The Most Implacable Enemy Of Free Expression: Higher Education

FIRE has the low down on a case that, sadly, has become all too typical in the very places that ought to know better: Peace College to Critics: ‘Desist’ From Exercising Free Speech

In higher education, a significant transformation has been underway at Peace College in North Carolina, a women's college that will begin admitting men to its full-time undergraduate programs starting this fall. The proverbial "winning hearts and minds" is an important task for a college leader guiding her institution through a major transformation, and criticism from within and without is an inevitable part of the process. How colleges respond to such pressures can greatly affect their public perception.

Pity, then, the way Peace College (which will be renamed William Peace University as part of its transformation) has responded to criticisms leveled by the Preserve Peace College Campaign. In response to a letter circulated by the coalition, Peace College (through an outside law firm) has not-so-kindly asked all signatories to the letter to "desist from further distribution" and "send letters of retraction" to atone for the letter's supposedly "damag[ing]" content....

FIRE does not vouch for the assertions in the group's letter or take any position on its content, though it is worth pointing out that the assertions in the letter can be checked rather easily, and statements of opinion are clearly labeled as such. And, to be clear, the right to circulate a list of grievances as the Preserve Peace College Campaign has done is about as basic a principle of freedom of expression as there is.

Yet here is what Arrowood wrote to roughly 40 signatories of the letter:

The university has recently become aware of a letter sent over your signature which contains various statements about the University and its President, statements which are not only false but individually and collectively damage the reputation of the University and its President. The letter reflects an intent to deliberately and improperly interfere with the University's relationships with its various constituencies. ...

[...]

[I]n order to mitigate damage arising from the continued publication of the letter, you should desist from further distribution of the letter and send letters of retraction to any persons to whom the letter was published, whether they received the letter directly by mail or otherwise. In addition, we ask that you furnish us with the list utilized to distribute this letter so that we may communicate directly with its recipients to correct your misstatements.

You have to give them some credit: It takes a lot of nerve to send that kind of letter in response to a letter expressing disagreement with the way Peace College is being run. Actually, you don't have to give them credit. Such disrespect by the college for the basic exercise of the group's free speech rights, in fact, smacks precisely of one of the charges leveled against the college by the group: that it is unaccountable to the public and that "[c]oncerned alumni of Peace College are treated as adversaries when they pose legitimate questions to the new guard."

God only knows what is going on here, and what the motivations are of those who have "taken over" Peace College is certainly a mystery to me. However, the bullying brownshirt tactics being used to silence dissent have no place in a free society, especially at an institution supposedly dedicated to free inquiry. Seemingly, the powers that be at Peace College had no rational arguments to make in response to their critics, so they resorted to threats and intimidation.

How classy. How enlightened. How pathetic.