Fredrik deBoer has been in and around academia his entire life. He’s a fourth generation Ph.D. who has blogged about education issues since 2008. Writing from a socialist perspective, he regularly tackles campus free speech debates.

Last month, deBoer wrote a piece for The Los Angeles Times arguing that recent efforts to shut down conservative speakers on campus have contributed to an environment where 58 percent of Republicans say colleges have a negative effect on the country.

On today’s episode of So to Speak, we ask deBoer how this distrust threatens the future of higher education, and why he believes his colleagues on “the left” contribute to it. We also review common arguments against free speech, and deBoer explains how anti-communist purges targeting his grandfather sparked his early appreciation for academic freedom.

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