Unlearning Liberty Quotes

“Being offended is an emotional state, not a substantive argument; we cannot afford to give it the power to stifle debate.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“So what happens when students get the message that saying the wrong thing can get you in trouble? They do what one would expect: they talk to people they already agree with, keep their mouths shut about important topics in mixed company, and often don’t bother even arguing with the angriest or loudest person in the room (which is a problem even for the loud people, as they may not recognize that the reason why others are deferring to their opinions is not because they are obviously right).”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“...those in power often invoke civility to punish speech they dislike, but overlook the equally acid-tongued statements that are in agreement with their own assumptions.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“No one individual is immune to the criticism of others and none can claim to be above intellectual reproach. No one is omniscient or infallible, so we are all forced to defend our arguments with logic, evidence, and persuasion.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“As the sociologist Diana C. Mutz discovered in her book Hearing the Other Side (2006), those with the highest levels of education have the lowest exposure to people with conflicting points of view, while those who have not graduated from high school can claim the most diverse discussion mates.19 In other words, those most likely to live in the tightest echo chambers are those with the highest level of education.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“We must stop apologizing for believing in free speech and embrace it as the best tool we have yet devised for the growth of knowledge and understanding.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“The idea that we should campaign against hurtful speech among adults arises from a failure to understand that free speech is our chosen method of resolving disagreements, using words rather than weapons. Open debate is our enlightened means of determining nothing less than how we order our society, what is true and what is false, what wars we should fight, what policies we should pass, whom we should put behind bars for the rest of their lives, and who gets to control our government. This is a deadly serous business. While protecting children from abuse is a noble goal, an overly expansive definition of bullying cannot be allowed to hobble the gravely important exchange of ideas among adults upon which our nation depends. The new emphasis on collegiate "bullying" treats adults like kindergarteners and forgets entirely the gravity of the issues we face in our democracy every single day and the rightful passions they ignite.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“The idea that we should campaign against hurtful speech among adults arises from a failure to understand that free speech is our chosen method of resolving disagreements, using words rather than weapons. Open debate is our enlightenend means of determining nothing less than how we order our society, what is true and what is false, what wars we should fight, what policies we should pass, whom we should put behind bars for the rest of their lives, and who gets to control our government. This is a deadly serous business. While protecting children from abuse is a noble goal, an overly expansive definition of bullying cannot be allowed to hobble the gravely important exchange of ideas among adults upon which our nation depends. The new emphasis on collegiate "bullying" treats adults like kindergarteners and forgets entirely the gravity of the issues we face in our democracy every single day and the rightful passions they ignite.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“An educational system in which the authorities believe they should decide what is right without being questioned is more like a seminary or madrassa, not anything deserving of the name university. Without an open process of debate and discussion, we can expect the ideas produced by academics to grow increasingly incoherent and useless to our society.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“By threatening or punishing mainstream (and yes, often socially conservative) opinions on campus, academic authorities are dismissing the views of many Americans and silencing important public discussions. They are also marginalizing higher education itself. In this time of hyperpartisanship, universities could help bridge that political gulf by fostering discussions across political and personal divides. If they continue selectively silencing voices they disagree with, however, they will never be trusted to take on that role. Unless speech codes, campus censorship, and the heavy-handed techniques that stifle debate come to an end, the academy cannot expect to be treated as the honest broker we so desperately need in the arena of political and cultural controversy. In fact, until then, the academy won’t deserve that role.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“The idea that we should campaign against hurtful speech among adults arises from a failure to understand that free speech is our chosen method of resolving disagreements, using words rather than weapons.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“What constitutes due process has evolved over hundreds of years and is rooted in both pragmatism and deep philosophy. It recognizes several truths about human nature: people can be mistaken in what they remember or believe; people do falsely accuse their neighbors; people can even convince themselves that false things are true if they desire to punish someone they hate or feel has wronged them; and we must limit people in power to enforcing clear laws fairly to avoid abuse of the system. Judges and juries have their own biases, blind spots, areas of expertise, and areas of ignorance, all of which need to be systemically balanced out (through processes for appeal, for example) to minimize the likelihood that people are unfairly punished.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“The First Amendment exists to protect minority points of view in a democracy, and anything that undermines it necessarily gives more power to the authorities. It is ultimately the best protection of the weak, the unpopular, the oddballs, the misfits, and the underdogs. If the only price that we have to pay for this freedom is that we sometimes hear words that we find offensive, it is well worth it.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“Having pure intentions, steadfast goals, and an unwillingness to consider that you might be wrong is the formula for some of the worst evils mankind has ever wrought upon one another, from inquisitions to the twentieth century’s disastrous experiments with totalitarian utopias.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“Some people may associate “fundamentalism” with religion, but Rauch explains it as a broader refusal by those in power to recognize (at least publicly) the possibility that they might be wrong.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“As the sociologist Diana C. Mutz discovered in her book Hearing the Other Side (2006), those with the highest levels of education have the lowest exposure to people with conflicting points of view, while those who have not graduated from high school can claim the most diverse discussion mates.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“In 2009, the First Amendment Center’s survey of knowledge about basic rights found that 39 percent of Americans could not name even one right protected by the First Amendment.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“the advocates of benign censorship fundamentally miss a simple truth that Buddhists have known for millennia: life is pain. Most Americans find this statement jarring at first, but when you think about it for even a moment and accept that there is nothing strange or odd about the challenges inherent in being alive, life becomes less painful. As philosophers and popular writers have argued, much of our unnecessary emotional pain comes from our obsession with avoiding pain. The sometimes painful process of intellectual growth and living in the world needs to be accepted, not fled from, and that acceptance needs to be taught.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“The problem with this, of course, is that by following a “sensitivity for everyone” as opposed to a “free speech for everyone” model, you create the risk that nobody will be allowed to say anything interesting at all.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“Learned Hand,”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“According to Sendy Guerrier, a UD administrator, students “should be confronted with this information at every turn.”11 Guerrier also wrote that the program should “leave a mental footprint on their consciousness,” apparently missing the echo of the villain from George Orwell’s 1984.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“Interestingly, to succeed, liberal science relies on people being unafraid of being wrong on a regular basis.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate

“believing all opinions are true leads to nonsense.”
― Greg Lukianoff, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate