Public colleges and universities shouldn't be able to restrict free speech on campus.

My opponent brings up a good point, hate speech is bad and harmful to the world and it needs to be stamped out. The reason why hate speech is so brutally effective is that in many cases, it's unexpected and you are open to such insults. However, shoving such speech under the rug on campus just to have it fly back out again in real life is not the way to protect people, the way to better protect people would be to bring it to attention, front and center, how silly and unnecessary hate speech is. Here"s how one community recently approached an incidence of hate speech by calling attention to it rather than attempting to suppress it"by encouraging speech that pointed out how out of place the hate speech was in a community that values the dignity of all. Matt Hale, a notorious racist, was recently asked to speak at the University of Illinois at Springfield. Hale is the leader of the World of the Creator, a white supremacist group. His presence on campus was controversial. Several students, faculty, and community members thought that the university should cancel his appearance. Instead, he was allowed to speak. Hale"s audience was not impressed. He came across as having a confusing set of beliefs that were out of place in a democratic, multicultural society. Several faculty and students spoke out against his message of hatred. By allowing Hale to speak, the university recognized free speech rights but also provided a means for community members to respond(http://www.americanbar.org...). This scenario is much more preferable to silencing hate speech and shoving it under the rug. By bringing this out into the open, you can show people just how out right stupid hate speech really is and how it brings about nothing good. This can not only better mentally prepare a future victim, but it may stop some people from using hate speech in the future. Because this method of eliminating hate speech works without breaking the First amendment(because hate speech is unfortunately protected), this negates my opponents first point. My opponent next brings up Time, place, and manner restrictions. Time, place and manner restrictions normally functions to keep things running on schedule and are important. Speech limited by such codes are disruptive speech such as lewd and vulgar words, and words that may cause violence. However, in the Bethel vs Fraser case, the supreme court ruled that the First Amendment did not prohibit schools from prohibiting vulgar and lewd speech since such discourse was inconsistent with the "fundamental values of public school education."(https://www.oyez.org...) What this means is that no longer being protected by the First Amendment, said words are not Constitutionally protected speech falling outside the topic of this debate. This nullifies my opponents point on time, place and manner restrictions. My opponent then goes to bring up how the UN has banned hate speech, however, I believe I covered that with my response to their hate speech argument. I will like to talk more about schools limiting discourse and discussion of sensitive topics. I am not saying that the NEG is directly for the limitation of such conversations, but it is what is happening as of now. Colleges and Universities throughout the States are limiting what policies and topics students can talk about. Topics such as abortions, sexes and genders, voting candidates and other big topics have been shunned and or outright banned on campus. Halloween isn't even safe any more. At Yale, students protested about an email sent out by the staff that said that they would not be banning costumes that had head dresses and other Native American attire. This was met with an uprising of fury as students protest this decision, asking the teacher be kicked out and silenced because his opinion was different than theirs. Yet he thought more of peoples feelings than most the students did, The reason he would not place the costume codes was because it would be unfair and cater only toward one group. What about the Christians who don't want skin showing? They had no voice. This moves on into my last point for this round. The reason why silencing one group to give another voice is a slippery slope to everyone being muted. Human nature drives us to want that which others have but we have not. And if one group has been given special treatment, two more groups are going to want special treatment as well. If you are going to mute one voice, you have to mute them all or none at all. That is why you should vote affirmative in this debate. Side note: Threats(Fighting words), incitement and especially child porn are all illegal or could be easily banned without impeaching the First. Also, you have most definitely had this debate before. Debater or just read up on topics you like?