyed whole generations.

The MIT survey found a majority students believe that it is acceptable to shout down or block speakers who hold opposing views. It captures the downstream impact primary, middle, and high school educations treating speech as harmful…

Story continues below advertisement

The survey shows that we are raising the most speech-intolerant generation in our history. It is not enough to protest, you must silence speakers and prevent access to lectures. It is the face of the new American orthodoxy that has taken hold of our institutions of high education (Jonathan Turley)

John Sexton writes:

n August 2021 a University of Chicago professor named Dorian Abbot co-wrote an opinion piece for Newsweek questioning the value of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion efforts on college campuses. Here’s a bit of what he wrote:

The underlying premise of DEI is that any statistical difference between group representation on campus and national averages reflects systemic injustice and discrimination by the university itself. The magnitude of the distortions is significant: for some job searches discrimination rises to the level of implicitly or explicitly excluding applicants from certain groups.

DEI violates the ethical and legal principle of equal treatment. It entails treating people as members of a group rather than as individuals, repeating the mistake that made possible the atrocities of the 20th century. It requires being willing to tell an applicant “I will ignore your merits and qualifications and deny you admission because you belong to the wrong group, and I have defined a more important social objective that justifies doing so.” It treats persons as merely means to an end, giving primacy to a statistic over the individuality of a human being.

That all sounds perfectly reasonable to me but as you can imagine it inspired woke outrage from people determined to cancel him. So when he was invited to give a prestigious lecture at MIT a group of students and and alumni demanded he be disinvited. After about a week, professor Abbot received a call from MIT saying his lecture had been canceled.

Last December, MIT tried to redeem itself by issuing a strong statement in defense of free speech.

A commitment to free expression includes hearing and hosting speakers, including those whose views or opinions may not be shared by many members of the MIT community and may be harmful to some. This commitment includes the freedom to criticize and peacefully protest speakers to whom one may object, but it does not extend to suppressing or restricting such speakers from expressing their views. Debate and deliberation of controversial ideas are hallmarks of the Institute’s educational and research missions and are essential to the pursuit of truth, knowledge, equity, and justice.

All of that sounds good but it turns out a majority of MIT students don’t believe it. Today Jonathan Turley wrote about a recent survey of students and professors carried out by the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE).

The survey found that roughly 25 percent of faculty reported they are “very” or “extremely” likely to self-censor. Forty percent of faculty are “more” or “much more” likely to self-censor on campus now than in 2020. It further found that 32 percent of students and 41 percent of faculty “agree that the administration’s stance on free speech is not clear.”

There should never be any such widespread doubt on the position of free speech on a campus. It should be clear and unambiguous. However, almost half of the faculty are unsure. The reason is obvious after the Abbot disaster. The university leadership is clearly not viewed as a reliable ally in free speech fights. It is one thing to mouth free speech values. It is entirely a different thing to stand by a faculty member’s free speech and academic freedom rights when a flash mob forms around a cancel campaign.

Only 14 percent of MIT faculty believe that it is “extremely likely” or “very likely” that the university would stand by a faculty member in a controversy over controversial speech. That is an indictment of the entire university administration and the university board.  What is notable with this data is that only a small percentage (if any) of faculty self-identify as Republican or conservative. Yet, a significant percentage still fear speaking openly in their own classes or on campuses.

Yet, what is most striking is the attitude of the students who have been taught for years that free speech is harmful. Seventy-seven percent of students believe that it is acceptable to shout down speakers with opposing views to prevent others from hearing them. Another 52% believe it is acceptable to physically block access to such events or speakers. That is the result of the new orthodoxy taught in our school system where free speech is viewed as harmful.

The Truth Must be Told

Your contribution supports independent journalism

Please take a moment to consider this. Now, more than ever, people are reading Geller Report for news they won't get anywhere else. But advertising revenues have all but disappeared. Google Adsense is the online advertising monopoly and they have banned us. Social media giants like Facebook and Twitter have blocked and shadow-banned our accounts. But we won't put up a paywall. Because never has the free world needed independent journalism more.

Everyone who reads our reporting knows the Geller Report covers the news the media won't. We cannot do our ground-breaking report without your support. We must continue to report on the global jihad and the left's war on freedom. Our readers’ contributions make that possible.

