Study Finds College Students of No Faith Less Likely to Support Free Expression

Study Finds College Students of No Faith Less Likely to Support Free Expression

People on the left are not big on religion or free speech, so this makes perfect sense.

The Washington Examiner reports:

College students with no faith are more likely to want to shut down speech

The American religious landscape has been changing rapidly with church membership recently declining to below a majority of Americans for the first time along with shrinking numbers believing in God and a significant rise in agnostics and atheists most notably among younger Gen Z Americans . These changes in faith-based institutions are noteworthy as these institutions have historically helped anchor civil society and have been instrumental in forging ethical norms and social ideals for generations. Yet, they may be disappearing.

One major consequence that has emerged from these shifts involves free expression. Nearly four in ten (38%) students on collegiate campuses today are either atheists, agnostics, or nothing in particular. These students have notably less supportive views toward open inquiry and free speech than their faith-identifying peers.

The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) just released its study of almost 45,000 voices of currently enrolled students at over 200 colleges and universities around the nation, investigating attitudes toward speech and one’s religious leaning. While the study does not ask about religious practice or attitudes, it does measure religious identification and captures the significant number of students who do not identify as a member of traditional faith. Even without deep data on faith outlook and practice, real cleavages emerge suggesting that faith is deeply tied up with how students think about civility and discourse.

Consider the fact that schools regularly bring in a variety of speakers to campus and there has been a recent rise in attempts to prevent or shut down these events . When asked about the acceptability of shouting down a speaker to prevent them from speaking on campus, 57% of students with a faith identification believe that there are times when shouting down a speaker could be acceptable. A much higher 71% of no-faith students feel the same way. As for blocking other students from attending a campus event, 34% of religious students maintain that there are times when this behavior is acceptable compared to a higher number of non-faith students at 43%. These figures are too high, but it is very clear that even with fairly crude measures of faith, those of no faith, atheist or agnostic are far more open to trying to stop expression.

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