HNN Academic Freedom Article (Left/Right Coalition)

Here is an excerpt:

....freedom of speech is now under siege. What is new in our academic communities is that it is threatened both from within and from outside them. The internal threat to free speech in academia is posed by"speech codes." They take many forms and vary from one college to the next university. After the 1960s, when American colleges and universities ceased to operate in loco parentis, campus speech codes emerged on one campus after another as a means of securing a"safe space" for some students who were offended by certain kinds of speech. On one campus or another, speech that is discomforting, embarrassing, flirtatious, gender specific, inappropriate, inconsiderate, harassing, intimidating, offensive, ridiculing or threatens a loss of"self-esteem" is banned by speech codes. Too often, they target student critics of academic bureaucracy.