Geller Report's independent, investigative journalism takes a lot of time, money and hard work to produce. But we do it because we believe our work is critical in the fight for freedom and because it is your fight, too.

Please contribute here.

or

Make a monthly commitment to support The Geller Report – choose the option that suits you best.

• $25.00 here
• $50.00 here
• $75.00 here
• $100.00 here
• $250.00 here

5 2 votes

Article Rating

14 Comments

Oldest

Newest Most Voted

Inline Feedbacks

View all comments

From a Remote Location

1 year ago

And this is EXACTLY why there should be a movement to RAISE the minimum voting age to up to 30. EXACTLY. This is yet another strike against the 18-29 year old age group, outside of their utter hatred of America and support for radical socialism and all that comes with it.

7

D

PlatinumGhost

1 year ago

And this just shows that those who are supposed to be very intelligent can still be very stupid. But seeing the keffiyehs and hijab being worn by some in the picture, I understand where the sentiment is coming from.

7

Snowedin

1 year ago

The only speakers they will allow to speak, are progressive,commie demo Anti-American.

3

ADR

1 year ago

I didn’t know that MIT students had the time to protest. These idiots had to be from the non-engineering and non-science majors. I did not know that MIT cancelled a speaker because of his views. They will now get no further donations from this alumnus.

6

D

ed

1 year ago

I would openly invite any and all effeminate egghead MIT students and all those wearing fake-a-stinian scarves to please….PLEASE !!!! Try to block me if I wander across Boston into Cambridge to go to any MIT speaker event.

4

D

poptoy1949

1 year ago

Super Smart People like the ones at MIT are dumber that shit when it comes to Politics and Social Well Being.

4

sgt_doom

1 year ago

Reply to  poptoy1949

I cannot think of any smart people who graduated from MIT —– not saying they do not exist but those I have come into contact with in IT environments weren’t impressive — usually the opposite?!

Read a book years back on a fellow’s experience as a grad student in Mechanical Engineering st MIT: dude had to have the lab tech there explain to him how a spark plug works?!?!

And that was in his book —– not making that up!

Reminded me when I was a contractor with Micro$oft Tech Support years ago and the Sys Admin from Los Alamos called with the problem of why the network install of a Windows OS failed. After going through the troubleshooting process and coming up dry, I asked him if there had been any lights flickerimg — perhaps ther was a momentary power flux?!

He then explained they were in the middle of a power outtage, no electricity?!?! (So I tactfully and patiently explained electricity was a required ingredient?!)

Next call was from Compaq Engineering, wondering why their newly created optical drive wasn’t loading into the Windows OS.

Suggested they examine their “driver program” and they were surprised the OS didn’t come with that already?!

I tactfully and patiently explained that when a new peripheral was invented/developed, there was no way there were already preexisting driver programs!

Lots of geniuses out there . . .

2

Dwayne Oxford

1 year ago

Yup, idiots who’ve bought lucifer’s lie that they’re smart.

2

Grendel

1 year ago

If they assault you …… shoot them!

3

STIKIT

1 year ago

If you knew the truth about the Weimar Republic, you would know the Bolshevik Communists controlled the Universities, just like they are here. Hitler had the sense to remove them from teaching Communism, and removed all Communist propaganda, including books and literature of pornagrahy, homosexuality, and pedophilia, etc. And the German students burned the filthy books and Communist immorality liturature… but that offends you. And you will delete my post, as you have so many times before, as I point out that you are upset, with the German youth for protecting their morals, education, and institutions from being ravished, as they are now, in America.

2

STIKIT

1 year ago

Maybe this short film will give you insight , on why one man and his old vetrans took back their country:
https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/115/094/313/playable/10cc7d3d278a30ec.mp4

1

sgt_doom

1 year ago

“We have no tolerance for comments containing violence, racism, profanity, vulgarity, doxing, or discourteous behavior. ”

That attitude would get you expelled from Harvard, Princeton and MIT!

1

D

arthur facteau

1 year ago

I used to be under the impression MIT was full of really smart people. That impression has changed…

1

Daniel

1 year ago

The people in the photograph appear to be Arab. That and the “Palestine”flag.. And they oppose free speech? I’m shocked. Shocked! I say.

How can anyone be shocked or even surprised by this? Import people that want to burn your civilization to the ground, then act surprised when the fire starts.

0