Survey: 91 Percent of College Students Think 'Words Can Be Violence.' That Could Feed Real Violence.

Of all the stupid ideas that have emerged in recent years, there may be none worse than the insistence that unwelcome words are the same as violence. This false perception equates physical acts that can injure or kill people with disagreements and insults that might cause hurt feelings and potentially justifies responding to the latter with the former. After all, if words are violence, why not rebut a verbal sparring partner with an actual punch? Unfortunately, the idea is embedded on college campuses where a majority of undergraduate students agree that words and violence can be the same thing.

"Ninety one percent of undergraduate students believe that words can be violence, according to a new poll by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression [FIRE] and College Pulse," FIRE ann