FIRE, a tireless champion of student's rights on campus, has announced its February 2010 winner of worst campus speech code: Westfield State College.
Here is FIRE's description of the speech code. Read it, and let us know in the comments what it's really like at your school.
Westfield's Student Handbook prohibits "discrimination," which it defines to include "making disparaging remarks that insult or stigmatize a student's cultural background or race" as well as "making insensitive remarks that reflect a student's disability." Westfield State College is a public university, bound to protect its students' First Amendment right to free speech. The college recognizes this fact elsewhere in its policies, clearly stating that "Westfield State College recognizes that the student, as an adult member of society and a citizen of the United States of America, is entitled to respect and consideration and has the right to the constitutionally guaranteed freedoms of speech, assembly and association." The non-discrimination policy, however, completely ignores this obligation, explicitly prohibiting large amounts of protected speech.
