Talk:Speech code

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2006 comments[edit]

There's two completely separate articles in here -- one sociolinguistic, the other legal. AnonMoos 16:29, 10 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I split the articles into "Speech Code" and "Speech Code Theory". -- 17:40, 10 November 2006 User:ReedieJR

It should be noted that Matthew Duffie is a huge fan of Speech Code. To such a point that he considers it a way of life... - Um, ya.... that's gone --VTEX 18:09, 2 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Extremely vague statement[edit]

'There were approximately 645 hate speech codes in place at U.S. colleges and universities in 1990; by 1991, the number grew to over 300' - That is extremely vague. So there were 645 speech codes, and the year later there were 'over 300'. Typo? Maybe it must be 3000? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.89.167.177 (talk) 16:43, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

75 was erroneously 645 as per http://www.scu.edu/ethics/publications/iie/v5n2/codes.html --Eliezerlp (talk) 10:23, 15 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Neutrality[edit]

The line "Today, most talk of speech codes is within institutional contexts and refer to colleges and refers to official lists and rules established by authorities, where speech codes are occasionally used by colleges and universities as a bludgeon to suppress speech that others find offensive." is, without a doubt, not written from a neutral point of view and therefore is not encyclopedic. Therefore I added the neutrality tag and would like to foster a discussion on how this could be rewritten. Something else I'd like to point out that I noticed in the article is frequent mention of the first amendment. The first amendment guarantees in a nutshell that you won't be thrown in prison for speaking your mind in a public forum. It does NOT guarantee that you won't be fired from you job (cursing at customers) or expelled from your school (disrupting class, yelling out the answers to an exam while its in progress.) In both of those cases your freedom to speak has not been stepped on - you were free to curse at the customer or yell in the classroom, and you weren't thrown in jail in either case. There is no guarantee by the first amendment that you can say anything you want and nothing at all will happen to you in any circumstances. You can't sue your company for firing you because you cussed out your boss. Anyway that's my 2 cents. Spiral5800 (talk) 11:54, 26 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

And the crucial difference between speech codes and the examples that you provided is, in your examples the person is being punished for disruptive behavior and not for expressing his/her views, while speech codes are expressly intended to restrict the content of people's speech based on the political views expressed (which clearly violates the 1st Amendment, which guarantees everyone the right to express their political views in public without fear of retribution); in fact, according to Donald Downs, speech codes "are linked to a broader ideological agenda designed to foster an egalitarian vision of social justice", which means in effect that their very purpose is to suppress any voices that oppose egalitarianism and "social justice" (thus violating freedom of speech). I should also add that public education institutions (those receiving taxpayer money) are just as much bound by the 1st Amendment as the government itself, and for them to punish a student in any way based on the expression of his/her political views is unconstitutional. Last but not least (although it's not directly relevant to the above), speech codes are in themselves discriminatory because they give certain classes of people (e.g. fagots, cultists, etc.) special protection against criticism, while still allowing them to criticize anyone who doesn't belong to those "protected classes" (i.e. straight white English-speaking Christians -- who else?) Your typical leftist muddling of the issue won't make your arguments hold water any more than they do (which they don't by a long shot). Anyway that's my 2 cents, and I expect your response within 30 days or I will consider myself free to remove the ugly tag from the article. 67.170.215.166 (talk) 08:31, 27 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The first comment makes absolutely no sense, at all. Being fired from your workplace for saying something rude is not even remotely the same as First Amendment violations committed by government organs, which is what public universities are. If speech codes at public universities confined themselves to the prevention of yelling fire in a crowded theater or bona fide harassment or the deliberate disruption of classroom instruction, you MIGHT have a point, but the vast majority of speech codes, as documented by organizations such as FIRE, prohibit speech that is clearly protected by the First Amendment you seem to find so pesky. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.141.158.8 (talk) 05:12, 24 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Regardless of how off his examples were, his point is clear in that depicting speech codes as a "bludgeon to suppress speech that others find offensive" strongly voices one side of the discussion and overlooks the other. Simply wording it a bit differently can say about the same thing and going a bit further to state why speech codes have been nonetheless defended might be useful as well as fair.

Also, although all public forums are constitutionally protected, including on campus to a point, the Court also recognizes that institutions enjoy a margin of appreciation concerning their institutional policies in order to carry out their functions. Institutions of education, and particularly higher learning, are formed around the construction of a school mission. In essence, it is not simply a question of public forum because that is easily solved by the First Amendment. The question is whether this school mission can sufficiently serve as constitutional justification to restraints placed on speech in instances of racism, sexism, etc.

Lastly, the author of this article can at least fix the several typos.Sackblack (talk) 17:56, 5 June 2011 (UTC)zack[reply]

valuative?[edit]

What does this word mean? I've not heard it before and can't find it in any dictionary. Is it a neologism? 202.36.179.66 (talk) 03:48, 23 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

maybe it should be 'full of value'. Never heard of 'valuative' before... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.54.96.139 (talk) 10:43, 6 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed merge with Banned word[edit]

This unsourced stub seems to fit better within the existing substantial article at Speech code, rather than being developed into an overlapping article at this title. PamD 08:32, 16 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]