THE 2027 COLLEGE FREE SPEECH RANKINGS ARE OUT. A record 140 schools passed this year, but the national average is still a D-, which is another way of saying higher ed has improved from “terrible” to “still pretty bad.” See where your alma mater ranks.

A STUDENT SENATE VOTES 25–0 TO DENY A REPUBLICAN CLUB FOR BEING REPUBLICAN. At Whitman College, apparently freedom of association is fine, as long as you associate with the approved people. Rights that protect only popular opinions are not really protections at all.

CANADIAN COURT REJECTS A FORCED APOLOGY FOR MEME, THAILAND IMPRISONS ACTIVIST FOR INSULTING MONARCHY, & CHINA CENSORS FOOTAGE FROM TIBET: Different countries, same recurring temptation: punish the speech instead of answering it.

UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON LEARNS THAT COMPELLED SPEECH CAN BE EXPENSIVE: Professor Stuart Reges challenged the school’s land-acknowledgment requirement, and the case ended with a $600K settlement. Academic freedom includes the right not to mouth the university’s preferred message. More in this weekend’s Free Speech Update.

FREE SPEECH HAS A MUCH LONGER, STRANGER, AND MORE HARD-FOUGHT HISTORY THAN MOST PEOPLE REALIZE. For history buffs, I put together a reading list tracing the battles over censorship, dissent, toleration, and free expression from the ancient world to the present.

HIGHER ED DOESN’T HAVE A PERCEPTION PROBLEM: Americans picture more ideological diversity on campus than the evidence supports. A closer look lowers confidence. Perhaps universities should spend less time managing perceptions and more time asking what those perceptions are hiding.

AMERICANS ARE GIVING HIGHER ED TOO MUCH CREDIT: The public substantially underestimates the ideological imbalance of the professoriate. When people learn how lopsided it really is, confidence declines. Reality turns out to be lousy PR.

HIGHER ED’S CONFIDENCE PROBLEM IS WORSE THAN IT LOOKS: Americans already think college faculties are far more ideologically balanced than they are. Give them a clearer picture and confidence falls. Apparently the problem isn’t just the sales pitch.

NEW COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES HAVE ALWAYS CHANGED WHO GETS TO QUESTION AUTHORITY. The printing press brought millions of new minds into the conversation. Social media brought billions. Free speech is what lets that scrutiny produce discovery, correction, and progress.

THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE GAVE AMERICANS A LASTING LANGUAGE OF EQUALITY AND RIGHTS. On The Blessings of Liberty, Jeffrey Rosen talks with historian Ted Widmer about how generations of Americans have drawn on its promises to expand freedom.

THE FURTHER LEFT STUDENTS LEAN, THE WORSE THEIR MENTAL HEALTH. In FIRE’s survey of 55,000+ students, 57% of very liberal students reported poor mental health at least half the time, versus 34% of very conservative students. Why? Check it out on ERI.

THE FOUNDERS BUILT A SYSTEM FOR FLAWED PEOPLE. THE SOVIETS TRIED TO BUILD NEW PEOPLE FOR THE SYSTEM. Robert P. George joins Jeffrey Rosen on why liberty requires limits on power.

 NO ADMINISTRATION CALLS ITS ATTACKS ON FREE SPEECH “CENSORSHIP.” The trick is to redefine the speech you want to suppress as something else entirely. Watch Part 1 of FIRE’s 1AX: Trump 2.0.

CYBERCRIME LAWS ARE BECOMING A CONVENIENT NEW HOME FOR OLD-FASHIONED CENSORSHIP. A UN treaty meant to fight online crime could make it easier for governments to help one another investigate and punish speech that authoritarian states simply redefine as “serious” crime.

A FREE SOCIETY REQUIRES A THICKER SKIN: In The Coddling of the American Mind, Jonathan Haidt and I argued that treating offense as harm makes people more fragile, institutions more censorious, and free inquiry harder to sustain.

TRUMP SAID HE’D RESTORE FREE SPEECH IN AMERICA. Halfway through his second term, the question is whether his actions have matched that promise.

A FREE SOCIETY SHOULD BE VERY CAREFUL ABOUT GIVING GOVERNMENT MORE POWER OVER SPEECH: Nadine Strossen and I explain why censorship is often sold as protection, but history shows that vague power to punish “harmful” ideas rarely stays confined to the people you want silenced.

THE CONSTITUTION WAS WRITTEN IN PHILADELPHIA, BUT THE ARGUMENT OVER AMERICA HAS BEEN EVERYWHERE SINCE. Beverly Gage joins Jeffrey Rosen for a road trip through the places where Americans remember, reinterpret, and fight about their past.

HORSESHOE THEORY MAY HAVE A FREE SPEECH EDITION. FIRE’s latest survey finds very liberal and very conservative Americans are much more comfortable discussing controversial issues than moderates, even as most Americans remain deeply reluctant to speak freely on the toughest topics like Israel/Palestine and ICE.

CANADA, FRANCE, AND BRAZIL ARE SHOWING HOW QUICKLY SPEECH RESTRICTIONS CAN GO TOO FAR. This week’s stories include a Canadian social-media bill, France shutting a mosque over religious texts, and a Brazilian influencer convicted after misgendering a politician.

ACADEMIA’S FREE SPEECH PROBLEM DIDN’T DISAPPEAR. PEOPLE JUST GOT BETTER AT PRETENDING IT DID. Tyler Harper explains why he left the tenure track, Tuskegee polices student dress codes, and a suspended student wins in court.

IF YOU’RE GOING TO ARGUE ABOUT AMERICA, YOU MIGHT AS WELL KNOW WHAT YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT. The Blessings of Liberty digs into the ideas, cases, and historical fights behind the Constitution with Jeffrey Rosen and guests who know the material cold.

BAD IDEAS GET MUCH HARDER TO KILL ONCE THEY ACQUIRE CREDENTIALS. A shaky claim becomes a study, the study becomes a textbook lesson, and the lesson becomes conventional wisdom. Kitty Genovese and the Stanford Prison Experiment show why we need better ways to trace bad claims, broken citations, and everything built on top of them.

TWO OF THE MOST FAMOUS LESSONS ABOUT HUMAN NATURE WERE BUILT ON BULLSHIT. The Kitty Genovese story and the Stanford Prison Experiment helped teach generations to see people as more cowardly and cruel than the evidence justified. The Reality Test Project is about finding claims like these before they harden into “knowledge.”

HATE SPEECH LAWS DIDN’T STOP THE NAZIS. Weimar Germany tried censoring them before they took power. The laws failed, and the lesson is a grim one: censorship is no substitute for defeating bad ideas.