>One, perhaps the only, problem with freedom of speech in academia is that can be very actively exploited by bad faith actors, i.e., people who are not interest

>One, perhaps the only, problem with freedom of speech in academia is that can be very actively exploited by bad faith actors, i.e., people who are not interested at all in truth and merely abuse the university system as a platform for furthering political goals and "whitewashing" their position. Strong disagree. The problem with "freedom of speech in academia" is that it's a polite fiction. What happens when an MIT professor puts out a press release saying that the US deserved 9-11 and that more attacks are justified? Or that the Charlottesville protestors didn't go far enough, and more lefties need to be run down in the street like dogs? Will MIT be hiring Holocaust denier history professors? Does anyone truly believe that, if a professor publicly expresses views well outside of mainstream acceptability, there will be no professional consequences? "Free expression" at a place like MIT still means you need to keep well within the standards of acceptability, just that we want to make sure that the standards include certain things that are now considered beyond the pale.