Berkeley: Where Free Speech Ends

Back before our time, partisan politicians used to proclaim that politics stops at the water’s edge. Now, that seems to be where free speech ends, before it can hit the shore.

Berkeley prides itself on being the birthplace of the free speech movement but is that where it will end? “The Heterodox ranking lists Berkeley as 105 out of 106 schools, citing the protests that stopped Mr. Yiannopoulos and Ms. Coulter from speaking as well as a missive from the University of California system urging faculty ‘not to criticize affirmative action or to refer to America as a melting pot,’” Douglas Belkin reported in the Wall Street Journal on June 26, 2017.

Most of the professors who belong to Heterodox consider themselves moderate, according to Belkin. “Harvard University was 103rd out of 106 schools in the ranking. Heterodox, which weighs schools’ regulations as well as the ratings of other first-amendment groups, cited Harvard’s history of censoring outside speakers, a blacklist on private clubs and a laminated ‘social justice’ place mat handed out to students before winter break in 2015. The aim of the place mat was to help students prepare ‘for holiday discussions on race and justice with loved ones.’”

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