Most public colleges and universities have social-media blacklists that violate the First Amendment, according to a report by the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education.
And they’re being helped by Facebook.
“There’s no social media exception to the First Amendment,” said Adam Steinbaugh, who wrote FIRE’s new report. “Government actors cannot sanitize public discourse — whether it’s President Trump blocking Twitter critics or American colleges filtering dissent on their social media accounts. By selectively eliminating particular viewpoints, universities are violating the First Amendment.”
The FIRE study found colleges block more than 1,800 unique terms on their social media pages. And there are “secret filters” to remove comments regarding political figures, corporate partners, sports teams and even faculty members.
Eighty-seven percent of colleges block users on Facebook or Twitter, and college managers “abuse social platform tools to quietly censor posts and users — transforming their pages from public forums into vehicles for positive publicity,” FIRE reported.
The “blacklist” that most public colleges and universities use was “created by Facebook, to automatically censor comments on university social media pages,” the report said.
“Colleges also compile custom lists collectively banning more than 1,800 words and phrases: from profanities to posts referencing matters of local and national concern, campus controversies, criticism of colleges’ corporate partners or sports teams, and even the weather. The findings, gleaned from public records from nearly 200 top institutions, show that public universities — bound by the First Amendment — are impermissibly censoring public dialogue,” FIRE said.
FIRE said it sent public records requests to more than 200 schools in 47 states.
“The records from the 198 responding institutions reveal that almost half of the surveyed institutions — 49% — use Facebook’s ‘strong’ profanity filter, and 28% use the ‘medium’ filter to prohibit a list of words not disclosed to the public,” FIRE said.
FIRE provided examples.
Some 30% of colleges create their own “blacklist,” collectively censoring 1,825 unique words and phrases. Words such as “Trump,” “Bernie” and “Hillary” are banned by Portland State, Oklahoma State, the University of Arizona and North Carolina-Chapel Hill.
During protests against the “Silent Sam” Confederate monument at Chapel Hill, officials blocked “Silent Sam.”
Oklahoma State blocks “boomer sooner” and “university of oklahoma” while the University of Oklahoma blocks an emoji.
Texas A&M won’t stand for “peta” and “abuse,” and Santa Monica bars “cats,” “dissecting” and “torture.”
“Suffolk County Community College (NY) blocks posts concerning inclement weather, including terms that demonstrate that the purpose is to inhibit criticism, barring the words ‘blizzard,’ ‘snow,’ ‘dangerous,’ ‘slip,’ ‘scared,’ ‘irresponsible,’ ‘tragedy,’ and ‘accident.'”
Courtesy of the system developed by Facebook, state schools can “automatically ‘hide’ users’ comments if they contain words included on either Facebook’s undisclosed list of banned words or their own customized list. These tools enable public colleges and other government actors to quietly remove critical posts,” FIRE said.
The report noted that even though courts have found such government social media sites are subject to the fairness requirements of the First Amendment, the University of Kansas blocks “Boycott Koch Industries,” a Facebook account referencing America’s second-largest privately-held company, which is based in Kansas and is a major donor to the university.
Also:
- Georgia State University blocked a “Georgia for Bernie” Twitter account.
- The University of New Hampshire blocked a Twitter account belonging to “UNH Students for Gary Johnson,” a Libertarian Party presidential candidate.
- Mississippi State University blocks “Legalize Marijuana in Mississippi.”
- The University of Utah blocks animal rights activists, including PETA.
- And, the University of Alaska Anchorage blocked an “Alaskans4Trump” account.”
“State universities are preemptively censoring large swaths of protected speech and altering the public discourse with just a few clicks of the mouse — and Facebook gives them all the tools they need to do it,” said FIRE Executive Director Robert Shibley. “While social media makes it possible to amplify opinions, it also makes it easier than ever for government actors to silence Americans.”
FIRE said Facebook could help by releasing its “secret blacklist” or limiting such tools for government accounts. The platform could even alert users when they’ve been censored.
“Around the country, our public institutions are quietly determining which specific words can be part of the public dialogue,” said Steinbaugh. “FIRE has spent years fighting this fight on campus, and protecting freedom of expression online is all the more important as the coronavirus pandemic drives our communities online.”
