An indication of the extent to which “progressivism” now controls American college and university campuses is the existence of “bias incident” reporting systems. Students who don’t like what others have said can file complaints against them, and school administrators will eagerly “investigate” to see what sanction is appropriate for the miscreant. This is another way for leftists to employ power to get what they want — in this case, the silencing of those who disagree with them.
In today’s Martin Center article, Magdalene Horzempa writes about this phenomenon, focusing on a company that provides the software for these bias incident systems.
She writes, “Not only is Maxient a medium by which students can make bias reports, but it is also a system in which sensitive student data are stored. Students visit a page on a university website after witnessing an instance of “bias,” then they fill out a form detailing the event. That form is then submitted and housed within the Maxient system, where campus administrators can review it in perpetuity.”
Both of North Carolina’s flagship universities have gone in for this. Administrators use the reports to monitor the “climate” on campus, which always means stifling those who disagree with leftist ideas.
Why does this matter? Horzempa explains, “The biggest problem with bias reporting is that it can be an assault on free speech. In the past, students and faculty with dissenting opinions worried about being ostracized by their peers, making lower grades in certain classes, or suffering from the lack of viewpoint-diversity on campus. Now, students and faculty who think against the grain must worry about being reported to administrators who, in turn, provide echo-chamber punishments and arbitrary consequences to ideological nonconformists.”
This teaches students that the way to respond to opposing points of view is not to formulate good arguments in response, but to file an official complaint. That’s not the way free societies work.