Why FIRE is now judging bias-reporting systems more harshly — and why I changed my mindhttps://eternallyradicalidea.com/p/why-fire-is-now-judging-bias-reportingFIRE has made an important change to how we evaluate colleges in our Spotlight Database, the largest and most comprehensive database of written campus speech policies in the country. From now on, no school that explicitly solicits reports about protected speech can earn a green-light rating — our highest rating awarded to institutions whose policies do not seriously imperil free expression.
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How this started
I first learned about what would later become known as bias response teams (BRTs) in the early 2000s, when I attended a student-conduct conference where administrators described a new approach to “bias” on campus. Their focus wasn’t harassment, stalking, or violence. It was what students were writing on dorm-room whiteboards — off-color jokes, jabs between friends, things that were, at worst, crude. Some schools were even calling the police over these incidents. What struck me most wasn’t the censorial tone but rather the counterproductive result: the data showed that whiteboard policing actually increased the behavior they were trying to curb.
But the “whiteboard police” weren’t deterred.
I didn’t like what I saw. But at FIRE, we’ve always tried to give people the benefit of the doubt. When bias response systems began spreading across campuses under various names — Bias Incident Response Teams, Bias Support Services, Inclusive Community Response Groups — we tried to treat them on a case-by-case basis. If a school set up a mechanism that only offered support to students in distress, without investigating or punishing speakers, maybe that could exist without chilling speech. But even back then, I was uneasy with it.
Over time, it became harder to ignore what was happening. We saw students use these systems — along with tools like Change.org petitions — to report their own professors for nothing more than expressing controversial ideas. FIRE’s Scholars Under Fire Database documents case after case where these systems became pipelines for silencing dissent and enforcing conformity.
When I knew we had to act
The tipping point for me wasn’t just the cases we were seeing on campus. It was the realization that this model — originally built for universities — was being exported into everyday life.
Today, we see state and local governments setting up hotlines and portals where people can report one another for “bias incidents.” And what counts as a bias incident? Often it’s entirely lawful speech. In Oregon, you can be reported for telling an offensive joke or “imitating someone’s cultural norm.” In Connecticut, residents are encouraged to report speech they didn’t even witness themselves. In Philadelphia, officials may contact people named in reports and “recommend” sensitivity training. Some jurisdictions even offer financial or counseling support to the complainant.
Personally, I would not have given these speech inhibitors any benefit of the doubt, but an org like FIRE has to tread with care.
