90% of College Students Believe That ‘Words Can Be Violence’

When I was growing up, one of the mantras every child was told in order to civilize them and make them resilient to hateful slurs aimed at them was “Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words will never hurt me.”

It was one of those kindergarten lessons taught to kids, whose emotional dysregulation we all know. Learning self-control and how to deal with inevitable conflicts is a life lesson we should all internalize as quickly as possible, both because self-control is vital to civilizational flourishing and because not being able to withstand hurtful words or disagreement is antiresilient. 

Only you can control your reaction to external stimuli. Words cannot harm you, if you don’t allow it. This is basic education that college kids should have learned by the end of middle school. #SticksAndStoneshttps://t.co/RGrZDTi2Qy @CollegeFix

— Bob Beasley (@13013B) December 4, 2025

Sometime between the period I grew up in, early Gen X, and the education of the Millennials and Gen Z, the old mantra has been reversed. Now, words are violence, and violence in return is just self-defense. 

Earlier this year, FIRE conducted a poll of college students that included questions about their attitudes toward speech, and the results were genuinely shocking. 

Nine out of 10 college students believed that, in at least some circumstances, speech itself could be classified as a form of violence. 

My first thought was that, perhaps, most were speaking about what we call “fighting words,” which amount to threats of violence that can, in some circumstances, lead to imminent violence. “I’m going to kill you” might be a call to violence, or shouting at a crowd “get him” might count. Could it be what they are speaking about?

Nope. The College Fix dived into the results and they were, shall we say, disturbing. All that propaganda about “stochastic terrorism” and “silence is violence” is working on the younger set. 

When respondents were asked how much the statement “words can be violence” describes their thoughts, 47 percent answered with “completely” or “mostly.” Twenty-eight percent said it describes their thoughts “somewhat,” and 15 percent said “slightly.”

Additionally, around 59 percent of students said “silence is violence” describes their views at least “somewhat,” though only 28 percent said it describes their thoughts “completely” or “mostly.” 

“When people start thinking that words can be violence, violence becomes an acceptable response to words,” FIRE Chief Research Advisor Sean Stevens said in a news release following the poll. 

“Even after the murder of Charlie Kirk at a speaking event, college students think that someone’s words can be a threat. This is antithetical to a free and open society, where words are the best alternative to political violence,” Stevens said. 

The poll also showed that moderate and conservative students have grown less supportive of disruptive or violent tactics to stop campus speakers, while liberal students’ support for those tactics has stayed the same or risen slightly compared to the spring. 

At the same time, moderate and conservative students have become more open to allowing controversial speakers, while liberal students have maintained or increased their opposition to those speakers.

We saw the results of this kind of thinking in the reaction to Charlie Kirk’s murder. While many liberals were horrified, younger liberals in particular seemed elated or unbothered by his assassination. 

One of the reasons for this is that the leftist establishment has been preaching that conservatives deserve to die. That isn’t an exaggeration; the most common videos I saw of people celebrating Kirk’s assassination were from the academic and medical professions, which we often call the “caring” professions. They saw Kirk as a violent man, deserving of death. 

Teacher allegedly showed Charlie Kirk assassination video to 10 and 11-year-olds, told students he deserved to be killed https://t.co/kMa8dT7vTU pic.twitter.com/2PJWbj8QTQ

— New York Post (@nypost) September 14, 2025

Is it surprising that Gen Z, with role models like this, has absorbed this attitude?