Students at Rutgers University are forced to watch what they say. The reason: Rutgers maintains a bias reporting system, where it encourages students to report each other for any words that cause anyone “harm.” These days, that could mean anything. Because bias reporting systems conflict with the First Amendment by targeting protected speech, Southeastern Legal Foundation wrote a letter to Rutgers demanding that it remove the bias reporting system.
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In its anti-bias code, Rutgers explains that students can be reported for engaging in speech the community deems hateful by “consensus.” But as SLF points out in its letter, how does the University decide when a consensus is reached? Does every student have to agree that something is hateful? Or just a majority?
And even if a majority of students do consider something to be hateful, it is a fundamental principle that even the most hateful ideas are protected by the Constitution. Those ideas can be weeded out through open discourse and discussion—not silence and censorship. For these reasons, SLF calls on Rutgers in its letter to remove its bias reporting system. At a minimum, the University must clarify that hate speech and speech that “harms” others is protected by the First Amendment.