Timothy Burke has responded to my response to his response to my original post about Swarthmore's speech code. Meanwhile, Ralph Luker looks on, reminding us of the value of the debate we are having. It's a good reminder, for both of us. Just because we are both aware of how the modern academy acculturates its inhabitants to place their sensitivities above reasoned argument (with, among other things, speech codes), that does not mean that we don't both feel sometimes like our toes are getting stepped on by the other. We are both, whether we like it or not, creatures of campus speech code culture. So, thanks, Ralph.

Tim's response to me is actually an elaboration of an email exchange we had last night. It distills things we each said, and it poses the three main questions that Tim sees emerging from an exchange that has been just as substantial off line as on. They are:

1) How do we resolve contradictions in policies where one part says one thing and another part says another thing? Doesnít Swarthmore's sexual harassment cancel out or make actively irrelevant any statement anywhere else about protecting speech?

2) Isn't trusting in grievance procedures dangerous given that they tend to violate due process concerns? Is there any reason to think that Swarthmore's procedures are any more protective of due process than most colleges? Hasnít that already been a slippery slope elsewhere? Isn't Burke concerned about that?

3) What about this little section on discriminatory harassment? Doesn't that cancel out the general harassment policy? Can we talk about how to read those two in relation to one another?

That's where we differ. As I wrote to Tim last night,

Yes, as you say, good things are said [in the policy on non-harassing speech]. And yes, compared to other schools, and even compared to policies Swarthmore had on its books in the late 1990s (which get repeatedly described as "the speech code" in The Phoenix), it's an enlightened policy. But it just isn't worth the pixels its printed in when there are a whole host of subsidiary policies that undercut it, that create loopholes in it, and that effectively make it possible for administrators to prosecute offensive speech at their own discretion. You object that I don't take the policy more seriously, and insinuate that there is a degree of dishonesty in the fact that I don't cite it at length in my posts. To that I would say, I cannot take seriously a policy protecting speech that is so drastically and systematically undermined by other school policies and that even in places undermines itself (the phrasings about shame, self-respect, and so on). If Swarthmore wants me to hold up its speech protection policy as a wondrous thing that all colleges should emulate, then it should get rid of its hidden restrictions on sexual speech and on speech that offends groups. As it is, I see the policy on free expression as a dangerously disingenuous trojan horse.

... I think we also disagree about how much trust we are willing to place in college administrators, especially when it comes to adjudicating questions of expression and to ensuring due process. The news that Swarthmore administrators will carefully adjudicate complaints about expression to determine whether that expression is actionable is not at all reassuring to me, particularly when I learn from the fine print of school policies that these admins will adjudicate not only time, place, and manner issues, but also issues of content. Add to that that admins are no better on due process than they are on free speech. Perhaps I unfairly malign the good people at Swarthmore, but from where I sit there is no more reason to trust them than there is to trust any other college administration that purports--hubristically, if well-meaningly--to be able to outthink and improve on the First Amendment. To you, the contradictions in Swarthmore's many policies are interesting wrinkles to be analyzed; they do not in themselves discount the sweeping statement in favor of free expression. To me, the contradictions are evidence that Swarthmore is not as committed to free speech as it says it is; they absolutely do discount the larger statements about free expression because their existence speaks quite bluntly to the school's interest in preserving the capacity to punish speech that the Constitution protects.

Tim wonders aloud in his post about where Swarthmore's Discriminatory Harassment policy came from, and acknowledges that its language about protecting "groups" from offending speech is disturbing. That's a question it would be well worth researching, and I hope Tim does decide to pursue it.