This is bad, sad news for our country, and for the prospects of America's continuing traditions around free speech.
I'm not sure how to improve the situation. My first thought is for high schools to teach debate and rhetoric to almost everyone, starting in middle school/ very early adolescence rather than mainly just to high school students headed towards liberal arts (or law) degrees in college. We need to teach everyone how to first understand the evidence about a topic, and argue based on evidence, rather than de-platform, shout down, or attack the people they disagree with.
As bad as the US situation is politically, it isn't only political speech that's being repressed or met with violence. The scientists and commentators who have proposed (with peer-reviewed data and math) that something other than human-caused CO2 is potentially responsible for some or all of the changes in global climate and weather are being shouted down and hounded out of university careers in Earth Science, Astrophysics, and Solar Physics. Several speakers at conferences, who agree that there are (and have always been) changes happening to the climate from entirely natural causes have been picketed, disrupted, had poster-session displays torn down and even been physically attacked.
This is bad, sad news for our country, and for the prospects of America's continuing traditions around free speech.
I'm not sure how to improve the situation. My first thought is for high schools to teach debate and rhetoric to almost everyone, starting in middle school/ very early adolescence rather than mainly just to high school students headed towards liberal arts (or law) degrees in college. We need to teach everyone how to first understand the evidence about a topic, and argue based on evidence, rather than de-platform, shout down, or attack the people they disagree with.
As bad as the US situation is politically, it isn't only political speech that's being repressed or met with violence. The scientists and commentators who have proposed (with peer-reviewed data and math) that something other than human-caused CO2 is potentially responsible for some or all of the changes in global climate and weather are being shouted down and hounded out of university careers in Earth Science, Astrophysics, and Solar Physics. Several speakers at conferences, who agree that there are (and have always been) changes happening to the climate from entirely natural causes have been picketed, disrupted, had poster-session displays torn down and even been physically attacked.