The threat to stop universities from no-platforming speakers shows how little people really understand about free speech

The backlash against no-platforming amounts to a demand by those who already have great privilege – and usually a public platform – that they be permitted to continue exercising their privilege irrespective of others’ wishes

Universities minister Jo Johnson has been criticised for suggesting that universities who no-platform speakers should be fined (Getty)

There is something exceedingly rum about this Government’s sudden conversion to the merits of free speech. Damascene, almost. Though others may have a different word for it: hypocrisy?

Still, if the Government is going to legislate, I hope politicians pay some attention to the ponderings of the parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights. The Committee is looking into the vexed topic of no-platforming in universities and, to my great surprise, I was recently invited to appear and give evidence.

It was a cheering experience. Absent were the soundbites of politicians in a hurry, like Conservative minister Jo Johnson. Instead, I found a willingness to listen and an appreciation that some things are complex. The idea that anyone was signed up to absolute free speech was, I argued, a myth. In fact almost everyone would like to ban someone or something, with right-wing banners well to the fore.

You don’t believe me? Just attend your local Armistice Day celebrations next November wearing a white poppy and count the purple faces! The fact that everyone is against absolute free speech, though, was a relatively easy point to make, given that I was appearing just one week after UK parliamentarians had advocated the ultimate no-platform of the Big Sleaze himself, President Trump.

No-platforming is far more complex than the tabloid press pretends. Different circumstances, from demonstrations against unpopular speakers to individuals refusing to share a platform have been counted as one and the same. As a result, any one-size-fits-all solution is likely to fall flat on its face.

What, I wondered, would advocates of everybody being given a platform do if a speaker refused to speak? Would they be marched in chains onto the platform and fined for every minute of silence?

And what of counter-demonstrations? Would they be banned? Are we now entering that twilight zone in which it is necessary to destroy free speech in order to save it?

The reality is this: speech is usually about a lot more than speech. Speech is, in fact, also about space.

We need to look at the meta-communication. That is, we need to consider not simply the intellectual argument being presented, but also the implications of particular speech in particular circumstances. It’s not a difficult point.

A teenager could wreck a family reunion with an inappropriate comment, then take refuge in “But I only said...” This would be an example of an unfitting platform for certain speech. As would every politician ever using the same tactic.

Another example is that of extreme right-wing racists insisting on marching through non-white communities and, when challenged, insisting it is their right to do so. Because free speech!

Speech is not just about the words. Nor is the issue anything to do with offence. Rather, as the last example makes clear, it is the statement you make by a dogged insistence on being heard in places where you are unwelcome. Few, if any, of those who have hit the headlines as “no platforming victims” have been present to advance great new intellectual arguments, or debate.

As the trans community has often pointed out, the presence of a speaker such as Germaine Greer seems to guarantee no more than a rehash of arguments made and answered decades back. Which makes one wonder, if debate really is so vital to the advancement of learning, why Greer has learnt so little from it.

The cries to give those discriminating against a minority a platform is a demand by those who already have great privilege, in terms of public platform, that they may continue to exercise their privilege irrespective of the wishes of communities that may not wish to hear from them.

This, though, is where government hypocrisy comes into play. In 2014, the Government introduced Public Spaces Protection Orders (PSPOs). These orders are given out by local authorities if they believe “activities carried on in a public place within the authority’s area have had a detrimental effect on the quality of life of those in the locality”.

Opponents of PSPOs make the point that they are overbroad, criminalising a range of behaviours previously tolerated: from eccentricity, to sleeping rough, to unpopular speech. Still, the Government believed there was a need to protect communities from the actions and – in extremis – the speech of those who might disrupt them.

The clear message: communities have rights. In that respect, it seems self-evident that a student society is a community as deserving of having its wishes respected as any other.

So why the difference? The common factor to both seems to be support for privilege. In the case of PSPOs, government has protected the privileged from the agony of being forced to face the consequences of austerity: a policy that many of them voted for.

For no-platforming, government is quick to defend the privileges of its own (political) class against communities that have lost patience with it.

I hope the joint committee were taking notes.