I’m not sure you’re correct that nothing is different. I saw a lecture recently by someone whose organization does mediation between student groups and universities with regards to free speech. He was saying that a few years ago for the first time his organization was starting to mediate in the opposite direction.

Was a very interesting talk. The speaker had tried to commit suicide and in the process of recovering from that realized that the speech patterns that are associated with sucidal tendencies, extreme consequences to minor events, were being used by student groups. Things like “if so and so comes to campus, people will die”. And they weren’t being hyperbolic, like they were honestly afraid someone would die if a speaker were allowed to speak. So the mediations required finding ways to bring nuance back to the conversation.

I honestly don’t know how different these objections to speakers are than in the past, but I thought it was interesting that there was a shift in the balance of power between university administrations and student groups in the US.

Edit: Thanks to mrosett for pointing out this was Greg Lukianoff who is with FIRE. Please take care researching this topic, it is a large lightning rod for alt-right and heavily conservative view points. Some cursory searches show that FIRE might not be as neutral as I thought they were.