'As for "scary places"... really?'
Maybe you'd like to revise that after the shenanigans at Sussex University, where a Professor who'd been pilloried as transphobic for her views on gender identity recently resigned after harassment from a small but noisy group of students.
As it happens, I don't support her views, but that is the point: she had the right to express them. In this case, I think the University (which supported her) got it right. Their position was as follows: we already have laws in this country which restrict the right to free speech IF that speech is deemed (by law) to incite hatred and/or violence against a group of people; but the academic in question was NOT shown to have broken those laws, and therefore the students did not have a case to demand her resignation. They did have every right to protest against her views - but their actions went beyond peaceful protest, into harassment.
It's a shame she felt it necessary to resign - especially since she had the full support of the University establishment, and especially because the group of idiots responsible for the harassment was very much a minority amongst the student body.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
