Many US High School Kids Oppose First Amendment Freedoms
An amusing and disturbing report hit the newspapers this week in which researchers noted a substantial minority of US high school students oppose the broad freedoms enumerated in the First Amendment to the constitution. Hodding Carter, president of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation which sponsored the $1 million survey, said, "These results are not only disturbing, they are dangerous." But they shouldn’t be surprising.
For those readers outside the US, or for those in the US who are still in high school, the text in question reads in full:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
The survey conducted for the foundation by the University of Connecticut included 100,000 students, 8,000 teachers and 500 or so administrators at 544 public and private high schools last year. It’s the biggest such survey in recent memory, and its methodology is about as good as anything involving surveys and teenagers is likely to be (and a damn sight better than one dealing with sex and drugs).
The results show that 1 in 3 kids say the first amendment “goes too far.” Only half believe that newspapers should be free to print stories without government approval. Around 80% believe people should be free to express unpopular opinions (teachers can in at 97%, and principals at 99%). At the same time, these authoritarian instincts are buttressed by ignorance. About 75% of America’s high school students wrongly believe that flag burning is illegal. And half say the government can place restrictions on internet material; the other half can have the keys to the car this week-end since they have done their homework.
This isn’t a story about “kids today.” The same instincts for oppression were used in the Hitler Jungen and the Soviet Union’s Young Pioneers. Teenagers, by virtue of their awkward stage of life, are conformists, many desperate to belong somewhere. High school is a four-year lesson in arbitrary power and social pressure against dissent. Was high school any better in 1995, or 1985, or 1975, or 1965? Recollection without the rosy mist of nostalgia says no.
Then again, if one-third of the kids think the First Amendment goes too far, that means two out of three don’t. That’s a veto-proof majority and certainly a good foundation. Now, will the grown-ups start teaching civics?
© Copyright 2005 by
The Kensington Review, J. Myhre, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without
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