Self-censorship on Campus Is Bad for Science

Amid heightened tensions on college campuses, well-established scientific ideas are suddenly meeting with stiff political resistance.

Luana Maroja, Professor of biology at Williams College

I have taught evolution and genetics at Williams College for about a decade. For most of that time, the only complaints I got from students were about grades. But that all changed after Donald Trump’s election as president. At that moment, political tensions were running high on our campus. And well-established scientific ideas that I’d been teaching for years suddenly met with stiff ideological resistance.

The trouble began when we discussed the notion of heritability as it applies to human intelligence. (Heritability is the degree to which offspring genetically resemble their parents; the concept can apply not only to physical traits, but also to behavioral ones.) In a classroom discussion, I noted that researchers have measured a large average difference in IQ between the inhabitants of the United States and those of my home country, Brazil. I challenged the supposed intelligence differential between Americans and Brazilians. I asked students to think about the limitations of the data, which do not control for environmental differences, and explained that the raw numbers say nothing about whether observed differences are indeed “inborn”—that is, genetic.

There is, of course, a long history of charlatans who have cited dubious “science” as proof that certain racial and ethnic groups are genetically superior to others. My approach has been to teach students how to see through those efforts, by explaining how scientists understand heritability today, and by discussing how to interpret intelligence data—and how not to.

In class, though, some students argued instead that it is impossible to measure IQ in the first place, that IQ tests were invented to ostracize minority groups, or that IQ is not heritable at all. None of these arguments is true. In fact, IQ can certainly be measured, and it has some predictive value. While the score may not reflect satisfaction in life, it does correlate with academic success. And while IQ is very highly influenced by environmental differences, it also has a substantial heritable component; about 50 percent of the variation in measured intelligence among individuals in a population is based on variation in their genes. Even so, some students, without any evidence, started to deny the existence of heritability as a biological phenomenon.

Similar biological denialism exists about nearly any observed difference between human groups, including those between males and females. Unfortunately, students push back against these phenomena not by using scientific arguments, but by employing an a priori moral commitment to equality, anti-racism, and anti-sexism. They resort to denialism to protect themselves from having to confront a worldview they reject—that certain differences between groups may be based partly on biology. This denialism manifests itself at times in classroom discussions and in emails in which students explain at length why I should not be teaching the topic.

To my surprise, some students even objected to other well-established biological concepts, such as “kin selection,” the idea that, when individuals take actions for the benefit of their offspring and siblings, they are indirectly perpetuating their own genes. Startled students, falling into what we call the “naturalistic fallacy”—the notion that what occurs in nature is good—thought I was actually endorsing Trump’s hiring of his family! Things have gone so far that, in my classes, I now feel compelled to issue a caveat: Just because a trait has evolved by natural selection does not mean that it is also morally desirable.

The duty of scientists is to study the world—including the human body and mind—as it is. Some of our students, however, are seeing only what they want to see and denying real-world phenomena that conflict with their ideology. Take, for example, the obvious biological differences between the sexes, not only in physical traits (men, on average, are clearly stronger and faster than women are), but also in aptitudes and preferences (boys generally prefer wheeled toys, and girls prefer plush toys, a preference that is also observed in baby monkeys!).

People expect an equal sex ratio across academic professions and sometimes ascribe the lack of such equality to bias. In the so-called STEM fields—science, technology, engineering, and mathematics—the relative paucity of women is frequently taken to reflect endemic sexism. While this is undoubtedly a factor, the effect of bias as opposed to other factors, such as differences in what male and female students prefer, requires detailed empirical study.

One set of data challenges the idea that bias is the only cause of sex-ratio differences in the STEM fields. The so-called gender-equality paradox involves the observation that, while women and men around the world perform equally well on standardized science tests, countries with the highest proportion of women in STEM are not the ones with the least discrimination or sexual harassment, but those with the greatest gender inequality. Where women are free to choose their own path and do not have to worry about pay, they gravitate toward the humanities. Countries such as Norway and Finland have relatively few women in STEM fields, while countries such as Algeria and Indonesia have an ample supply.

However, when one assumes that everyone is a blank slate, differences between what males and females do can be explained only by bias and harassment. The conclusion is obvious: All STEM fields are cesspools of sex discrimination. This is what happens when ideology replaces biology. It’s become taboo to even mention the possibility that men and women might have different preferences.

Sadly, students do not seem to realize that their good intentions may lead them to resist learning scientific facts, and can even harm their own goal of helping women and ethnic minorities. The existence of any genetic differences between males and females, or between different ethnic groups, does not imply that we should treat members of those groups differently. Denying reality and pretending that differences do not exist—as if this were the only possible path toward equality—is dangerous. If you believe that moral equality relies on biological equality, this makes your moral views susceptible to future research that might reveal biological inequalities. Instead, equality and equal opportunity for all should be the default position, regardless of potential biological differences.

When students at Williams or anywhere else try to protect their worldview by denying scientific evidence, it is bound to affect what professors teach and how they teach it. Campus norms proscribe any discourse that might offend women, minorities, or anyone perceived as a victim of patriarchal white societies. However, this rule, no matter how well intentioned, is harming the very people it aims to protect. The argument favoring a certain amount of self-censorship is that it is necessary to protect minority students from feeling unsafe when they hear what they see as “hate speech.” However, by not talking about science that some find unsettling, we deny students opportunities for learning and for intellectual empowerment. How well can they argue their positions effectively unless they are seeing the world as it really is?

