It s even true that some people on the left are raising their voices against speech codes. A new book documenting and denouncing such restrictions, The Shadow University, is co-written by a liberal Massachusetts lawyer Harvey Silverglate. Yet for all this, I doubt that most of the leftists who dominate college campuses have seen or will see the error of their ways. Intimidation tactics have now become a matter of habit for them. Among faculty and staff, many have been throwing their weight around since their student days in the 1960s, when they shouted down any professor or other speaker who dared disagree with them.
Speech codes fit right into that pattern.
The hard reality is, speech codes come with teeth. It should go without saying that this isn t the stuff of a good-natured campaign for tolerance and civility. It can only be used as a club. And the club gets used a lot. For all these incidents, there are countless others that didn t make it into the book.