The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, or FIRE, a US based non-profit, non-partisan civil liberties organisation has compiled a damning indictment of the UCD code of conduct, giving it a ‘Red Light’ rating for its level of protection of freedom of speech.
FIRE is dedicated to the protection of students’ right to freedom of speech on college campuses across the US, and was founded about 20 years ago. It rates the state of freedom of speech on college campuses using a ‘traffic light’ system.
Tim Crowley, a professor of philosophy at UCD requested that FIRE examine the Irish university’s behavioural codes to see how it measures up to US standards.
He writes for the Irish Times today, “FIRE had never before applied its rating system to a non-US university, but it agreed to do so in this case. The result: UCD, if assessed by the standards FIRE applies to US universities, would receive a ‘Red Light’, FIRE’s worst rating.”
The results placed UCD in the bottom 20% for its poor protection for freedom of speech. “Of the 481 universities assessed for its 2022 ‘Spotlight on Speech Codes’ report, just under one fifth earned a red light. In other words, UCD would be in the bottom 20%, or what FIRE calls ‘the naughty list’.”
The findings and criteria assessed can be read here in Crowley’s original article on the report.