If you have been following the news at all lately, you know students across the nation are demanding universities provide “safe spaces,” which are places where students can go and not have to worry about offensive discourse.

This has sparked outrage across America. Many argue discouraging offensive discourse amounts to censorship, and is a violation of the First Amendment. Some claim if we start discouraging offensive discourse, it won’t be long before we start getting rid of everything we disagree with.

However, I cannot simply buy into this inflexible view of free speech, which the protestors don’t want to stifle. For example, no one is advocating for students who do something offensive to be arrested. Furthermore, disagreement and debate can happen in safe spaces. In general, people can have interesting debates without being offensive.

Finally, the argument asserting if we discourage offensive discourse we will eventually begin censoring everything disagreeable is especially flawed. The whole argument rests on a slippery slope — doing one thing doesn’t necessarily have to lead to another because restraint is possible.

But more importantly, offensive discourse can hurt people in ways contrarians cannot understand. The main reason for this is privilege. If you look at the people who write the articles fighting for “free speech”, you will see that many of them are cisgender, mostly heteronormative, white men. Because of this, they simply cannot fully understand the impact of offensive discourse because they do not experience it.

I also am unable to truly understand the impact of racist discourse as I benefit from white privilege. However, I am a transgender woman, which helps me understand how offensive discourse can be problematic. There was a similar debate around free speech back in October about Germaine Greer. Greer is a feminist who frequently made offensive comments about trans women. Because of this, she was barred from speaking at a university. Many claimed this amounted to censorship and students should be open to considering alternate viewpoints.

But as a trans woman, I could not accept her discourse because it specifically attacked my identity. I couldn’t be open to an alternative point of view and “agree to disagree”.

This is because, despite the popular idiom that words cannot hurt a person, discourse matters a great deal. Oppressed groups, particularly students of color, have their identities under siege every day on campuses. For example, the University of Missouri, one of the campuses which helped spark this debate, has a long and disturbing history of racism.

Because of the amount of bigotry on campuses, those with marginalized identities often do not feel comfortable engaging in campus discourse. For example, I would not feel comfortable on campus if my college invited a speaker who said I was a freak for being trans (like Germaine Greer). This is precisely what the protests are about. Many of the protestors do not feel safe and accepted on campus because their identities are constantly being attacked.

Obviously, safe spaces will not end racism, transphobia or any other type of bigotry. But they can help mitigate the problems associated with them by giving oppressed groups a space to feel comfortable with their identity. Thus, safe spaces are necessary in order to have the free and open discussion the “free speech” advocates want so badly.

In addition, offensive discourse can actually have implications for how oppressed groups are treated. As humans, we internalize messages from our environment. These messages create implicit biases, which we might not even be aware of. When offensive discourse is so prevalent, it informs how we think about certain people, especially marginalized groups.

It makes people with privilege more complicit in the oppression of those without it. For example, Germaine Greer’s discourse makes cisgender people think of trans people as freaks, which feeds a system that results in the death of trans people on a near weekly basis. Another example is how offensive discourse around black people has created negative stereotypes that result in racism. In fact, all across America, black people are much more likely to be judged negatively because of their race.

By allowing offensive discourse in colleges, we allow this system of oppression to continue. At the colleges in which protestors organized demonstrations, racism has helped keep students of color in subordinate positions. Thus, we need to analyze how our discourse upholds the system we claim to oppose.

Even those against the protestors understand this concept to a certain extent. We would not want someone from the KKK to speak at a university event. It would be absurd if people made arguments about how we need to stop being too sensitive and need to consider other points of view in that case. We recognize the KKK’s discourse is problematic and shouldn’t be given a platform.

Some argue instead of the university discouraging offensive discourse, students offended should have a discussion with those being offensive. This is problematic for two reasons. First, because of implicit bias and privilege, students doing something offensive probably will not change their behavior just because they were told it was offensive. Second, and more importantly, it is very problematic to make those already oppressed have to fight to not have their identities disrespected. No one should have to do extra work to try to convince people to respect who they are.

Another way people dismiss the protestors is through ad hominem attacks. People argue college students cannot handle any sort of emotional distress. However, there is no empirical evidence to show college students are more emotionally fragile than anyone else. Others have called the protestors violent and disruptive. That sort of discourse against protestors is eerily similar to how another racial justice movement was criticized. Plus, often the only way marginalized groups can exert power is through being disruptive. It forces people in power to confront issues that make them uncomfortable.

Finally, something disturbing about these “free speech” arguments is they are only ever used to punch down. Earlier this year, a Native American girl was removed from a class due to her saying that genocide against Native Americans happened and a Missouri Senator tried to block a student’s research on abortion. Both of these actions blatantly violated free speech, yet the people who claim the First Amendment is under attack were silent. If someone is going to say free speech is important, they should actually address instances of the privileged censoring the speech of the oppressed. But that unfortunately doesn’t happen with the same frequency or intensity.

None of this means sometimes students don’t go overboard, but accusing the entire movement of censorship is deeply problematic. The impact of offensive discourse has kept marginalized groups down and has helped maintain traditional structures of power. Fighting against that is not censorship and it does not mean that college students are “coddled”. It means there are people fighting against an oppressive status quo.

That is not something we should vilify.