California’s colleges and universities should be fostering free expression and promoting viewpoint diversity because these are the essential conditions for acquiring actual knowledge.

Instead, according to the College Free Speech Rankings recently released by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), campuses throughout the state have become environments where self-censorship is in, and dissent is out.

Today, the heckler’s veto, cancellation and violence are increasingly viewed as acceptable responses to speech that strays from campus orthodoxy.

As Greg Lukianoff, the CEO of FIRE — who will be speaking at the Lobero Theatre on Oct. 8 — noted when the rankings were released: “The overall state of free speech on campus is grim.”

This is an understatement. Despite giving rise to the free speech movement in the 1960s, UC Berkeley now gets an “F” from FIRE for its lack of commitment to free expression.

Sadly, it is hardly alone. Of the 27 California colleges ranked by FIRE, only two received passing grades. 18 other schools, in addition to UC Berkeley, received Fs.

According to FIRE, 37% of California college students have engaged in self-censorship on a regular basis. Those who do voice their opinions can face cancellation, harassment or even violence.

Incredibly, 72% of students believe it is acceptable to shout down a speaker with whom they disagree, and 34% believe that violence to prevent such speech is sometimes acceptable.

There is ample evidence to support these survey findings. In California higher education, free expression and viewpoint diversity have given way to an Orwellian world of thought police mobs, both on campus and online.

FIRE successfully sued Clovis Community College for violating the First Amendment rights of conservative students by taking down their flyers because of their political content.

Right here at UC Santa Barbara, a student leader who condemned the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks on Israel was hounded and vilified by her fellow students (and perhaps school officials) both on campus and online.

The conduct was so pervasive and egregious that she sued the university.

Not surprisingly, UCSB received an F in the latest FIRE rankings. But it is somehow in the middle of the pack in California.

One can only wonder how bad things are on campuses at schools that fared even more poorly in the FIRE rankings, like USC, UC Berkeley and Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo.

Restoring free expression and viewpoint diversity on California college campuses is an urgent reform — every bit as important as a reform that has received widespread media attention recently: ensuring that students admitted to STEM majors at the University of California will not need remedial courses to learn K-12 math.

If we do not fix campus cultures and school speech policies, our college students will learn very little in other disciplines as well.

But they will learn that many seemingly bright people believe there is only one way to think about many problems and that it is easier to go along to get along or bite your tongue than to offer a different perspective.

These are problems not just for college administrators, but for civil society.

Campus culture is spreading like a cancer into the rest of the civic body. Self-censorship is now a fact of life for a majority of Americans, and cancel culture does not just claim college graduation speakers.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Jennifer Sey lost her C-Suite position at Levi Strauss in San Francisco for publicly questioning the wisdom of school closures.

In June, state Sen. Scott Wiener, a very liberal member of our very liberal California Democratic Party, was harassed by pro-Palestinian activists at the San Francisco Trans March. He was forced to leave for his own safety because he was not sufficiently anti-Israel.

We all have a stake in rejecting both these tactics and coerced orthodoxy.

If we want a healthy and vibrant democratic society here in California, where people are free to debate and scrutinize policy choices without facing cancellation and violence, we need to start by changing the culture on our college campuses.

Fortunately, reform is possible. UC Davis, for example, vaulted up the FIRE rankings this year because it voluntarily enacted reforms to comply with the First Amendment and promote “the free and open discourse that is essential to our educational mission and our role in a democratic society.”

We can spur and accelerate similar efforts at other California colleges in three ways.

First, voters should tell our elected officials that we expect our public schools to fully comply with the First Amendment and all our colleges adopt policies that protect speech and promote viewpoint diversity.

Second, California college alumni should write their alma maters and demand the same. When donors demand change, colleges listen.

Third, anyone who cares about the First Amendment can support FIRE, which consults with schools seeking to improve their free speech policies and sues those that commit the most egregious violations.

To learn more about why FIRE’s mission is so important for a vibrant and healthy democracy, please attend the  “Free Speech Under Fire” event with Lukianoff at the Lobero Theatre on Oct. 8.

It is no coincidence that FIRE is headquartered in Philadelphia, the home of Benjamin Franklin, who wrote: “Without Freedom of Thought, there can be no such thing as wisdom; and no such thing as public liberty, without Freedom of Speech.”