Freedom of Speech

Students have a fundamental constitutional right to free speech, and free exchange of ideas is not suppressed because the ideas put forth are thought by some or even by most members of the University’s community to be offensive, unwise, immoral, indecent, disagreeable, conservative, liberal, traditional, radical, or wrongheaded.
UT Southern is committed to the following:
(A) maintaining a campus as a marketplace of ideas;
(B) giving students the broadest possible latitude to speak, write, listen, challenge, learn, and discuss any issue, subject to exceptions outlined in BT0010 Policy Affirming Principles of Free Speech for Students and Faculty, Section 4;
(C) providing an atmosphere that is most conducive to speculation, experimentation, and creation by all students and all faculty, who shall always remain free to inquire, to study and to evaluate, and to gain new understanding;
(D) maintaining the generally accessible, open, outdoor areas of its campus as traditional public forums for free speech by students (i.e., limited public forums because the University has intentionally opened those areas for the limited purpose of free expression activities by a certain group, students);
(E) promoting a lively and fearless freedom of debate and deliberation; and
(F) protecting the freedom of all students and all faculty to state their own views about and contest the views expressed on University property, and to state their own views about and contest speakers who are invited to express their views on University property.

It is not the proper role of the University to attempt to shield individuals from free speech, including ideas and opinions they find offensive, unwise, immoral, indecent, disagreeable, conservative, liberal, traditional, radical, or wrong-headed. It is for the University's individual students and faculty to make judgments about ideas for themselves, and to act on those judgments not by seeking to suppress free speech, but by openly and vigorously contesting the ideas that they oppose. Although the University greatly values civility and mutual respect, concerns about civility and mutual respect must not be used by the University as a justification for closing off the discussion of ideas, however offensive, unwise, immoral, indecent, disagreeable, conservative, liberal, traditional, radical, or wrongheaded those ideas may be to some students or faculty. More information, including guest speakers, faculty responsibilities, etc., is available in UT Board Policy BT0010 - Policy Affirming Principles of Free Speech for Students and Faculty, found at https://policy.tennessee.edu/policy/bt0021-policy-affirming-principles-of-free-speech-for-students-and-faculty.