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Campus Crusade Against Christianity

A new survey of college students by the liberal-leaning Knight Foundation shows the future of the First Amendment doesn't look so bright in America. It found 41 percent said "hate speech" should not be protected by the Constitution. Only 58 percent thought it should.

In fact, a 2017 survey out of UCLA found that out of 1,500 college students who were asked whether "hate speech" is protected by the First Amendment, only 39 percent correctly said yes. On campus today, it can be defined as "unsafe" to hear an opinion you don't like. Unwelcome speech is compared to a physical attack.

Make no mistake. The Thought Police are gaining ground, dangerously.

The central question is what qualifies as "hate speech"? The standards can shift quickly. The Knight Foundation poll found that 68 percent of students believe the campus climate prevents students from expressing their opinions because of fears they might offend other classmates.

The irony is inescapable. So many of them support the censorship they claim to abhor.

We've all heard story after story about students protesting those horrible right-wing speakers like Henry Kissinger and Condoleezza Rice for daring to set foot on campus. These same radicals regularly try to end the careers of professors found to be extremists for things such as seeing no problem in little white girls dressing as a Disney character "of color," like Mulan or Tiana, for Halloween.

Yale University seems to be the new True North for political intolerance, and here comes yet another episode in an endless list of grievances from the $72,000-a-year-tuition oppressed. An LGBTQ advocacy group called the Outlaws is furious that Yale's Federalist Society invited a lawyer from a so-called "hate group," the Alliance Defending Freedom, to discuss the case of Colorado baker Jack Phillips's refusal to make a cake for a same-sex wedding. For the record, ADF is one of the most respected organizations in the conservative movement today, which is why it qualifies as a hate group. In a sympathetic response, Yale Law School is creating a policy to stop providing stipends or loan forgiveness to students who work for organizations that defend traditional Christian views on sexual ethics.

So if you work for the ACLU or Planned Parenthood after college, you can receive some loan forgiveness. You can defend abortionists or terrorist suspects and Yale will love you. But support traditional marriage? The right to life? That's beyond the pale.

Sen. Ted Cruz called the policy "transparently discriminatory" and is now investigating, noting that Yale receives lots of federal funding, and the Trump administration has made it clear it's willing to deny federal funding to universities that curb freedom of speech. It's about time.

"I think Yale law school is the canary in the coal mine," Sen. Cruz says. "If they get away with this, we'll see law school after law school after law school following the same pattern. And I'll tell you, what the LGBT group demanded of Yale not just that they discriminate against Christians and financial aid. They demanded that they discriminate against anyone who believes in traditional marriage in admissions, that they not even admit anyone who believes in a biblical definition of marriage. That is profoundly dangerous, and we've got to stand up and prevent it."

Yale officials told Sen. Cruz that its policy isn't based on excluding a religion or ideology, which is false on its face. The LGBTQ ideology will not abide the expression of a biblical view of sexuality and marriage. It wants the view punished as "hate speech," and it wants to begin blacklisting Christians for advocating their beliefs in public. To the libertine left, opposing "discrimination" means building an imposing border wall with barbed wire around the First Amendment. "Tolerance" demands no less.

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The war on wrongthink academics

The news that law lecturer Gunnar Beck is standing in the German Bundestag elections for the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party must have shocked many of his colleagues and students at his university, the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London. Understandably so. The AfD is an extreme right-wing party with prominent members who have openly expressed racist views. Some AfD politicians have even flirted with blatantly racist groups such as Pegida. They have made substantial gains in their short existence, currently holding 91 out of 709 seats in the Bundestag.

But this shock has too readily crossed the line into a demand that Beck should be sacked. SOAS students and even the lecturers’ union, the University College Union (UCU), say Beck must go. Twenty-three out of 31 law-school staff signed a public condemnation of their colleague. Last week students organised a protest to demand ‘an immediate review of his employment’. ‘Beck and those who support his views should not be given a platform’, they said.

I view the AfD’s politics as despicable, but I won’t join the demands for Beck to be sacked. If we value freedom of speech and workers’ rights, we should oppose such demands. These freedoms and rights mean we should be able to express unpopular and even offensive opinions without our employment status being threatened.

These rights ought to be indivisible. Beck’s right to freedom of speech would apply equally to a much-cited Islamist mathematician, a literary critic accused of anti-Semitic activism, or a noted pedagogue who stands for UKIP. It would also apply to academics criticising their institution’s governance or educational orthodoxy.

Defending Beck’s freedom to express his opinions is a defence of the rights of all of us. The statement signed by some in his department states: ‘We are speaking out because we recognise the importance of not being complicit in the normalisation of reactionary, right-wing populism.’ But many things are (wrongly) referred to as right-wing reactionary populism these days, including support for Brexit or even the views of gender-critical feminists. Will academics who hold these views be next to face demands for their sacking?

Protesters have argued that Beck’s views pose a threat to student and staff welfare. Jo McNeil, currently candidate to be general secretary of UCU, said the ‘welfare of our students and our staff’ was the paramount reason that Beck should be fired. This is the same argument that is used to try to No Platform ex-Muslim campaigners, gender-critical feminists, critics of #MeToo, and others – the idea that their opinions pose a threat to others. This is an insulting and censorious position.

Demanding the sacking of a person for their political views is not progressive. Beck’s employment status should be defended; it’s his views that should be challenged.

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