Censoring Spencer Only Makes Him Louder

As an increasing number of universities take a stand against alt-right figures, perhaps it’s the wrong approach.

Suppressing speech only widens its audience — this theory has proven itself true from the times of the ancients up to recent failed totalitarian states like the Soviet Union or the Third Reich. And yet, time and time again, our twenty-first-century society falls into the same pitfall: tragedy, media circus, empty political promises, and then the suppression of personal liberties. Among the first of these liberties to go, and the most dangerous to surrender, is the freedom of speech.

Following the terrorist attack in Charlottesville, universities, business, news networks, and government officials have gone out of their way to capitalize on the public’s shock and disapproval. President Trump, who is no stranger to controversy, was lambasted from the left and right for drawing a moral equivalency between white supremacists and anti-fa counter protestors (who, in all fairness, were likewise armed, and have since been declared a terrorist organization by that state of New Jersey). Members of Trump’s business and tech councils resigned, and the infrastructure council was disbanded altogether. Aside from these CEOs’ “moral qualms,” their move was good for business, seeing as the PR boost companies like Campbell’s Soups received for their disavowment of Trump translated to greater revenue. Go figure that white supremacists make for a good business model.

Latest in the string of PR stunts have been public and private universities across the country, along with my very own Penn State, preemptively disinviting Richard Spencer, an alt-right leader, from speaking on campus. There are legitimate concerns about the constitutionality of publicly funded universities censoring speakers, which had kept many universities reluctant to do so, until now. Since the events of Charlottesville did claim an innocent life, universities have now felt emboldened to claim that Spencer and fellow alt-right speakers incite violence, and therefore their speech is not protected by the First Amendment. Meanwhile, in a country based on the presumption of innocence, it seems a little disingenuous to assume a speaker’s intentions, and ban them accordingly, before he or she even asks to speak or offers a topic.